The Age of Eisenhower

by William I Hitchcock

  31. Atkinson, An Army at Dawn, 198–99. Churchill supported the deal on the grounds of military necessity, even if it came at a high political cost at home. The episode is portrayed in Churchill, The Second World War: The Hinge of Fate, 629–47; Miller, Ike the Soldier, 417–432.

  32. Danchev and Todman eds., War Diaries, 1939–1945, 343, 351.

  33. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 245, 247.

  34. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 388.

  35. Letter, April 7, 1943, Griffith, Ike’s Letters to a Friend, 19.

  36. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 116. For an equally glowing assessment by a war correspondent who spent years covering Eisenhower, see Gunther, Eisenhower, 19–24. General Brooke desperately wanted to command Overlord but was denied it; Eisenhower expected that Marshall or perhaps Brooke would be given the job and seemed both resigned and perhaps even relieved that others would carry the burden for a while. It is hard to imagine that he would have felt the despair that Brooke experienced upon being told that Overlord would not be his assignment. See Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 421; Roberts, Masters and Commanders, 395–98. For FDR’s informing Eisenhower about the command, see David Eisenhower, Eisenhower at War, 42–46.

  37. Roberts, Masters and Commanders, 386–88; diary entry, June 3, 1944, Ferrell, The Eisenhower Diaries, 118.

  38. For details about life in Telegraph Cottage, see Summersby, Eisenhower Was My Boss, 25–32.

  39. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 730.

  40. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 792; letter, July 9, 1945, Griffith, Ike’s Letters to a Friend, 26.

  41. Butcher, My Three Years with Eisenhower, 834.

  CHAPTER 2: STAR POWER

  Epigraph: DDE quoted in New York Times, July 5, 1947.

  1. John Eisenhower, Letters to Mamie, 224.

  2. Letter, Marshall to DDE, PDDE, 6:14–15.

  3. Churchill quotation and text of speech in New York Times, June 13, 1945; Danchev and Todman, Lord Alanbrooke, 697; coverage in The Times (London), June 13, 1945.

  4. New York Times, June 20, 1945. On La Guardia’s declaration, New York Times, June 18, 1945.

  5. Ferrell, Off the Record, 47.

  6. The Truman offer is recounted in DDE, Crusade in Europe, 444. Truman later denied the episode. Letters to Neill Edwards Bailey, August 1, 1945, and George Marshall, August 27, 1945, PDDE, 6:239, and 309–10.

  7. Letters, May 12 and 18, 1945, John Eisenhower, Letters to Mamie, 253–54.

  8. For press criticism, see letter to Marshall, June 1, 1945, PDDE, 6:114–17; John Eisenhower, Strictly Personal, 113.

  9. DDE, Crusade in Europe, 459.

  10. DDE, Crusade in Europe, 463; John Eisenhower, Strictly Personal, 102–4.

  11. John Eisenhower, Strictly Personal, 106–9; DDE, Crusade in Europe, 475.

  12. Letter to Marshall, August 27, 1945, PDDE, 6:309–10; letters, August 31 and September 4, 1945, John Eisenhower, Letters to Mamie, 269–70.

  13. DDE, At Ease, 316. Coverage of demobilization crisis in New York Times, January 5, 8, 10, 11, 13, 1947; Washington Post, January 10 and 16, 1946.

  14. Eisenhower statement to Congress in New York Times, January 16, 1947; ban on demonstrations, New York Times, January 18, 1946; letter to Douglas MacArthur, January 28, 1946, PDDE, 7:797–99.

  15. Letter to Bernard Baruch, January 5, 1946, PDDE, 7:735–36; Griffith, Ike’s Letters to a Friend, 80.

  16. DDE, At Ease, 319.

  17. For Eisenhower’s report on military readiness, New York Times, March 6 and 7, 1946; for speech to American Newspaper Publishers Association, New York Times, April 26, 1946.

  18. Letter, March 13, 1946, Griffith, Ike’s Letter’s to a Friend, 34; letter to John Sheldon Doud Eisenhower, March 3, 1946, PDDE, 7:881–82.

  19. Patterson, Grand Expectations, 39–52.

  20. New York Times, November 10, 1946.

  21. Arthur Krock, “Taboo against Soldiers May Die in the ’48 Race,” New York Times, September 29, 1946.

  22. New York Times, September 29, 1946; “Eisenhower for President Talk Grows Louder,” New York Times, December 8, 1946; diary entries, November 12 and December 7, 1946, Ferrell, The Eisenhower Diaries, 138–39.

  23. New York Times, November 11, 1946; letter to John Sheldon Doud, January 31, 1947, PDDE, 8:1470–72.

  24. Letter to Walter Bedell Smith, April 18, 1946, PDDE, 8:1648–49.

  25. DDE, At Ease, 337; letter to Thomas I. Parkinson, June 23, 1947, PDDE, 8:1775–76.

  26. “The appointment [to Columbia] immediately revived talk of Eisenhower entering politics, possibly as a ’48 or ’52 White House candidate,” reported the Washington Post, June 25, 1947. Joseph and Stewart Alsop declared that the Columbia appointment triggered a “sheep-like stampede” among Republicans to Ike (Washington Post, August 20, 1947). On the Draft Eisenhower group and Ike’s repudiation of it, see New York Times, August 29, September 11, September 12, October 12, 1947; Washington Post, September 11, 1947.

  27. He made these remarks to reporters in Vicksburg on July 4, 1947 (New York Times, July 5, 1947). Letter to Walter Bedell Smith, September 18, 1947, PDDE, 9:1933–35. He wrote in a similar vein to Milton (October 16, 1947, PDDE, 9:1986–88).

  28. New York Times, January 10, 1948; correspondence between Finder and Eisenhower in PDDE, 9:2191–93, 2202–3; Leonard Finder Papers, box 1, DDEL. Finder had written to Eisenhower on January 12 telling him of the paper’s endorsement of the draft movement in New Hampshire. Eisenhower told Finder a week later that the public refusal had been “a difficult letter to write.” Finder papers, box 1, letter to Finder, January 27, 1948, DDEL.

  29. Letter to James Forrestal, September 27, 1948, PDDE, 10:230–31.

  30. Diary entry and footnote, December 13, 1948, PDDE, 10:365–68.

  31. On the frequency of his speaking engagements, letter to Helen Rogers Reid, September 24, 1948, PDDE, 10:224.

  32. Columbia University inaugural speech, text in New York Times, October 13, 1948.

  33. Diary entry, January 14, 1949, PDDE, 10:430–32; letter to Professor Benjamin Wood, May 6, 1949, PDDE, 10:570–72; New York Times, January 30, 1949.

  34. Letter to Amon G. Carter, June 27, 1949, PDDE, 10:665–69.

  35. Diary entry, September 27, 1949, PDDE, 10:755–57. For press comment on Ike’s renewed presidential fortunes, see New York Times, September 11 and 18, 1949; Washington Post, September 8, 1949; diary entry, November 25, 1949, PDDE, 10:839–41.

  36. On the best-dressed poll, Los Angeles Times, February 9, 1950.

  37. Hughes, The Ordeal of Power, 19–20; on Ike “moving young,” see C. D. Jackson, “Notes on Ike,” C.D. Jackson Papers, box 50, DDEL; Susan Eisenhower, Mrs. Ike, 34; Kenneth Davis, Soldier of Democracy, 135–36; Krock, Memoirs, 280; Cutler, No Time for Rest, 262.

  38. Cleveland Plain Dealer, April 6, 1950.

  39. Robinson on Eisenhower’s energy is in Robinson notes on meeting of October 17, 1947, Robinson Papers, box 9, DDEL; obituary of William E. Robinson, New York Times, June 8, 1969; Samuel T. Williamson, “Cokes All Around,” New York Times, January 17, 1960.

  40. Sampson, The Masters.

  41. New York Times, March 2, 1962, and August 26, 1952.

  42. New York Times, March 9, 1985; Washington Post, March 9, 1985.

  43. Profile of Woodruff in Wall Street Journal, January 9, 1981; New York Times, December 20, 1982; “Robert Woodruff (1889–1985),” in New Georgia Encyclopedia at newgeorgiaencyclopedia.org.

  CHAPTER 3: CALL TO DUTY

  Epigraph: Diary entry, October 4, 1951, PDDE, 12:609.

  1. Diary entry, January 1, 1950, PDDE, 11: 882–89.

  2. Gallup poll conducted February 26–March 3, 1950, www.ropercenter.uconn.edu; Richard Rovere, Harper’s, May 1950; Dewey in New York Times, June 19, 1950.

  3. New York Times, March 24, March 28, March 30, March 31, 1950.

  4. Marshall to Rose Page Wilson, July 24, 1950, Papers of
George C. Marshall, 7:146.

  5. For a brilliant summary of U.S. strategic thinking in this period, see Leffler, A Preponderance of Power, 361–74.

  6. Eisenhower’s notes on his meeting with President Truman, diary entry, October 28, 1950, PDDE, 11:1388–92; letter to Swede Hazlett, November 1, 1950, PDDE, 11:1396–98.

  7. Diary entries, July 6, 1950, November 6, 1950, and December 5, 1950, PDDE, 11:1211–12, 1408–11, 1459–60; letter to Gen. Al Gruenther, November 30, 1950, PDDE, 11: 1450–51.

  8. “Table 3.1—Outlays by Superfunction and Function: 1940–2017,” White House, http://www.whitehouse.gov/omb/budget/Historicals; Leffler, A Preponderance of Power, 372–74.

  9. Hoover speech, New York Times, December 21, 1950; Taft speech in Senate, Los Angeles Times, January 6, 1951; New York Times, January 6, 1951. The full text of the January 5 speech is in Papers of Robert A. Taft, 4:230–52.

  10. Text of the speech in New York Times, February 2, 1951.

  11. New York Times, February 2, 1951.

  12. DDE, Mandate for Change, 14; DDE, At Ease, 369–72. Eisenhower related the details of this encounter to his brother. See Milton Eisenhower, The President Is Calling, 243–45).

  13. Washington Post, February 2, 1951; New York Times, March 4, 1951.

  14. Diary entry, March 13, 1951, PDDE, 12:124. German attitudes in Vigers, “The German People and Rearmament.”

  15. Letter to Edward J. Bermingham, February 28, 1951, PDDE, 12:74–78. A few days later Eisenhower forwarded this letter to his pal Bill Robinson with an accompanying note recalling how he had been “violently opposed” to many of the Truman administration’s policies and that only a sense of “military duty” compelled him to take up the NATO position. Letter to Bill Robinson, March 6, 1951, PDDE, 12:97–99; Robinson Papers, box 1, DDEL.

  16. Rovere and Schlesinger, The General and the President, 168–72; Hartford Courant, March 24, 1951; New York Times, March 25, 1951; Christian Science Monitor, March 26, 1951; Boston Globe, April 6, 1951.

  17. Rovere and Schlesinger, The General and President, 5; Boston Globe, April 11, 1951.

  18. Address by General MacArthur to Congress, April 19, 1951, reproduced in Rovere and Schlesinger, The General and the President, 270–77. Parade details: New York Times, April 21, 1951.

  19. Clay to Eisenhower, April 13, 1951, Robinson Papers, box 1, DDEL; Clay to Eisenhower, May 18, 1951, Pre-Presidential Papers, Principal File, box 24, DDEL. According to Herbert Brownell, Clay was “the key man.” He said “it would have been impossible for any other individual to convince him to run.” Brownell Oral History, OH-362, DDEL. Cliff Roberts and Bill Robinson both sent similar analyses of the MacArthur issue to Ike: Roberts to Eisenhower, April 18, 1951, and Robinson to Eisenhower, April 20, 1951, Robinson Papers, box 1, DDEL.

  20. Letters to Clay, April 16 and May 30, 1951, PDDE, 12:306–7.

  21. William Robinson, “Paris Diary,” June 21–July 8, 1951, Robinson Papers, box 1, DDEL.

  22. Lodge, The Storm Has Many Eyes, 77–79.

  23. Clay to Eisenhower, August 22, 1951, Pre-Presidential Papers, Principal File, box 24, DDEL; letter to Ed Birmingham, September 24, 1951, PDDE, 12: note 2, 564; diary entry, October 4, 1951, PDDE, 12:608–9.

  24. The details of Clark’s visit and the text of the letter are in Clark’s lengthy manuscript “Eisenhower for President,” Edwin N. Clark Papers, box 4, DDEL. The actual letter was discovered only in 1993 by Eisenhower scholar William Bragg Ewald Jr. and was published in the New York Times Magazine, November 14, 1993. For the Clark mission, see Ewald’s book, Eisenhower the President, 40–41. For a profile of Duff, see William S. White, “Senator Duff of the Eisenhower Team,” New York Times, November 11, 1951.

  25. New York Times, November 3, 1951. The poll was done in mid-October 1951 and can be seen at http://www.ropercenter.uconn.edu/. The Gallup poll showed Eisenhower with a lead over Truman from February 1950 right through the spring of 1952. Ike’s lead in these polls was never smaller than 30 points. The press coverage can be seen in Christian Science Monitor, November 5 and 7, Washington Post, November 5 and 7, New York Times, November 6 and 7, and Boston Globe, November 7, 1951. Arthur Krock reported the detailed political exchange in the New York Times on November 8, 1951, which was promptly denied by the participants. Krock elaborated on the controversy in his memoirs, where he stuck to the story and revealed that Associate Justice William O. Douglas of the Supreme Court was his source for the Truman-Eisenhower conversation (Memoirs, 268–69). Truman admitted this in passing when he referred to the political content of their lunch conversation in a later letter to Eisenhower. Letter to Truman, January 1, 1952, PDDE, 12:830–31, note 1.

  26. Letter to William Robinson, November 8, 1951, PDDE, 12: note 2, 691.

  27. New York Times, November 18, 1951.

  28. On Lodge’s efforts, see Lodge, The Storm Has Many Eyes, 83–87; letter to Robinson, November 24, 1951, PDDE, 12:731.

  29. William Robinson memo, December 29, 1951, Robinson Papers, box 1, DDEL. “The Case for Ike,” Life, January 7, 1952.

  30. Lodge, The Storm Has Many Eyes, 94–98. In correspondence with Ed Bermingham, Eisenhower said that it had finally become necessary “to acknowledge the existence of a factual record that establishes a party allegiance coinciding with that of so many of my warm friends.” Letter to Bermingham, January 7, 1952, Eisenhower-Bermingham Correspondence, box 1, DDEL.

  31. McCrary obituary, New York Times, July 30, 2003.

  32. Extensive press coverage of the event was carried in the February 9 and 10, 1952, editions of the New York Times, Boston Globe, Los Angeles Times, and Washington Post. Life magazine carried many photographs of the evening’s festivities in the February 18, 1952, issue.

  33. Letter to Philip Young, February 11, 1952, PDDE, 13:970.

  34. Jacqueline Cochran Oral History, OH-42, DDEL; diary entry, February 12, 1952, PDDE, 13:971. Eisenhower gives a less dramatic account in Mandate for Change, 20.

  35. Lucius Clay Oral History, OH-56, DDEL.

  36. Letter to Clay, February 20, 1952, PDDE, 13:997–99.

  37. Taft campaign speeches covered in Boston Globe, March 7, Christian Science Monitor, March 8, New York Times, March 8, 1952.

  38. James Reston, “New Hampshire Stages a Politician’s Circus,” New York Times, March 9, 1952.

  39. Manchester Union Leader, June 18 and 24, 1952. For an excellent analysis of the campaign, see Robert B. Dishman, “How It All Began: The Eisenhower Pre-Convention Campaign in New Hampshire, 1952,” New England Quarterly, March 1953, 3–26; Walter Lippmann, Boston Globe, March 13, 1952; Pickett, Eisenhower Decides to Run, 182.

  40. Brownell, Advising Ike, 89–103.

  41. See the essay in Time, April 7, 1952. Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr., who was present that night, recalled that some Democrats in the audience, eager for a new leader, were pleased by the news (Journals, 3–4). Truman later claimed he had decided not to run two years earlier, but this seems dubious given his correspondence with Eisenhower in late 1951. Had Ike stayed out and Taft been nominated by the Republicans, it seems highly likely Truman would have run for reelection. See Truman, Memoirs: Years of Trial and Hope, 488.

  42. Letter to Truman, April 2, 1952, and Truman’s reply of April 6, PDDE, 13:1154–56.

  CHAPTER 4: CRUSADE

  Epigraph: “Address Accepting the Presidential Nomination at the Republican National Convention in Chicago,” July 11, 1952, American Presidency Project, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=75626.

  1. New York Times, June 5, 1952.

  2. Herbert Brownell Oral History, OH-157, DDEL.

  3. New York Times, June 5, 1952. “Eisenhower’s First Campaign Speech,” Boston Globe, June 5, 1952; Atlanta Daily World, June 5, 1952; Hartford Courant, June 5, 1952. For details on the Truman-era scandals, see Dunar, The Truman Scandals, chapters 5–6.

  4. Washington Post, June 6, 1952.

  5. Stewart Alsop, New York Herald Tribune, June 6, 1952. See also
Christian Science Monitor, June 6, 1952, and the praise of the Washington Post editorial page, June 6, 1952.

  6. New York Times, June 1, 1952.

  7. Staff Files, Citizens for Eisenhower Files of Young and Rubicam, “The Texas Steal,” box 5, DDEL. On Eisenhower’s Texas speech, see Boston Globe, New York Times, Baltimore Sun, and Washington Post, all June 22, 1952.

  8. Brownell, Advising Ike, 117. His chapter 6 provides an excellent summary of the technical issues at stake at the convention, as does Lodge, The Storm Has Many Eyes, 105–25. See also Patterson, Mr. Republican, 547–58. A smart account of the whole affair by a close observer is Moos, The Republicans, 449–84. For the full text of the Fair Play amendment, see Brownell Papers, box 128, DDEL.

  9. The detailed vote tabulations are in Official Report of the Proceedings of the Twenty-Fifth Republican National Convention, 405–6. See also Parmet, Eisenhower and the American Crusades, 83–101.

  10. Rovere, Affairs of State, 26–27, 32. For the enduring bitterness, see Moos, The Republicans, 482–83. Robert Taft died a year later, in August 1953. Had he been nominated, he probably would have selected Douglas MacArthur as his running mate. Had Taft been elected, MacArthur would have been president at least from 1953 to 1956.

  11. New York Times, May 22, 1952, reporting the result of a Newsweek poll.

  12. Brownell quoted in Mazo, Richard Nixon, 89; Adams, Firsthand Report, 34. Adams put it this way, some years later: “Nixon’s activity against the Communist conspiracy in this country had well categorized him as a buoyant, active, aggressive and I guess you could say reasonably intelligent politician, and they accepted him on the basis of his accomplishments, rather than his immaturity” (Sherman Adams Oral History, OH-162, DDEL). Jim Hagerty recalled it much the same way. The key factors were “his Congressional record” and “the Alger Hiss incident” (James Hagerty Oral History, OH-91, DDEL).

  13. New York Times, May 9, 1952; Nixon, Six Crises, 299; Mazo, Richard Nixon, 90; Morris, Richard Milhous Nixon, 683–84.

  14. Smith, Thomas E. Dewey and His Times, 596–97; Adams, Firsthand Report, 34–36; Brownell, Advising Ike, 120–21; Morris, Richard Milhous Nixon, 731–33. In 1970 Dewey sent Brownell a memorandum detailing the Nixon selection of 1952, emphasizing that Nixon’s role in getting Hiss was the principal argument in his favor. Dewey to Brownell, March 17, 1970, Herbert Brownell Papers, box 108, DDEL.