FDR kept up this pace for much of the next seven days, holding his first cabinet meeting and press conference of the New Year; meeting British Ambassador Edward Halifax to speak about the current state of Anglo-American relations and the coming summit; discussing the work of the United Nations Relief and Rehabilitation Administration with its director, Herbert Lehman; corresponding with Gifford Pinchot about the organization of a world conservation conference in conjunction with the end of the war; reviewing the need to recruit additional Army psychiatrists to help cope with the psychological rehabilitation—what today we would call PTSD treatment—of returning servicemen; and hosting a series of other meetings with senior members of Congress and his administration.3
Amid all this activity, on the morning of January 3, 1945, members of the House and Senate gathered to open the seventy-ninth Congress. Well aware that war in Europe was far from over, and deeply troubled by the president’s frank admission the day before that “important differences” existed among the Allies, they were in a somber mood. There was a general feeling that this Congress might be “one of the most fateful assemblies in the history of the nation,” and universal recognition that the challenge of ending the war and securing the peace was going to be formidable. Yet, in sharp contrast to the opening of the special session of the seventy-third Congress that launched the famous 100 days twelve years before, there was little interest among the House and Senate leadership in initiating any new legislation. Much of this reluctance stemmed from a desire to avoid any appearance of excessive optimism about impending victory in the wake of the Ardennes crisis. But it also resulted from a profound sense of uncertainty about the future. Indeed, on the very day that Congress reconvened, official Washington learned that the Soviet government was about to extend formal recognition to the Polish Committee of National Liberation that the Kremlin had brought into being in July 1944. This committee, often referred to as the “Lublin Poles,” represented a direct challenge to the London-based Polish government-in-exile that had the support of the Western Allies, and its existence was further confirmation—if any was needed—of the “important differences” to which the president had referred.4
Thus most members of the House and Senate concluded that it would be better to wait until they had received the president’s State of the Union Message before they set themselves to the tasks at hand—not knowing, of course, that the man to whom most of them looked to provide leadership during this critical period would fall victim to a massive cerebral hemorrhage exactly 100 days after the Speaker’s gavel brought the new session into being.
FDR INITIALLY HOPED THAT HE COULD KEEP HIS ANNUAL REPORT TO Congress relatively brief. But given the many controversies that had arisen since early December, it would turn out to be the longest of his entire career. As he told his principal speechwriter, Samuel Rosenman, on January 4, he wanted the address to cover a wide field of matters, including the status of the war, the international situation after the war, and the United Nations Organization.5
Not willing to expend the energy to make the trek over to Capitol Hill to deliver the speech in person, FDR opted instead to deliver his 1945 State of the Union Address over the radio on the evening of January 6. He began by calling for the immediate passage of a National Service Act. He also recommended that Congress pass “work or fight” legislation aimed at requiring all young men classified as 4-F who were not currently working in war production facilities to do so or face limited military service. Legislation was also needed to meet the alarming shortage of nurses in the armed forces. And in reference to his call for the adoption of an Economic Bill of Rights a year earlier, the president insisted that the nation be prepared to take measures to maintain full employment once the war was over.
This initial focus on the manpower requirements needed to maintain the strength of America’s armed forces and industry came at the direct behest of FDR’s Chiefs of Staff. It was their view that in spite of the significant gains that had been achieved since the D-Day landings, the US Army—still staggering from the losses it had sustained from the sudden German counteroffensive—had been rendered understrength at the very moment it was about to enter what General George C. Marshall referred to as “the most critical phase of the war.”6
FDR opened his discussion of the all-important international situation by reminding the American people that “the nearer we come to vanquishing our enemies the more we inevitably become conscious of differences among the victors.” Anticipating the difficult negotiations that lay ahead over the future of Central and Eastern Europe with London and Moscow, he argued that it was vitally important “not to let those differences divide us and blind us to our more important common and continuing interests in winning the war and building the peace.” Indeed, “in our disillusionment after the last war,” he said, “we preferred international anarchy to international cooperation with Nations which did not see and think exactly as we did. We gave up the hope of gradually achieving a better peace because we had not the courage to fulfill our responsibilities in an admittedly imperfect world. We must not let that happen again, or we shall follow the same tragic road again—the road to a third world war.”7
He then referenced the Atlantic Charter, admitting (in light of the recent revelation that it was an unsigned document) that the principles in the Charter do “not provide rules of easy application to each and every one of this war-torn world’s tangled situations. But it is a good and useful thing—it is an essential thing—to have principles toward which we can aim.” As to the recent criticisms in the press about what was going on in Greece and Poland, FDR admitted that he shared the public’s concern. “But we must not permit,” he said, “the many specific and immediate problems of adjustment connected with the liberation of Europe to delay the establishment of permanent machinery for the maintenance of peace.”8
In retrospect, the speech reflects, perhaps more than anything else, FDR’s own anxiety about the need to secure the American people’s support for the United Nations Organization and the postwar order he hoped to establish. The fact that the United States, the United Kingdom, and the Soviet Union inhabited “an imperfect world” and differed on how best to protect their national security interests was no reason to give up on the idea of further cooperation. On the contrary, it was this hard reality that rendered the establishment of the United Nations—with its all-important Security Council—so important. As he said in closing: “1945 can and must see the substantial beginning of the organization of world peace. This organization must be the fulfillment of the promise for which men have fought and died in this war. It must be the justification of all the sacrifices that have been made—of all the dreadful misery that this world has endured.”9
Yet, in another indication that the US public was weary of war, the headlines that followed the address focused on the immediate matters, rather than the long-term aims, that Roosevelt had mentioned. The New York Times led with “Roosevelt Demands a National Service Act, Draft of Nurses and 4Fs, Postwar Training.” The headline in the Los Angeles Times read “President Calls for Total Draft,” while the Washington Post’s headline was “President Asks Full Use of Manpower.” The Chicago Daily Tribune, always in opposition to FDR, blared “Draft War Deserters,” with a sub-headline that read “Work or Fight, Forced Labor, New Sacrifices Asked.” Nor was the new Congress enamored of FDR’s proposals as the war entered its final “critical phase”—again, in contrast with his first 100 days. There would be no National Service Legislation, no bill passed to secure the induction of nurses, and no legislation focused on 4Fs. Congress did, at least, wrestle with the speech’s larger implications. But mostly this resulted in critiques. On January 10, Senator Arthur Vandenberg, the ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, launched a widely anticipated rebuttal, raising FDR’s “deprecation of the Atlantic Charter” and apparent unwillingness to address the specific challenges presented by Soviet and British behavior. Although sympathetic to the need to main
tain Allied unity and supportive of the president’s call for the establishment of the United Nations, Vandenberg nevertheless insisted that “trends towards disunity cannot be reversed by our silence upon the issues… involved.”10
FDR invited Vandenberg and the other members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee to the White House for an extended discussion the next day, January 11. In a frank admission of the limits of American power, FDR argued that as early as the Tehran conference it had become apparent to him, Churchill, and Stalin that “the occupying forces had the power in areas where their arms were present and each knew that the others could not force things to an issue.” In Eastern Europe, Russia had “the power” and thus the only practical course “was to use what influence we had to ameliorate the situation.” It may be true, as one senator suggested, that the present Russian goal was to eliminate all opposition and “to settle all questions by force of arms… before the Dumbarton Oaks institutions were set up,” but FDR still believed “that much could be done by readjustment if the machinery could be set up and if the Russians could be brought in and could acquire confidence in it.” This task was paramount, and due to the delicacy of the situation, FDR had decided that the best approach was to press American concerns over Soviet behavior at the coming conference—in Yalta, in the Crimea, in early February—not, as Vandenberg had suggested, in his annual message to Congress.11
Despite Vandenberg’s criticisms, FDR told his cabinet later that afternoon that he was pleased about the overarching theme of the senator’s foreign policy address, which to him indicated that the once-doctrinaire isolationist now understood the importance of the proposed United Nations Organization as well as the need for the United States to remain engaged in the world. Still, the senator’s admonition—that American silence when “Moscow wants to assert unilateral war and peace aims which collide with ours” or “when Mr. Churchill proceeds upon his unilateral way to make decisions often repugnant… to our ideals” would do nothing to reverse these unfortunate developments—rang true with many members of Roosevelt’s own cabinet. Vandenberg’s address thus added to the immense pressure FDR was under both at home and abroad in the days and weeks before he would depart for his much-anticipated summit meeting with Churchill and Stalin in Yalta.12
Always alert to FDR’s health and state of mind, Frances Perkins and Henry Wallace seemed reassured that the president appeared to be doing well at the cabinet meeting on January 11. FDR had certainly aged, but the fatigue and lack of focus that Wallace had observed in their last encounter before the Christmas holidays seemed to have subsided—a development that Wallace, like Perkins and other members of the cabinet, attributed to FDR’s famous ability to “bounce back” following a period of rest. Yet these remained “hectic” times. As Perkins observed, the entire cabinet recognized that the president was “studying and working hard, going over a great mass of material… trying to learn all that he would have to know so that he could have it at his fingertips at the conference.” This preoccupation was not without its consequences. FDR struggled to address certain secondary matters such as Wallace’s oft-stated desire to become secretary of commerce as his tenure as vice president came to an end and Secretary Perkins’s wish to step down at the close of FDR’s third term.13
The president’s workload also affected his relationship with Eleanor. FDR seemed to have lost all patience with Eleanor’s determination to challenge some of his decisions and to press him to act on certain issues, often via memos that were placed in a special basket by his bedside each evening. At the same time, he clearly wanted Eleanor “to be around more,” though as a friend and companion, not an adviser. FDR reacted angrily, for example, when Eleanor—at dinner a mere two hours before the president was scheduled to deliver his State of the Union broadcast—once again raised the issue of his recent State Department appointments, which she strongly opposed. And a few weeks earlier there was the scene that occurred during FDR’s much-celebrated “children’s hour”—the daily ritual of taking the thirty minutes or so before dinner to serve cocktails and relax, an almost sacred moment in FDR’s day when policy talk was prohibited. Eleanor rarely engaged in the gentle banter of these gatherings, and in any case she usually joined at the very end, just before dinner was served. On this occasion, however, she entered the Oval Study in the president’s private quarters with a sheaf of papers, sat down opposite her husband, and reached across his desk to hand them to him, exclaiming, “Now Franklin, I want to talk to you about this.” FDR flew into a rage, taking the entire pile of papers, throwing them across his desk, and saying in a fury to his daughter, Anna, “Sis, you handle these tomorrow morning.” At which point Eleanor quietly said she was sorry, got up, took her glass, and walked calmly away to join the others.14
Paradoxically, however, Eleanor was the one person, even more than Anna, who could relieve him of the pressures of office. Given his lack of mobility and her political and moral stature, it was Eleanor who frequently stood in for her husband at the myriad public and private events required of the nation’s chief executive. She was a highly respected political counselor herself, but one whose relationship to the president was complicated by the fact that they were also man and wife. At this point in his tenure, FDR seemed to long more for the latter than the former. As he admitted to Elliott in a quiet conversation over the holidays, he still hoped for a return to the closeness he and his son’s mother had once shared. But Eleanor, deeply concerned about the fate of the liberal agenda in which she so passionately believed and critical of what she saw as her husband’s backpedaling on a number of major issues, found it hard to find fulfillment in her husband’s simple need for companionship. So she pressed on, while Franklin, as he had so often done in the past, looked to others for the solace he craved.
FDR certainly did so on the night of January 11, when he set off for another four days’ rest in Hyde Park, this time in the company not of Eleanor but of Lucy Mercer Rutherfurd. It was FDR’s relationship with the un-married Mercer during his tenure in the Wilson administration that had led to his estrangement from Eleanor, who discovered the affair in 1918. We do not know the extent to which they were physically intimate, but given the intellectual nature of the relationship between Eleanor and her husband, FDR’s emotional betrayal was perhaps of greater significance to her than any physical bonds that may have existed between FDR and Lucy. Eleanor’s torment led to talk of divorce, and this, coupled with a threat by FDR’s mother to cut off all future financial support if the relationship continued, prompted FDR to promise he would never see Mercer again.15
Lucy subsequently married, and though we now know that she and FDR stayed in touch by letter, and may have met from time to time, not until the spring of 1941 did the two of them begin to see each other more frequently. They would take drives together in the Virginia countryside, and occasionally meet in the White House, when Eleanor was absent. On these early visits Lucy often used the name Mrs. Paul Johnson. But as FDR’s desire to see Lucy increased with the intensification of the war and the decline of his health, their encounters became more frequent and open. In late 1944 and early 1945, Anna—concerned about the president’s well-being and recognizing his need for relaxed company—became the principal liaison between FDR and Lucy.16
As unusual as Anna’s role was, she was not the only person close to FDR who abetted the relationship. Both Daisy and FDR’s cousin Laura “Polly” Delano were well aware that the president and Lucy were spending time together. So too was Grace Tully, another person among the president’s immediate entourage who helped arrange meetings between the two.
On this occasion, FDR and Lucy were joined by Daisy, who by then had grown quite fond of Lucy, whom she referred to as her “new cousin” and with whom she shared an “unselfish devotion to F.” FDR had invited Lucy to Hyde Park ostensibly to show her some of the new items he had brought to his Presidential Library, and on the morning of January 12, the three of them thoroughly enjoyed themselves as Daisy wheeled FD
R around the library museum in his chair while he described each piece. They then enjoyed lunch together before Daisy “took herself off” after coffee, allowing FDR and Lucy to enjoy some private conversation before Lucy left for home on the 3:27 train from Poughkeepsie.17
FDR spent the rest of the long weekend preparing for Yalta and working on his inaugural address. He also took time to meet with a representative of the National Park Service to discuss the history of “the home place.” In addition to building the nation’s first Presidential Library, FDR had made the decision to bequeath much of his beloved Springwood to the public after his death, on the condition that his family be granted lifetime usage of the estate. He wanted to be sure the Park Service understood the full history of the house and grounds, including the century-old hemlock hedge that bordered the Rose Garden. FDR was concerned that the hedge had grown ragged and seemed to be failing, so he ordered the Park Service to replant it that spring.18
FDR left Hyde Park on the evening of Monday, January 15, 1945, and would spend the next five days meeting with a host of officials in preparation for his departure for Yalta and working on his fourth inaugural with his two principal secretaries, Grace Tully and Dorothy Brady. In the middle of one of these sessions FDR suddenly stopped his dictation, looked around the study, and asked the two women, “What in this room reminds you most of me?” Grace pointed to a naval print, while Dorothy Brady picked out a little French portrait of John Paul Jones that FDR’s confidant Louis Howe had given to the president years ago. FDR thereupon dictated two notes that were immediately placed in his White House safe. These indicated that “in the event of his death” the two women should have these items. He then resumed his dictation.19
The Last 100 Days Page 3