by Gore Vidal
“Then, sir, am I to instruct the senators of our party to vote against the treaty if the preamble stays?”
Wilson nodded. “Don’t you see if I refuse to veto but don’t accept the treaty with reservations—just put it in a drawer—Lodge can’t say that I killed my own League?”
“But isn’t that what you’re doing?” Logic, no matter how exquisite, that rested upon a false hypothesis tended to annoy Burden.
“No.” The voice of the history teacher was flat and cold. “It will be clear to the country when the Democratic senators vote against the treaty that the treaty no longer is what it was. Then when the Senate goes into recess, the public and the press will have the time to convince at least two-thirds of the senators that Lodge’s game is simply partisan malice and not a reflection of those crowds I saw in the West, day after day, until …” The voice stopped.
“Surely,” said Burden, “some treaty is better than no treaty at this point …”
“The President must take his medicine,” said Mrs. Wilson. She was on her feet. The senators rose. Wilson extended his right hand to each man; again, the grasp was startlingly strong.
“Perhaps,” said Hitchcock, always tactless in Burden’s eyes, “the time has come to hold out the olive branch.”
“Let Lodge do that.” The white-bearded old man looked to be carved from ice.
In the hallway, Mrs. Wilson turned to Hitchcock. “I think you’re right, Senator. I would accept any reservations to get this awful thing settled, so that he can get well again. But he said. ‘Little girl,’ ” her obsidian-dark, narrow Indian eyes were bright with tears, “ ‘don’t you desert me. I couldn’t bear that. I have no moral right to accept any change in a paper that I have signed without giving all the other signers, even the Germans, the right to do the same thing. It’s not that I will not accept: it is the nation’s honor that is at stake.’ ”
Hitchcock was visibly moved. Burden was, he hoped, invisibly enraged. “What does Colonel House advise?”
“I don’t know. We’ve not seen him.” This confirmed the rumor that House had been excluded from the President’s councils. “I’m told he is in Washington. But our door is shut now, I’m afraid.”
“Even to Lord Grey?” The British foreign secretary had arrived the previous month to assure everyone that His Majesty’s Government would not strenuously object to Lodge’s various reservations as long as there was, at the end, a world League of Nations. But the President would not see him because, according to Alice Longworth, whose gossip was always lurid but no less accurate for that, one of the British embassy aides had made an unforgivable joke about Mrs. Wilson (Question: “What did Mrs. Galt do when the President proposed to her?” Answer: “She fell out of bed”), and though Mrs. Wilson had demanded the aide’s dismissal, Lord Grey had said no, and now his lordship was being punished and the door was shut to him as well as to Colonel House.
“The Prince of Wales brought up the subject! Imagine involving a boy in such a matter! We only saw him because his parents had been so nice to us when we arrived in the middle of their Christmas holidays. Anyway, we owe nothing to Lord Grey, quite the contrary.” A bell rang from the bedroom.
“Don’t go,” she said, and hurried into the sickroom.
“Let’s talk to the Vice President.” Burden was hard.
“I did. He won’t make a move. You know how they keep in touch with him?” Hitchcock was now whispering. “Tumulty tells this friend of his on the Baltimore Sun what’s going on here and he tells Marshall.”
“Then maybe we’ll have to go to law to get these people out.” Burden was amazed at his own anger and perfect lack of compassion. Either the nation was serious or it was not. Either there was a functioning president or there was a dangerous absence that could not be filled by a loyal wife and a naval doctor.
“But he’s not disabled. He vetoed the Volstead Act. He’s out of bed …”
The loyal wife returned. “The President says that Democrats are to vote against the treaty but instead of saying that they are defeating it, they are only nullifying it.”
On that note, the Minority Leader of the Senate and his deputy departed. Burden saw nothing but disaster ahead; and a Republican president the next year.
3
Jess and the Duchess sat with the McLeans in the Senate gallery. Once again all Washington had assembled to see the Battalion of Death crush the President and the League of Nations. Below them, W.G. waved to the Duchess as senators streamed onto the floor. In fact, the entire Senate would be present to hear Lodge present his committee’s report. Then, after a discussion, the League would be put to a vote. W.G. had already been asked by Lodge to open the debate for the Republican side in support of the revised League which then the Democrats would, confusingly, vote to nullify.
“Warren’s very nervous,” said the Duchess to Evalyn McLean. “He’s been practicing for days in front of the mirror.”
“I thought he just made it up as he goes along.” Evalyn was now very like her old self; on the other hand, Ned was sober, a sign of some new development in his character, or liver.
Jess looked about the crowded gallery. The self-styled Colonel of the Battalion of Death, Alice Longworth, was accompanied by Ruth Hanna McCormick, daughter to Mark Hanna, wife to Medill McCormick, recently elected senator from Illinois, young and aggressive and ambitious, and brother to Robert McCormick of the Chicago Tribune. Medill was going to be president one day, everyone said, including Alice, who doted on his wife, a lady as fiercely partisan as she. The two women held court at the end of the row. A number of senators clustered about Alice, who was like that woman who knitted beside the guillotine in one of Jess’s favorite movies. Whenever she dropped a stitch, she said kill, kill, kill.
Jess had actually heard Mrs. Longworth call Senator Lodge “Senator Wobbly” because he had been intent on establishing some sort of non-Wilsonian league. Meanwhile, whenever any senator dared suggest that the magnificent Theodore Roosevelt had ever so much as dreamed of a league, she would send him a stern note from the gallery. Alice had been chosen by Heaven and herself to be the keeper of the Roosevelt flame as well as the promoter of the Roosevelt heir, General Leonard Wood, the progressive Republican candidate who had so recently delighted the country by breaking up strikes with troops in an all-out war against what he called “radicalism,” to which Jess could only say “amen.” But Daugherty thought General Wood would fizzle out. When he did, the party would turn to W.G. Thus far, W.G. had been noncommittal.
There was a stir in the chamber as the Vice President sauntered through the swinging doors and climbed the steps to the high throne, and muttered something to the parliamentarian who was never far from his side. Then Thomas R. Marshall brought down his gavel hard. The Senate was in session, and even Alice Longworth was stilled.
Senator Lodge, more than ever like a bumblebee gone white from too much—presidential pollen?—delivered the Foreign Relations Committee report on the treaty, with fourteen reservations, one for each of Wilson’s famous Fourteen Points. Then Senator Harding rose to endorse the committee’s hard work.
Jess thought W.G., as always, magnificent. He used all six of his famous gestures in the most natural way. The voice had enormous power. The arguments, whether good or not, thrilled Jess and the gallery. Even Alice Longworth rose and cheered him when he proclaimed, “It is my deliberate conviction that the League of Nations Covenant as negotiated at Paris either creates a super-government of the nations which enter it or it will prove the colossal disappointment of the ages. I cannot believe this republic ought to sanction it in either case.”
Only the Vice President’s threat to clear the gallery brought to an end this thrilling outburst. Those in favor of the League seemed half-hearted, to say the least. Burden Day was as eloquent as Harding but received no applause because he favored the original League as approved by President Wilson at Paris, and not the one that Lodge had so skillfully re-created. Day also suggested that a compromi
se in the form of two leagues might be acceptable to everyone, but this was received in uncomprehending silence.
As the hours passed, Jess grew wearier and wearier, but the Duchess would not budge until the thing was over. At shortly before eleven in the evening the mellifluous Senator Underwood, a rival to Hitchcock for the minority leadership, proposed an unconditional resolution to ratification.
The Vice President then asked for a vote; and the President’s league was briskly defeated at the request of the President, who would not accept any of Lodge’s handiwork. Then Lodge, master now in his own house, asked for a vote on Wilson’s own treaty, without reservations. Since all the Republicans save one voted against the League, the war between Lodge and Wilson was over; and Lodge was the victor.
As the gallery cheered, the Duchess rose and applauded the Senate as if she had just watched the curtain fall on a particularly satisfying play. Then she and Jess pushed their way through the mob to the rotunda, where Harding was waiting for them.
“We’ve just had an invitation,” he said.
“You go. I’m going home.” The Duchess was firm. “My ankles are killing me.”
“Well, I guess I did wrong by accepting Alice Longworth’s invitation to go over to their house for a late-night supper.”
Jess knew that Mrs. Longworth’s refusal to invite Mrs. Harding to her house on any non-poker occasion deeply rankled. The Duchess’s first reaction was shock. “Why now?” she asked.
Harding pretended to misunderstand. “Because we’ve all missed our supper. And since she’s the colonel of our battalion, she wants to feed her troops.”
“Well, if it makes her happy,” was the Duchess’s dour comment. As they started across the rotunda, Senator Lodge, at the head of what looked to be a parade of admirers, stopped to shake Harding’s hand. “That was a superb speech, Senator.”
“I hope it didn’t do any harm.” W.G. was his usual genial modest self.
“No. Only good.”
Jess was breathing hard now: too much history.
“I have never been through anything like this before,” said Lodge; then frowned. “No. The fight to annex the Philippines was almost as bad.” He turned to Senator Wadsworth. “I remember right after that vote I met your father-in-law, John Hay, on this very spot, and how pleased he was, we all were.” Lodge then swept past them.
The Duchess, possibly eager to annoy Mrs. Longworth, insisted that Jess come, too.
By the time the Hardings arrived at M Street, the small house was crowded. There were the irreconcilables: Senators Borah, Reed, Brandegee, Moses; and the reservationists, Freylinghuysen and the Wadsworths; and the reservationist Democrat, the blind Senator Gore, and his wife.
“Well, that speech was a humdinger!” Folksily, Alice greeted W.G. “You must be very, very proud, Mrs. Harding.”
“Oh, I’ve heard Warren do better.”
“But never in a better cause.” Jess stared with wonder at all the stuffed animal heads on the walls—game shot by Theodore Roosevelt. Alice, who never remembered Jess nor tried to, saw him staring up at the huge head of a mightily antlered moose. “I’m putting Wilson’s head right next to Father’s bull moose.”
Nick Longworth had not been at the Senate. He had dined at home with his French brother-in-law. Now he greeted the guests with the announcement “The cook’s gone home.”
“We’ve got a great many eggs,” said Alice.
“I’ll cook them.” The Duchess marched off to the kitchen, leaving the Colonel of Death’s Battalion to savor her victory in the drawing room, her chosen battlefield, among her chosen troops.
Brandegee toasted Alice, who said, “We’ll do this again in March, when the final vote comes due—like a foreclosure or whatever they call it, on a mortgage, on Mr. Wilson.”
Although Jess was not quite sure why the whole process had to be repeated, it was now clear that the President had lost his League and W.G. had got the country’s attention in a big way. He couldn’t wait for the next day’s newspapers. Meanwhile, W.G. sat between Nick and Borah on a sofa, and seemed unusually content.
In August, the all-powerful Penrose had asked Harding if he’d like to be president, and W.G. had said, characteristically, that as he couldn’t run for two offices at once, he preferred to keep the one he had: he’d file for the Senate. This had only excited the fat man all the more. Ohio was the key to the election, and Harding was Ohio’s favorite son. After Wilson’s imperial approach to war and peace, the country needed a rest, a return to the noble good quiet McKinley sort of man. Later that month, during a hot night on the verandah of the house in Marion, W.G. had discussed the matter with Daugherty and Jess. After the Duchess had taken her ailing kidney to bed, W.G. had given all the reasons why he could not be nominated, starting with everyone’s favorite, General Leonard Wood. Daugherty had dismissed the great paladin with the single word “Epaulets.”
“What does that mean?” asked Jess.
W.G. answered him. “Harry figures that no man who was a general in the war is going to get the vote of any man who wasn’t a general.” W.G. chuckled. “Could be. But Wood’s got all the rich Easterners behind him, and they can usually go out and buy you the job.”
“Not this time.” Daugherty was positive. “He’s got no following. Nobody likes him. Everybody likes you.”
“Well, a lot of people here in Marion and over in Washington Court House think the world of me, but I have a feeling there are a lot of places out in Nevada where nobody gives a damn.” W.G. chewed tobacco comfortably; then spit over the railing in a perfect arc.
Jess envied him this necessary skill in dealing with the plain folks. For years, Jess had tried to chew tobacco but his natural tendency to salivate too much had ruined more than one shirt, including several not his own.
“Then there’s Governor Lowden.” Harding dried his lips with the back of his hand. “He’s got Illinois, and he’s rich.”
“Too rich. His wife’s a Pullman. Not even the Republican Party is going to vote for anybody with railroad money.”
“There was Lincoln,” observed W.G. mildly.
“He was just a hired hand, a railroad lawyer. Lowden married the boss’s daughter. So that leaves you.”
“You know, Harry, even in my daydreams, I’ve never seen myself as another Lincoln.” W.G. was droll.
Daugherty laughed. “I’ll tell you a secret. Nobody else has either. But I’ll tell you another secret. This country doesn’t want another Lincoln, ever again. Why, he killed half a million men, and started up all this darky problem. No, sir, we praise Lincoln but we won’t elect anybody like that ever again. Same goes for Wilson. Folks want a quiet time now, to make some money.”
There was a long silence broken only by the sound of W.G.’s rocking chair. Then an owl hooted in a nearby tree, and Jess shuddered; owls terrified him with their fixed staring eyes and sharp murderous beaks that could slit your throat.
“I suppose,” said Harding at last, “we should start moving around and getting the idea talked about. Outside Ohio, there’s no way I’m going to be anybody’s first choice, but if I’m everybody’s second choice, I’ll make it.” Jess was awed by W.G.’s simple clarity. Even Daugherty, who preferred to do the talking, was struck. He turned in his chair to face Harding, who was now stretching his shirt-sleeved arms. “But the only problem is, what do you do when you’re there, and there’s no war?”
“Well, you throw out the first baseball of the season.”
“That’s seemly,” Harding nodded, “and enjoyable. But what else in a quiet time?”
“Pray that it is a quiet time. Life’s full of surprises. Look at Wilson. He never expected to be a war president or, maybe, a president of the world. So now the man’s a wreck. But every so often history just goes to sleep. Let’s hope we hit one of those long snoozes.”
“And let the folks make money.” Jess added his two bits.
“If I didn’t know everybody in public life, I’d say I wasn’t big
enough for the job, wasn’t worthy.” Harding stood up. “But I do know everybody, so—why not?”
“Good night, Mr. President,” said Daugherty, as Harding opened the screen-door to the house. Harding looked back and smiled; then he shook his handsome head and let the screen-door slam shut behind him.
Now Warren Gamaliel Harding listened respectfully to Senator Borah talk about Senator Borah while Senator Gore, a young-looking man with white hair, ate scrambled eggs with a fork that he held in his right hand while his left forefinger made sure that the eggs were securely on the fork. But how, Jess wondered, fascinated, could he tell so accurately just where his mouth was if he couldn’t see the fork? Of all the Democratic senators, Wilson hated Gore the most. While of the President, Gore had said, “He finds it disturbing if you look above the third button on his waistcoat.”
W.G. regarded the dark-eyed Mrs. Gore as the most attractive of the senatorial wives, but then she was supposed to be part-Indian. Jess amused himself, thinking of the two together, one part-Indian and the other part-Negro. It was a good thing that the public was never let in on half the secrets Jess Smith had found out, starting back in Washington Court House and ending, for now, right here at the heart of the United States Senate.
Alice Longworth proposed a toast. “Down with Wilson.” Everyone drank except Senator Gore, who continued his delicate balancing act. Of course he had been blind since the age of ten and he had had a lot of practice.
4
In the large picture-window of Pamela Smythe’s “palatial home” above Franklin Avenue stood the greatest of living writers, Elinor Glyn, back to the setting sun. Reverently, Mrs. Smythe presented Caroline to the author of Three Weeks, and Caroline nearly curtseyed to the robust woman, swathed, like a sofa, in a purple velvet cloak that somewhat muted the turbulent masses of a glorious red wig that had been parted down the middle of an ursine head out of which peered the intelligent features of a green-eyed Irish girl, somewhat long in the tooth.