Woodrow Wilson as I Know Him Part 37

On September 16th, Mr. Lansing telegraphed the following message to the President:

On May 17th, Bullitt resigned by letter giving his reasons with which you are familiar. I replied by letter on the 18th without any comment on his reasons. Bullitt on the 19th asked to see me to say good-bye and I saw him. He elaborated on the reasons for his resignation and said that he could not conscientiously give countenance to a treaty which was based on injustice. I told him that I would say nothing against his resigning since he put it on conscientious grounds, and that I recognized that certain features of the Treaty were bad, as I presumed most everyone did, but that was probably unavoidable in view of conflicting claims and that nothing ought to be done to prevent the speedy restoration of peace by signing the Treaty. Bullitt then discussed the numerous European commissions provided for by the Treaty on which the United States was to be represented. I told him that I was disturbed by this fact because I was afraid the Senate and possibly the people, if they understood this, would refuse ratification, and that anything which was an obstacle to ratification was unfortunate because we ought to have peace as soon as possible.

When the President received this explanation from Mr. Lansing, he sent for me to visit with him in his compartment. At the time I arrived he was seated in his little study, engaged in preparing his speech for the night's meeting. Turning to me, with a deep show of feeling, he said: "Read that, and tell me what you think of a man who was my a.s.sociate on the other side and who confidentially expressed himself to an outsider in such a fas.h.i.+on? Were I in Was.h.i.+ngton I would at once demand his resignation! That kind of disloyalty must not be permitted to go unchallenged for a single minute. The testimony of Bullitt is a confirmation of the suspicions I have had with reference to this individual. I found the same att.i.tude of mind on the part of Lansing on the other side. I could find his trail everywhere I went, but they were only suspicions and it would not be fair for me to act upon them. But here in his own statement is a verification at last of everything I have suspected. Think of it! This from a man whom I raised from the level of a subordinate to the great office of Secretary of State of the United States. My G.o.d! I did not think it was possible for Lansing to act in this way. When we were in Paris I found that Lansing and others were constantly giving out statements that did not agree with my viewpoint. When I had arranged a settlement, there would appear from some source I could not locate unofficial statements telling the correspondents not to take things too seriously; that a compromise would be made, and this news, or rather news of this kind, was harmful to the settlement I had already obtained and quite naturally gave the Conference the impression that Lansing and his kind were speaking for me, and then the French would say that I was bluffing."

I am convinced that only the President's illness a few days later prevented an immediate demand on his part for the resignation of Mr.

Lansing.

That there was no real devotion on the part of Mr. Lansing for the President is shown by the following incident.

A few days after the President returned from the West and lay seriously ill at the White House, with physicians and nurses gathered about his bed, Mr. Lansing sought a private audience with me in the Cabinet Room. He informed me that he had called diplomatically to suggest that in view of the incapacity of the President we should arrange to call in the Vice- President to act in his stead as soon as possible, reading to me from a book which he had brought from the State Department, which I afterward learned was "Jefferson's Manual," the following clause of the United States Const.i.tution:

In case of the removal of the President from office, or his death, resignation, or inability to discharge the powers and duties of the said office, the same shall devolve upon the Vice-President.

Upon reading this, I coldly turned to Mr. Lansing and said: "Mr. Lansing, the Const.i.tution is not a dead letter with the White House. I have read the Const.i.tution and do not find myself in need of any tutoring at your hands of the provision you have just read." When I asked Mr. Lansing the question as to who should certify to the disability of the President, he intimated that that would be a job for either Doctor Grayson or myself. I immediately grasped the full significance of what he intimated and said: "You may rest a.s.sured that while Woodrow Wilson is lying in the White House on the broad of his back I will not be a party to ousting him. He has been too kind, too loyal, and too wonderful to me to receive such treatment at my hands." Just as I uttered this statement Doctor Grayson appeared in the Cabinet Room and I turned to him and said: "And I am sure that Doctor Grayson will never certify to his disability. Will you, Grayson?" Doctor Grayson left no doubt in Mr. Lansing's mind that he would not do as Mr. Lansing suggested. I then notified Mr. Lansing that if anybody outside of the White House circle attempted to certify to the President's disability, that Grayson and I would stand together and repudiate it. I added that if the President were in a condition to know of this episode he would, in my opinion, take decisive measures. That ended the interview.

It is unnecessary to say that no further attempt was made by Mr. Lansing to inst.i.tute ouster proceedings against his chief.

I never attempted to ascertain what finally influenced the action of the President peremptorily to demand the resignation of Mr. Lansing. My own judgment is that the demand came as the culmination of repeated acts of what the President considered disloyalty on Mr. Lansing's part while in Paris, and that the situation was aggravated by Mr. Lansing's notes to Mexico during the President's illness.

When I received from the President's stenographer the letter to Mr.

Lansing, intimating that his resignation would not be a disagreeable thing to the President, I conferred with the President at once and argued with him that in the present state of public opinion it was the wrong time to do the right thing. At the time the President was seated in his invalid chair on the White House portico.

Although physically weak, he was mentally active and alert. Quickly he took hold of my phrase and said, with a show of the old fire that I had seen on so many occasions: "Tumulty, it is never the wrong time to spike disloyalty. When Lansing sought to oust me, I was upon my back. I am on my feet now and I will not have disloyalty about me."

When the announcement of Lansing's resignation was made, the flood-gates of fury broke about the President; but he was serene throughout it all.

When I called at the White House on the following Sunday, I found him calmly seated in his bathroom with his coloured valet engaged in the not arduous task of cutting his hair. Looking at me with a smile in his eye, he said: "Well, Tumulty, have I any friends left?" "Very few, Governor," I said. Whereupon he replied: "Of course, it will be another two days'

wonder. But in a few days what the country considers an indiscretion on my part in getting rid of Lansing will be forgotten, but when the sober, second thought of the country begins to a.s.sert itself, what will stand out will be the disloyalty of Lansing to me. Just think of it! Raised and exalted to the office of Secretary of State, made a member of the Peace Commission, partic.i.p.ating in all the conferences and affixing his signature to a solemn treaty, and then hurrying to America and appearing before the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate to repudiate the very thing to which he had given his a.s.sent."

During the illness of the President his political enemies sought to convey the impression that he was incapacitated for the duties of his office. As one who came in daily contact with him I knew how baseless were these insinuations. As a matter of fact, there was not a whole week during his entire illness that he was not in touch with every matter upon which he was called to act and upon which he was asked to render judgment. The White House files contain numerous memoranda showing his interest in all matters to which department heads felt it inc.u.mbent to call his attention during his illness. One of the most critical things upon which he pa.s.sed was the question of the miners' strike, which resulted in the beginning from an injunction suit by the Attorney General, Mr. Palmer, to restrain the miners from carrying out their purpose to strike. This was one of the most critical situations that arose during his illness and with which he daily kept in touch.

Uncomplainingly the President applied himself to the difficult tasks of the Western trip. While the first meeting at Columbus was a disappointment as to attendance, as we approached the West the crowds grew in numbers and the enthusiasm became boundless. The idea of the League spread and spread as we neared the coast. Contrary to the impression in the East, the President's trip West was a veritable triumph for him and was so successful that we had planned, upon the completion of the Western trip, to invade the enemy's country, Senator Lodge's own territory, the New England States, and particularly Ma.s.sachusetts. This was our plan, fully developed and arranged, when about four o'clock in the morning of September 26, 1919, Doctor Grayson knocked at the door of my sleeping compartment and told me to dress quickly, that the President was seriously ill. As we walked toward the President's car, the Doctor told me in a few words of the President's trouble and said that he greatly feared it might end fatally if we should attempt to continue the trip and that it was his duty to inform the President that by all means the trip must be cancelled; but that he did not feel free to suggest it to the President without having my cooperation and support. When we arrived at the President's drawing room I found him fully dressed and seated in his chair. With great difficulty he was able to articulate. His face was pale and wan. One side of it had fallen, and his condition was indeed pitiful to behold. Quickly I reached the same conclusion as that of Doctor Grayson, as to the necessity for the immediate cancellation of the trip, for to continue it, in my opinion, meant death to the President. Looking at me, with great tears running down his face, he said: "My dear boy, this has never happened to me before. I felt it coming on yesterday. I do not know what to do." He then pleaded with us not to cut short the trip. Turning to both of us, he said: "Don't you see that if you cancel this trip, Senator Lodge and his friends will say that I am a quitter and that the Western trip was a failure, and the Treaty will be lost." Reaching over to him, I took both of his hands and said: "What difference, my dear Governor, does it make what they say? n.o.body in the world believes you are a quitter, but it is your life that we must now consider. We must cancel the trip, and I am sure that when the people learn of your condition there will be no misunderstanding." He then tried to move over nearer to me to continue his argument against the cancellation of the trip; but he found he was unable to do so. His left arm and leg refused to function.

I then realized that the President's whole left side was paralyzed.

Looking at me he said: "I want to show them that I can still fight and that I am not afraid. Just postpone the trip for twenty-four hours and I will be all right."

But Doctor Grayson and I resolved not to take any risk, and an immediate statement was made to the inquiring newspaper men that the Western trip was off.

Never was the President more gentle or tender than on that morning.

Suffering the greatest pain, paralyzed on his left side, he was still fighting desperately for the thing that was so close to his heart--a vindication of the things for which he had so gallantly fought on the other side. Grim old warrior that he was, he was ready to fight to the death for the League of Nations.

In the dispatches carried to the country, prepared by the fine newspaper men who accompanied us on the trip, it was stated that evidences of a breakdown on the part of the President were plainly visible in the speech he delivered at Pueblo.

I had talked to him only a few minutes before the delivery of that speech, and the only apparent evidence that he was approaching a breakdown was in his remark to me that he had a splitting headache, and that he would have to cut his speech short. As a matter of fact, this last speech he made, at Pueblo, on September 25, 1919, was one of the longest speeches delivered on the Western trip and, if I may say so, was one of the best and most pa.s.sionate appeals he made for the League of Nations.

Many things in connection with the Pueblo meeting impressed themselves upon me. In the peroration of the speech he drew a picture of his visit on Decoration Day, 1919, to what he called a beautiful hillside near Paris, where was located the cemetery of Suresnes, a cemetery given over to the burial of the American dead. As he spoke of the purposes for which those departed American soldiers had given their lives, a great wave of emotion, such as I have never witnessed at a public meeting, swept through the whole amphitheatre. As he continued his speech, I looked at Mrs. Wilson and saw tears in her eyes. I then turned to see the effect upon some of the "hard-boiled" newspaper men, to whom great speeches were ordinary things, and they were alike deeply moved. Down in the amphitheatre I saw men sneak their handkerchiefs out of their pockets and wipe the tears from their eyes. The President was like a great organist playing upon the heart emotions of the thousands of people who were held spell-bound by what he said.

It is possible, I pray G.o.d it may not be so, that the speech at Pueblo was the last public speech that Woodrow Wilson will ever make, and I, therefore, take the liberty of introducing into this story the concluding words of it:

What of our pledges to the men that lie dead in France? We said that they went over there not to prove the prowess of America or her readiness for another war but to see to it that there never was such a war again. It always seems to make it difficult for me to say anything, my fellow citizens, when I think of my clients in this case.

My clients are the children; my clients are the next generation. They do not know what promises and bonds I undertook when I ordered the armies of the United States to the soil of France, but I know, and I intend to redeem my pledges to the children; they shall not be sent upon a similar errand.

Again, and again, my fellow citizens, mothers who lost their sons in France have come to me and, taking my hand, have shed tears upon it not only, but they have added: "G.o.d bless you, Mr. President!" Why, my fellow citizens, should they pray G.o.d to bless me? I advised the Congress of the United States to create the situation that led to the death of their sons. I ordered their sons overseas. I consented to their sons being put in the most difficult parts of the battle line, where death was certain, as in the impenetrable difficulties of the forest of Argonne. Why should they weep upon my hand and call down the blessings of G.o.d upon me? Because they believe that their boys died for something that vastly transcends any of the immediate and palpable objects of the war. They believe, and they rightly believe, that their sons saved the liberty of the world. They believe that wrapped up with the liberty of the world is the continuous protection of that liberty by the concerted powers of all the civilized world. They believe that this sacrifice was made in order that other sons should not be called upon for a similar gift--the gift of life, the gift of all that died-- and if we did not see this thing through, if we fulfilled the dearest present wish of Germany and now dissociated ourselves from those alongside whom we fought in the war, would not something of the halo go away from the gun over the mantelpiece, or the sword? Would not the old uniform lose something if its significance? These men were crusaders. They were going forth to prove the might of justice and right, and all the world accepted them as crusaders, and their transcendent achievement has made all the world believe in America as it believes in no other nation organized in the modern world. There seems to me to stand between us and the rejection or qualification of this treaty the serried ranks of those boys in khaki, not only those boys who came home, but those dear ghosts that still deploy upon the fields of France.

My friends, on last Decoration Day I went to a beautiful hillside near Paris, where was located the cemetery of Suresnes, a cemetery given over to the burial of the American dead. Behind me on the slopes was rank upon rank of living American soldiers, and lying before me on the levels of the plain was rank upon rank of departed American soldiers.

Right by the side of the stand where I spoke there was a little group of French women who had adopted those graves, had made themselves mothers of those dear ghosts by putting flowers every day upon those graves, taking them as their own sons, their own beloved, because they had died in the same cause--France was free and the world was free because America had come! I wish some men in public life who are now opposing the settlement for which these men died could visit such a spot as that. I wish that the thought that comes out of those graves could penetrate their consciousness. I wish that they could feel the moral obligation that rests upon us not to go back on those boys, but to see the thing through, to see it through to the end and make good their redemption of the world. For nothing less depends upon this decision, nothing less than the liberation and salvation of the world.

Now that the mists of this great question have cleared away, I believe that men will see the trust, eye to eye and face to face. There is one thing that the American people always rise to and extend their hand to, and that is the truth of justice and of liberty and of peace. We have accepted that truth and we are going to be led by it, and it is going to lead us, and through us the world, out into pastures of quietness and peace such as the world never dreamed of before.

CHAPTER XLIII

RESERVATIONS

On June 25, 1919, I received from President Wilson the following cabled message:

My clear conviction is that the adoption of the treaty by the Senate with reservations will put the United States as clearly out of the concert of nations as a rejection. We ought either to go in or stay out. To stay out would be fatal to the influence and even to the commercial prospects of the United States, and to go in would give her a leading place in the affairs of the world. Reservations would either mean nothing or postpone the conclusion of peace, so far as America is concerned, until every other princ.i.p.al nation concerned in the treaty had found out by negotiation what the reservations practically meant and whether they could a.s.sociate themselves with the United States on the terms of the reservations or not.

WOODROW WILSON.

The President consistently held to the principle involved in this statement. To his mind the reservations offered by Senator Lodge const.i.tuted a virtual nullification on the part of the United States of a treaty which was a contract, and which should be amended through free discussion among all the contracting parties. He did not argue or a.s.sume that the Covenant was a perfected doc.u.ment, but he believed that, like our American Const.i.tution, it should be adopted and subsequently submitted to necessary amendment through the const.i.tutional processes of debate. He was unalterably opposed to having the United States put in the position of seeking exemptions and special privileges under an agreement which he believed was in the interest of the entire world, including our own country. Furthermore, he believed that the advocacy for reservations in the Senate proceeded from partisan motives and that in so far as there was a strong popular opinion in the country in favour of reservations it proceeded from the same sources from which had come the pro-German propaganda. Before the war pro-German agitation had sought to keep us out of the conflict, and after the war it sought to separate us in interest and purpose from other governments with which we were a.s.sociated.

By his opposition to reservations the President was seeking to prevent Germany from taking through diplomacy what she had been unable to get by her armies.

The President was so confident of the essential rightness of the League and the Covenant and of the inherent right-mindedness of the American people, that he could not believe that the people would sanction either rejection or emasculation of the Treaty if they could be made to see the issue in all the sincerity of its motives and purposes, if partisan attack could be met with plain truth-speaking. It was to present the case of the people in what he considered its true light that he undertook the Western tour, and it was while thus engaged that his health broke. Had he kept well and been able to lead in person the struggle for ratification, he might have won, as he had previously by his determination and conviction broken down stubborn opposition to the Federal Reserve system.

So strong was his faith in his cause and the people that even after he fell ill he could not believe that ratification would fail. What his enemies called stubbornness was his firm faith in the righteousness of the treaty and in the reasonableness of the proposition that the time to make amendments was not prior to the adoption of the Treaty and by one nation, but after all the nations had agreed and had met together for sober, unpartisan consideration of alterations in the interest of all the contracting parties and the peace and welfare of the world.

Even when he lay seriously ill, he insisted upon being taken in his invalid chair along the White House portico to the window of my outer office each day during the controversy in the Senate over the Treaty.

There day after day in the coldest possible weather I conferred with him and discussed every phase of the fight on the Hill. He would sit in his chair, wrapped in blankets, and though hardly able, because of his physical condition, to discuss these matters with me, he evidenced in every way a tremendous interest in everything that was happening in the Capitol that had to do with the Treaty. Although I was warned by Doctor Grayson and Mrs. Wilson not to alarm him unduly by bringing pessimistic reports, I sought, in the most delicate and tactful way I could, to bring the atmosphere of the Hill to him. Whenever there was an indication of the slightest rise in the tide for the League of Nations a smile would pa.s.s over the President's face, and weak and broken though he was, he evidenced his great pleasure at the news. Time and time again during the critical days of the Treaty fight the President would appear outside my office, seated in the old wheel chair, and make inquiry regarding the progress of the Treaty fight on Capitol Hill.

One of the peculiar things about the illness from which the President suffered was the deep emotion which would stir him when word was brought to him that this senator or that senator on the Hill had said some kind thing about him or had gone to his defense when some political enemy was engaged in bitterly a.s.sailing his att.i.tude in the Treaty fight. Never would there come from him any censure or bitter criticism of those who were opposing him in the fight. For Senator Borah, the leader of the opposition, he had high respect, and felt that he was actuated only by sincere motives.

I recall how deeply depressed he was when word was carried to him that the defeat of the Treaty was inevitable. On this day he was looking more weary than at any time during his illness. After I had read to him a memorandum that I had prepared, containing a report on the situation in the Senate, I drew away from his wheel chair and said to him: "Governor, you are looking very well to-day." He shook his head in a pathetic way and said: "I am very well for a man who awaits disaster," and bowing his head he gave way to the deep emotion he felt.

A few days later I called to notify him of the defeat of the Treaty. His only comment was, "They have shamed us in the eyes of the world."

Endeavouring to keep my good-nature steady in the midst of a trying situation, I smiled and said: "But, Governor, only the Senate has defeated you. The People will vindicate your course. You may rely upon that." "Ah, but our enemies have poisoned the wells of public opinion," he said. "They have made the people believe that the League of Nations is a great Juggernaut, the object of which is to bring war and not peace to the world. If I only could have remained well long enough to have convinced the people that the League of Nations was their real hope, their last chance, perhaps, to save civilization!"

I said, by way of trying to strengthen and encourage him at this, one of the critical moments of his life--a moment that I knew was one of despair for him--"Governor, I want to read a chapter from the third volume of your 'History of the American People,' if it will not tire you." He graciously gave his a.s.sent and I took from under my arm the volume containing an account of the famous John Jay treaty, in the defense of which Alexander Hamilton was stoned while he stood defending it on the steps of the New York City Hall. There was, indeed, a remarkable similarity between the fight over the John Jay treaty and the Versailles Treaty. I read an entire chapter of Woodrow Wilson's "History of the American People," including the pa.s.sage:

Slowly the storm blew off. The country had obviously gained more than it had conceded, and tardily saw the debt it owed Mr. Jay and to the administration, whose firmness and prudence had made his mission possible. But in the meantime things had been said which could not be forgotten. Was.h.i.+ngton had been a.s.sailed with unbridled license, as an enemy and a traitor to the country; had even been charged with embezzling public moneys during the Revolution; was madly threatened with impeachment, and even with a.s.sa.s.sination; and had cried amidst the bitterness of it all that "he would rather be in his grave than in the presidency."

The country knew its real mind about him once again when the end of his term came and it was about to lose him. He refused to stand for another election. His farewell address, with its unmistakable tone of majesty and its solemn force of affection and admonition, seemed an epitome of the man's character and achievements, and every man's heart smote him to think that Was.h.i.+ngton was actually gone from the nation's counsels.

When I concluded reading this chapter, the President's comment was, "It is mighty generous of you to compare my disappointment over the Treaty with that of Was.h.i.+ngton's. _You have placed me in mighty good company._"