Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him Part 39

And when I say this of Woodrow Wilson I mean it. I hope I have all of the generous tendencies of my race and that I know a great heart when I see its actions. I could not have been a.s.sociated with him all these years, witnessing the great heart in action, without having full faith in what I now say. No man of all my acquaintance, with whom I have discussed life in all of its phases and tragedies, at least those tragedies that stalked in and out of the White House, was more responsive, more sympathetic, and more inclined to pity and help than Woodrow Wilson. His eyes would fill with tears at the tale of some unfortunate man or woman in distress. It was not a cheap kind of sympathy. It was quiet, sincere, but always from the heart. The President continued talking to me--and now he spoke as the canny Scot--"I am cold in a certain sense. Were I a judge and my own son should be convicted of murder, and I was the only judge privileged to pa.s.s judgment upon the case, I would do my duty even to the point of sentencing him to death. It would be a hard thing to do but it would be my solemn duty as a judge to do it, but I would do it, because the state cannot be maintained and its sovereignty vindicated or its integrity preserved unless the law is strictly enforced and without favour. It is the business of the judge to uphold it and he must do it to the point of every sacrifice. If he fails, justice fails, the state falls. That looks cold- blooded, doesn't it? But I would do it." Then his voice lowered and he said, "Then, after sentencing my own son to death, I would go out and die of a broken heart, for it would surely kill me."

That is one key to the character of the man that was revealed before my own eyes in the years of our intimacy.

It showed itself on many other occasions. It was his idea of the duty of the trustee, the judge, the guardian.

I remember a visit that two very warm friends from the Pacific Coast made to him, both of whom had worked night and day for his cause in the great state of the Golden West.

Their son had been convicted and was incarcerated in the Federal Prison.

They had every personal reason for feeling that a mere appeal on their part on behalf of this son would be a winning one, for their friends.h.i.+p with the President was one of long standing and most affectionate in character. I can see him now, standing in the centre of the room, with the two old people grouped about him, shaking his head and saying, "I wish I could do it, but I must not allow personal consideration to influence me in the least. I know it is hard for you to believe that I will turn away from your request, but the only basis upon which you make it is our friends.h.i.+p. I would be doing an injustice to many a boy like yours who has similarly offended and for whom no one is able to speak or approach me in the intimate contact which is your privilege. Please do not think me cold- hearted, but I cannot do it."

I remember one of the last pardon cases we handled in the White House was that of an old man, charged with violating the banking laws and sentenced to imprisonment. I pleaded with the President to pardon the old man; the Attorney General had recommended it, and some of the warm-hearted members of the President's family had gone to him and sought to exert their influence in behalf of the old man. It seemed as if everything was moving smoothly and that the old man might be pardoned, until the family influence was brought to bear. It was the last pardon case I brought to his attention before the fall of the curtain on March fourth. I went to him, and said, "My dear Governor, I hope you will close your official career here by doing an act of mercy." He smiled at me and I thought I could see the prison gates open for the old man, but when I mentioned the name in the case, the President stiffened up, stopped smiling, and looking at me in the coldest way, said, "I will not pardon this man. Certain members of my family to whom I am deeply devoted, as you know, have sought to influence my judgment in this matter. They have no right to do it. I should be unworthy of my trust as President were I to permit family interference of any kind to affect my public actions, because very few people in the country can exert that kind of influence and it must not be tolerated." The case was closed; the pardon refused.

He often spoke to me in the frankest way of his personal appearance; how he looked and appeared and of the "old Scotch face," as he called it, which gave him the appearance of what Caesar called a "lean and hungry look." Speaking at the annual banquet of the Motion Picture Board of Trade, he discussed his personal appearance in this way:

"I have sometimes been very much chagrined in seeing myself in a motion picture. I have wondered if I really was that kind of a 'guy.' The extraordinary rapidity with which I walked, for example, the instantaneous and apparently automatic nature of my motion, the way in which I produced uncommon grimaces, and altogether the extraordinary exhibition I made of myself sends me to bed very unhappy. And I often think to myself that, although all the world is a stage and men and women but actors upon it, after all, the external appearance of things are very superficial indeed."

He knew that his facial expression gave one the impression that he was a cold and canny Scot. In repose one would get that impression, but when that old Scotch face took on a winning smile it was most gracious and appealing. One of his favourite limericks was:

For beauty I am not a star, There are others more handsome by far.

But my face I don't mind it, For I am behind it, It's the people in front that I jar.

Behind the cold exterior and beneath the "gleam of the waters" there was a warm, generous heart. I have often thought of the character discussed by Israel Zangwill in his book "The Mantle of Elijah." These lines, in my opinion, draw a perfect picture of Woodrow Wilson as I knew him:

Speaking of Allegra's father Zangwill said:

"With him freedom was no nebulous figure, aureoled with s.h.i.+ning rhetoric, blowing her own trumpet, but Free Trade, Free Speech, Free Education. He did not rail against the Church as the enemy, but he did not count on it as a friend. His Millennium was earthly, human; his philosophy sunny, untroubled by Dantesque depths or shadows; his campaign unmartial, const.i.tutional, a frank focussing of the new forces emergent from the slow dissolution of Feudalism and the rapid growth of a modern world. Towards such a man the House of Commons had an uneasy hostility. He did not play the game. Whig and Tory, yellow and blue, the immemorial shuffling of Cabinet cards, the tricks and honours--he seemed to live outside them all.

He was no clubman in 'The best club in England.' He did not debate for argument's sake or to upset Ministers. He was not bounded by the walls of the Chamber nor ruler from the Speaker's chair; the House was resentfully conscious it had no final word over his reputation or his influence. He stood for something outside it, something outside himself, something large, vague, turbulent, untried, unplumbed, unknown--the People."

A little incident ill.u.s.trating the warmth of the heart of Woodrow Wilson and the sympathetic way he manifested his feeling came to me in a letter received at the White House in 1920 from a Red Cross nurse, who was stationed at the Red Cross Base Hospital at Neuilly, France. An excerpt from it follows:

I might interest you to recite an incident within my own personal knowledge that proves the depths of his sympathy--his sincerity. I was one of the unit of Red Cross Workers who went to France to help our soldiers blinded in battle. I was at the time of this incident stationed at the Red Cross Base Hospital No. I at Neuilly. After a visit of the President and Mrs. Wilson to the hospital, one of my charges, a totally blind private to whom Mr. Wilson had spoken, said to me: "Miss Farrell, I guess the President must be very tired." I said, "Why do you think that, Walter?" "Well, because," replied the soldier, "he laughed and joked with all the other fellows but was so quiet when he talked with me and just said, 'Honourable wound, my boy,' so low I could hardly hear him. But say," continued Walter, "look at my hand please and see if it is all there, will you? The President sure has some hand and he used it when he shook hands. I'll say."

The fact was, Walter was the first blind soldier the President had met in France and knowing from experience the appeal the blind make to our emotions, I knew the President was so touched that he was overcome and couldn't joke further--he was scarcely able to manage the one remark and could not trust himself to venture another, 'Twas with tears in his eyes and a choking voice that he managed the one. Both he and Mrs.

Wilson wept in that blind ward.

As a political fighter, he was gallant and square. No one ever heard him call an opponent a name or knew him unworthily to take advantage of an opponent.

Ill.u.s.trative of the magnanimous att.i.tude of the President toward his political enemies was the striking incident that occurred a few weeks before the close of the last Presidential campaign, 1920. Early one afternoon two Democratic friends called upon me at the Executive offices and informed me that they could procure certain doc.u.ments that would go a long way toward discrediting the Republican campaign and that they could be procured for a money consideration. They explained the character of the doc.u.ments to me and left it to me to say what I considered a fair price for them. They explained the serious nature of these doc.u.ments, and it was certainly a delicate situation for me to handle and embarra.s.sed me greatly. I was reluctant to offend these gentlemen, and yet I was certain from what they said that the doc.u.ments, as they explained them to me, even though they might discredit the Republican campaign, were not of a character that any party of decent men ought to have anything to do with.

When the gentlemen told me the name of the person who claimed to have these damaging papers in his possession, I at once recalled that we had in the files of the White House certain letters that could be used to discredit this very man who claimed to possess these incriminating doc.u.ments. I thought it wise, therefore, to listen politely to these gentlemen until I could get a chance to confer with the President. I did this at once.

At this time the President was lying ill in his sick room at the White House. The nurse raised him up in the bed and I explained the whole situation to him, saying to him that it was my opinion that the Democratic party ought not to have anything to do with such a matter and that I thought we should at once apprise the Republican managers of the plan that was afoot to discredit by these unfair means the Republican candidate and campaign. When I told the President of the character of these doc.u.ments that had been offered to me he was filled with indignation and said, "If we can't win this fight by fair means, we will not attempt to win it by unfair means. You have my authority to use whatever files we have against this party who would seek unfairly to attack the Republican nominee and you must at once notify the Republican managers of the plan proposed and explain the whole situation to them. Say to the Attorney General that he must place at the disposal of Mr. Harding and his friends every officer he has, if necessary, to disclose and overcome this plot. I am sure that Governor c.o.x will agree with me that this is the right and decent thing to do."

Acting upon the President's suggestion, I at once called upon a certain Republican senator from the West, now a member of President Harding's Cabinet, and told him of the proposed plot that was afoot to discredit the Republican campaign. I told him I was acting upon the express authority of the President. He expressed his high appreciation of the information I had brought him and informed me that he would place the matter in our hands with the utmost confidence in us to handle it honourably.

It ought to be said here that upon investigation, personally made by myself, I found that there was nothing in this whole matter that in the slightest degree reflected upon the honour or the integrity or high standing of President Harding.

One of the things for which President Wilson was unduly censured shortly after he took office was the recognition he gave to his political enemies in the Democratic party. The old-line politicians who had supported him in 1912 could not understand why the loaves and fishes were dealt out to these unworthy ones. Protests were made to the President by some of his close personal friends, but he took the position that as the leader of the party he was not going to cause resentment and antagonisms by seeming to cla.s.sify Democrats; that as leader of his party he had to recognize all factions, and there quickly followed appointments of Clark men, Underwood men, Harmon men, all over the country. A case in point ill.u.s.trates the bigness of the President in these matters--that of George Fred Williams as Minister to Greece. In the campaign of 1912 Mr. Williams had travelled up and down the state of Ma.s.sachusetts making the bitterest sort of attacks upon Woodrow Wilson. I remember how I protested against this appointment.

The President's only reply was that George Fred Williams was an eccentric fellow, but that he believed he was thoroughly honest. "I have no fault to find, Tumulty, with the men who disagree with me and I ought not to penalize them when they give expression to what they believe are honest opinions."

I have never seen him manifest any bitterness or resentment toward even his bitterest, most implacable enemies. Even toward William Randolph Hearst, whose papers throughout the country have been his most unrelenting foes, he never gave expression to any ill feeling or chagrin at the unfair attacks that were made upon him. I remember a little incident that shows the trend of his feelings in this regard, that occurred when we were discussing the critical Mexican situation. At this time the Hearst papers were engaged in a sensational propaganda in behalf of intervention in Mexico. The President said to me, "I heard of a delightful remark that that fine old lady, Mrs. Phoebe Hearst, made with reference to what she called her 'big boy Willie.' You know," he continued, "Mrs. Hearst does not favour intervention in Mexico and it was reported to me that she chided her son for his flaming headlines urging intervention, and told him that unless he behaved better she would have to take him over her knee and spank him."

The President has one great failing, inherent in the very character of the man himself, and this is his inborn, innate modesty--his unwillingness to dramatize the part he played in the great events of the war, so that the plain people of the country could see him and better understand him. There is no man living to-day who has a greater power of personal appeal or who is a greater master in the art of presenting ideals, facts, and arguments than Woodrow Wilson. As his secretary for nearly eleven years, I was often vexed because he did not, to use a newspaper phrase, "play up" better, but he was always averse to doing anything that seemed artificially contrived to win applause. Under my own eyes, seated in the White House offices, I have witnessed many a great story walk in and out but the President always admonished us that such things must not be pictured or capitalized in any way for political purposes; and thus every attempt we made to dramatize him, as Colonel Roosevelt's friends had played him up, was immediately placed under the Presidential embargo.

His unwillingness to allow us in the White House to "play him up" as the leading actor in this or that movement was ill.u.s.trated in the following way: On July 1, 1919, a cable reached the White House from His Holiness, Pope Benedict, expressing the appreciation of His Holiness for the magnificent way in which the President had presented to the Peace Conference the demands of the Catholic Church regarding Catholic missions, and conveying to the President his thanks for the manner in which the President had supported those demands. The cable came at a time when certain leaders of my own church, the Roman Catholic Church, were criticizing and opposing the President for what they thought was his anti- Catholic att.i.tude. I tried to induce the President to allow me to give publicity to the Pope's cable, but he was firm in his refusal. The cable from the Pope and the President's reply are as follows:

Rome, The Vatican.

1 July, 1919.

TO HIS EXCELLENCY, Doctor Woodrow Wilson, President of the United States.

EXCELLENCY:

Monsignor Carretti, upon his return from Paris, hastened to inform us with what spirit of moderation Your Excellency examined the demands regarding the Catholic Missions which we presented to the Peace Conference, and with what zeal Your Excellency subsequently supported these demands. We desire to express to you our sincere grat.i.tude and at the same time we urge Your Excellency to be good enough to employ your great influence, also, in order to prevent the action, which according to the Peace Treaty with Germany it is desired to bring against the Kaiser and the highly placed German commanders. This action could only render more bitter national hatred and postpone for a long time that pacification of souls for which all nations long.

Furthermore, this trial, if the rules of justice are to be observed, would meet insurmountable difficulties as may be seen from the attached article from the _Osservatore Romano_, which deals exclusively with the trial of the Kaiser, the newspaper reserving right to treat in another article the question of the trial of the generals.

It pleases us to take advantage of this new occasion to renew to Your Excellency the wishes which we entertain for your prosperity and that of your family, as well as for the happiness of the inhabitants of the Confederation of the United States.

(Signed) BENEDICTUS PP. XV.

The White House, Was.h.i.+ngton, D. C.

15 August, 1919.

YOUR HOLINESS:

I have had the pleasure of receiving at the hands of Monsignor Cossio the recent letter you were kind enough to write me, which I now beg to acknowledge with sincere appreciation. Let me a.s.sure you that it was with the greatest pleasure that I lent my influence to safeguarding the missionary interests to which you so graciously refer, and I am happy to say that my colleagues in the Conference were all of the same mind in this wish to throw absolute safeguards around such missions and to keep them within the influences under which they had hitherto been conducted.

I have read with the gravest interest your suggestion about the treatment which should be accorded the ex-Kaiser of Germany and the military officers of high rank who were a.s.sociated with him in the war, and beg to say that I realize the force of the considerations which you urge. I am obliged to you for setting them so clearly, and shall hope to keep them in mind in the difficult months to come. With much respect and sincere good wishes for your welfare,

Respectfully and sincerely yours, (Signed) WOODROW WILSON.

His Holiness, Pope Benedict XV.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Correspondence with the Pope (Transcriber's note: contains a reproduction of the two above-quoted letters.)]

There was something too fine in his nature for the dramatics and the posturings of the political game, as it is usually played. He is a very shy man, too sincere to pose, too modest to make advances. He craves the love of his fellow-men with all his heart and soul. People see only his dignity, his reserve, but they cannot see his big heart yearning for the love of his fellow-men. Out of that loving heart of his has come the pa.s.sion which controlled his whole public career--the pa.s.sion for justice, for fair dealing, and democracy.

Never during the critical days of the war, when requests of all kinds poured in upon him for interviews of various sorts, did he lose his good- nature. Nor did he show that he was disturbed when various requests came from this or that man who claimed to have discovered some scientific means of ending the war.

The following letter to his old friend, Mr. Thomas D. Jones of Chicago, is characteristic of his feeling toward those who claimed to have made such a scientific discovery:

The White House, Was.h.i.+ngton, 25 July 1917.

My dear friend:

It was generous of you to see Mr. Kenney and test his ideas. I hope you derived some amus.e.m.e.nt from it at least. I am afraid I have grown soft-hearted and credulous in these latter days, credulous in respect to the scientific possibility of almost any marvel and soft-hearted because of the many evidences of simple-hearted purpose this war has revealed to me.