George M. Elsey Oral History Interview, July 9, 1970

Oral History Interview with
George M. Elsey

July 9, 1970
Jerry N. Hess

[Notices and Restrictions | Interview Transcript | Additional Elsey Oral History Transcripts | List of Subjects Discussed]

[Notices and Restrictions | Interview Transcript | Additional Elsey Oral History Transcripts | List of Subjects Discussed]

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HESS: To begin this morning, Mr. Elsey, let me congratulate you on your recent election as president of the American Red Cross.

ELSEY: Thank you very much, Jerry. President Truman took a great interest in the Red Cross while he was President of the United States. Under the congressional charter of the organization, the President of the United States is the honorary president of the Red Cross. President Truman took more than a passing interest in the work of the Red Cross. He appointed General Marshall as president when Basil O'Connor retired, and subsequently appointed Mr. E. Roland Harriman as General Marshall's successor in 1950. Mr. Harriman is still, twenty years later, the principal officer of the Red Cross although the organization's structure, administrative structure, has been changed, and Mr. Harriman's title is now chairman, rather than president.

I can recall traveling with President Truman out to Kansas City at the time of Missouri River floods and

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in--my recollection now is the fall of 1950--and while we were out there I can recall the President was keen on getting reports from the Red Cross staff as to the nature of the disaster and the relief work that was going on. But I think that's not what you came to talk to me about this morning.

HESS: That's quite all right. I think historians of the future will be interested to know that one of Mr. Truman's White House staff members has risen to such heights.

Before we begin this morning, our last interview was on foreign affairs, and I found one other thing that I want to call to your attention. It is on page 186 of Mr. Rigdon's book, White House Sailor, and he's talking about the Atlantic Charter, and he mentions in a footnote that you had the, how does he put it, "the communique" that was issued by President Roosevelt and Mr. Churchill, and I believe he said it was signed. He says that that is still in your possession, do you recall that?

ELSEY: That's right, Jerry, it is. And my copy is the only copy of the Atlantic Charter bearing the signatures of

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both President Roosevelt and Prime Minister Churchill. This really doesn't have anything at all to do with the Truman Presidency, but if you wish a digression, I will explain how I happened to have it.

HESS: Let's have a digression. That's marvelous. Actually information pertinent to the Roosevelt administration is not a digression from the Truman administration.

ELSEY: Well, as a one time historian, I am glad to hear you say that the Roosevelt administration is not a digression.

I have always been interested in typography and in printing and the attractive presentation of public documents in broadside form and so on.

In late '42 or early '43 I noted the fact that a broadside had just been published of the Atlantic Charter, that statement of joint aims that had been agreed upon by FDR and Churchill in Argentia, Newfoundland in August of 1941. This particular broadside was designed by Bruce Rogers, who was one of the most famous designers and typographers of his day. It was attractively done, special typeface, handmade paper,

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and a very distinguished document in appearance. Because, as I mentioned earlier, I was interested in this type of thing, I ordered a copy of this special printing of the Atlantic Charter from the rare book dealer that my family had known well in New York for many years.

Just a few weeks after I acquired this copy, we learned in the Map Room that Prime Minister Churchill would be coming to visit FDR in May of 1943. Well, bright lights went on in my head and I decided that I would be brazen enough to ask for the Prime Minister's signature on this document. Toward the end of that visit in May of '43, I spoke to Captain Richard Pim who was the head of the Prime Minister's traveling Map Room, that the PM had brought along with him. And in a sense Captain Pim was my, although senior in rank and older than I, was my opposite number in this Map Room exercise. I asked Captain Pim if he thought the Prime Minister would be willing to sign this copy of the Atlantic Charter that I had. Pim said he saw no reason why not, and suggested that I might give it to him because he would be able to catch the Prime Minister more easily than I, at a moment of leisure.

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The final morning of the Prime Minister's stay in Washington, just as he was about to take off for England, Pim handed me back the Charter with the signature "Winston S. Churchill" at the bottom. A few moments later the Prime Minister came to the Map Room for a last quick look-see at the situation and to bid us farewell. I thanked him at that occasion for having signed my copy of the Charter. He mumbled something, only semi-intelligible, to the effect that that was the first time he had ever signed it. I didn't really understand what he meant by "first" time he had signed it. And a day or two later as I was walking along the White House corridor from the Map Room back to his office with Harry Hopkins, I mentioned this to Mr. Hopkins and said, "What in the world did the PM mean by saying he had never signed the Charter before?"

Hopkins thought that over for a few paces and said, "Well, he's probably right. I don't think they ever did sign anything up there on that boat."

This got me to thinking even more and so not long thereafter I took my copy of the Charter with the one signature on it over to Miss Grace Tully, who was FDR's personal secretary, and asked if Miss Tully would be kind

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enough to have the President to add his signature to the PM's sometime at his convenience.

Miss Tully in her spacious office adjoining the President's oval one, had a large table on which she would pile documents, books, incoming stamps, all sorts of things that FDR might be interested in and that would want to wile away an idle hour or two late in an afternoon or on a weekend. When he was in a relaxed mood, he'd ask Miss Tully to bring in an armload of stuff from her table and she'd take it in. My Charter was added to that collection of stuff on the table.

Weeks went by. I assumed that something had happened, the Charter had been lost, I'd never see it again. But one day, while I was on duty in the Map Room, there was a tap on the door and one of the White House messengers when I answered it, handed me the copy of the Charter simply rolled up with a rubber band around it and said, "Miss Tully said this was yours." I opened it and sure enough there was FDR's name alongside Winston S. Churchill's.

I still didn't really accept as a fact, the statement that neither had ever signed the document before, the full impact of that hadn't yet sunk in on me. I was just pleased to have, what to me was going to be an

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interesting souvenir and memento of my fortuitous circumstance with these two men. I put the document away in a safe place for storage.

In the winter of 1944, well over a year later, the allied war effort had moved ahead very considerably, British troops had entered Greece, the Germans were out, there was a good deal of controversy over the political situation in Greece, and the British were alleged to be supporting a reactionary regime in Greece. There was a good deal of hubbub in London, particularly in the Parliament, over the policy of the British government vis-a-vis the various factions in Greece. The Prime Minister was asked one Thursday morning, in the traditional weekly question hour of the House of Commons, whether the policies of the British government in Greece were not in contravention of the principles of the Atlantic Charter. I can't at the moment quote you, but I do have in my files, the exact exchange between the questioner and the Prime Minister, but Mr. Churchill flashed back and somewhat sharply that, to the effect, that the actions of his Majesty's government were not in contravention of the Charter. Furthermore, the Charter had

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no binding effect, and indeed he, the Prime Minister, had never signed the Charter. Now, of course, my interest really did begin to perk up and I took pains to attend as I usually did, but not invariably, President Roosevelt's next press conference. Sure enough a question came from the floor from one of the reporters crowded around the President's desk, "Mr. President, the Prime Minister said a few days ago that he had never signed the Charter, how about that?"

And the President, leaning back in his chair, said, "Well, I guess that's right. I've never signed it either."

Well, now I knew that my copy of the Charter indeed was of greater interest to me than I had ever before realized. I kept quiet, of course, and never said anything to anybody that I had something that both men denied ever having signed. But Miss Tully and some others were amused by all this, and the word did get out in the press that this statement wasn't exactly true because at least one copy of the Charter was known to exist in possession of a member of the White House staff who had the signatures of both men on it.

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Well, not everybody in the White House staff knew of my copy of the Charter. There was a good deal of scurrying and flurrying around and the White House files were searched, and lo and behold, the President's papers that had been in the files ever since the Argentia conference were examined and there was found to be a copy of the Charter, with the names of both men appended to it. The interesting part of it was that both names, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and Winston S. Churchill, were in Franklin D. Roosevelt's handwriting. He had put both names on; Churchill had not. Bill Hassett who was then the Assistant Press Secretary was a little perplexed by this and had to waddle his way through various questionings from his curious reporters, but the subject was a minor one and in all the press and events of the war, particularly the Battle of the Bulge, which erupted some days later, this whole matter was quickly forgotten.

Well, that's all there is to the story, it's minor. I don't have the Atlantic Charter, of course, all I have is a version, a very handsome version, of the Charter which was signed by both men and is to the best of my

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knowledge and belief, and to the best knowledge of the staffs of the two men, Roosevelt and Churchill, the only existing copy of the documents which bears the authentic signatures of both statesmen.

HESS: It's probably, very, very, valuable, but if you would ever want to give it away, either Hyde Park or Independence would like to have it.

ELSEY: I'll take that under advisement.

HESS: All right. And in our . . .

ELSEY: A friend of mine at Harvard University's library has suggested that Harvard had ought to get it inasmuch as it is the one institution which conferred degrees upon Roosevelt, Churchill, and me. I also have taken that comment under advisement.

HESS: Well, that may be true.

Also one other point on foreign affairs. The Berlin airlift took place in June of 1948, or the…

ELSEY: The airlift commenced then.

HESS: Right, it commenced then. The Russian blockade of

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Berlin, and we did not discuss that last time. Does anything particular come to mind about Mr. Truman's decision to act as he did in that way and have an airlift. What was the thinking around the White House at the time of the Berlin blockade?

ELSEY: I have no special insight or comments to offer on that. By that time the National Security Council mechanism was operating and operating well and efficiently and effectively, although of course, it was a very simple structure compared to the very elaborate staffing that the NSC has built up in more recent years. The intelligence and information and the military and diplomatic evaluation of the significance of the Soviet action, we're conveyed to the President through the staff of the NSC, and by conferences between him and the Secretaries of State and Defense. The White House staff, to the best of my knowledge, had no direct role whatsoever in any decisions or in the execution of any of the carrying out of the airlift.

HESS: All right, moving on to another topic, that of White House congressional liaison. And in your second interview that you held with Charles Morrissey, you

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touched on this subject, but I have a few more questions I'd like to cover on it.

In the files of Philleo Nash at the Library I found a memo, [see Appendix B] of which we have a copy. It's from you to Charles Murphy and it's dated July 6th, 1950 and deals with a meeting that was held in Jack K. McFall's office that afternoon, and as the memo says the meeting was held to lay plans "in the fight to restore Point Four appropriations to the full amount . . ." Working from this memo, could you tell me a little about how such matters were handled? The part that Jack K. McFall who was congressional . . .

ELSEY: He was Assistant Secretary of State for Congressional Relations.

HESS: That's right. The part that he may have played in such matters. I see several interesting names in the memo; Averell Harriman--point number seven is that "Averill (sic) Harriman will exert his own good offices wherever he can." Basically, just how was congressional liaison handled, using this as a guide, or as a basis for discussion. [see appendix]

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ELSEY: I think this is probably a pretty good document to use as evidence here. You will note that the meeting was at the Department of State. It was in the office of the Assistant Secretary of State for Congressional Relations. This illustrates, I think, something that I have mentioned to you in times passed and probably did to Charlie Morrissey, that in that period, the principal responsibility for congressional liaison was vested in the department or agency concerned with the subject matter.

Point 4 was a Department of State responsibility, a Department of State activity, and the matter of fighting for appropriations, for pressing for the appropriate legislation, was vested in the Department of State and its congressional liaison. It was not handled by any special unit or group of people in the White House. You will note that most of the--well the opening sentence, "Leadership in the fight to restore Point Four appropriations to the full amount will be in the Department of State." And that really is the essence of the whole thing. From there on there are a list of eight or ten other items on individuals who will be asked to do various things and some of the White House staff,

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of course, would cooperate where appropriate, and would reach out and talk with some--well, labor groups and other elements of both the executive branch and outsiders. But the point, and I repeat, was that in the Truman administration there was no congressional liaison organization. There was no group of staff people that either determined strategy, or tactics, or was expected to execute them. Responsibility was that of the department concerned.

HESS: One question on that point: In 1949 two men were brought in and given the specific title of Legislative Assistants to the President; Joseph Feeney and Charles Maylon. Do you recall those gentlemen?

ELSEY: Yes, I had hope that you . . .

HESS: How did this work?

ELSEY: I hope that either you or Charlie Morrissey had a chance to interview both of them.

HESS: I interviewed Mr. Feeney just before his death, and Mr. Maylon died before we had a chance to interview him.

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ELSEY: Well, you do have Joe Feeney's statement of what he did and how he worked. There was plenty to do, but there is just a heavy volume of relation, personal-maintaining good personal relationship between the President and his principal staff, the White House generally, with people on the Hill. Feeney and Maylon did not participate in the kind of meeting that we're talking about here in point 4. They were not involved with basic matters of legislation, presidential program, they worked directly for, and under, the supervision of Matthew Connelly, the President's Appointments Secretary, and the President's liaison with the Democratic National Committee. They were more in the partisan, and political arena, than in the substance of legislation or presidential program or administration of the executive branch.

In the preparation let's say of the State of the Union message, or a message on legislation, or perhaps of drafting of a veto message on a highly controversial matter, the staff did not work with either Joe or Charlie. This was not their area of responsibility or concern. They weren't deliberately excluded, it just

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wasn't what they were there for, nor did they expect to be, or wish to be involved in legislative and program matters.

HESS: Did you feel that they were effective in carrying out the duties that they were assigned? Were they effective in what they were supposed to do?

ELSEY: I don't think I'm in any position to judge. I would have no way of evaluating their effectiveness in the matter as they did.

HESS: Did you work with Mr. McFall very often?

ELSEY: Oh, yes, since I was as much concerned, or more concerned, than anyone else on the White House staff, in the latter part of the Truman administration, on matters relating to the Department of State, I necessarily dealt with Mr. McFall and his colleagues on--I can recall particularly point 4, the whole voice of America, and I use that phrase very broadly, not the specific program that is now called "Voice of America;" all matters pertaining to U.S. information abroad; foreign aid legislation, very broadly considered, yes.

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HESS: Was he effective? He a good man to work with?

ELSEY: I would rather not try and pass judgment on the abilities or the effectiveness of individuals. Here again, time, this is now twenty years later, and I'm not sure that my comments along these lines this many years after the event would be valid and accurate. I don't trust my own memory in that regard, and I'm not sure it would be in good taste or proper. Furthermore, I really wasn't the one to--I'm not the one to evaluate these fellows anyway. The man to evaluate McFall would be the Secretary of State, or the Under Secretary of State for whom he worked. We worked with him, he did not work for us.

HESS: Did you work with him very often?

ELSEY: Yes, but as I recall at this point, I suspect probably I worked more often and more closely with Edward W. Barrett the Assistant Secretary for Public Affairs at State than with McFall. I recall Eddie Barrett much more vividly than I do Jack McFall. Perhaps the key man, the principal person I dealt with on a continuing basis, was Carl [Carlisle] Humelsine, the executive

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secretary of the Department, and then such personal assistants to Secretary of State Acheson, during the second Truman administration, as Luke Battle, Lucius D. Battle, and Marshall Shulman. Battle was Acheson's personal assistant and Shulman was his principal speechwriter.

HESS: Do you recall any particular project, do you recall anything of interest that we might put down about any of the projects that you worked on with those men?

ELSEY: I think we perhaps have a cross reference here to one episode that I recall particularly vividly regarding Eddie Barrett. I believe, Jerry, we put down on an earlier tape, my recollections of working out with Barrett one Sunday afternoon at the White House, a directive. This would have been let's say, December 1950, about the first week in December 1950, a directive regarding the clearance of speeches on foreign policy and speeches on military policy, the requirement that they be cleared. The directive, this particular directive, was the one later used to pin General MacArthur because it was the one specific directive emanating from the President that could be cited as proof that he had

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violated a presidential edict. Didn't we cover that?

HESS: We sure did.

ELSEY: I think we had the papers in question in hand.

HESS: What is your general evaluation of the relations between Congress and the White House during the Truman administration? Was White House-congressional liaison a success or not? If not, why not; if so, why?

ELSEY: It, I think, is impossible to give one answer that covers the entire Truman Presidency, because the situation varied so markedly. The 79th, 80th, 81st and 82nd Congresses each had a character of its own. We know, of course, that the 80th Congress was controlled by--the Republicans had a majority, and obviously that had--the President's relation with the 80th Congress were very different from his relations with the other three Congresses when the Democratic Party had a majority. So the degree with which his administration was able to make any hay on the Hill in terms of getting his program through presents a very jagged up and down line on the chart.

With respect to the President's personal relationships with congressional leadership, the President

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personally, I believe was known, trusted, respected, as a man, as an individual, as a former colleague, by men on both sides of the aisle. Of course there were certain exceptions, exceptions like Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin, but the senior Senators and the senior Representatives of both parties understood him, knew him, just as he understood and knew them. They were longtime political figures who understood the ground rules of politics as it exists in our country.

Even during the 80th Congress the President was able to maintain open lines of communications to leaders of the Republican Party as well, of course, as his own. It was his custom to have regular meetings of the congressional leadership, which he personally, and usually only with Matt Connelly in attendance, would talk over in a very candid, very frank fashion, the situation on the Hill. The President liked that kind of face to face exchange. It personally meant a great deal to him. That kind of firsthand obtaining of the feelings, the attitudes, reactions, the dos and the don'ts from the congressional leadership coming straight to him, were, at least for him, by far the most effective way to do business. A staff, no matter how competent, no matter how numerous,

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couldn't possibly have given Harry Truman the kind of insight into congressional interests, attitudes, that his face to face meetings with them gave him.

Other Presidents choose to work differently. Other Presidents who have not had congressional experience, want to work differently. I can quite understand why General Eisenhower would have preferred a different pattern of congressional relations. He had never been on the Hill as we know, he had always dealt with the Congress through intermediaries. He had grown up in the military where you had your separate liaison staff. He carried that pattern on into the White House with him. This is understandable and proper. Each President has to develop his own method of relationship with the Hill. Now I don't know how you're going to judge whether a President's relations with a Congress are satisfactory or not. This is a subjective judgment. I don't know how you measure it objectively unless you do it just on the . . .

HESS: Number of bills passed.

ELSEY: Number of bills passed, number of bills vetoed, number of vetoes overridden. You can, if you want to,

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try it that way. But back to what we were saying about the President's relationship with the Republicans during the 80th Congress. We spoke in our last interview about foreign affairs, and the remarkable landmark actions that were taken by the United States of America in the 1947-1948 period in international relations. That was the period of the 80th Congress. The Truman Doctrine, the Marshall plan, and various other measures were enacted at that time, because the President did have this kind of relationship of trust and candor with the leadership of both parties on the Hill, even though we were fighting with long knives, short knives, and everything else in the domestic arena.

HESS: Did you ever sit in on any of the meetings of the Big Four, as you mentioned when they…

ELSEY: No.

HESS: Congressional leaders would come down

ELSEY: No, no.

HESS: Every Monday morning wasn't it?

ELSEY: Every Monday morning. No, no…

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HESS: You mentioned that Matt Connelly did.

ELSEY: Matt Connelly did. Occasionally the President would have Mr. Steelman or Mr. Clifford on hand if there were particular matters that were topics on the agenda, and my recollection, and this is one that you could check easily, is that Charlie Murphy, as time went on, was more and more frequently in attendance. This is understandable because Charlie had spent ten years on the Hill in the Senate legislative drafting service and knew, and was known by, the Senate leaders even if not by the House leadership, but this might be a very good point. This would be a very good point to check out with Mr. Murphy and get his comments. I never did. None of the younger staff members to my knowledge, ever participated in any of these meetings.

HESS: Do you recall anything in particular about the relationship between President Truman and Sam Rayburn? Were they particularly close or not?

ELSEY: They were very close, but I have nothing to add on this point to what has been so widely and frequently cited in the public record about the warmth of their

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personal relationship. I do recall in the 1948 "whistle-stop" campaign, how the President directed that we be certain that when we scheduled and planned the Texas tour, that we include Bonham, Texas, because he particularly wanted to make a stop in "Mr. Sam's" home town, make a speech in praise of Mr. Sam, the Speaker, and be able to call and pay his respects at the Speaker's house. We did have a buffet supper at the Speaker's house with his sisters as hostesses, and the warmth of the President's feelings towards Mr. Rayburn and his family was certainly evident on that occasion.

HESS: How instrumental was Leslie Biffle in congressional liaison matters?

ELSEY: I'm in no position to judge that. I simply don't know. The President liked Les Biffle, they had--again, this was a matter of warm personal relationship, trust, mutual trust and confidence, and Les Biffle was very helpful in keeping the White House, keeping Matt Connelly and the President informed of the sentiments and attitudes of Senators, and developments on the Hill. But, while I knew Mr. Biffle, I--the relationship between him and the President and Matt Connelly was so close that we on the

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staff were not in the line of communication. It was a direct communication between the President and Biffle and Matt and Biffle.

HESS: Would you recall if Mr. Biffle might have had more influence in Mr. Truman's first administration up until 1948 than he had after Mr. Truman was elected?

ELSEY: Jerry, I simply have no knowledge. I'm not able to comment.

HESS: All right.

ELSEY: I don't know.

HESS: All right.

ELSEY: I'm not aware--at this point in time I can't recall any reason to draw a line between the earlier and the later period.

HESS: All right. Any other thoughts on congressional-White House liaison?

ELSEY: No, none.

HESS: Our next subject is the trip of June 1948 and you

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stated in interviews number three and four that you did not go on that trip, and also you gave a very good summary of the success of the trip and your remarks to Kenneth Hechler's class at Princeton University in January 1949, but I have a couple of more questions. Do you know where the idea for that trip originated?

ELSEY: I suppose I knew at one time, but I certainly can't at this point recall.

HESS: There was some criticism in the press because the President was out of town so near the end of the regular session of Congress. Do you recall if that question came up in any of the discussions before the trip? Should we not take this trip at this time because Congress is in session?

ELSEY: Oh, I don't attach any regard to that kind of criticism. You find it even today. Today it is popular among some people to criticize President [Richard M.] Nixon for spending so much time at San Clemente or Key Biscayne. This is par for the course. There are always a few people of the press, or a few men on the Hill of the opposition party, who will criticize the President for being out of

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town. President Eisenhower used to be criticized for going to the farm at Gettysburg. I'm sure that if the President spent all of his time at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue the same kind of people would be criticizing the man for staying locked up behind the iron fence and not getting out and finding out what's going on in the country. I dismiss this kind of criticism as being really very trivial, and it's almost a space filler kind of thing.

HESS: Do you recall if David Lilienthal helped write any of the speeches for that particular trip?

ELSEY: No, I have no recollection. As a matter of fact, I don't recall David Lilienthal as ever having participated in the writing of any speeches for President Truman. Material may--background material might have been requested from him on matters, some matters pertaining to natural resources of conservation and so on, but I don't recall that he ever did anything in terms of drafting, or writing a speech.

HESS: The incident in Omaha at the Ak-sar-ben, however you pronounce it (Nebraska spelled backwards), at the auditorium

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is well-known, when there was only a small crowd when the President spoke at the 35th Division reunion, that is fairly well-known, but did you ever hear the President speak of that occasion?

ELSEY: I have no recollection of ever hearing him talk about it. I'll make the generalization that he rarely looked backwards. If something hadn't gone right, too bad, he'll try and do better next time, but he was not one to agonize on or dwell on disappointments, or situations where he felt he might not have done as well as he could or where he felt that his staff or others might not have performed up to expectation. This just wasn't in the man's character. I do not have, to be specific on your question, any recollection of him ever referring to that.

HESS: Did you ever hear him refer to the incident in Carey, Idaho where he dedicated the airfield to the wrong person?

ELSEY: Never.

HESS: Okay.

ELSEY: Plenty of other people cited it, but I never heard him speak about it.

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HESS: All right. Do you recall if Oscar Chapman acted as an advance man for that trip?

ELSEY: Well, I think he did. He certainly was active as an advance man later on in the other trips of 1948 and I'm--my recollection is that he did act, on at least some of it if not all of it, no one person can act as an advance man for a trip as long as that. It takes several advance men just because of the length of the trip and the amount of time. I really don't know how much Chapman had to do with that. He certainly was not as intimately involved and not as closely concerned with all details as he was later on in 148. There wouldn't be any Idaho or Nebraska episodes if Oscar Chapman had been responsible for those particular arrangements.

HESS: Do you recall who else worked as advance men either in June or in the regular campaign of September to November?

ELSEY: Well, Don Dawson did on some. Mostly I think it was a staff from the National Committee.

HESS: Do you recall who?

ELSEY: No. Again, the White House staff (to repeat what

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you've heard me say so many times), the White House staff was a small staff. We didn't have, we simply didn't have bodies that you could dispose and send out on matters of this sort. The few of us who were clustered generally around Clifford and later Murphy, had our hands full when it came to long trips of this sort, with getting ready on the speeches, not going out making advance plans. And the staff men generally clustered around John Steelman had their hands full with the day by day operations of the executive branch. Matt Connelly, of course, was intimately concerned with all the political arrangements of a trip, but he couldn't leave the White House to go out and beat the bushes himself. He kept in touch with what was going on by nearly continuous telephone conversations throughout the country, but he wasn't available to go on out and make advance arrangements. It had to be done by the committee, Democratic National Committee, and a few carefully selected individuals borrowed from elsewhere in Government.

HESS: Such as Oscar Chapman?

ELSEY: Yes.

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HESS: Do you recall if Judge Sam Rosenman helped write any of the speeches for that June trip?

ELSEY: I do not recall.

HESS: Do you recall if he went along on that trip?

ELSEY: I do not recall that. I don't think he did.

HESS: I believe he helped write an outline for the President's acceptance speech at the convention, is that correct? Do you recall anything about that? We may have covered this before, but what do you recall about President Truman's acceptance speech in Philadelphia and do you recall Sam Rosenman having anything to do with that?

ELSEY: Well, I do think, yes, I do think Sam Rosenman came down from New York to help on the acceptance speech. It seems to me I recall some meetings in the Cabinet Room with Rosenman in attendance. I think, Jerry, we probably could cite . . .

HESS: Did we cover this?

ELSEY: I'm not sure that we did cover that, but I think if one

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would look at my folder on the acceptance speech, which I guess by now is in Independence, one would find drafts, various drafts, with probably marginal or other annotations by me as to persons who participated in the various drafts, and who sat in on the editing and revision conferences.

HESS: Judge Rosenman did not go along on any of the campaign trips and his services were not used. Do you know why his services were not used during the campaign?

ELSEY: No, I don't. He, of course, had long since left Washington, was back in New York practicing law, the head of a very large law firm. I know that the President respected Judge Rosenman, valued his opinions, and I think Judge Rosenman, my recollection is that he was pretty heavily involved in New York in the fall campaign. Certainly the President sought out his advice on matters pertaining to the campaign in New York City and New York State.

HESS: All right, moving on into the events of the 1948 election, which has been covered to a degree by yourself and Mr. Morrissey, but in the book, The Truman Presidency,

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by Cabell Phillips, this is on page 196 and 197, Mr. Phillips states that in the fall of 1947, President Truman offered to step aside for General Eisenhower, if the General would accept the Democratic nomination for President while he, Mr. Truman, would take the number two position on the ticket as Vice President. Do you believe the incident as related by Phillips is correct?

ELSEY: I have no knowledge at all of the instance. I've heard it--I've read it in Phillips and I've heard others assert that, but I have no reason to--I have neither reason to believe it or disbelieve it, I simply have no knowledge on the score.

HESS: And moving on further, in Cabell Phillips' book on page 197, he makes reference to a report that was given by Clark Clifford to the President and he says:

Did you assist Mr. Clifford in the preparation of that memo and what do you recall about that memo?

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ELSEY: I did not. I did not write it, I did not assist him in it. I did see some drafts of it. I read portions of it from time to time, but I was not--well, I was more of a casual observer of the process at work than a participant in it. I would say that the thought that Clifford was expressing there, were as I understood it then, and have no reason to change my opinion since, were pretty much the outcome of those discussions that he was having on a fairly regular basis with the Oscar Ewing group. And I think you know what I mean there. The group of people who would meet from time to time in Oscar Ewing's apartment at the Sheraton Park and talk over political matters. Also Mr. Clifford had the benefit of memoranda that other keen observers on the political scene around town had written and had sent to him. He took all of this material and considered it, and studied it, material both written and oral, and consolidated it in a fashion that he thought would be meaningful and helpful to President Truman.

HESS: Were there any particular observers that you had reference to who might have submitted memos to Mr. Clifford?

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ELSEY: Well, I do recall that James Rowe had sent one memorandum to Mr. Clifford which he found particularly impressive.

HESS: All right, our next subject deals with the President's decision to call Congress back into special session. And in your second interview with Morrissey, you mentioned that you could not remember the source of who suggested that the President call Congress back. Is that right? Do you recall that?

ELSEY: I don't remember that particular conversation with Charlie Morrissey, but I have been asked this question by a number of people from time to time. My response, generally, is that I don't know there's much point in trying to say--trying to give the credit to a single individual for proposing the idea at a specific moment in time. The thought of Congress being called back into a special session is not unique, not extraordinary. The President, Mr. Truman, had been on the Hill, he had these constant contacts with congressional leadership, with these advisers in the political scene. The matter of calling Congress back into session had been alluded

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to over a period of weeks, if not months, by columnists, editorial writers, and others. It was just something that was in the air, in the atmosphere.

A memorandum which Charlie may have cited to me, if not others have, I've been shown a copy of a memorandum that came out of the files of the Independence library and asked if I could remember who wrote it. There is a memorandum, I think, from Bill Batt and his group on this subject, and I've been asked if I thought Batt was responsible for it. I think my answer there again is the same. The Batt memorandum was probably just one of a number of pieces of paper that are strewn through the files discussing the subject. Batt gave some pros and some cons, this was sort of a summary of the pros and cons that were pretty much in people's minds at that time. The President had called Congress back into session the preceding autumn. So, then when people say, "Who gave him the idea of calling back in the summer of '48?" I think they tend to overlook the fact that only six months before he called Congress back into special session. So it's not that extraordinary or unique an idea.

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HESS: Now the memo we have this morning is, "Should the President call Congress back?" and it's really unsigned but do you know, is this the one from the Research Division, is this the one from Batt?

ELSEY: I think this is the one from the Research Division.

HESS: Have you ever seen a copy of this that was signed? This is a copy of one that is in Sam Rosenman's papers at the Truman Library, it's dated June 29, 1948, entitled, "Should the President call Congress back?". Have you ever seen something like this that was signed by Batt or the Research Division people? Do you recall?

ELSEY: No, I don't. I think the reason I cite, or refer, to Batt's name now is that some of the other people who from time to time in recent years have asked me about it, have said that they've been told that Batt wrote such a memorandum, or that Batt recalls having written such a memorandum. I do not, at this point, recall ever having seen one signed by him, nor has anybody ever shown me a copy of one actually signed by him. But, again, oh, I guess I've already said it, people were talking about it, the White House staff was talking about it. If one

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simply refers to the newspapers and the columnists I'm sure that you will find that lots of people were talking about this possibility.

HESS: Fine. All right, now moving on, I think that we have adequately covered your duties on the train in 1948, in times past.

ELSEY: I think so.

HESS: I think so.

ELSEY: Irwin Ross' book also has . . .

HESS: The Loneliest Campaign.

ELSEY:...covers that. I do not think I have anything to add to what Irwin Ross has said.

HESS: Moving on to the trip that the President took in May of 1950. We referred to this slightly during our interview at the National Archives in April when we were going through the papers, but there we were principally discussing the speech that you wrote for the President at the Library of Congress just after the completion of this trip, but we did not really discuss

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the trip itself. The main address during that trip was at the dedication of the Grand Coulee Dam on the llth of May. Just why was this trip made, other than to dedicate a dam that had already been dedicated several times?

ELSEY: I don't know that I have the answer to that.

HESS: To give the President a chance to get out of town or something? Maybe?

ELSEY: I simply don't know, Jerry, why the trip was made at that time, or that area. He liked the trip, he enjoyed traveling by train as we know, he liked to get out and do the "whistle-stop"' routine, but I don't now remember any particular motivating factor that inspired that trip.

HESS: Who were a few of the staff members that went on that trip? This will be down in some of the logs, but who comes to mind?

ELSEY: It will be down in the logs, or my trip files there where I have all of the itineraries and everything else. Oh, Matt Connelly, Charlie Murphy. Of course Clifford had by now retired from the White House and Charlie Murphy was Special Counsel. The regular group from the press office. Dave Bell I know was along. He and I were together a great deal of the time. But, let's refer to the file. Everyone's name will be listed.

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HESS: I found a memo in your papers at the National Archives from David Bell to Charles Murphy which indicated that the President did not want to go into California on that trip because of the primary fight there between Senator [Sheridan] Downey and Mrs. [Helen Gahagan] Douglas and there were no stops in California. Do you recall anything about that?

ELSEY: No, I think the Dave Bell memorandum probably covers the subject adequately.

HESS: All right, and in your papers at the Archives I found a four-page memo to you and David Bell from Walter S. Salant, dated May 2, 1950 and the subject: "Comments on fourth draft for Fargo." Did Mr. Salant help out very often on matters of this nature; going over drafts and . . .

ELSEY: No, not often. But we valued his knowledge and from time to time would ask him to react to matters, but it was unusual for him to respond in a lengthy memorandum. He was a particularly close friend of Dave Bell's and Dave would call on Salant for facts, quick opinions, and interpretations, rather than reactions to full speech drafts.

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HESS: In Kenneth Hechler's very good analysis of the trip, and a copy of that analysis is in your papers, he mentions that when David Lloyd became ill in April the services of Donald B. MacPhail and James L. Sundquist were obtained from the Bureau of the Budget to assist in drafting the major speeches. Could you tell me a little about those two men and were they called in by the White House at any other time than this? Donald B. MacPhail and James Sundquist?

ELSEY: I don't recall MacPhaills having been involved at any other time; Sundquist had on earlier occasions been lent to us by the Bureau of the Budget. Sundquist, for example worked on the Truman State of the Union message of January 1947. Jim and I were the two staff members who put together the earliest drafts of that January 1947 State of the Union, and Jim helped on other speeches from time to time. I don't recall MacPhaills participation on any other occasion, however.

HESS: On that trip the President spoke in Chicago on May 15th at the National Democratic Conference and Jefferson Jubilee, and in that speech Mr. Truman made reference to the fact

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that on the trip he had been followed around the country by a representative of the Republican politicians. Mr. Truman said that the way that he showed up reminded him of a little poem:

And the man who was following the President around was identified as Victor A. Johnston, who was an employee of the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee. Did you see, or possibly talk, to Mr. Johnston during that trip?

ELSEY: Oh, I remember, certainly we all saw Vic Johnston, he flew--sometimes would charter a small plane and fly around. It got to be a great joke on the part of those of us on the train and it was a matter of considerable amusement to the press. When they had little else to write about they'd tease and refer to Vic Johnston.

I have another even more vivid recollection than of Vic, and that was of Philip Willkie, the son of the Republican presidential candidate in 1940, Wendell L. Willkie. I had known Phil Willkie since undergraduate

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days in college, and had known him later as a fellow graduate student at Harvard, and still later as a fellow Naval Reserve officer during the war.

Phil accompanied Vic Johnston on most, even perhaps all, of the trips and Phil and I would frequently engage in banter at the "whistle-stop" or rear platform appearances. And to the amusement of all, I invited Phil several times to come aboard the Truman train, and I would introduce him around to members of the press and to my colleagues on the White House staff.

The Truman treatment here was simply to ridicule the Republican effort, poke fun at it and treat it lightly, not treat it as any serious, or ominous, or sinister effort of any sort. We just laughed at it and thought it was funny, but it was Phil Willkie that I saw more of than Vic--although I met Vic Johnston, we could all readily identify him. My recollection of him is that he always wore a large white, or very light tan, cowboy style hat, so you could pick him out of any crowd quickly and easily.

HESS: He wasn't hard to see.

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ELSEY: He wasn't hard to see. It was pretty silly exercise. Phil later on had a career of his own in Indiana politics, holding various state offices in Indiana.

HESS: In your papers at the National Archives--that were at the National Archives, and are now in the Truman Library--in the folder, "Western Trip - May 1950" I found a memo regarding the speech at Madison, Wisconsin, and you were transmitting a draft that you had been given, you were transmitting it to Charles Murphy and you said, "I am attaching the Ben Hardy draft for Madison, Wisconsin." Well, now we have discussed Mr. Hardy several times, and we know his relationship to point 4, but did he often contribute ideas or speech drafts?

ELSEY: No, not often, simply because he had a full-time job in the Department of State and was much too busy. I had forgotten this. My surmise is that we perhaps asked Ben for some ideas on that occasion because the President was going to dedicate the, what, CUNA, Credit Union National Association headquarters there at Madison?

HESS: A dedication of the Filene House, and that was named

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in honor of Edward Filene, who was founder of the credit union movement.

ELSEY: Yes.

HESS: The Credit Union National Association.

ELSEY: Yes, CUNA, right. And among other ideas that had been thought about, discussed, and considered, as in the broad point 4 area, how could we help other countries, or developing countries, acquire pools of capital, indigenously, and acquire some of the types of credit and savings and loan, and other associations that we have, other institutions that we have in the United States. The credit union movement was one that was talked about, and my recollection is that the officials of the whole credit union movement were much interested in point 4 and the point 4 concept and wanted to help out. I think that's why we thought that Ben might appropriately give us some ideas for a speech on that occasion. Obviously we did not turn to full-time civil servants, career officers, for partisan or political speeches, but this was not a partisan or a political occasion, or a partisan or political speech. CUNA is a non-partisan activity and public service

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and the President was there as the President of the United States, not as a campaigning political figure. So, we certainly never asked Ben Hardy, or anyone else for that matter, at the State Department to participate in any political speech writing exercise.

HESS: We may have covered this before, but was the first time you met Ben Hardy when he came to see you about point 4?

ELSEY: The first time I met Ben Hardy, or had even heard the name, was when he phoned my office at the White House in December of 1948 and asked for an appointment to come over and talk with me about an idea he had that he was having trouble getting accepted in the Department of State; the idea which we subsequently came to know as point 4.

HESS: All right, moving on to the campaign of 1950. Now, Mr. Truman did not campaign very much. He made only one political address, and that was delivered at what might be considered Mr. Truman's favorite place, Kiel Auditorium in St. Louis, on November the 4th of 1950. Was there any decision made to restrict President Truman's participation in that campaign that year?

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ELSEY: He thought it would be completely inappropriate in view of the Korean conflict which had begun on June 25th. He simply did not think he ought to be out engaging in the kind of political endeavor he had two years earlier when we were in the midst of active hostilities. The war, although we were careful at that point to avoid calling it formally a war, was in his--uppermost in his mind, and the minds of everybody, and he did not think that he had ought to be out campaigning for individual members of the Senate and the House under those circumstances.

HESS: A few days after his address in St. Louis, he was in Independence, Missouri at the dedication of the Liberty bell. This was on November the 7th. That was the Liberty bell that is now out in the front lawn of the Truman Library. Did you go along on that trip to Independence in 1950?

ELSEY: No, I'm sure I did not. No, I didn't.

HESS: All right, just before the President left for that trip, on November lst, 1950, there had been an attempt on his life. What do you recall about that? Where were

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you when you first heard about that attempt?

ELSEY: I was in my office at the Executive Office Building at the time, and of course, heard about it as we all did, everybody in that building, everybody in that part of town did in a matter of moments, but I have no knowledge of the matter other than what has appeared so copiously in the public press. I was in my office, my office overlooked the White House, overlooked West Executive Avenue and the White House, so I could not see Blair House and saw nothing, either before, during, or after.

HESS: Did you hear any shots?

ELSEY: No.

HESS: Did you every hear the President speak of those events after that time; of that particular assassination attempt, or assassination attempts in general?

ELSEY: I have no recollection of his discussing assassination attempts. The only time that I recall--there must have been other occasions--but the only one I now recall twenty years later, the only time that I recall him discussing

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particular assassination attempt, was when John Steelman, some weeks thereafter, presented President Truman with a photograph of Leslie Coffelt, the White House policeman who lost his life in that assassination attempt.

I don't remember why Steelman thought it appropriate to give the President a copy of that print. Perhaps because it was a good portrait of Coffelt, all of us had known him. He was a fine, very friendly officer, and Steelman had known him because he had been on duty over near Dr. Steelman's office for a long time. That might have been why Steelman handed the President a copy of the print at one of our morning staff meetings. The President took it and tears came to his eyes, and his voice broke, and for a few moments he was unable to speak. He mumbled a few words about a man doing his duty and giving up his life to protect him, but he was so moved by seeing the portrait of Coffelt and his recollection of the episode that he simply was unable for a little while to carry on, carry on a conversation, or carry on the meeting. But that was the only time that I remember ever hearing him or any of us discussing the assassination attempt in his presence. Of course,

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the matter of his personal protection, the protection of Mrs. Truman and Miss Margaret Truman were matters that he discussed, or were discussed with him by the Secret Service and other officials concerned with security, but those of us on the staff whose duties did not relate to security, didn't get into that matter.

HESS: On the subject of Mr. Truman's trips to Key West: During the Truman administration would you go to Key West when he did?

ELSEY: I don't remember how many times I went to Key West, five or six perhaps in all. I did not go in the early part of the administration. I was not that closely associated with him, or one of the principal members of the staff. In 1949, '50, '51 I went down several times.

HESS: How was it decided who would accompany the President?

ELSEY: The President decided that.

HESS: How was staff work carried on in Key West?

ELSEY: Bill Rigdon's logs give a pretty complete account of what the President's day was like and what the staff members did there at Key West, that gives you the chronology

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and the time.

The offices were established in one of the office buildings of the naval base, just a few yards from the so-called "Little White House." Rigdon and two or three other staff members, clerical help, would come down from Washington and they would be supplemented as necessary by yeomen made available by the base commander.

There were regular mail pouches down from the White House, at least one a day, and other occasions two a day. They were flown down. Papers requiring the President's signature would come from Bill Hopkins, the executive clerk. Bill Rigdon was responsible for handling them, seeing they were properly signed, all the necessary mechanics attended to and they would be bundled up and sent back to the White House.

The President used these Key West occasions for opportunities for relaxed discussion, think sessions, with his staff. Sometimes there would be a luncheon out on the lawn, and the President would sit around a semi-circle and talk over matters in a quiet and unhurried fashion.

Usually members of the Cabinet, or occasionally a

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political leader, would be on hand for a portion of the trip. Sometimes a Secretary of State, or a Secretary of Defense, or Secretary of the Treasury would fly down in the morning and have lunch session with the President on a matter that he wanted to talk about and would fly on home. There was a pretty steady stream of visitors down from Washington, official leaders, down from Washington. A small White House staff would stay through continuously with the President, but he was not isolated by the White House staff. He was in regular contact with Cabinet and congressional leaders.

I remember one particular occasion where we sat around on the lawn and the President hashed out a whole series of decisions, most of which he thought through before. But he got all his ducks in a row and this involved, oh, half a dozen changes in personnel in the executive branch, the pros and cons of who could best do the job and the timing of the transfer. I would prefer not--since personalities were very much involved in that discussion, I remember it very carefully and I took, at his request, kept track of decisions as they were reached in respect to persons, positions and timing and so on, I would--as I say personalities were a large part of discussion. I would

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prefer not to be any more specific at this point.

HESS: All right. In checking Mr. Rigdon's logs, I believe you were present on the trip to Key West just after the election in 1948. Do you recall if the President was able to relax? Just what was his frame of mind, just after his big upset in 1948, do you recall?

ELSEY: Well, I don't think it takes much imagination to figure out what he felt like on that occasion.

HESS: What did you enjoy most while at Key West? What did you enjoy doing? What was your favorite recreation; tennis, poker, swimming, fishing--not hiking in the mountains, that's for sure.

ELSEY: No, no hiking in the mountains there. Oh, just the mornings over at the very small swimming beach doing a little exploring. Two or three times we would go over to--several of us would go over to Havana for the day, shopping and sightseeing there. The opportunity to relax with the President, to see him unwind and enjoy himself, and the joshing and the banter with him and other members of the White House staff. Yes, there were card games,

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poker games, but they didn't last into late at night or anything of that sort. They were always very mild and modest in their stakes so that nobody would get hurt if his luck or his skill were particularly bad.

HESS: Do you recall if the President's announcement at Key West that he was not going to run for re-election in 1952 was in March of '51 as Mr. Truman has in his Memoirs, Vol. 2, page 489, or on November the 19th, 1951 as William Rigdon has in his book, White House Sailor, page 267? Do you know when that announcement was made?

ELSEY: What do you mean by announcement, Jerry? There was no announcement by him until the spring of '52 at a dinner at the National Guard Armory. Do you mean private discussion with the staff?

HESS: That's right, a private discussion with certain members of his staff, with a few members of his staff.

ELSEY: I was not present on any occasion when he made such a remark to any members of the staff.

HESS: When did you first learn that he was not going to run? Was it at the Jefferson-Jackson Day dinner or did you know

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before then?

ELSEY: Well, the first time I officially, or publicly, heard him say he was not going to run was at that National Guard Armory dinner, in March, the end of March '52.

HESS: I think the 29th.

ELSEY: The 29th or thereabouts, '52. My personal feeling, not based on conversation with him, and not based on any private information from any member of the staff, I had simply not felt in my own bones, for a long time, that he would run again, but that was a feeling on my part, it was not based on anything he had said to me or anything anyone had said to me that purported to have come from him. I was unaware until these later books came out that he had made any statement to the staff on any occasion at Key West. I do not recall that any staff member ever told me that he had said any such thing to them. So, I guess we have two things here--three things: One, I'm not aware of any statements he made to the staff at Key West meetings. However although I was not, was not aware of such statements, I personally had not felt that he would run again, but finally, third,

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I did not hear any public statement to that effect until he, himself, publicly said so at the Armory meeting.

HESS: Do you recall anything of interest about any other of Mr. Truman's vacations that he may have taken on the Williamsburg or Shangri-La? Did you go aboard the Williamsburg very often?

ELSEY: Yes, I was on the Williamsburg a number of times.

HESS: Do you recall anything of interest that may have transpired?

ELSEY: I was on the Williamsburg in the early part of his administration. I was then still in uniform, and was on board in my capacity as Assistant to the Naval Aide, not present. Sometimes the Naval Aide would be elsewhere on duty, or not go, and I would be the naval officer present.

No the pattern was the same, Mr. Truman and Mrs. Truman and Margaret were, in the privacy of the Williamsburg, just as in any other private occasion with that family, they were warm, friendly, and relaxed, and treated their staff members with respect and courtesy and friendliness. I think I must have said on other

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occasions that Mrs. Truman had almost a maternal attitude towards the younger members of the staff. She was solicitous about their welfare, she was--and as a result was respected and liked and admired by us.

I can recall just a few vignettes of life on the Williamsburg. I recall on one occasion, I can't date it now, I think it probably was fairly early, I might have still been in uniform. I went up to the President's cabin with a message that had come in over the radio, and I took it up and tapped on the door. President and Mrs. Truman said, "Come in," and I went in and the two of them were playing double solitaire. I apologized for interrupting the game and the President said, "Oh, that's all right, I'm ahead anyway."

And Mrs. Truman laughingly bantered and said, "Yes, he's ahead and he's ahead because he cheats."

And this was just a nice relaxed teasing, friendly kind of relationship that they had with each other, and that they had with staff members who came in. I was--no matter how young or in uniform or later out of uniform, you never went in and stood at attention, rigidly. That is, you would go in that way, but the

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very first thing that President Truman or Mrs. Truman would say, "Sit down," ask you to sit down and be seated and you were put at your ease at once with them. I don't think this is very significant historical point of view, Jerry, I'm not sure what you want here, but I'm giving you my recollections and my feelings.

This has been true throughout. And then when I took my thirteen year old boy out to Independence last summer, he had never met the Trumans, they had left Washington long before he was born. By prearrangement we went to see the President and Mrs. Truman at their house in Independence. I was--we were greeted, and my son was treated with the same warmth and the same friendliness by the President and Mrs. Truman that I had been twenty-five years earlier. They don't change in that regard. I'm sure you've found the same thing yourself. My son was placed between the President and Mrs. Truman. My son was a little abashed by this proximity to a former President and a former First Lady. Mrs. Truman put him at ease right away. As she said to me, "I know what to do with boys, I've got four grandsons," and we were off and running and had a great

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time. I had trouble getting away because I didn't think we should stay too long. Several times I tried to get up and Mrs. Truman would say, "Oh, stay a while longer and visit some more." But that was just the same way it had been in '46, '47, '48, '49, '50 and '51.