(单词翻译:单击)
听力文本
Welcome to THE MAKING OF A NATION -- American history in VOA Special English. Theodore Roosevelt became president of the United States at the beginning of the twentieth century. It was a time of great technological progress in the United States. Yet many people felt that there was too little social progress. They demanded reforms in politics, industry and the use of natural resources. Theodore Roosevelt supported this call for reforms. His first target was big business. This week in our series, Kay Gallant and Harry Monroe continue the story of the presidency of Teddy Roosevelt. In the early nineteen hundreds, a group of wealthy American businessmen agreed to join their railroads. They formed a company, or trust, to control the joint railroad. The new company would have complete control of rail transportation in the American West. There would be no competition. President Roosevelt believed the new company violated the Sherman Anti-Trust Law. The law said it was illegal for businesses to interfere with trade among the states. Roosevelt said he would make no compromises in enforcing the law.
He asked the Supreme Court to break up the railroad trust. "We are not," Roosevelt said, "attacking these big companies. We are only trying to do away with any evil in them. We are not hostile to them. But we believe they must be controlled to serve the public good." The Supreme Court ruled against the railroad trust. In the next few years, other trusts would be broken up in the same way. The American people called this trust-busting. And they called Theodore Roosevelt the trust-buster. Roosevelt made several speeches explaining his position on big business. Everywhere he went, he found wide public support. Later, he told a friend why people liked him so well. He said: "I put into words what is in their hearts and minds, but not in their mouths." President Roosevelt won even more public support for his actions during a labor crisis in the coal industry. The incident was one of many in American history in which a president had to decide if he should interfere in private industry. Coal miners went on strike in the spring of nineteen-oh-two. They demanded more pay and safer working conditions. Mine owners refused to negotiate. One even insulted the miners.
"The rights and interests of the laboring man will be protected and cared for. It will not be the labor activists who take care of him. It will be the Christian men to whom God in his great wisdom has given the control of the property interests of this country." This self-serving use of religion made many Americans support the striking workers. After several months, President Roosevelt invited coal mine owners and union leaders to a meeting in Washington. He asked them to keep in mind that a third group was involved in their dispute: the public. He warned that the nation faced the possibility of a winter without heating fuel. Roosevelt said: "I did not call this meeting to discuss your claims and positions. I called it to appeal to your love of country." The union leaders said they were willing to have the president appoint an independent committee to settle the strike. They said they would accept the committee's decision as final. The mine owners rejected the idea. One warned the president not even to talk about it. Such talk, he said, was illegal interference in private industry. That made Theodore Roosevelt angry. Later, he said: "If it were not for the high office I held, I would have taken him by the seat of the pants and the nape of the neck and thrown him out the window."
Finally, Roosevelt got both sides to agree to a compromise. Mine owners agreed to have an independent committee study the miners' demands. And the miners' agreed to return to work until the study was completed. Several months later, the report was ready. The committee proposed that miners accept a smaller pay increase in exchange for improved working conditions. Both sides accepted the proposal. The coal strike ended. Not everyone was happy. Many people still felt Roosevelt had no right to interfere. Roosevelt disagreed. "My business," he said, "is to see fair play among all men -- capitalists or wage-workers. All I want to do is see that every man has a fair deal. No more, no less." Roosevelt believed the United States needed a strong leader. He planned to strengthen the presidency whenever he could. Roosevelt was an active, noisy man. As one writer described him: "Theodore is always the center of action. When he goes to a wedding, he wants to be the bride. When he goes to a funeral, he wants to be the dead man." Many of Roosevelt's friends thought he was an over-grown boy. "You must always remember," one said, "that the president is about six years old." Another friend sent this message to Roosevelt on his forty-sixth birthday: "You have made a very good start in life. We have great hopes for you when you grow up."
Theodore Roosevelt loved outdoor activities. He especially loved the natural beauty of the land. He worried about its future. Roosevelt wrote: "I recognize the right and duty of this generation to develop and use the natural riches of our land. But I do not recognize the right to waste them, nor to rob -- by wasteful use -- the generations that come after us." Roosevelt set aside large areas of forest land for national use. He created fifty special areas to protect wildlife. And he established a number of national parks. Theodore Roosevelt faced the responsibilities of foreign policy with the same strength he used in facing national problems. He firmly believed in expanding American power in the world. "We have no choice," he said, "as to whether or not we will play a great part in the world. All that we can decide is whether we will play our part well or poorly." To play well, Roosevelt said, the United States needed a strong Navy. It also needed a canal across Central America so the Navy could sail quickly between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans. For many years, people had dreamed of such a waterway. With a canal across Central America, ships could sail directly from ocean to ocean. They would not have to make the long, costly voyage around the southern end of South America. The most likely place to build such a canal was at the thinnest point of land: Panama. Another possible place was just to the north: Nicaragua.
Over the years, several attempts were made to build the canal. In the eighteen eighties, Ferdinand de Lesseps -- builder of the Suez Canal -- formed a French company to build a waterway across Panama. De Lesseps spent three hundred million dollars to build just one-third of the canal. He could get no more money. His company failed. In the eighteen nineties, an American company tried to build a canal across Nicaragua. It made little progress. After three years, it gave up the attempt. When Theodore Roosevelt became president in the early nineteen hundreds, he was ready to try again. A study was made to decide which would be a better place for the canal -- Panama or Nicaragua. Engineers said it would cost less to complete the canal De Lesseps had started twenty years earlier in Panama. But De Lesseps' company still owned the land on which the canal would be built. The United States would have to buy the land, as well as the rights to build the waterway. The study decided it would be less costly, overall, to build the canal in Nicaragua. The proposal went to the United States Congress for approval. That will be our story next week.
重点解析
1.break up 处于......的开端；起初
Many families break up because of a lack of money.
许多家庭由于缺钱而破裂。
2.refuse to 不肯；拒绝
You were quite within your rights to refuse to co-operate with him.
你完全有权拒绝跟他合作。
3.agree to 同意；赞成
I cannot but agree to your decision.
我不得不同意你的决定。
4.grow up 成长；长大成人
It's time you grew up.
你该懂事了。
参考译文
欢迎收听VOA慢速英语之建国史话节目。西奥多·罗斯福在20世纪初成为美国总统，那是美国技术进步巨大的时期。但是，很多人还是觉得社会进步不大。他们要求在政治、工业和自然资源利用方面进行改革。西奥多·罗斯福支持这一改革呼吁，他的第一个目标是大型企业。在本周的系列节目中，凯·格兰特和哈里·门罗将继续讲述泰迪·罗斯福总统的故事。上世纪初，一群美国富商同意加入他们的铁路项目，他们成立了一家公司（信托公司）来控制这条联合铁路。新公司将完全控制美国西部的铁路运输，不会存在竞争。罗斯福总统认为新公司违反了《谢尔曼反托拉斯法》。该法律规定，企业干预各州之间的贸易来往是非法的，罗斯福说他在执法方面不会妥协。
他要求最高法院解散铁路信托基金。罗斯福说，“我们没有攻击这些大公司，我们只是想除掉他们所具有的弊端，我们并不敌视他们。但我们认为，必须控制它们，才能为公共利益服务。”最高法院驳回了铁路信托的判决，在接下来的几年里，其他信托公司也将以同样的方式被拆分。美国人民称之为反托拉斯活动，他们把西奥多·罗斯福称为反托拉斯者。罗斯福发表了几次演讲，解释了他在大企业问题上的立场，他所到之处都得到了公众的广泛支持。后来，他告诉一位朋友，人们为什么那么爱戴他。他说：“我用言语表达他们心中的想法，但不是他们口中所说的东西。”罗斯福总统在煤炭行业的劳工危机中的行动，赢得了更多的公众支持。这一事件是美国历史上许多总统必须决定是否干涉私营企业的事件之一。煤矿工人在1992年春天举行了罢工，他们要求增加工资，并让工作条件更加安全。煤矿主拒绝谈判，其中一个人甚至对矿工大加侮辱。
“劳动者的权益将得到保护和照管，照看他们的不再是劳动积极分子。上帝以他的睿智将国家财产利益的控制权交给了那些基督徒。”这种自私自利的宗教信仰使许多美国人支持罢工工人。几个月后，罗斯福总统邀请煤矿主和工会领袖参加在华盛顿举行的一次会议。他要求他们谨记，第三批人卷入了他们的争端：公众。他警告说，美国人正面临着没有取暖燃料的冬天。罗斯福说：“我召开这次会议不是为了讨论你的主张和立场，而是为了表达你对国家的热爱。”工会领导人表示，他们愿意让总统任命一个独立委员会来解决罢工问题。他们说，他们将接受委员会的最终决定。煤矿主们拒绝了这个主意，其中一个人警告总统甚至不要谈论此事。他说，这种交谈是对私营企业的非法干涉。这让西奥多·罗斯福感到很生气。后来，他说：“如果不是我担任着高级职务，我会把他连人带椅子一起端起来，扔出窗外。”
最后，罗斯福让双方都同意做出妥协。煤矿主们同意成立一个独立委员会来研究矿工们的要求。矿工们同意在研究完成前继续工作。几个月后，报告准备好了。委员会建议矿工们接受较小幅度的加薪，以换取改善工作条件。双方都接受了这个建议。罢工结束了。不是每个人都对此表示高兴，许多人仍然觉得罗斯福无权干涉。罗斯福不同意。他说：“我的任务是在所有人，资本家或工薪阶层之间看到公平竞争。我只想让每个人都获得公平的交易，不多也不少。”罗斯福认为，美国需要一位强有力的领导人。他计划尽可能巩固其总统职位。罗斯福是个活跃、吵闹的人，正如一位作家所描述的那样：“西奥多永远是活动的中心。他去参加婚礼时，想成为新娘。他去参加葬礼时，就想成为去世的那个人。”罗斯福的许多朋友都认为他虽然长大了，但却还是个孩子。“你必须永远记住，”有一个人说，“总统大约六岁大。”另一位朋友在罗斯福46岁生日时给他发了这样一条信息：“你的生活有了一个良好的开端，我们对你的成长寄予厚望。”
西奥多·罗斯福喜欢户外活动，他特别喜欢这片土地的自然美景。他担心它的未来。罗斯福写道：“我承认这一代人有权利和义务开发和利用我们土地上的自然财富，但我不承认浪费他们的权利，也不承认以浪费的方式掠夺我们后代资源的权利。”罗斯福留出大片林地供国家使用，他创建了50个保护野生动物的特殊区域，还建立了一些国家公园。西奥多·罗斯福以他在面对国家问题时所运用的同样力量，面对外交政策的责任。他坚信要扩大美国在世界上的势力。他说，“对于我们是否会在世界上发挥重要作用，我们别无选择。我们所能决定的是，我们将能否发挥好自己的作用。”罗斯福说，要想发挥好作用，美国需要一支强大的海军。还需要一条横跨中美洲的运河，这样海军就能在大西洋和太平洋之间快速航行。
多年来，人们一直梦想拥有这样一条水道。有了横跨中美洲的运河，船只可以直接跨海航行，而不必在南美洲南端进行漫长，又花费高昂的航行。最有可能修建这样一条运河的地方是在陆地最细窄的地方：巴拿马。另一个可能的地点是在北边：尼加拉瓜。多年来，人们曾多次尝试修建这条运河。上世纪80年代，苏伊士运河的建造者费迪南德·莱塞普斯成立了一家法国公司，在巴拿马修建一条水道。莱塞普斯花了3亿美元修建了运河的三分之一。他再也拿不到钱了，他的公司倒闭了。19世纪90年代，一家美国公司试图在尼加拉瓜修建一条运河，进展甚微。三年后，它放弃进行这个尝试。当西奥多·罗斯福在19世纪初成为总统时，他准备再试一次。一项研究决定了哪个地方更适合修建这条运河，巴拿马还是尼加拉瓜。工程师们表示，20年前在巴拿马开凿这条莱塞普斯运河将花费更少。但是，德莱塞普斯的公司仍然拥有修建运河的土地。美国将不得不购买土地，以及建造水路的权利。这项研究认为，总体而言，在尼加拉瓜修建这条运河的成本更低，这项提议提交美国国会批准。这将是我们下周要讲述的故事。
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