This is a brand of republicanism which has long since been killed off by “greed and brutal arrogance.” If a republican were to utter these sentiments today he/she would be chastised and tea bagged out the door.
President Roosevelt October 18th, 1905.
So it is in civil life. This Government was formed with as its basic idea the principle of treating each man on his worth as a man, of pay ing no heed to whether he was rich or poor, no heed to his creed or his social standing, but only to the way in which he performed his duty to himself, to his neighbor, to the state. From this principle we can not afford to vary by so much as a hand s breadth. Many republics have risen in the past, and some of them flourished long, but sooner or later they fell; and the cause most potent in bring ing about their fall was in almost all cases the fact that they grew to be governments in the interest of a class instead of governments in the interest of all. It made no difference as to which class it was that thus wrested to its own advantage the governmental machinery. It was ultimately as fatal to the cause of freedom whether it was the rich who oppressed the poor or the poor who plundered the rich. The crime of brutal disregard of the rights of others is as much a crime when it manifests itself in the shape of greed and brutal arrogance on the one side, as when it manifests itself in the shape of envy and lawless violence on the other. Our aim must be to deal justice to each man; no more and no less. This purpose must find its expression and support not merely in our collective action through the agencies of the Government, but in our social attitude.