“direct aid of”: Bhagavan, Peacemakers, 23–25, 30–31ff. For the Bengal famine and Churchill’s “will to punish” the people of India, see Mukerjee, Churchill’s Secret War. Mukerjee revised the death toll to over five million. See also John Newsinger, “Britain’s Noxious History of Imperial Warfare,” Global Research, 19 November 2013.
divided the Balkans: Breckinridge Long, Diary, 6 June 1944, 352; William Neumann, After Victory: Churchill, Roosevelt, Stalin and the Making of the Peace, 130; Manchester, Last Lion, 2:877–82. The Moscow meetings lasted until 27 October to deal with Poland, and Stalin’s desire to recognize Charles de Gaulle, which FDR agreed to do, eventually.
“Half my mail”: ER to Lash, 14 September 1944, in Lash, World of Love, 139.
“colored WACs are going”: ER to Oveta Culp Hobby, 4 May 1944.
colored WACs assigned: Colonel William Scobey, executive assistant to McCloy, secretary of war, to ER, 24 June 1943. Scobey reported Hobby’s decision that assignments to Camp Shelby “will not be made” and other locations would be investigated; “Colonel Hobby shares Mrs. Roosevelt’s feeling concerning overseas service for Negro members of our Corps.” But we send only “personnel requisitioned by the theatre commanders” and no Negro WAC “has been requisitioned.” See ER to Alston, 8 November 1944.
“Why do Northern Negro”: ER to McCloy, December 1944.
“fit only to do”: Moore, Fighting for America, 292.
“Our people are greatly”: Lillian Jackson to ER, 24 March 1945.
of “rampant discrimination”: See Moore, Fighting for America, 201–3; James, Fighting Racism, 321–23.
“special care in”: ER to James Forrestal, 8 April 1945, with NAACP pamphlet “Mutiny”; Forrestal to ER, 12 April 1945.
“Partitions have been”: My Day, 22 September 1944.
“character which has”: Ibid.
“Storm in the Shelter”: Gruber, Haven, 199.
“your world-known humanity”: Ernst Wolff to ER, 1 February 1945, enclosing “Storm in the Shelter”; Morgenthau to ER, 20 February 1945; Morgenthau to Wolff, 19 February 1945; Elinor Morganthau and sleepless nights, 217.
“to culminate in”: FBI report on “Refugees At Oswego,” S. S. Allen to D. M. Ladd, 27 February 1945.
“admissible under the”: Gruber, Haven, 238–45.
“the Old World’s”: Wendell Willkie, “Cowardice at Chicago,” and “Citizens of Negro Blood,” Collier’s, 7 September and 7 October 1944; Neal, Dark Horse, 315–23. See also Muriel Rukeyser, One Life.
his “great leadership”: My Day, 12 October 1944.
“You are still my”: Hick to ER, ca. 11 October 1944, ibid., 142.
“the ornamental office”: Lash to ER, 1 October 1944, ibid., 143.
“if I don’t deserve”: ER to Lash, 22 October 1944, ibid., 144.
of “re-homing people”: Lady Reading to ER, 10 October 1944, box 1739; ER replied to this letter and to Lady Reading’s cable of congratulations on FDR’s election on 18 November 1944. For V1s and V2s see Olson, Citizens of London, 323–26.
“Republican leaders have”: FDR, Address at Dinner of International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Chauffeurs, . . . Washington, DC, 23 September 1944, in Rosenman, FDR Public Papers, 13:290.
“The right to vote”: FDR, radio address from the White House, 5 October 1944, in Rosenman, FDR Public Papers, 13:317.
vigorously slammed “propagandists”: Ibid.
to “this land”: FDR, campaign address at Soldiers’ Field, Chicago, 28 October 1944, ibid., 13:3670.
“change into dry”: TIR, 337.
“I was really worried”: TIR, 337.
“prudence” in riding: Churchill to FDR, 23 October 1944.
“does not hurt”: FDR to Churchill, 24 October 1944.
“very peaceful and”: Daisy Suckley Diary, 7 November 1944, 140–41.
“the leaves crackling”: Lash, World of Love, 145–47.
“an unusually nice”: Daisy Suckley Diary, 7 November 1944, 140–41.
the president toasted: Lash, World of Love, 146.
“winning the war”: ER, press conference, 9 November 1944, in Beasley, ER Press Conferences. See also C. B. Powell, “FDR or Governor Dewey,” Crisis, October 1944, 315.
wanted all “pussyfooting”: Sherwood, Roosevelt and Hopkins, 831; Lash, Eleanor and Franklin, 712, 713.
“had their lunch”: Daisy Suckley Diary, 23–27 November, 346–47.
“I received yesterday”: My Day, 4 December 1944. John Groth, ER’s source, was a correspondent and artist for the Chicago Sun. “The Camp of Disappearing Men” was based on reports from the Polish underground labor movement; the pamphlet may have been in part a product of the Office of War Information director Elmer Davis. It was published before the Soviets liberated Auschwitz on 27 January 1945 and was distributed by the CIO War Relief Committee. It has been digitized by the University of Michigan.
“It seems to me”: ER to FDR, 4 December 1944, in Lash, Eleanor and Franklin, 713–14. ER’s worries about FDR’s State Department shared by Wallace, see Diary, 11–20 December 1944, 400–9, and Waldo Heinrichs on Joseph Grew.
and “treacherous aggressors”: For Greece, see Wittner, American Intervention in Greece, 23–35, 322–23; Papandreou, Nightmare in Athens, 20–26. For Sforza and Italy, see Cook, Eisenhower, 21–37.
“The composition of”: Stettinius, statement, 5 December 1944.
“I like the statement”: ER to FDR, 6 December 1944, in Lash, Eleanor and Franklin, 714.
be a “pest”: Lash, World of Love, 159.
“suspicious of this”: ER to Trude, 5 December 1944, in Lash, World of Love, 159.
“wrote a column”: ER to FDR, 6 December 1944, ibid.
ER’s phone calls: Daisy Suckley Diary, 28 November–17 December 1944, 347–66.
“You will . . . I believe”: FDR, Fourth Inaugural Address, 20 January 1945, in Rosenman, FDR Public Papers, 13:523.
“evening when we”: ER to Lash, 11 January 1945, in Lash, World of Love, 164.
“I am tired”: ER to Lash, 21 January 1945, ibid., 165.
“Franklin felt that”: ER to Florence Willert, 8 February 1945.
“territorial trusteeships and”: Stettinius, Roosevelt and Russians, 236–39.
“I have never met”: FDR’s visit with King Ibn Sand in Colonel William Eddy’s memo of conversations aboard USS Quincy. The Lebanon-born U.S. minister to Saudi Arabia, Marine Colonel William Eddy, translated and documented these meetings; see Eddy, FDR Meets Ibn Saud. For Eddy’s memo of conversations and related FRUS documents and State Department Bulletin, 25 February 1945, I am grateful to Karl Meyer. FRUS, 1945, vol. 8, 1–9.
“his one complete failure”: ER to Lash, 28 February 1945, in Lash, World of Love, 172; also Lash, Eleanor and Franklin, 717. See also Thomas W. Lippman, “The Day FDR Met Saudi Arabia’s Ibn Saud,” The Link (Ameu.org), April–May 2005, 1–12; and Thomas Lippman, Inside the Mirage: America’s Fragile Partnership with Saudi Arabia.
“Many people in”: My Day, 26 February 1945. For changes in Middle East policy, see Catherwood, Churchill’s Folly, and Fromkin, Peace to End All Peace.
great “personal loss”: TIR, 342.
“Franklin feels his”: Daisy Suckley Diary, 27 February 1945, 397.
“I come from the”: FDR, address to Congress on Yalta, 1 March 1945, in Rosenman, FDR Public Papers.
“He says he felt”: ER to Lash, 28 February 1945, in Lash, World of Love, 172.
“thin and worn and gray”: Margaret Fayerweather Diary, in Lash, Eleanor and Franklin, 718–19.
“I found him less”: TIR, 342–43.
“they would not”: Ibid.
“settled in Warm”: Lash, Eleanor and Franklin, 719.
“great mee
ting at”: ER press conference, 2 April 1945, in Beasley, ER Press Conferences, 331–32.
“We are now talking”: Ibid.
“whether colonial empires”: Bhagavan, Peacemakers, 34–41, 49–53. See also Brittain, Envoy Extraordinary; Pandit, Scope of Happiness.
“so as not to stir”: ER to Stettinius, 4 April 1945, in Bhagavan, Peacemakers.
“Dearest Franklin, I”: ER to FDR, 8 April 1945.
“most interesting speeches”: My Day, 11 April 1945.
was “terribly shocked”: Morgenthau Diaries, 11 April 1945, 1499–1503, with gratitude to Bill Hannegan.
“real knowledge” of: ER, press conference, 12 April 1945, in Beasley, ER Press Conferences, 334–36.
“in a sea of misery”: For U.S.-U.K. reaction to the camps, 11–15 April, and Eisenhower’s tour, see Hitchcock, Bitter Road, 295ff, and Cook, Eisenhower, 33–35. The night Eisenhower learned that FDR was dead, he resolved to honor all agreements made at Yalta. For ER’s tour of Zeilsheim, see the epilogue.
FDR had “fainted”: TIR, 343–44.
“the President had slipped”: Laura (Polly) Delano’s call.
“pour a generous jigger”: ER II, With Love, 84–85; ER II to author.
“tall and stately”: West, Upstairs, 55–56.
“waited in our office”: West, Upstairs. In TIR, ER says she asked to have the casket opened “so that I could go in alone to put a few flowers in it,” 345.
“Today this nation”: FDR’s final speech, ms.
“did not tell anyone”: Lash, World of Love, 183.
“I know you”: ER to Lash, 16 April 1945, ibid., 188.
“loved him more deeply”: Daisy Suckley Diary, 420–21.
“I don’t think she ever”: Lape to Lash and many others.
“You have an understanding”: ER to Lape, 25 April 1945, in Lash, World of Love, 190. See Eleanor and Franklin, 720–23; World of Love, 183–90; Burns, Soldier of Freedom, 601–6.
“All human beings have”: TIR, 349.
“The story is over”: Lash, World of Love, 191.
Epilogue: ER’s Legacy: Human Rights
“Like countless other women”: ER, You Learn by Living, 55.
“pervades the world”: My Day, 17 April 1945.
“a stroke of genius”: Black, ed., ER Papers, 1:16.
“Nothing would induce me”: My Day, 19 April 1945.
“Because I was the wife”: My Day, 19 April 1945.
“I’m glad you like”: ER to Trude Lash, n.d., in Lash, World of Love, 192.
“The Trumans have”: ER to Hick, 19 April 1945, ibid., 189.
“If we do not”: My Day, 30 April 1945.
“I listened to your”: ER to Truman, 8 May 1945, in Neal, Eleanor and Harry, 25.
“the whole family”: Truman to ER, 10 May 1945, ibid., 26–27.
“Your experience with”: ER to Truman, 14 May 1945, ibid., 28–29.
“The day the atomic”: My Day, 12 October 1945.
“We have an obligation”: ER to Truman, 20 November 1945, in Neal, Eleanor and Harry, 45–46.
felt “very inadequate”: ER to Anna, 20 December 1945, in Lash, World of Love, 207.
“first UN team”: New York Times, 20 December 1945.
“War must be abolished”: Carrie Chapman Catt to ER, 28 December 1945, box 4561, ER Papers.
“the desires of American Negroes”: Walter White, Mary McLeod Bethune, and Dr. W. E. B. Du Bois to ER, December 1945, box 4561.
“The important thing”: Lape to ER, December 1945, box 4562, ER papers.
“said in his rather deep”: ER, On My Own, 41–42.
her words were quoted: New York Times, 8 January 1946; FRUS, I, 1947, 304ff; FRUS, I, 1948, 278–79.
“I like the Vandenbergs”: ER, London Diary, 2, 6, 7, and 27 January 1946.
“is smart & hard”: ER to Elinor Morgenthau, 20 January 1946, in Lash, World of Love, 214. ER told Hick, “Byrnes is a curious study, when I come home I’m going to give you thumbnail sketches of my playmates that I don’t dare put on paper.” ER to Hick, 22 January 1946, in Lash, World of Love, 215–16.
“I said many things”: ER, London Diary, 16 January 1946.
“The papers should not”: Ibid.
“At the Assembly”: Ibid.
“Yesterday was the”: ER, London Diary, 31 January 1946.
“The afternoon session”: Ibid., 23 January 1946.
“a pleasant dinner”: Ibid., in Black, ed., ER Papers, 1:221. In 1947, when Brittain was on a ten-week tour of the United States, ER invited her to Hyde Park. Again, we have no details of their discussions, although Brittain noted that ER was “now informal and unintimidating.” Brittain, Testament of Experience, 407. A lifelong member of WILPF, she subsequently wrote a biography of its illustrious British founder Emmeline Pethick-Lawrence, whose favorite expression after the war was “It’s women for women now!” See Brittain, Pethick-Lawrence; Brittain, Envoy Extraordinary; and Muriel Mellown, “Vera Brittain: Feminist in a New Age (1896–1970),” in Spender, ed., Feminist Theorists, 313–44.
“It is a liberal”: Ibid.
“Ukrainians, Belorussians”: ER, On My Own, 49–50.
“all we could”: ER, On My Own, 49–53.
“So—against odds”: ER, London Diary, 6 and 8 February 1946.
“had the pleasure”: My Day, 11 and 13 February 1946.
“at the end”: ER, London Diary, 29 January 1946 and passim.
“fill our souls”: My Day, 16 February 1946. See also On My Own, 55–56; Black, ER Papers, 1:252–59.
“Poles and Balts”: My Day, 16 February 1946.
the “ultimate answer?”: My Day, 16 February 1946.
“the structure and functions”: Glendon, A World Made New, 30.
“From Stettin in the Baltic”: Churchill, Iron Curtain speech, 5 March 1946. See YouTube, with dramatic details. Also see My Day, 7 March 1946. Margaret Truman, who wrote her father’s speech, was not prepared for Churchill’s bellicose declaration, although the prime minister had sent the president an “Iron Curtain” telegram on 12 May 1945. See Churchill, Taken from the Diaries of Lord Moran: The Struggle for Survival, 1940–65, 311–314.
“Instead of running”: My Day, 7 March 1946.
“men of all parties”: Arthur Murray to ER, 19 March 1946, in Black, ER Papers, 1:279–281. ER to Murray, 13 April 1946.
the committee that: Mary Ann Glendon details the work and vision of the key members of the team that drafted and lobbied for the Declaration from its first meetings in January 1947 at Lake Success, New York, to its final meetings in Geneva and Paris. Glendon, A World Made New, 32–35, 53. The contributions of John Humphrey, Charles Malik, P. C. Chang, and René Cassin were mostly forgotten and uncelebrated until Glendon’s book; see 126–30.
the words “all men”: Ibid., 90–92. For Hansa Mehta’s role, see Bhagavan, Peacemakers, 137–46.
“All human beings”: UN Declaration of Human Rights.
a “first step”: Glendon, A World Made New, 139.
Hansa Mehta’s suggestion: Bhagavan, Peacemakers, 137–43, 204.
“reached a turning point”: Truman, “Address Before the NAACP,” 29 June 1947, in Geselbracht, Legacy of Truman, 152–55. For 29 June 1947, see Neal, Eleanor and Harry, 88, 105–6.
“blot of lynching”: Geselbracht, Legacy of Truman, 96.
“To Secure These Rights”: ER to Truman, 23 December 1947, in Neal, Eleanor and Harry, 117; New York Times, 19 June, 29 June, and 30 June 1947.
“We Charge Genocide”: Black, ER Papers, 2:855–58.
“role will embarrass”: Glendon, A World Made New, 195.
“harsh and naïve”: Ibid., 199. Republican Ambassador to the Holy See under George W. Bush, P
rof. Glendon’s views are tempered and complex.
“reports and studies”: The UN adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide on 9 December 1948, and it entered into force on 8 September 1951. The United States did not ratify the Genocide Convention until 1988. Browne-Marshall, Race, Law, and American Society, 234–35.
she traveled across: See ER, India and the Awakening East.
“Where, after all”: ER to United Nations, 27 March 1958, in Black, ER Papers. In 1980 the human rights case Filártiga v Peña-Irala, 630 F.2d 876 (2d Cir. 1980), brought by the Center for Constitutional Rights, globalized the Universal Declaration. For ER’s human rights legacy, see Beth Van Schaack, “The Anatomy of Torture: A Documentary History of Filártiga v Peña-Irala” (review), Human Rights Quarterly 30, no. 4 (November 2008). See also Bert Lockwood, ed., Women’s Rights: A Human Rights Reader; Wendy Chavkin and Ellen Chesler, Where Human Rights Begin: Health, Sexuality, and Women; and Amnesty International, Outright, Human Rights Watch.
“our great struggle”: ER, Congressional Record, 19 April 1950, A-2802.
“leader among the American”: My Day, 3 May 1952.
“save us” from: My Day, 22 May 1952.
“He wanted to find”: My Day, 3 September 1949.
“does not permit”: ER, “Some of My Best Friends Are Negro,” Ebony, February 1953, in Black, What I Hope to Leave Behind, 171–78.
“dedicated to the fight”: For ER and Anne Braden, see Catherine Fosl, Subversive Southerner. Anne Braden became editor of The Southern Patriot in 1957; her memoir, The Wall Between, which ER hoped everyone would read, was published in 1958.
“segregation were practiced”: My Day, 17 October 1952. See also Black, ER Papers, 2:956–59.
“the white race”: ER’s campaign addresses for Adlai Stevenson, Detroit, 3 October 1956, in Black, What I Hope to Leave Behind, 441–42; see esp. Charleston, WV, 1 October 1956, 437–39.
“inaugurated the American”: Belafonte, My Song, 188.
“Well, little man”: Ibid., 189.
“I am sure”: Ibid., 191–92.
“to move in”: Ibid., 192.
“race . . . the greatest”: Ibid., 188–197.
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