Oscar Straus (politician)
Oscar Straus | |
|---|---|
United States Ambassador to the Ottoman Empire | |
| In office July 1, 1887 – June 16, 1889 Envoy | |
| President | Grover Cleveland Benjamin Harrison |
| Preceded by | Samuel S. Cox |
| Succeeded by | Solomon Hirsch |
| In office October 15, 1898 – December 20, 1899 Minister | |
| President | William McKinley |
| Preceded by | James Angell |
| Succeeded by | John Leishman |
| In office October 4, 1909 – September 3, 1910 | |
| President | William Howard Taft |
| Preceded by | John Leishman |
| Succeeded by | William Rockhill |
| Personal details | |
| Born | Oscar Solomon Straus December 23, 1850 Progressive "Bull Moose" (1912) |
| Spouse | Sarah Lavanburg |
| Children | 3 |
| Relatives | Lazarus Straus (father) Isidor Straus (brother) Nathan Straus (brother) Roger Williams Straus Jr. (grandson) Oscar Schafer (grandson) |
| Education | Columbia University (BA, LLB) |
Oscar Solomon Straus (December 23, 1850 – May 3, 1926) was an American politician and diplomat. He served as
United States Cabinet Secretary.[1]
Straus also served in four presidential administrations as
Progressive "Bull Moose" Party
, in tandem with Roosevelt's own unsuccessful run for a nonconsecutive third term as president that same year.
Early life and education
Oscar Straus was born to a
German Jewish family in Otterberg in the former Palatinate, then ruled by the Kingdom of Bavaria (now part of present-day Germany), the third child of Lazarus Straus (1809–1898) and his second wife, Sara (1823–1876). His siblings were Hermine Straus Kohns (1846–1922), Isidor Straus (1845–1912), and Nathan Straus (1848–1931). The family moved to the U.S. state of Georgia in 1854. The Straus family owned slaves and conducted business with other slave owners, taking several formerly enslaved people to the North with the family following the defeat of the Confederacy.[2]
At the close of the
Columbia College in 1871 and Columbia Law School in 1873. He practiced law until 1881, and then became a merchant, retaining his interest in literature.[3]
Diplomatic career
He first served as
United States Minister to the Ottoman Empire from 1887 to 1889 and again from 1898 to 1899. Upon his arrival to Constantinople, he was said to have been given a "cordial welcome".[4]
At the outbreak of the
Sulu Sultanate telling them to submit to American suzerainty and American military rule.[6] The Sulu sultanate agreed,[7][8][9][10] with Straus writing that the "Sulu Mohammedans ... refused to join the insurrectionists and had placed themselves under the control of our army, thereby recognizing American sovereignty."[6]
President McKinley sent a personal letter of thanks to Straus and said that its accomplishment had saved the United States at least twenty thousand troops in the field."[11][12]
The
Moro Crater Massacre
.
On January 14, 1902, he was named a member of the Permanent Court of Arbitration at The Hague to fill the place left vacant by the death of ex-President Benjamin Harrison.[13]
Career as Secretary of Commerce and Labor and Ambassador to Ottoman Empire
In December 1906, Straus became the
Anarchist Exclusion Act.[14]
Straus left the Commerce Department in 1909 when
Dollar Diplomacy. It failed with respect to the Ottoman Empire because of opposition from Straus, who served until 1910, and to the Ottoman vacillation under pressure from the entrenched European powers, which did not wish to see American competition. American trade remained a minor factor.[15]
In
Versailles Peace Conference.[18]
He was president of the American Jewish Historical Society.[16]
He is buried at Beth El Cemetery in Ridgewood, New York.
Family
The Straus family had several influential members including Straus's grandson
RMS Titanic in 1912, served as a representative from New York City's 15th District, and was co-owner of the department store R. H. Macy & Co. along with another brother, Nathan; and nephew Jesse Isidor Straus, confidant of Franklin Delano Roosevelt and Ambassador to France
from 1933 to 1936.
In 1882, Strauss married Sarah Lavanburg.[19] They had three children: Mildred Straus Schafer (born 1883), Aline Straus Hockstader (born 1889), and Roger Williams Straus (born 1891).[20][21]
The family's household goods from their Washington home were sold at an auction by C.G. Sloan held March 25, 26, and 27, 1909.[22]
His grandson is Oscar Schafer, Chairman emeritus of the New York Philharmonic.
Legacy
Washington, D.C., commemorates the achievements of this famous Jewish-German-American statesman in the Oscar Straus Memorial.
Works
- The Origin of the Republican Form of Government in the United States (1886)
- Roger Williams, the Pioneer of Religious Liberty (1894)
- The Development of Religious Liberty in the United States (1896)
- Reform in the Consular Service (1897)
- United States Doctrine of Citizenship (1901)
- Our Diplomacy with Reference to our Foreign Service (1902)
- The American Spirit (1913)
- Under Four Administrations, his memoirs (1922)
See also
References
- ^ "Oscar S. Straus (1906–1909): Secretary of Commerce and Labor" Archived 2011-05-23 at the Wayback Machine, Miller Center, University of Virginia
- ^ "Isidor Straus (1845-1912)". Immigrant Entrepreneurship. Retrieved 2022-05-23.
- ^ Wilson, J. G.; Fiske, J., eds. (1900). . Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton.
- ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-06-12.
- ISBN 978-1-58112-423-1.
- ^ ISBN 978-0-19-513618-0.
- ISBN 978-1-250-03745-9.
- ISBN 978-1-58112-423-1.
- ^ Akyol, Mustafa (December 26, 2006). "Mustafa Akyol: Remembering Abdul Hamid II, a pro-American caliph". Weekly Standard – via History News Network.
- ^ ERASMUS (July 26, 2016). "Why European Islam's current problems might reflect a 100-year-old mistake". The Economist.
- ^ George Hubbard Blakeslee; Granville Stanley Hall; Harry Elmer Barnes (1915). The Journal of International Relations. Clark University. pp. 358–.
- ^ The Journal of Race Development. Clark University. 1915. pp. 358–.
- New International Encyclopedia(1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.
- ^ "To Drive Anarchists Out of the Country," New York Times, March 4, 1908, pp. 1-2.
- ^ Naomi W. Cohen, "Ambassador Straus in Turkey, 1909-1910: A Note on Dollar Diplomacy." Mississippi Valley Historical Review 45.4 (1959) online
- ^ a b Rines, George Edwin, ed. (1920). . Encyclopedia Americana.
- ^ "APS Member History". search.amphilsoc.org. Retrieved 2023-10-19.
- ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2023-06-12.
- Jewish Telegraph Agency. May 4, 1926. Retrieved March 18, 2018.
- ^ "Sarah Lavanburg Straus 1861 – 1945". Jewish Women's Archive. Retrieved March 16, 2018.
- New York Times. July 9, 2005. Retrieved March 16, 2018.
- ^ Catalogue of valuable household furnishings, art decorations, rugs, books, etc., including the effects of Honorable Oscar S. Straus, formerly a member of President Roosevelt's cabinet. C.G. Sloan & Co.Inc. Auctioneers. 1909.
Further reading
- Brand, Katharine E. "The Oscar S. Straus Papers." Quarterly Journal of Current Acquisitions 7.2 (1950): 3-6. at the Library of Congress
- Cohen, Naomi W. A Dual Heritage: The Public Career of Oscar S. Straus (1969).
- Medoff, Rafael, and Chaim I. Waxman. Historical Dictionary of Zionism (Routledge, 2013).
- Strauss, L. L. "Oscar S. Straus, an Appreciation." (American Jewish Historical Society, 1950) online.
External links
- Straus Historical Society
Media related to Oscar Solomon Straus at Wikimedia Commons- Works by Oscar Straus at Project Gutenberg
- Papers archived at the Library of Congress as MS41749
- Works by or about Oscar Straus at Internet Archive
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