Why is President Obama going to Osawatomie, Kansas?

The White House announced that on Tuesday, President Obama will visit Osawamomie, Kansas - a town of just more than 4,000 people in the reddest of red states. The reason why he would choose that location has been a bit of a mystery.

This morning WH Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer had a little fun on Twitter asking people to guess the reason for the trip. When someone guessed the right answer, he confirmed it with this tweet:

Just over 100 years ago, President Teddy Roosevelt came to Osawatomie, Ks and called for a New Nationalism.

Pfeiffer then encouraged us to read Roosevelt's New Nationalism speech and I did. All I can say is "WOW!"

First of all, just a bit of context. Roosevelt had gone to Osawatomie for the dedication of the city's John Brown Memorial Park. And so the speech is built of the foundation of the lessons learned and accomplishments of the Civil War.

Kansas was the theatre upon which the first act of the second of our great national life dramas was played. It was the result of the struggle in Kansas which determined that our country should be in deed as well as in name devoted to both union and freedom; that the great experiment of democratic government on a national scale should succeed and not fail. In name we had the Declaration of Independence in 1776; but we gave the lie by our acts to the words of the Declaration of Independence until 1865; and words count for nothing except in so far as they represent acts.

And then he goes on to challenge America to continue that effort.

In every wise struggle for human betterment one of the main objects, and often the only object, has been to achieve in large measure equality of opportunity. In the struggle for this great end, nations rise from barbarism to civilization, and through it people press forward from one stage of enlightenment to the next. One of the chief factors in progress is the destruction of special privilege. The essence of any struggle for healthy liberty has always been, and must always be, to take from some one man or class of men the right to enjoy power, or wealth, or position, or immunity, which has not been earned by service to his or their fellows. That is what you fought for in the Civil War, and that is what we strive for now.

At many stages in the advance of humanity, this conflict between the men who possess more than they have earned and the men who have earned more than they possess is the central condition of progress. In our day it appears as the struggle of freemen to gain and hold the right of self-government as against the special interests, who twist the methods of free government into machinery for defeating the popular will. At every stage, and under all circumstances, the essence of the struggle is to equalize opportunity, destroy privilege, and give to the life and citizenship of every individual the highest possible value both to himself and to the commonwealth. That is nothing new...

Now, this means that our government, National and State, must be freed from the sinister influence or control of special interests. Exactly as the special interests of cotton and slavery threatened our political integrity before the Civil War, so now the great special business interests too often control and corrupt the men and methods of government for their own profit. We must drive the special interests out of politics. That is one of our tasks to-day...For every special interest is entitled to justice, but not one is entitled to a vote in Congress, to a voice on the bench, or to representation in any public office. The Constitution guarantees protection to property, and we must make that promise good. But it does not give the right of suffrage to any corporation.

The true friend of property, the true conservative, is he who insists that property shall be the servant and not the master of the commonwealth; who insists that the creature of man’s making shall be the servant and not the master of the man who made it. The citizens of the United States must effectively control the mighty commercial forces which they have called into being.

The absence of effective State, and, especially, national, restraint upon unfair money-getting has tended to create a small class of enormously wealthy and economically powerful men, whose chief object is to hold and increase their power. The prime need to is to change the conditions which enable these men to accumulate power which it is not for the general welfare that they should hold or exercise...We grudge no man a fortune in civil life if it is honorably obtained and well used. It is not even enough that it should have been gained without doing damage to the community. We should permit it to be gained only so long as the gaining represents benefit to the community. This, I know, implies a policy of a far more active governmental interference with social and economic conditions in this country than we have yet had, but I think we have got to face the fact that such an increase in governmental control is now necessary...

I do not ask for the over centralization; but I do ask that we work in a spirit of broad and far-reaching nationalism where we work for what concerns our people as a whole. We are all Americans. Our common interests are as broad as the continent...

The object of government is the welfare of the people. The material progress and prosperity of a nation are desirable chiefly so long as they lead to the moral and material welfare of all good citizens.

I've tried to pull some highlights to give you an idea of the importance of this speech and its relevance to us today, but you can read the whole thing at the link up above.

For those of us who have followed President Obama closely, its amazing to see the parallels between he and Roosevelt. For example, I think of Obama's speech about race where he focused on the development of A More Perfect Union. Roosevelt also goes to great lengths to not simply demonize special interests and corporations - but he clearly calls them to account for their role in our commonwealth.

I expect that this speech by President Obama will likely be a defining moment in his presidency and will lay the groundwork for the campaign and his second term. So you can bet I'll be watching!