Theodore Roosevelt, Health Care Progressive

A century after his death, we should follow his lead.By Patricia O’TooleMs. O’Toole, the author of “When Trumpets Call: Theodore Roosevelt After the White House,” is writing a book about Theodore Roosevelt and American health.Theodore Roosevelt died 100 years ago Sunday, on Jan. 6, 1919, at his home in Oyster Bay, N.Y. A pulmonary embolism, the doctors said.Americans found it hard to believe that Roosevelt was dead, much less that he had died in bed. The ostensible goals were economic, but the plan also called for flood control, soil reclamation and pollution abatement — all boons to public health.Toward the end of his presidency, Roosevelt appointed a White House commission to study the problems of rural life. Treading softly, the commission made only mild recommendations: basic education in hygiene and sanitation, and a promise of federal help in health matters if a state requested it.Roosevelt also invented the White House conference, giving himself yet another way to act without Congress. The experience was a victory for conservation and public health, and it offered a model for federal-state collaboration on matters affecting the well-being of all Americans.The most notable of Roosevelt’s White House conferences, on dependent children, took place a few weeks before he left office. Considered a landmark in American social policy, the conference led to the establishment of the United States Children’s Bureau, spurred the growth of adoption agencies and inspired the founding the Child Welfare League of America.When Roosevelt left office, on March 4, his files were thick with correspondence from social activists, urban reformers, physicians and others who shared his belief that the federal government ought to play a larger role in advancing health and well-being. Opposition from the medical profession blocked the path to national health insurance, and opposition from the South ensured that Social Security would exclude domestic and agricultural labor, major occupations of African-Americans.Theodore Roosevelt was not perfect.