Abstract

The Tale of the Teapot

Now that the first senatorial hearings on the Teapot Dome Naval Oil Reserve affair have been completed and now that all the star witnesses have shed their full if not their final rays upon the subject, it becomes possible for the first time to tell in assured detail and in coherent sequence the total story of the policy and behavior of the United States government in the management of its naval oil estate, called the Teapot Dome, in Wyoming. The first character in the story is former U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt. He gave support and prestige to the policy of the conservation of oil in the ground for the use of the government at some future time when the customary commercial supplies of oil might be insufficient and when some great impending national emergency might demand a governmentally reserved and controlled abundant source of fuel for U.S. fighting ships.