Theodore Roosevelt and the Idea of Race

This provocative study examines Theodore Roosevelt's ideas about race, focusing especially on his attitudes towards blacks, American Indians, immigration, and imperialism. Thomas G. Dyer gives careful attention to formal and nonformal aspects of Roosevelt's thought, as revealed in his voluminous published works and personal papers. Historians have traditionally disagreed about the character of Theodore Roosevelt's racial ideology. Dyer's illuminating study clarifies many of the relevant issues by viewing Roosevelt's racial theory as an integrated whole.