Theodore Roosevelt stressed the importance of National Unity

Grand Old Partisan celebrates more than seventeen decades of Republican heroes and heroics. Today, I applaud Republican commitment to national unity. October 12th 1915, Theodore Roosevelt addressed the Knights of Columbus, a Catholic fraternal organization. He stressed the importance of ensuring that immigrants consider themselves to be Americans, first and only:

"There is no room in this country for hyphenated Americanism. A hyphenated American is not an American at all. Our allegiance must be purely to the United States. The one absolutely certain way of bringing this nation to ruin, of preventing all possibility of its continuing to be a nation at all, would be to permit it to become a tangle of squabbling nationalities. Those hyphenated Americans who terrorize American politicians by threats of the foreign vote are engaged in treason to the American Republic.

We should meet this situation by on the one hand seeing that these immigrants get all their rights as American citizens, and on the other hand insisting that they live up to their duties as American citizens.

All of us, no matter from what land our parents came, no matter in what way we may severally worship our Creator, must stand shoulder to shoulder in a united America for the elimination of race and religious prejudice. We must stand for a reign of equal justice to both big and small. We must insist on the maintenance of the American standard of living.

Finally and most important of all, we must strive for the establishment within our own borders of that stern and lofty standard of personal and public neutrality which shall guarantee to each man his rights, and which shall insist in return upon the full performance by each man of his duties both to his neighbor and to the great nation whose flag must symbolize in the future as it has symbolized in the past the highest hopes of all mankind."

Back to Basics for the Republican Party is my civil rights history of the GOP. To quote the book: "The more we Republicans know about the history of our party, the more Democrats will worry about the future of theirs. For more information, see www.grandoldpartisan.com. 

Here is a YouTube Video about this article.

Here is an Instagram Video about this article.

Here is a TikTok Video about this article.

Michael Zak is author of Back to Basics for the Republican Party, a history of GOP civil rights achievement.

Each day, his YouTube videos and TikTok videos and Rumble videos and Grand Old Partisan blog celebrate more than seventeen decades of Republican heroes and heroics. And, see Speech Raves for audience feedback from his presentations in thirty-one states.

Clarence Thomas cited Back to Basics for the Republican Party in a Supreme Court decision.

"This is the most amazing book about politics that I have ever read. The Overview should be required reading for anyone with even a minor interest in government. The remainder is an enthralling history lesson that I will never forget. For years, we have all been misled about the true nature of the GOP. This is the real deal! Read it and be proud!"

"Your book is a national treasure. I'm always recommending it."

"Michael Zak wrote the definitive history of the GOP."

"Back to Basics for the Republican Party is the most significant contribution to the Republican Party in the last twenty years apart from Ronald Reagan."

"Back to Basics for the Republican Party is more important to our party now than ever before."

and

"one of the best books I ever read"