Welcome to Call to Decision 

 American Minute with Bill Federer

 July 1

 Teddy Roosevelt and the Rough Riders charged up Cuba's San Juan Hill
 and captured it JULY 1, 1898.

 After eight hours of heavy fighting over 1,500 Americans lay dead or
 wounded.

 Just 4 months prior the U.S.S Maine was blown up in Havana's Harbor.

 Teddy Roosevelt resigned as Assistant Secretary of the Navy and
 organized the first volunteer cavalry, made up of polo riders,
 cowboys and even Indians.

 Forty years earlier, President James Buchanan stated December 19,
 1859:

 "When a market for African slaves shall no longer be furnished in
 Cuba...Christianity and civilization may gradually penetrate the
 existing gloom."

 President Ulysses S. Grant stated December 2, 1872:

 "Slavery in Cuba is...a terrible evil...It is greatly to be hoped
 that...Spain will voluntarily adopt...emancipation...in sympathy with
 the other powers of the Christian and civilized world."

 On July 6, 1898, after the Battle of San Juan Hill, President William
 McKinley wrote:

 "At a time...of the...glorious achievements of the naval and military
 arms...at Santiago de Cuba, it is fitting that we should pause
 and...reverently bow before the throne of divine grace and give
 devout praise to God, who holdeth the nations in the hollow of His
 Hands."