The Accidental President

by A. J. Baime

  Hitler and his band of gangsters would soon be held accountable, Truman was sure. Top Nazi officials were hiding somewhere in Berlin. They could only hope the Americans would get to them first, before the Russians, who unlike American soldiers bore the scars of a Nazi invasion of their country. Nor did the Soviet army hold itself to what the Americans considered a code of moral conduct in the European war.

  Concentration camp prisoners were not the only innocents dying in Europe. The liberation of Nazi-occupied nations brought on problems that American officials found potentially unsolvable, notably starvation and pestilence. The War Department had sent one of its officials, John J. McCloy, on a fact-finding mission in Europe, and McCloy had now returned. His report was delivered to Truman during the early days of the new administration.

  “There is complete economic, social and political collapse going on in Central Europe,” McCloy wrote, “the extent of which is unparalleled in history unless one goes back to the collapse of the Roman Empire, and even that may not have been as great an economic upheaval . . . One of the chief elements of disorder is the immense number of previously enslaved people who will be running around loose, as well as Germans who have been made homeless by the devastation of [the Allies’] victory.”

  According to the State Department, seven million displaced people were now in Germany or in formerly Nazi-conquered territory, with nowhere to go and no infrastructure to help them. There was little food, and little coal production for heating. Railroads, canals, and roads had been destroyed, making transportation—the arterial system of all economies—almost nonexistent. The most basic human comforts were unavailable to vast populations throughout the continent. An April 16 memo to the president pointed out that “without drastic action,” hunger and pestilence in liberated areas would lead to more political unrest, and could derail the formation of the United Nations: “The success of any plans agreed upon at San Francisco can be seriously jeopardized, if not defeated, by internal chaos in the liberated countries.”

  Still another complication arose during Truman’s first week. On the day of Roosevelt’s death, Eisenhower’s troops had established a bridgehead on the Elbe River near Magdeburg, some sixty miles west of Berlin. It was here that Eisenhower was to make the most controversial decision of his military career. The commanding general ordered his armies to stop at the Elbe, rather than push on toward the German capital. In the days before FDR’s death Eisenhower and Churchill had engaged in a contentious debate over the general’s plans to halt the Anglo-American armies at the Elbe. The Russians were pushing toward Berlin from the east. Churchill urged, almost desperately, that Eisenhower push past the Elbe to capture Berlin, before Stalin’s armies got there.

  “Why should we not cross the Elbe and advance as far eastward as possible?” Churchill cabled Eisenhower. The prime minister feared that if the Russians captured all of Austria and Berlin, this would “raise grave and formidable difficulties in the future.” The Soviets were allies, but from the prime minister’s point of view, the Anglo-Americans and the Red Army were in a race to fill the power vacuum left by the conquered Nazis.

  Eisenhower chose to halt at the Elbe. His reasoning would be debated by historians for generations, but the following are logical conclusions: First, zones of post-surrender occupation had already been drawn, and Eisenhower’s armies had already pushed past the border of where the American occupation zone was to be, and into the Russian zone. So why conquer more territory at the cost of American lives knowing that, once the Germans surrendered, Eisenhower would have to give that territory back to the Soviets? Second, Eisenhower feared what would happen when the American and Russian armies finally met, joining the eastern and western fronts. This meeting was likely to happen in a matter of a few days. The Elbe River would serve as a convenient buffer when it did. The third reason was that Berlin was a political objective. Eisenhower was a general, and had to make decisions in the field based on military objectives—not political ones.

  From the White House, Truman supported Eisenhower’s decision. What would happen next was anyone’s guess. As Secretary of War Henry Stimson described the situation: “The armies had outrun the policy makers.” Only one thing seemed for sure. As McCloy had concluded in the report on his fact-finding mission in Europe: “In this atmosphere of disturbance and collapse, atrocities and disarrangement, we are going to have to work out a practical relationship with the Russians. It will require the highest talents, tolerance and wisdom in order to accomplish our aims.”

  ///

  At 9:45 a.m. on April 20—Truman’s eighth full day as president—Henry Morgenthau arrived in the Oval Office.

  “Mr. Secretary,” Truman said.

  “Before you were President,” Morgenthau came back, “you called me Henry. I wish you would continue to do that.” Then: “Mr. President, if you don’t misunderstand me, as a citizen, I would like to say that I think you have done extremely well in the first week.”

  “I have had all the breaks,” Truman said.

  Morgenthau had only fifteen minutes scheduled with Truman. He handed over a memo—pages full of facts that Truman had requested from him. This memorandum was the first of many aimed at developing a snapshot for the president of the nation’s economy, and how it fit into the current global emergency. For a man who had been a financial failure all his life, Truman was skilled with handling budgets and spotting leaks in the flow of capital, a skill he had first picked up as a judge in Jackson County during the Depression. Only now the numbers were astronomical, for the United States currently formed the largest, most powerful economy in the history of the world. The federal government had become the purchaser of nearly half the products of the nation’s industries. This was a situation that had no precedent. Truman had only six weeks before he would have to deliver his first military budget to Congress. He was facing very difficult decision making.

  According to Morgenthau’s memorandum, fiscal year spending for 1945 equated to some $99 billion, $88 billion of which was for war activities. Receipts, exclusive of borrowing, were estimated at $46 billion, or about 46 percent of the total. The federal government’s income flowed through taxes and war bonds, the latter of which 85 million Americans had invested in. For fiscal year 1946, Morgenthau estimated the budget at $82.5 billion, with $69.5 billion marked for war activities, though there was no way to know what war expenditures would be, as they would depend on the results of military action as yet to play out.

  The gap in spending and income had resulted in unprecedented national debt, already well over $250 billion and growing fast. Roosevelt had promised when he entered the White House in 1933 that he would balance the budget, something the previous president, Hoover, had failed to do. However, FDR had subsequently been influenced by the British economist John Maynard Keynes, who argued that in times of emergency (such as the Great Depression and the war), “public authority must be called in aid to create additional current incomes through the expenditure of borrowed or printed money.” In other words, Keynes urged deficit spending. This radical theory, along with the spectacular rise in economic activity spurred by the war, was greatly responsible for pulling the United States out of the Depression.

  The war had electrocuted the economy. The gross national product had more than doubled during the war years, and consumer income had risen sharply. Average weekly earnings in America were $24.20 in 1940; now, in 1945, that number hit $44.39. However, supplies of goods from toaster ovens to automobiles had declined or disappeared altogether. This equation—tremendous demand, very little supply—resulted in the frightening specter of runaway inflation. The federal government’s army of economists had strategized an elaborate price-control system to stem inflation. But the price controls could not remain in place forever. Some critics claimed FDR and Keynes had steered the American economy head on for a cliff ledge. Economists had learned a lot from the last war, but still, this was uncharted territory.

  Above all of this financial turmoil hun
g the dark cloud of reconversion. Someday—and that someday would come soon, Truman could only hope—thousands of government-owned factories, building war materiel, would have to stop producing. As soon as the war ended, the federal government was set to cancel billions of dollars’ worth of war contracts almost instantly, and in fact, this process had already begun. Unemployment was predicted to skyrocket. Millions of soldiers would return from overseas with money earned fighting, money they would want to spend, which would only fuel further inflation. Massive budget deficit, price controls, with reconversion soon to arrive—never before had any economy faced what the American economy did at the time Truman took over.

  From his discussions with Morgenthau, Truman also concluded that he did not have faith in the Treasury secretary’s loyalty. Morgenthau came off as petulant and hungry for power. Already, the new president was considering who could take the secretary’s place.

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  The White House Cabinet Room adjoined the Oval Office in the West Wing, separated only by the president’s secretary’s office. For years the Cabinet Room had served as a theater where Roosevelt extemporized performances with rambling stories and often incisive polemics, for fidgety cabinet officials crowded around a mahogany conference table. For Roosevelt, cabinet meetings were long-winded solo performances. Truman’s first cabinet sessions were a study in contrast.

  “The quickest Cabinet meeting that I remember since I came into the War Department in 1940,” Stimson commented in his diary after Truman’s first, on April 20, his eighth day in office. “The President took command and galloped . . . through the meeting in an hour.” Truman wanted a different culture from the one fostered by Roosevelt. He went around the table and directed each department secretary to speak. FDR liked to foster rivalries among his cabinet officers, which sometimes turned turbulent and often played out in the newspapers. The new president wanted no backbiting, no feuds. Truman wanted a team. “He was very vigorous, decisive, and hardboiled in presenting [this] viewpoint,” Secretary of Commerce Henry Wallace wrote in his diary after Truman’s second cabinet session.

  The founding fathers had created the cabinet in article 2 of the Constitution—department heads whose job it was to advise the president on matters pertaining to their offices. George Washington had appointed the first cabinet: Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, Secretary of the Treas­ury Alexander Hamilton, Secretary of War Henry Knox, and Attorney General Edmund Randolph. By Truman’s time there were ten officers, all Democrats but one (Secretary of War Stimson). Cabinet secretaries were appointed by the president and confirmed by the Senate by simple majority. And that meant they were the easiest positions of power for a president to replace, as they were not elected officials. It was here, within the cabinet, where Truman was going to make his first changes, in an effort to build his own team.

  He had already formed his initial opinions of the cabinet figures he had inherited. Secretary of State Edward Stettinius was “a fine man, good looking, amiable, cooperative, but never an idea new or old.” Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau was a “block head,” a “nut.” Secretary of War Stimson was “a real man—honest, straight forward and a statesman.” Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, the only female cabinet member, was “a grand lady—but no politician,” while navy secretary James Forrestal was painfully indecisive: “Poor Forrestal . . . He never could make a decision.” Only four of these ten figures would remain in their job through the end of 1945. Truman was preparing numerous cabinet changes within the next month. In fact, he would shape a new cabinet faster than any succeeding VP ever had.

  His first major appointment was not a cabinet official but nonetheless, a high-profile job—press secretary. On the evening of April 19, Charlie Ross arrived to meet with the president. Ross was part of the legendary class of 1901 at Independence High—along with Harry and Bess Truman. Ross had been valedictorian. He had since worked his way up to chief political reporter for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, winning a Pulitzer Prize along the way for his reporting on the Depression. Ross had not always been kind to Truman in print. In fact, Ross had eviscerated him years earlier for his Pendergast connections. But the president knew that he, Harry Truman, was fair game, that any other good reporter would have done the same thing in Ross’s shoes. Now he thought Ross was the right man for press secretary—wise, hardworking, well connected. He could count on Ross to be 100 percent loyal. When Ross appeared at the White House, the two greeted each other as old friends.

  Lanky and intense, with piercing green eyes and greased brown hair, Charlie Ross had a cigarette habit to rival any. When he spoke, the words sounded like they were pumping out of a smokestack. He would have to take a massive pay cut to join Truman’s team, he informed the president, from $35,000 to $10,000, and he feared he would lose his pension if he quit the Post-Dispatch, a paper owned by Joseph Pulitzer Jr.

  “Matt,” Truman barked to Matthew Connelly, “get that no-good Pulitzer on the phone. I want to talk to him.” Connelly managed to get Pulitzer, who must have been surprised to hear from the president of the United States that evening. With Ross sitting by, and Truman doing the negotiating, Joseph Pulitzer agreed to allow Ross a two-year leave from the newspaper, and he could keep his retirement.

  It was agreed. Truman sent for cocktails to celebrate. Then he ordered Connelly to make another phone call. He wanted to talk to Miss Tillie Brown of Independence, Missouri.

  “Who’s Miss Tillie Brown?” Connelly asked.

  “Charlie and I know. She was our school teacher.”

  Connelly made the phone call through the White House operator, and Miss Tillie Brown picked up in Independence. Truman grabbed the phone and said, “Miss Tillie, who do you think this is?”

  “Well, I don’t know,” answered the elderly woman.

  “This is Harry Truman.”

  “The President?”

  “Miss Tillie, who do you think I have with me?”

  “Who do you have with you?”

  “Charlie Ross. He’s going to be my press secretary.”

  Connelly would recall tearing up while listening to this phone call. So too did Stephen Early, Roosevelt’s longtime press secretary, who happened to be at the White House that night. At the end of the night Early said to Connelly (according to Connelly’s recollection): “Boy, what a man. I’ll never forget it. I loved Roosevelt, but we have a President.”

  Truman made the announcement the next day at his regular press conference—Charlie Ross would begin May 15. “Charlie and I graduated in the same high school class,” Truman told the packed room.

  “What was that year, sir?” one reporter asked.

  “1901. Do your own figuring. [Laughter.] That covers everything, doesn’t it?”

  Over the next few days Truman announced more appointments: Edwin W. Pauley as U.S. representative on the Allied Reparations Commission, with the rank of ambassador. It would be Pauley’s job to figure out a method of forcing Germany to pay the Allies back for war damages after the Nazi surrender. Robert Hannegan of St. Louis would take over as postmaster general, which was a cabinet position. Justice Robert H. Jackson of the Supreme Court would take on the most daunting position. As Truman described Jackson’s appointment officially, the justice would be “Chief Counsel for the United States in preparing and prosecuting charges of atrocities and war crimes . . . to bring to trial before an international military tribunal.” Justice Jackson was going to begin to build cases and the foundation for an international court to try them, to bring Nazi war criminals to justice. The only member of the current United States Supreme Court who had never completed law school, Jackson—widely considered brilliant—would become chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg trials.

  ///

  “Dear Mamma + Mary,” Truman wrote on April 21, “I’ve been the president for nine days. And such nine days no one ever went through before, I don’t believe.” Even before Truman was sworn in, “it was necessary for me to begin making decisions,” he wrote. �
��And I’ve been making them ever since.”

  Each morning Truman arrived in his office to find his daily calendar stacked up with meetings of high national and international consequence. Senators and congressmen came and went in the time it might take a man to chat with an acquaintance on the street, often groups of visitors scheduled for five-minute blocks. The issues at hand were innumerable and often so complex, it required hours of reading to have a rudimentary grasp on them before Truman was forced into dialogue. At 3 p.m. each day, Roberta Barrows—the assistant appointments secretary—delivered to the president what she called “legal sheets,” bios of all the people who would be meeting with the president the following day. These required Barrows to perform careful detective work. “I had to know their background and what they were going to talk to the president about,” she recalled.

  “There are no minor problems that come to his desk,” recalled Truman’s friend and now administrative assistant Eddie McKim. “They are all major . . . Everybody was there on appointment; they had to be there on a major problem, or they wouldn’t get in . . . There was no two of them alike. That’s the Presidency.”

  On April 19, President Osmeña of the Philippines arrived at the White House for Truman’s first visit with a foreign leader. The Philippines had been a U.S. colony since 1898 and would be granted independence at the war’s end, but Truman needed reassurance that the United States could maintain military bases there.