APRIL 29TH, 1881, Oren Junior wrote to "Hu": "Mother says she
wishes 'folks wouldnt call you a politician,' she 'hates politicians'
Ergo my boy she hates you--but dont go & bet on it now--you might
lose your money." Elihu had no intention of becoming a "politician."
He merely continued to be a lawyer and to fulfill what he conceived
to be a citizen's duty and took his part in the affairs of the Repub-
lican party.

In the fall of 1881 he served for the first time as a delegate to the
Republican State Convention. His father-in-law, Salem H. Wales,
wrote on September 28th, 1881, that he had told Hess, the district
leader, that Root should be elected since "it will be prudent on my
part to keep out of the fight -- Besides this I think Gen Arthur would
be pleased to have you in the Convention."

In the same year, along with Joseph H. Choate, Judge Noah Davis
and others, Root signed the petition to nominate for the State As-
sembly from the Twenty-first District, a young fellow who had just
come back from his honeymoon in Europe with an assortment of
loud vests and a broad a; his name was Theodore Roosevelt. Root
took an additional part by managing the elimination of an undesirable
rival candidate who was blocking Roosevelt's nomination. ¹ On Wash-
ington's Birthday, 1883, Root with others extolled Roosevelt at a
Union League Club meeting as "the one man whom the citizens
could look to for reform rather than to Mr. Hewitt." ² Root was now
in general demand as a speaker and drafter of resolutions at such
meetings. In January, 1882, he was a member of the newly elected
Republican Central Committee; he took a firm stand against the

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