Choosing Truman: The Democratic Convention of 1944

Notes

NOTES 1. Days of Uncertainty 1. Truman saw very clearly what the vice-presidential nomination in 1944 would mean; on July 9, just before the convention in Chicago, he wrote his daughter that "1600 Pennsylvania is a nice address but I'd rather not move in through the back door" (Margaret Truman, ed., Letters from Father: The Truman Family's Personal Correspondence , 55). The literature on Roosevelt's illness and death is now large. After the early and altogether unsatisfactory book by Admiral McIntire and George Creel, White House Physician, Dr. Bruenn brought out his "Clinical Notes on the Illness and Death ofPresident Franklin D. Roosevelt." See also the remarkable interview by Jan Kenneth Herman, "The President's Cardiologist." Chapter 2 of the present writer's Ill-Advised: Presidential Health and Public Trust rests in part on an interview with Dr. Bruenn of February 16, 1992. Other accounts appear in Bert Edward Park, The Impact ofIllness on World Leaders; Kenneth R. Crispell and Carlos F. Gomez, Hidden Illness in the White House; Robert E. Gilbert, The Mortal Presidency: Illness and Anguish in the White House; and Jerrold M. Post and Robert S. Robins, When Illness Strikes the Leader: The Dilemma of the Captive King. 2. Letter ofJune 15, 1946, in Robert H. Ferrell, ed., Dear Bess: The Letters from Harry to Bess Truman, 1910-1959, 526. 3. Henry A. Wallace diary, Aug. 16, 1944. This sentence was omitted from John M. Blum, ed., The Price ofVision: The Diary ofHenry A. Wallace, 1942-1946, 380. In great old age Truman said much the same thing to the writer Thomas Fleming: "He was the coldest man I ever met. He didn't give a damn personally for me or you or anyone else in the world as far as I could see" ("Eight Days with Harry Truman," 56). During his last years the former president was "spacy," his thoughts unreliable, but this is an interesting commentary. To Fleming Truman added a remark he often made in earlier years: 97 98 Notes "But he was a great President. He brought this country into the twentieth century." 4. Anna Roosevelt Halsted oral history, May 11, 1973, p. 51. Copy in Anna Roosevelt Halsted Papers, box 12. The president's daughter said the same thing to the writer Richard H. Rovere in an interview of August 16, 1958, folder 1, box 15, Richard H. Rovere Papers. Rovere in 1958 had in mind a book on how Truman received the vicepresidential nomination and accumulated a file of material including several interviews. He signed a contract with a publisher, but for some reason he then gave up the project, perhaps because of the death of Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, which offered an opportunity to do a book on the McCarthy era. He published that book the next year. His Arrivals and Departures: A Journalist's Memoirs offers no explanation for dropping the proposed book on Truman. 5. Edwin W. Pauley with Richard English, "Why Truman Is President ," 4, undated, "The President," box 30, White House central files, confidential files, Truman Library. For the shift to Truman during the first months of 1944 see Brenda L. Heaster, "Who's on Second?" General Watson passed on to the president any letters critical of Wallace, such as the following: "The only reason for the writing of this letter is that this section of the country is bitterly opposed to Wallace for Vice-President. Use that as you will" (Tom Anglin to Watson, Feb. 10, 1944, box 11, Edwin M. Watson Papers). Watson wrote to Anglin, "I showed your letter to the President . Obviously he did not make any comment, but he read it very carefully and thanked me for showing it to him" (Feb. 18). And again: '~t an appropriate time I wish you would bring this note to the President's attention. I think it is a mistake to renominate Mr. Henry A. Wallace. There would be no trouble in the south today except for the belief that the President will insist upon Wallace . Many, many democrats who like President Roosevelt, are somehow very, very much against Wallace. I believe it would be a mistake to put him on the ticket. . . . I believe that Wallace's name on the ticket will cost three million votes" (C. J. Harkrader, publisher ofthe Bristol [Va.-Tenn.] Herald Courier, to Watson, June 15, 1944, box 8, Watson Papers). Watson wrote on a buckslip, "Respectfully forwarded to the President." Afterward a secretary queried him...