Summary

Roosevelt returned to the White House in the fall of 1903 after a delightful family summer vacation. Right away, he realized that his rants against political bosses and big corporations may have estranged them from supporting him in the presidential election, only 13 months away. Establishment Republicans were largely in the camp of GOP party chairman Mark Hanna, Roosevelt's likely opponent for the Republican nomination. But Roosevelt was cheered by the fact other reform-minded Republicans — as well as some Democrats — had defeated party machines to win public office and to usher in a new era in American politics.

Lincoln Steffens played a large part in supporting the reform agenda with his series on corruption "that plagued every level of government" and helped to "topple old bosses, bringing in a new generation of Roosevelt-type reformers to positions of power in cities and states across...