Reason v. Force

A head cold which confined President Roosevelt to his living quarters most of last week had a silver lining. It saved him from discussing the European situation, passing hourly from tension to tension. At one press conference he discussed instead the high price of carrots and celery with Correspondent May Craig of Maine. From another press conference he absented himself, letting Secretary Steve Early do the honors. At week's end he showed himself at the President's Cup speed boat regatta on the Potomac but paid small attention to the races. Europe was on his mind. Returning from the races, the President again saw Under Secretary of State Sumner Welles (fresh back from Paris), then Secretary Morgenthau. After dinner, from 10 p. m. until past midnight, he sat alone in his study pondering. Besides the events in Europe, he had U. S. public opinion to consider and one of the biggest events of the week was that U. S. opinion had performed a major shift.

Fortnight ago the thought of war in Europe, between whatever powers, for whatever cause, was abhorrent to most U. S. citizens. But after Prime Minister Chamberlain had appealed to Adolf Hitler, and agreed to the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia, after Czechoslovakia made a gesture of yielding and then prepared to fight, popular disapproval of Dictator Hitler (which Mr. Roosevelt and Secretary of State Hull had helped to generate), and sympathy for Czechoslovakia as the innocent underdog, underwent a transformation. Nobody wanted the U. S. to go to war, but many were already cheering, "Go to it, Czechoslovakia!'' At pro-Czech mass meetings this feeling welled up. Pacifists like Thomas Mann and "realists" like Columnist Dorothy Thompson were that very day whipping it up. Episcopal Bishop Manning of New York was saying: "All men of sense know that there is a point beyond which injustice and aggression cannot be permitted to go, and that as a last resort in certain situations, the use of force may not only be justified but may be required of us by every principle of right, of duty, and of true man-hood."

It was a moment for the President of the U. S. to make a gesture toward Europe. Franklin Roosevelt, alone in his study, pondered sending a personal message (composed for him during the afternoon by Assistant Secretary of State Berle and Chief of European Affairs Moffat), to Adolf Hitler and President Benes, copies to go to London, Paris, Warsaw, Budapest. When he had decided he sent for Secretaries Hull and Welles. They sent for 14 correspondents, who arrived in pajamas and bedslippers under their topcoats, to receive the text of President Roosevelt's world gesture.

What he said to Hitler and Benes was about what any U. S. President would have found it safe to say at such a juncture. He spoke of the "incalculable" consequences of rupturing the "fabric of peace." He disavowed for the U. S. any "mesh of hatred." He reminded his addressees of the Kellogg-Briand anti-war pact, etc. Said he: "The supreme desire of the American people is to live in peace. But in the event of a general war they face the fact that no nation can escape some measure of the consequences of such a world catastrophe. . . .

"On behalf of the 130 millions of people of the United States of America and for the sake of humanity everywhere I most earnestly appeal to you not to break off negotiations looking to a peaceful, fair and constructive settlement of the questions at issue.

"I earnestly repeat that so long as negotiations continue, differences may be reconciled. Once they are broken off, reason is banished and force asserts itself.

"And force produces no solution for the future good of humanity."

This was a far more noncommittal gesture than Woodrow Wilson's cablegram to Emperor Franz Josef on Aug. 4, 1914, offering "to act in the interest of European peace." Yet to the increasingly numerous U. S. sympathizers with the Czechs, it was still a gesture. England, France and South America applauded it, Czechoslovakia welcomed it. Upon the one man whom it would do any good to move it had less effect. As the Cabinet convened this week to discuss the deepening European crisis, Adolf Hitler's reply to Washington was a lengthy lecture restating, in more didactic language, his Berlin speech putting the blame flatly on the Czechs (see F. N.)

>No flagrant nepotist, Franklin Roosevelt has found places for four members of his large clan in his Administration: Son James, Secretary ($10,000); late First Cousin (mother's side) Warren Delano Robbins, Minister to Canada ($10,000); late Fifth Cousin, Henry Latrobe Roosevelt, Assistant Secretary to the Navy ($10,000); Mrs. Irene de Bruyn Robbins (Warren Delano Robbins' widow), assistant chief of the State Department's Foreign Service Buildings Office ($6,500). Two others, Uncle Frederick A. Delano (Vice-Chairman of National Resources Committee & Chairman of National Park & Planning Commission), and Cousin William A. Delano (member of National Park & Planning Commission) hold honorary posts without pay.

Up from Governor of the Federal Home Loan Bank System ($10,000) to be Comptroller of the Currency ($15,000) the President last week raised Preston Delano, 52. Mr. Delano and the President are cousins but "very distant"; Mr. Delano announced he had talked to the President only thrice in his life.

>U. S. political crack-of-the-week was credited to Franklin Roosevelt, speaking apropos the Purge of New York's Representative O'Connor (see p. 12): "Harvard lost the schedule but won the Yale game."

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