Revelations of a Good Boy

Ever since they began rushing their memoirs into print, Franklin D. Roosevelt's political intimates have shared one fascinating conviction. They quite obviously feel that few of their colleagues were cut out for the administration of public affairs. They have also intimated that their own contributions to history are not to be underestimated.

Last week, ex-Interior Secretary Harold Ickes followed this pattern as he began describing "My Twelve Years with F.D.R." in the Saturday Evening Post. He took a wallop at Harry Hopkins' WPA: "[Harry] was not priming the pump; he was just turning on the fireplug." He indignantly described an undercover effort by Henry Wallace to get him out of the Cabinet. Wrote he of Henry in a 1938 diary entry: "Henry Wallace is a selfish and not too forthright individual who is so consumed with his political ambition that there isn't anything that he won't do to advance himself, even at the cost of injury to someone else . . ."

Ickes' most interesting revelation--how he tried to help Roosevelt fire Secretary of War Harry Woodring--also shed considerable light on the character of his boss.

Cool Attitude. "The President," wrote Ickes, "said that Woodring had refused to resign [F.D.R. had offered to make him minister to Canada] . . . Then the President told me the astonishing bit of news that Woodring wanted to go as ambassador to the Court of St. James's.

"I threw my hands into the air and said, 'My God, he doesn't think much of himself, does he?'

"The President remarked that Woodring's father-in-law, former Senator Marcus A. Coolidge of Massachusetts, was willing to invest a half million dollars in it for Woodring."

The matter drifted until a subsequent luncheon when Ickes brought it up again. "I said, 'Mr. President, I have an idea. Why don't you send for Woodring and say to him, "Harry, ordinarily Dublin is not an important diplomatic post, but now it is, on account of the war. There will be a vacancy there and I wish to fill it with one of my very strongest men. I want to appoint you." ' The President did not seem to think Woodring would agree to this.

"Then I said, 'Mr. President, I would send for Harry Woodring and I would say to him, "Harry, it is either Dublin, Ireland, for you, or Topeka, Kansas."' The President looked at me, somewhat abashed. Reading his mind, I said, 'You can't do that sort of thing, can you, Mr. President?'

" 'No, Harold, I can't,' he replied."

Hot Letter. Later Ickes thought up a more "brilliant idea"--that all Cabinet members should resign because of the war in Europe and leave the President free to replace any of them. Said F.D.R.: "Why, I couldn't do that, Harold. Some of the members of the Cabinet might think that I don't want them."

" 'Well,' I retorted, 'there are some that you don't want, aren't there?' But he would not consent."

Woodring, however, eventually sent Roosevelt a letter of resignation--a letter the President never made public. Wrote Ickes: "How the President, who above all things hated to dismiss a man, screwed up his courage I do not know, but finally the thing happened ... I have never doubted that Mr. Woodring deliberately wrote a resignation that could not be made public.

On Nov. 7, 1940--two days after F.D.R.'s third-term victory--Ickes also sent a resignation to F.D.R. "in the belief that you ought to be entirely free to reshuffle your official family . . ."

Roosevelt shot it back with the comment: "That is mighty sweet of you, and if I were a Frenchman I would kiss you on both cheeks. As an American, all I can say is 'you are a very good boy.' "

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.