"While I am President the doors of the White House will open as
easily for the labor leader as for the capitalist,--and no
easier." [Footnote: Hagedorn, p. 242. ]

Many Presidents might have said the first part of that sentence.
Few of them would have added the last three words.

He annoyed many people in the South by inviting a very able and
eminent Negro, Booker T. Washington, to eat luncheon with him.
According to the curious way of thinking on this subject, Mr.
Washington who had been good enough to eat dinner at the table of
the Queen of England, was not good enough to eat at the White
House. Shortly after being violently denounced for being too
polite to a Negro, he was still more violently denounced for being
too harsh to Negroes. He discharged from the Army some riotous and
disorderly Negro soldiers. Persons with small natures had attacked
him for showing courtesy to a distinguished man; other persons
with equally small natures now attacked him for acting justly
towards mutinous soldiers.

What did he do while he was President? What laws were passed by
Congress, which he advocated or urged, and which he approved by
his signature? Here are some of them as they are given by Mr.
Washburn, [Footnote: Washburn, "Theodore Roosevelt," p. 128.] a
Congressman of that time:

The Elkins Anti-Rebate Law, to end unjust business dealings of the
railroads.