The Regular Guys

(See Cover)

A fat man in a floppy hat piled out of a dusty sedan at the White House door last week, shook hands with the doorman, stopped to gab a while with the President's personal secretary and ambled in to see the boss. Harry Truman exclaimed, "Well, look who's back," and jumped up to pump the fat man's hand.

How was he? He was fine, down to 198 lbs.; the neuritis was gone; and how was the boss? The President told him how he was (fine) and how things were going (not so good), while the fat man's moon face worked fluidly with sympathy and concern.

He'd been reading the papers, he said, when the President had finished. He figured it this way: it was time to sit back now. Give the country a rest, things would pick up now and production would start to go. Well, goodbye now, he said; he had to get back to his own job.

The dusty sedan rolled away from the White House and around Lafayette Square to the headquarters of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation.

So did roly-poly George Edward Allen return to Washington after five weeks in the hospital and in Atlantic City. Harry Truman was mighty glad; there was no one he would rather have around than George. Congress was gone and there would be a lull, but he needed all the help, advice and laughs he could get. So it was good to have George back with the rest of the "gang."

The Prompters. In the White House the word "gang" does not necessarily have a sinister connotation. Most U.S. Presidents have had their gangs, some big, some little, some called one thing, some called another. Jackson had the "Kitchen Cabinet"; its chief cooks were two Kentucky editors, Amos Kendall and Francis Preston Blair. Wilson had Colonel House. Teddy Roosevelt had his "Tennis Cabinet," the "high-minded and efficient set" of young men which included Gifford Pinchot and James G. Garfield. Harding had Harry Daugherty and Albert Fall, who belonged to his official Cabinet and doubled as part of the gang out of meetings. Franklin Roosevelt had a whole school of brain-trusters, advisers, special assistants and above all, Harry Hopkins.

That U.S. voters have no voice in the selection of such prompters and choremen--who may exercise far-reaching power--is a fact that concerns practical as well as academic politicians. But there is nothing that can be done about it: the executive branch has grown too large for close and effective democratic control. The nation can only pray that its White House gangs are men of competence and high principle.

The 1946 Gang. Harry Truman's gang is large, loose-knit, amiable and loyal. Some members, like Judge Samuel Rosenman, serve only part time. Others serve as specialists, like David K. Niles, a New-Dealing Bostonian inherited from F.D.R., who advises on problems of minority groups (currently, U.S. Zionists). At least one, Major General Harry Vaughan, holds a kind of honorary membership. Vaughan, who once burbled from the pulpit of an Alexandria, Va. church "I don't know why a minister can't be a regular guy," has one quality which endears him to the President: he is what Harry Truman calls a regular guy.

As in all kitchen cabinets and brain trusts, the membership in Harry Truman's gang shifts and changes. Long forgotten are burly, apple-cheeked Hugh Fulton who talked too much, and Omaha insurance man Ed McKim, who served with Harry Truman in the field artillery but was deemed dated for modern Washington. Wrinkled old Admiral Leahy no longer sees the President regularly. Even National Chairman Bob Hannegan has had to take a seat somewhat to the rear.

The top power now rests in four men, some of them brand-new to high councils of any kind, in and out of government. They are the men who currently have Harry Truman's ear on all domestic matters, and some foreign; the men with whom he consults almost daily behind the Executive Office's closed doors. They are a college professor, a lawyer, a banker, and George himself.

The Professor. John Roy Steelman, the professor, was born on an Arkansas farm 46 years ago. He went to war, returned and worked his way through college, got a master's degree in sociology, became professor of sociology at Alabama College. He was called to Washington by Frances Perkins to serve as a labor conciliator. Now, as the boss of OWMR, he sits over the whole national economy--a regular fellow and a friend of all.

The Lawyer. Clark McAdams Clifford, the lawyer, comes from St. Louis, where he was "pretty well irresistible to juries." Handsome, young (39) Clark Clifford was commissioned a lieutenant (j.g.) in the Navy. He never went to sea, but he wound up two years later as naval aide to the President and a four-stripe captain, a feat which ordinarily takes Annapolis graduates around 20 years. Six weeks ago he became the President's special counsel, the job vacated by shrewd, veteran judge & lawyer Sam Rosenman. Everyone agrees that Clark Clifford, who is "perfectly devoted" to Harry Truman, has a way with Harry Truman as he has with juries.

The Banker. John Wesley Snyder, the banker, was RFC loan administrator in St. Louis, where he applied himself to becoming a better banker and a more learned man. He got his reward in 1940 when Jesse Jones called him to Washington to become executive vice president of the Defense Plant Corp. He left after a row with Jones, went back to St. Louis and the vice presidency of the First National Bank. Then one day his friend Harry Truman telephoned him that Franklin Roosevelt had just died. "John," said a shaky Harry Truman, "you'll have to come up here right now."

John Snyder, 50, plump, white-faced and shy with strangers, has been with his friend ever since. Now, a little appalled, he finds himself Secretary of the U.S. Treasury and, according to his careful friends, just "an all-round good fellow."

And George. Washington has never seen anything quite like George Allen, who was born in Booneville, Miss, in 1896, who practiced law, wangled himself a commission in the Army in World War I, wangled a job in the hotel business, wangled an appointment as District Commissioner of Washington, D.C., and bounced up one day at the elbow of the President.

George is all the more remarkable be cause, to the naked eye, he is a clown. He is fat, he rolls his eyes, he shakes like jelly, he roars with laughter. He can keep friends in stitches for hours with his stories. The butt of all of them is George himself and that makes good fun, too.

A favorite is his account of the Georgia Tech-Cumberland U. football game in 1916. Cumberland's fullback and captain, George Allen himself, made the best run of the game for his hard pressed side: "I only lost six yards." He would have made one beautiful punt if his own center had not blocked it with the back of his neck. George recalls: "I once dropped the ball and yelled at another fellow: 'Pick it up.' He yelled back at me, 'Pick it up yourself, you dropped it.'" The score: Tech, 220; Cumberland, 0.

George's first law case was against a railroad on behalf of a woman who tripped over an umbrella and broke her leg. George filed suit for $40,000. The railroad settled for $10--$5 for the woman, $5 for George. "I was in no mood to dicker," is George's gag line.

Once when he was District Commissioner he started out to settle a local carpenters' strike. "And in no time at all," he says, "it was national."

George's comedy is always pretty much the same routine, but his tireless friends are convulsed. He never seems to run out of funny things to say--scrupulously never tells anything off-color.

Handy Man. His career as a national figure began with the Washington job, to which Franklin Roosevelt appointed him. George made the most of it. One way or another he kept his name on the front page: ALLEN DEMANDS MORE MONEY FOR DISTRICT RELIEF . . . COMMISSIONER ALLEN VIEWS COMING YEAR WITH OPTIMISM. In 1934 he set forth across the country dressed as a hobo to study conditions. It made a fine story.

Fun-loving George, who knew everyone worth knowing in Washington, became vice president of the Home Insurance Company. The way it happened was that the company had found itself involved with Boss Pendergast in Missouri's fire insurance scandal. It needed someone like George to fan out the smoke and put Home Insurance back in good odor with Congress. George's job was Good Relations.

So handy was George that other big companies put him on their boards. Among them: Victor Emanuel's Aviation Corp. and Consolidated Vultee Aircraft Corp., Tom Girdler's Republic Steel, General Aniline and Film Corp. George knew the men who ran the country. George was a fixer and a puller of wires. That was what George got paid for. Keeping a gruelling schedule, he seldom got home to his Wardman Park apartment and his pretty, pert wife.

"Don't Mess with Mr. In-Between." In 1943 George was made secretary of the Democratic National Party. Roosevelt trusted him even if he did not react to George's humor. "I am exactly 100% certain of his loyalty," wrote F.D.R. At the 1944 Democratic convention, when most smart politicians realized they might be nominating two Presidents, George latched on to Harry Truman and helped smooth his way to the No. 2 nomination. Then he helped draft the first speech for the vice-presidential candidate.

George showed his usefulness in a dozen different ways. Through some inadvertence Candidate Truman was scheduled to appear at conflicting C.I.O and A.F.L. rallies in Detroit. George fixed that, made everyone happy. He went along on the gruelling, transcontinental Truman campaign trip, smoothed over Truman blunders. He kept the candidate amused, became his fast friend, saw him elected.

Then one day in April, 1945, when he was on vacation, Washington called him long distance to tell him that Roosevelt had died. George flew east. Harry Truman's amanuensis Matt Connelly met him and exclaimed: "Good God, George. We've got three speeches to write. We have to go before Congress tomorrow."

George jumped in to help write the speeches which the 32nd President of the U.S. delivered to a shocked nation the next day.

George threw himself into other chores: appointments, arrangements, first moves. Fat, fast and reassuring, he was the new President's mainstay. He knew more about many presidential duties than did Harry Truman.

Things settled down but there were still plenty of chores to be done, and a lot of wires to be pulled. George managed the ticklish task of easing Secretary of State Ed Stettinius out to make room for Jimmy Byrnes. There was muttering around Washington over George's unofficial status.

Mr. Truman made him special presidential representative to study the liquidating of war agencies. Liquidating jobs was more in George's line, some Washington figures like Democratic Chairman Bob Hannegan suspected.

George's phone in the White House would ring. Matt Connelly would inquire: "You think that fellow we were talking about this morning is all right to appoint?" Afternoons, George and Harry Vaughan and Harry Truman splashed around together in the White House swimming pool.

In January, 1946, a grateful Harry Truman nominated George to be a director in RFC.

RFC had grown to be the nation's most powerful bank, a financial monstrosity with a "resource potential" of more than $14 billion which it could lend to states, municipalities, private banks, private businessmen, private citizens. In a 12-story building on Vermont Ave., amidst chromium and marble, in a magnificent air-cooled hush preside the giants who control this enterprise--the five directors. Harry Truman thought George should he one of them.

Some of George's critics thought this was going a bit too far--and they also thought George might never get the job. In almost the same breath, Harry Truman had nominated three other cronies--Jake Vardaman, Stu Symington and Ed Pauley--for top Government jobs, and the public howled. Ed Pauley subsequently had to withdraw after some dissection by a Senate committee; but George, as usual, was equal to the occasion.

The Accolade. A more or less astonished Senate committee listened to George explain his qualifications for the job. "I very badly want to be confirmed by you gentlemen," said George soberly. Then he cut loose with his best comedy routine. The Senators almost died laughing. Would George give up his 22 directorships? "I'd hate to cut out all," grinned George, "because what if the Democrats lost in '48?" In a burst of jolly good fellowship they confirmed George for the job. Senator Barkley wrung his hand.

George dropped his insurance directorships, hung onto the others. The RFC job pays him $10,000 a year. His income from private businesses, over which RFC holds wide powers: an estimated $50,000. The moral hazards of this situation are recognized by George. He knows that he is walking on eggs and that a fascinated and not too friendly audience is watching him. Aside from the moral question, George has a rule of conduct which may pull him through: keep your nose clean. The chairmanship of RFC is his for the asking when aging, gregarious Charles ("Senator") Henderson steps down.

Harry Truman is not worried about George. He has "implicit confidence" in him. On the wall of George's office hangs a picture of the President which bears Harry Truman's accolade. The picture is inscribed in Harry Truman's angular hand: "My very best to a regular guy, my friend George Allen."

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