THE ROOSEVELTS, Episode II: 1901-1910: B+/B A shorter slice of time should mean greater depth of treatment. And, to some extent, that means that episode II is better than episode I -- even if it is generally superficial, missing all but the most perfunctory bows to context, and celebratory. (One typical avoidable example of lack of context – the documentary repeatedly mentions trusts, but it provides not even a word of definition about what a trust is or what it was doing that required “busting.”) ON CAMERA TALKING HEADS: George Will has the questionable gift of saying the crashingly obvious while making it sound both boring and portentous. McCullough and Jenkinson are at best mediocre. H.W. Brands is better here than in Part I. Blanche Wiesen Cook does a fine job for Eleanor. Geoffrey Ward as always is very good. Doris Kearns Goodwin is better here than in Part I Some further examples of tin-ear interpretation and lack of context: It was not that “most presidents had been content to be caretakers” (narration). Great presidents – by which most historians and political scientists have meant energetic, activist presidents – have been exceptions, not the rule. It was not a matter of personal inclination, as the narration implies; rather, it was the prevailing political culture in a slower, more easygoing nation that settled most political power and initiative on Congress rather than on the president. Only in the twentieth century, with its rapid pace of events, did the prevailing conception of the presidency change. McKinley already had endured that quickening pace of change and he wasn’t thrilled with it. TR was the first president to be able to adapt himself to that great cultural change, but if he hadn’t been around, another activist, energetic politician probably would have emerged to fill that place. To make it all TR, all the time, is unconvincing. One possible error – the evaluation of TR as 6 years old here is attributed to the French ambassador, but other sources assign it to James Bryce, the great historian, comparative political scientist, and diplomat. Continuing problems of misunderstanding and mis-presenting constitutional history: (1) Jenkinson asserts that, though the economy may be a runaway economy, and government has the power to rein it in, “the Constitution doesn’t seem to want” that to happen. No – the clause empowering Congress to regulate interstate commerce does reach such matters, and was thought to do so at the time. Throughout this documentary,we see almost no understanding of the Constitution’s role in this era of history – and what is offered is superficial and wrong. Narration declares that, in 1902, “without any warning,” TR orders the Justice Department to sue a trust controlled by JP Morgan. No warning, when the Sherman Anti-Trust Act had been on the books since 1890? Overdramatic claptrap. Narrator declares that Roosevelt had no constitutional authority to intervene in the coal strike, when coal was shipped across state lines and thus a matter of interstate commerce. (2) In discussing TR’s 1904 statement that he would not seek another term of his own, the documentary misses the point, yet again. The two-term tradition that TR decided then not to challenge was all but a de facto amendment to the Constitution, started by GW and continued by all two-term presidents thereafter (except for US Grant, who in 1880 faintly gestured toward being willing to stand for a third term only to be rebuffed by his own party for doing so). Contrary to the documentary, it was not a miscalculation. TR rightly perceived in 1904 that nobody would accept his running again in 1908, and the argument that he had only filled out McKinley’s first term, had only one term of his own, and could therefore stand for a second term of his own without breaking the tradition, indeed would have been dismissed as what TR called it in 1904, a technicality. Thus, it was not a miscalculation, as the narration has it, except in purely personal terms concerning what a 50-year-old ex-president would do with himself after leaving office in early 1909. (3) Hepburn Act – George Will claims that TR’s campaigning for the enactment of this bill was “a shocking expansion of the pretensions of the Presidency.” Why is it shocking? Why was it shocking? Did anyone say at the time that it was shocking? A mere talking-head assertion is not argument. Nor is it at all convincing. Yet again, an oddly cramped and anti-historical understanding of the Constitution and how it developed over time pervades this documentary. Other issues/problems: Imperialism is slightly less problematic than in episode I – but, again, the documentary insists on omitting needed context (so what if it’s the Roosevelt Corollary to the Monroe Doctrine? Shouldn’t the documentary devote a sentence or so to explaining the Monroe Doctrine) and personalizing imperialism (almost defined here) so that it’s only a product of TR’s thought instead of a broader theme of US history? And merely shaking a talking-head finger at TR for imperialism, etc., doesn’t really convey what was at issue or why we should condemn him – or why others praised him. Panama Canal – largely celebratory, with obligatory bows to criticism – but why not use McCullough here, as he wrote a great book about the episode? Why use George Will? OK on TR’s record of achievement, and his legacy. (At least they did a reasonably good job addressing the Brownsville incident, and TR’s deeply disappointing and even dishonorable conduct.) Pal Giamatti is reassuringly good as TR’s offscreen – though he does not have TR’s high-pitched voice, he does have TR’s precise diction and energetic delivery. Meryl Streep as Eleanor is wonderful, and so is Edward Herrmann as FDR. Somewhat better on FDR, and very good on Eleanor – allowing the viewer to empathize with her.
Posted on: Sun, 21 Sep 2014 20:53:23 +0000