Eleanor Roosevelt: My Day (1946)

241

October 8, 1946

NEW YORK, Monday – For a day of rest, yesterday was fairly busy! At 1 o’clock, I lunched with a group of representatives of amalgamated workers at the Hudson Shore Labor School. They had been discussing domestic questions and the role of the citizen. I gathered from the conversation that there was an increasing awareness among the women workers of the practical methods by which organized workers can register their wishes with their representatives in both the state and the national Government.

I did not leave them until nearly 3:30, when I drove a little farther up the road and stopped for a few minutes to see the boys at Wiltwyck School.

Then, I drove on to Ulster Park where, in a grove of trees, a rally of the Democrats of the neighborhood was being held. Young Mayor Erastus Corning of Albany, candidate for Lieutenant-Governor, made a good speech. And, wonder of wonders, though he knew the local question over which feeling runs high in Kingston – “Are we to have a bridge across the Hudson River?” – he still did not promise the bridge.

He reminded the gathering that Governor Dewey had vetoed the bill and that their representative in Albany was promising them that, at the next session, the bill would pass and then Governor Dewey would sign it! He assured them that he understood the need, both for the city of Kingston and the surrounding rural area and for the people across the river, for a bridge at that point. And I think they felt his sincere desire to help them and accepted his pledge to do so if the opportunity comes his way.

Various other candidates also spoke. It was a good meeting and one that denoted unusual interest in this campaign. Similar meetings are being held all over our country, and they are typical of our democratic procedure.

I had to pay two visits on the way home, and so it was after 6 o’clock before I found myself being greeted by a little black dog who quite evidently thought I had been gone much too long and who complained all evening because of my desertion. To make up for it, I got up early this morning so he could have a walk before we started for New York City. This is the first time that I have brought Fala down to the city since last spring, and I am sure the streets are not going to be alluring to him!

I have started my Christmas shopping. Have you? I haven’t seen any reminders that we should shop early, perhaps because there isn’t going to be very much that we can buy this Christmas. But just for that reason, I thought I had better begin early and find what I could and get it wrapped and shipped off to different parts of the country. I have such a scattered family nowadays that, if I don’t think far ahead, things might not reach them. And in addition, nobody knows how long the United Nations Assembly will last and, while it lasts, there will be no time for me to do any shopping or wrapping!

242

October 9, 1946

NEW YORK, Tuesday – Both the President and Paul Porter of the OPA have very courageously explained to the people of the country why we are at present having a shortage of meat. Incidentally, I was amused yesterday to read of a Kansas farmer who said that he and his family were quite well off and had no desire to visit the cities, which had a meat famine. So the whole country is not starving!

I think it would be well for us to recognize a fact which we are apt to forget – namely, that a long war, in which most of our resources were devoted to producing war materials, means a slow return to normal conditions. The law of supply and demand, which you see invoked daily by someone, cannot operate when the supply cannot possibly equal the demand.

The fairest thing to everyone would be to resume the rationing system under which people shared equally. If there was very little, at least everybody got the same amount. To have kept our wage and price levels and to have accepted our restrictions until our industries had a chance to reconvert, until our armies had a chance to come home, and until labor had returned to more normal conditions, would have meant perhaps some black-market profiteering but, by and large, conditions would have been fairer for all concerned.

We could not wait, however. We would not face actual conditions. We hoped for a miracle which would let us reconvert overnight and give us prewar conditions without any period of readjustment. We are suffering now because we would not face realities.

There is a second problem which we will not face, and that is the problem of displaced persons in Europe. Europe is not able to support them, and these displaced people do not wish to work and to establish homes in that part of the world where they have suffered so greatly. They want to start in a new place. The President has tried to make us realize that there are displaced persons who might be of great value to us. Our example is needed by other nations.

The President has made a strong plea, too, that the recommendation of the Anglo-American Committee for allowing 100,000 Jews immediately to enter Palestine be upheld. The British seem shocked at this idea. And the Arabs suddenly announced that it would require 600,000 American soldiers to enforce this recommendation. Why this sudden desire to see American soldiers replace British soldiers? Great Britain has the mandate for Palestine – not the Arabs, nor the United States – and Great Britain asked for a joint commission to make recommendations on what should be done there.

I think President Truman is asking us to give him some backing in our domestic meat situation. The Government is not sitting back complacently. We may even buy Argentine beef. In the foreign field, even though the President is accused of bidding for votes because of his interest in 100,000 Jews, I think he probably realizes that right-thinking people here do not want any people to continue behind barbed wire either on Cyprus or in Germany or in any other part of the world.

243

October 10, 1946

NEW YORK, Wednesday – It was with great sorrow that, a few days ago, I read of the death of Gifford Pinchot, former Governor of Pennsylvania. To those of us who have had an interest in good government, he has held high the torch of unselfish service to his country.

I remember very well the first time I ever realized what conservation was. Mr. Pinchot came to Albany and spoke to the New York Legislature and showed some films of devastated areas in China. First he explained that once the hillsides had been covered with trees, and that the river had been well behaved and had never flooded the countryside; but as the trees were cut down, soil erosion took place and gradually the river carried more and more good soil out to sea, so that floods became a menace to all the neighboring territory. He translated this situation in China into terms of the United States, and showed us what could happen here if we did not prevent the cutting down of our virgin forests without replacing them.

Mr. Pinchot was waging a rather lonely fight then, and very few people paid much attention to his warnings. However, my husband was tremendously impressed and he began at once to replant trees on his own land in Dutchess Country, N.Y. He began to look for soil erosion wherever he went, and he taught me, too, to be conscious of this wasting of our land. The curious thing, which is not always remembered, is that where land is wastefully used and becomes unprofitable, the people go to waste, too. Good land and good people go hand in hand.

By dint of perseverance, Mr. Pinchot finally won many other citizens to join his crusade, and this crusade was only one of the many he carried on for good government. He was a Republican but also an independent, and he supported the principles and policies which he felt were of value to his country, regardless often of the party label.

He was not selfish nor self-seeking. Honors came to him, but he accepted them without laying too much stress upon them. It will be for his service as a grand human being that he will be remembered and missed by his neighbors and his fellow countrymen.

I went yesterday to a luncheon in the interest of a campaign which the American Social Hygiene Association is launching to raise a fund of $300,000. Apparently, we are following the pattern of the last war. During the war, social diseases were fairly well kept down, but in the period immediately after the war, the number of cases began to increase very fast. Now, the percentage of increase is about the same – twice as many cases this year as were reported last year. And the numbers involved are greater by far than they were at the end of the first World War. Money is needed for research and educational projects.

At the luncheon, Vice-Admiral Ross T. McIntire, Surgeon General of the Navy, and Fannie Hurst, the authoress, made very excellent speeches. Afterward, a press conference was held which brought out the really interesting information that our teenage youngsters, at the present time, are the victims of social diseases in greater number than any other age group.

244

October 11, 1946

NEW YORK, Thursday – The dinner given by Freedom House in honor of Bernard M. Baruch, to whom they gave their annual award for outstanding service in the cause of peace, was a very significant occasion. Here is a man who has not held elective public office and yet has been constantly in the public eye because, through his services to the public, he has built for himself an exceptional place in the esteem of many men.

I often think it must be hard to sit and hear yourself eulogized. I know that when I am being introduced as a speaker, I usually think: “Well, they have to justify having invited me, so all this praise is very pleasant but must not be taken too seriously.” It was different, however, the other night. Mr. Baruch had to take the praise seriously because the whole occasion revolved around him, and it was his past and present actions which had brought him so much genuine respect and admiration from men who themselves stand very high in the public’s esteem.

One of the speakers, Secretary of the Treasury John W. Snyder, mentioned the fact that we were in a unique position because we had seen the atomic age born. Most of us wonder whether seeing it born is half as important as seeing it develop along the proper lines!

This is why Mr. Baruch’s work as U.S. representative on the United Nations Atomic Energy Commission means so much to us all. If only a working agreement can be reached under which the commercial development of atomic energy can be both guarded and encouraged, I think we will have gone a long way toward establishing peace.

Just because this country has the atom bomb does not mean that other nations are not developing other weapons. But if we could reach an agreement for the control and release of this energy, the new developments for peace might be so exciting that one could really start a joint disarmament program which would cover all types of armament. This would give us greater security than we could have in any other way.

I was happy at the recognition accorded an old friend, and I pray that Mr. Baruch may long be able to continue the type of unselfish work he is now doing.

Yesterday afternoon, one of my neighbors, Xanti Schawinsky, came to talk to me about the memorial to my husband which is to be erected in Monterey, Mexico. He had visited the site with the two architects and the sculptor whose idea is to be executed. He tells me that the memorial will house a community center, and will be a little way off the Pan-American Highway, so that people entering the city can easily drive in to see it. And it will probably be attached to a stadium. The conception is on a very grand scale. Nothing of the kind has been created before in Mexico.

I am deeply appreciative of this honor, and appreciated kindness of Mr. Schawinsky in coming to tell me about the enthusiasm which the architects and the sculptor are showing in undertaking their work.

245

October 12, 1946

NEW YORK, Friday – Yesterday I attended a press conference and met some of the delegates who are going to the meeting of the International Assembly of Women at South Kortright, N.Y. Mrs. Alice T. McLean will be hostess to the group, which will meet on her farm. There are some 140 delegates from other countries, as well as a great number of American delegates.

They are interested in what can be done by women in the various nations to forward the one cause on which they are all united. No woman in the world wants war. Every woman knows that, if her country is once engaged in war, there is nothing she can do but work to help the men who fight, but every woman would like to prevent war if possible. This must be done when we are at peace.

That leads me to some reflections which Walter Lippmann’s column pointed up yesterday morning. He seemed to infer that, unless both we and the Soviet Union were ready to make some concessions, no solution could be found to the question of handling atomic energy.

I think that, for the moment, we are chiefly bogged down on the political level. If we want one world, we have got to find some level on which we can work together. Winston Churchill’s recent speech in Zurich, suggesting a federation of European countries, dealt with political questions. But I wonder if we could not find, on the economic and humanitarian side, something which would start us actually cooperating.

For the recovery of Europe, the one essential thing is to break down trade barriers and allow free travel from one country to another. Wouldn’t it be possible to have an economic federation, leaving to every country its political sovereignty but doing away with restrictions so that travel and trade could be accelerated? Could we not also give assurance that, as far as it lies in our power, the United States will continue to work with the United Kingdom and the U.S.S.R. to help all the European nations needing relief?

Such a plan would not create more divisions and might start us working together. And it seems to me essential that, somewhere, we begin building our confidence in each other through working contacts.

The other evening, the Inter-denominational Meeting of Greater New York and vicinity, which is made up of some 100 Negro ministers from the five boroughs, presented their first annual Franklin D. Roosevelt Memorial Brotherhood Award. They have established this award in honor of the work done by my husband, not only for better relations among different races and creeds in this country, but also for oppressed peoples in other parts of the world. The medal was presented to me, as his wife, because I have had so many opportunities to help in the work of creating more opportunities for the under-privileged. Better understanding can exist only when people regard each other as individuals and do not judge others in mass groups.

The service was a very fine one, and the music by a combined choir, representing different churches in Manhattan, was a great joy to all those present. I was grateful for the honor to my husband’s memory, but even more for the fact that together we had been able to achieve some forward steps and advance the cause of the brotherhood of man.

246

October 14, 1946

HYDE PARK, Sunday – Not far from the Houses of Parliament, in the little square near where the United Nations met in London, I used to watch people stop and bare their heads before the statue of Abraham Lincoln. A few days ago I saw in the newspapers that a bill was introduced in Parliament to erect a statue in London in memory of my husband.

It will be in Grosvenor Square, I believe, around which were the buildings where most of the United States officials and offices were housed during the war. There the work was carried on which helped the British to withstand the onslaught of the German forces. I hope the people of this country will always remember that without the strength and courage of the British people, led by their Prime Minister, Winston Churchill, we might easily have seen fighting in our own land.

The costs of this statue are to be defrayed by small popular subscriptions throughout the United Kingdom, but the bill to permit its erection was brought in by the Labor government and warmly endorsed by the leader of the Conservative opposition party, Mr. Churchill. The speech he made was beautiful and expressed his genuine affection and feeling.

Between my husband and Mr. Churchill, I am sure, there grew up, during the years of the war, a very deep personal affection. In spite of any differences in tactics or objectives which might have developed between their general staffs or themselves, a loyalty and respect existed which made their differences easier to reconcile.

Both of them knew, I think, that fundamentally their philosophies of government in peacetime were very different. I can remember Mr. Churchill once, in the midst of a discussion, turning to me and saying: “Your family and mine would be the first to be shot if there should ever be a revolution.”

I answered that I hoped that would never be necessary. I could remember returning in 1933 from the coal fields of West Virginia, where I felt conditions were at such a point that it needed only a leader for revolution to break out. I told my husband and, before the cold winter came, something was done to get miners and their families out of the tents in which they had lived for years, and to make relief a very different thing from what it had been.

It may be that these years of responsibility during a depression had helped to strengthen in my husband a different kind of peacetime philosophy from that which could be expected of a man who was at once a little older and who lived in a land of tradition far more firmly established and more difficult to change than ours. All British people love their country dearly. We may not like some of their policies; in fact, we may differ profoundly. But we must admire their admirable qualities. When, therefore, they do homage to one of our citizens, we accept it with deep and heartfelt gratitude.

247

October 15, 1946

NEW YORK, Monday – Some time this week, I am going to speak at a meeting concerned with recreation in the city of New York. Since most of us, in every city and even in rural areas throughout the country, cannot escape deep concern for the rise in juvenile delinquency everywhere, I think it is well to consider some of the things contributing to this rise and some of the efforts which can be made to meet it.

This condition occurs after all wars. The discipline of children has been relaxed, for their parents have been in the armed forces or have been working long hours in defense industries. Mothers as well as fathers have been out of the home to a great extent. In certain areas, however, there is always trouble with the children, arising from the bad conditions under which they live. Overcrowding, with all of its harmful results, exists in certain parts of big cities at all times. It is vastly increased immediately after a war.

In New York City, certain districts, such as the old downtown slum areas, have always had difficulty with the youngsters. The Henry Street Settlement has introduced many a young man to the problems of his city, and many of those men are now serving in public office or are running for election.

It is vitally necessary to the meeting of this problem that we elect to office men who understand that everything they do touches the lives of individuals, particularly the lives of children, and through them will affect the future of the nation. We can never separate problems like juvenile delinquency from government and from the choice of candidates for government office.

Here in New York State, this November, we will have to weigh candidates for governor, for the United States Senate, for the House of Representatives, for the State Legislature and for city offices. We must do so with a view to all kinds of problems, but we must bear in mind that all problems touch our children.

Former Gov. Herbert H. Lehman worked closely for years with Miss Lillian Wald on the problems of the Henry Street Settlement, and I am sure that this training affected his attitude on many questions as Governor and in his relief work. He is today a great humanitarian with a real understanding of the problems at home and abroad as they affect disadvantaged people and, above all, the children of the nation.

I have a particular interest that all children should be treated without discrimination. Opportunities for better recreation, for better education, and for better care in state institutions, should be alike for all children. The work which I have watched so closely at Wiltwyck School taught me the needs not only of our Harlem children, but also of many of our other children who come from distressed areas.

Words and promises are never enough. Performance is what counts. And when we deal with juvenile delinquency, it is performance in providing all the children of our country with facilities which will keep them out of trouble and, if they happen to get into trouble, with the best possible care.

Choose your government officials with this in mind!

248

October 16, 1946

NEW YORK, Tuesday – I want to thank everyone who was kind enough to remember my birthday. When you get to be 62, it is surprising to find that anyone remembers your birthday except your children and closest friends. Many people, however, sent me greetings and I cannot possibly hope to answer them all individually, so I am using my column to say how very grateful I am.

I find there are great advantages to getting old. You so willingly accept every opportunity for letting up on the numerous jobs which have kept you busy in the past! There was a time when to be inactive might have seemed a calamity. Now, whenever I get back to the country after a few days in town, I wonder why I ever leave it.

One thing which gives me great pleasure is the feeling that I no longer have any direct responsibility for helping to run the world. I think older people have a responsibility to help young people to assume more and more of the management of the world in which they live. An older person, when asked, should furnish assistance from his or her experience and should give it gladly, but there is no need to feel that nobody else can do a job if you neglect it!

Every young person has a right to a certain period in life in which they feel that someone else will take the major responsibility of directing not only their lives, but the surrounding world situation. Then there comes a period when, willy-nilly, the responsibility must be on their young but mature shoulders. They must carry it until they reach that pleasant evening of life when they may be advisers but no longer have the obligation to carry the major responsibility.

It is a pleasant time in life, and I now bend my efforts to shedding as many responsibilities as possible and enjoying to the full this period when I may be an adviser but somebody else has to make the decisions!

Yesterday I went to hear Philip Murray, head of the CIO, speak at a luncheon given by the women’s division of the National Citizens Political Action Committee in connection with their forum course. I have a great admiration for Mr. Murray. He is a wise and temperate labor leader, one with whom we discuss questions affecting the world as well as questions immediately affecting labor.

In the afternoon, I attended a meeting of the board of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and then, around 6 o’clock, found myself hurrying home in the subway.

I suddenly realized, during my rounds yesterday, how the years must be showing physically when, in a bus, a white-haired woman got up and offered me a seat! I don’t really feel as old as I look, and I was going only a short way, so I hurriedly pushed farther along in the bus.

In the evening, I went out to Yonkers to lecture on the United Nations. And I had an opportunity, in the Lincoln Park Jewish Center there, to see one of Miss Jessie Stanton’s nursery schools. It is a charming place, with every possible equipment to make children happy and at the same time to develop them in preparation for their future school life.

249

October 17, 1946

NEW YORK, Wednesday – I am glad to report that some one has taken the trouble to write me about those idle ships tied up in the Hudson River – which I mentioned in a recent column. My correspondent tells me that, not only in the Hudson River but in other waters, ships belonging to the U.S. Government are laid up for lack of employment.

Our Merchant Marine, which was large and active during the early days of our republic, later faded out of the picture because, with the rising economy in this country, the building and operating of American ships became more costly than the use of foreign vessels. “Subsidy and other laws, designed to offset these economic handicaps, were permitted to lapse or were not administered with sufficient vigor and continuity to revive American shipping in the foreign trade, writes my correspondent. Less than 30 percent of American foreign commerce was being carried in American ships in 1939.

My correspondent apparently has had a long experience in shipping, and one paragraph in his letter interested me greatly. “A comparatively small amount of money spent earlier, in peace, would have made it unnecessary to build so many ships in war. … Admiral King has warned the country against reverting to such prewar maritime inadequacy … There was good reason to believe that the Axis leaders realized the United States would eventually come into the war, but they also knew that we had too few ships to make our attack quickly effective. They thought to conquer first.”

The ships we see laid up are mostly of the slow freighter type. Congress has authorized the sale of the Government’s surplus ships, with the exception of those which the Army and Navy deem necessary for a national reserve. Foreigners can buy these ships on the same terms as American citizens. I, for one, wish that it would be made easier for foreigners, who have lost much of their shipping, to obtain these ships if they need them, for in peacetime slow ships are not so valuable to us.

However, I hope that this past war has taught us that we must vigorously and consistently administer the Merchant Marine Act which was passed in 1936. If we do so, we will not be caught again with as inadequate a supply of ships as we had on entering both World War I and World War II.

All of us should work to prevent another war. One of the ways of doing this is to distribute goods in our own ships throughout the world. Many of my forebears and my husband’s forebears were seafaring people, because they believed that trade was the basis of our prosperity and promoted good feeling among nations.

One of the contributions which we must make to future world peace is to help raise the standard of living in many countries where the standard has been extremely low in the past. It will pay us as an investment to subsidize an American Merchant Marine because it will help us to keep peace in the world.

250

October 18, 1946

NEW YORK, Thursday – Yesterday I had my first meeting with advisers in preparation for work on Committee No. 3 (Social, Humanitarian and Cultural) during the sessions of the United Nations Assembly. Today the regular meetings of the United States delegation begin, morning and afternoon. And next week the Assembly will be in session, beginning on the afternoon of Oct. 23.

Every citizen of the United States will listen with great interest to Secretary of State Byrnes’ report on the Paris Peace Conference when he broadcasts to the country Friday night. Nothing gives one such a sense of really understanding our foreign relations as hearing from the individual chiefly responsible for conducting negotiations. When you read accounts written by other people, you know you are getting the facts through their impressions, whereas when the man in charge actually talks to the people, the real situation emerges.

Last evening, I went to speak at St. George’s Episcopal Church, where they are holding weekly meetings to carry on, side by side, a study of the Bible and a study of the things that are happening in the world. The purpose is to make church people more conscious of their responsibilities in shaping world affairs.

Yesterday afternoon, I went up to receive an award from the Good Neighbor Federation at the Settlement House on East 106th Street. This house is carrying on a most interesting experiment in interracial work among young people in a neighborhood where many races live side by side. Puerto Ricans, Filipinos, Negroes, Jews and Italians all rub elbows there.

The building was turned over by the Jewish Federation to a new and reorganized board because the neighborhood had become so varied that they felt the building should no longer serve just one group. In it, varied leisure-time activities are carried on.

This is an underprivileged neighborhood, and therefore one finds gangs among the boys and many practices which would lead rapidly to juvenile delinquency. Often, great bitterness exists between the various young groups. Therefore, to have them develop their abilities in the arts and crafts, and learn to play together, is a real safeguard and outlet. I was very much impressed by the program of music which they put on yesterday. One boy played the piano so well that I wish I could have him come with some of his group and play for me.

I am always very appreciative of the kindness which prompts people to give me an award for help in interracial understanding, but I never feel that anything any of us do in this respect deserves an award, since we are serving our own interests and the interests of our country.

I have come to the conclusion that love of animals is one of the things that can create a bond among people. As I walk about Greenwich Village and exercise Fala, while doing my household shopping in the mornings, I find that all of the children and many of the grown-ups want to be friendly with both Fala and me!

251

October 19, 1946

NEW YORK, Friday – Last night, I went over to the East New York section of Brooklyn, where they are trying an experiment by using four public schools in combination as a youth and adult community center. They have a rich program of leisure-time activities from 3 p.m., when school closes, until 10 o’clock at night.

Always, I have felt it was such a waste not to use school facilities for community purposes, and here at last it is being done. The gymnasiums and swimming pools in two of the schools are used for an athletic program. The home-economics department has young people in cooking classes all afternoon, and adults all evening. If twenty people get together and want to learn something, an effort is made to find a teacher to give them the course they desire.

This community center is a far cry from the old-time adult classes in which foreigners who had settled in this country learned to read and write English. But when it comes to the classes for older people, the teachers, who deal with youngsters all day, have to develop an entirely new technique for their evening pupils.

This center has also had forums in which documentary films were shown and lectures given. For instance, they had one on Russia and one on Palestine, and then they had one on the New York State Legislature. The last, I am told, drew a very small audience. This shows that it is easier to be interested in something far away, which appeals to our imagination, than in something that touches our daily lives but nevertheless seems to have very little interest for the average person.

I think it is a challenge to the movie industry to make some films that will teach us the workings of our government and our obligations as citizens, and still be as interesting as a mystery film. It can be done but, as far as I know, it never has been done.

The other night, at a meeting of young Democrats, a film on how to vote was shown, and I was given to understand afterwards that it was particularly poor. Here is one great weapon of democracy – the secret ballot, which my husband used to say must be controlled by the people and guarded more carefully than any other right because, without it, slavery could steal upon us unawares. And yet we have never used our greatest and most imaginative industry, the movie industry, to dramatize the value of the ballot to us as citizens.

Mark McCloskey of the New York Board of Education, who accompanied me to East New York last night, tells me that centers such as the one now operating there will be started in two other areas this coming week. I think it is a thrilling and exciting adventure in the educational field, and in spite of all the headaches it must bring for those who work in this new venture, it must also bring great rewards.

252

October 21, 1946

HYDE PARK, Sunday – Friday night I saw the first play that I have been to for months, and I thoroughly enjoyed it. Jose Ferrer is a good Cyrano de Bergerac, and the whole cast supports him well. I think the staging done by Melchor G. Ferrer is charming; and while Brian Hooker’s version of Rostand’s play can never have for me quite the charm of the French words, still it is a remarkably good translation.

I had rather dreaded going because, in my student days, I had seen Coquelin do the part in Paris. It made an unforgettable impression upon me, and when I have heard of other people doing the part I have always refrained from going. My guests that night were anxious to see this revival of Cyrano, however, and I am not sorry that I went.

Curious how seeing again a play of this kind will take you back to what has always seemed to me the very greatest days of the theatre. I was telling some of my children not long ago that I could remember Duse in La Dame aux Camelias! One of my greatest thrills as a youngster was being taken backstage to meet her after the play. I was so young, the play probably had little meaning for me; but the impact of her charm and personality has never faded.

I can remember Sarah Bernhardt when she was at her height in Paris. I can remember Mounet-Sully in Oedipus Rex when he was going blind and the whole audience at the Comedie Francaise rose to cheer him at the end of his performance. I was in the top gallery, which seemed to make more noise than any other part of the theater, and I had never seen an audience demonstrate so enthusiastically.

Perhaps it is the rosy glasses of youth that make you feel sometimes that those were the greatest days of the theatre, and that we have few actors today who can stand on an equal basis with those earlier performers. Katharine Cornell is the greatest of the American actresses I know today – at least, I have been more deeply stirred by her than by any of the others. We have many competent, charming, gifted men and women on the stage, and I owe many of them a deep debt of gratitude for the hours of interest and pleasure which they have given me. But possibly they, too, if they were old enough, would agree that the names I have mentioned will stand out in theatrical history.

The great movie actors and actresses never seem to me to have the same opportunity for expression that the actors and actresses in a real play have. The director comes between you and the personality of those who appear on the screen. No matter how able he is, he can never produce the effect achieved by the actor who is actually living a part and putting it across the footlights to you in the audience. My own criterion of success has always been the ability to make the audience live the play while the curtain is up.

253

October 22, 1946

NEW YORK, Monday – Fortunately for me, no meetings of the United States delegation to the United Nations Assembly were held on Saturday, so after a short meeting with my advisers in the morning, I started for the country. Fala went with me, and we got home in time for a good walk in the woods before I went off to dine with the YWCA in Poughkeepsie, and to speak at their meeting.

The national YWCA is just starting a campaign for a round-the-world YWCA reconstruction fund. They have made a preliminary survey in Europe and Asia and find that there is universal need and desire among women overseas for American help and leadership.

Women in many countries are finding responsibilities thrust upon them to a greater extent even than in our own country, because they have lost the finest of their young and older men. This means that more and more women abroad will be taking part in public affairs, trying to solve the problems of health and education and giving the spiritual leadership and moral guidance which, under ordinary circumstances, would be expected of the men in their communities.

This is an unusual departure for many women in parts of the world where, formerly, they have lived in comparative seclusion. And that is why the YWCA feels that the work which it has been doing in many countries should now be strengthened and broadened to give greater help to our sisters struggling with their new problems.

In Manila, for instance, which is very close to our hearts in the United States, all of the YWCA buildings were demolished by bombs and must be rebuilt. In Czechoslovakia, new youth hostels will be needed everywhere. In Holland, women have no places in which to meet except barns and stables and lofts. In China, girl students and industrial workers are trying to devise ways and means to acquire education for citizenship.

Therefore the YWCA is trying to raise $2,100,000 to help the women of thirty countries with a special program during the next few years. These will be years of emergency, when new work must begin in practically every war-torn country. The five purposes of this YWCA program are:

I think every woman in the United States will want to share in this fund, so no matter how small your contribution has to be, I hope you will be sure to make one. In numbers there is strength, and we in America must help the women of the world.

254

October 23, 1946

NEW YORK, Tuesday – Last Sunday morning Mrs. Henry Morgenthau, Jr., and I drove from Hyde Park to South Kortright, N.Y., where the International Assembly of Women was being held. It was a beautiful drive and the colors on the slopes and in the valley, just after we crossed the Rip Van Winkle bridge, were as beautiful as any I have ever seen. We reached the meeting in time to hear Miss Katharine Lenroot, head of the U.S. Children’s Bureau, discuss standards of child care.

I hope the findings of the discussions of these American and foreign representatives of the women of 54 countries will be presented to the United Nations Assembly. I think they will emphasize the interest that the women of so many nations have in the establishment of peace. They cannot help but stir the enthusiasm of the Assembly to do its work with greater concentration.

A meeting of the U.S. delegation to the United Nations began yesterday morning at 9:30, so I had to get up early to drive down to the city from the country. The meeting lasted until 1 o’clock, when I came home to have lunch with two pleasant British visitors who had brought letters from my husband’s cousin. Then back to the afternoon meeting at 3 o’clock.

John Foster Dulles and I left the rest of our delegation still working hard and went to a broadcasting studio at 5:10 to talk on the subject of what we hoped for from this session of the Assembly. I liked Mr. Dulles’ simile that this organization is a seed. At San Francisco, they envisioned a full-blown flower, but now the delegates of the member nations have to cultivate the seed and wait for the flower. People have to be patient, since it may not grow too fast.

On leaving the broadcasting studio, I went to the center at 47th Street and Broadway where, during the war, so many GIs found rest and relaxation. This place has now been turned over to the Hospitality Committee for the United Nations. Under the leadership of Mrs. Winthrop Aldrich, it will be used for the delegates and their families.

As this is a very central location, the comfortable lounge will be a convenient meeting place, whether one wants to go shopping, to the movies or to the theatre. The lounge will be open from 11 o’clock every morning until midnight. It will be staffed entirely by volunteers, and refreshments can be obtained from noon on. I am looking forward to dropping in there occasionally and I think it may provide what is badly needed – a place where delegates can meet casually and really chat together.

Yesterday, on the Queen Elizabeth, many notables arrived for the Assembly session, and even in this crowded city, one begins to feel their presence.

255

October 24, 1946

NEW YORK, Wednesday – As we go out today to the World’s Fair grounds for the opening meeting of the United Nations Assembly, those of us who remember the World’s Fair will be thinking of that gigantic effort which brought together the art and the culture, the industrial and political exhibits, of so many countries in an effort to acquaint us with each other.

The World’s Fair was to me a most useful and interesting drawing together of people from many lands, and there are still remnants of that exhibit which might be used to increase our understanding now.

For instance, I have a letter telling me of two famous Polish statues sent to the World’s Fair which are still in the United States. It has been suggested that these statues might be bought in this country, for they have been given by the sculptors to two scientific institutions in Poland in the hope that these institutions may be able to sell them and purchase some of the instruments which they need to build up the destroyed laboratories in Warsaw.

One of the statues is a life-size bronze figure of Marie Sklodowska Curie, by Ludwika Nitsch. There are three of these figures. One was bought by the French Government for the city of Paris; another is at the Marie Curie Radium Institute in Warsaw and is one of the three statues in that city which escaped destruction; and the third one, which is here in this country, is the last one available.

It may be remembered that the women of this country presented Mme. Curie with a very valuable piece of radium when she came here years ago. This priceless American gift was saved by Polish scientists who managed to hide it during the six years of war, so it will be used again, as in prewar years, by the research laboratory of the Curie Institute in Warsaw. The proceeds from the sale of the Curie statue would go to this institute.

The second statue is of General Pulaski, done in gray granite by Ksawery Dunikowski. The proceeds of the sale of this statue would go to the Institute of Experimental Physics in Warsaw University.

Partly due to the great help of the Rockefeller Foundation, this institute, before the war, was one of the best research centers in Central Europe. Naturally, the Germans plundered the institute and removed precious instruments as early as 1939. But thanks to the energy of Professor Pienkowski, the institute started to function again last winter. The scholars and students alike, however, worked under unbelievable conditions. For months they had neither windows nor doors, and the lack of many instruments has hampered them greatly.

It is hoped that an American committee can be formed to sell these statues and place them in appropriate places in this country. Those who contribute can feel that they are advancing the fundamental things which are needed to rehabilitate Poland and its people, who have given us much help in the development of our own great country. The Polish citizens who migrated here may well be proud of the contribution they have made to the development of the United States, and now we, as a people, have an opportunity to show our gratitude.

256

October 25, 1946

NEW YORK, Thursday – I sat on the platform yesterday morning on the steps of the City Hall and looked at the crowds of people who had come to take part in the ceremonies of welcome that the Mayor of the City of New York was extending to the United Nations delegates.

In the absence of Mayor William O’Dwyer, because of the death of Mrs. O’Dwyer, the delegates from the 51 countries here for the meetings of the General Assembly were very ably greeted by Deputy Major Thomas L. J. Corcoran and Grover A. Whalen, chairman of the city reception committee. The response to the greeting, made by Paul-Henri Spaak of Belgium, the President of the United Nations General Assembly, was a very fine and forthright speech. He said that as he drove through the city he was conscious of a friendly people who gave the United Nations a cordial welcome, but that they were still skeptical and none too enthusiastic about the organization that has not yet proved it could prevent war.

It was well, I thought, to have this point of view placed squarely before us. The sooner we, the people, realize that the delegates, no matter how hard they labor, cannot make the United Nations work, the better it will be.

The job of writing a peace, and then building a peaceful world through the United Nations organization based on that peace, is not the job alone of the government officials who go to Paris or who come to New York and spend long hours trying to find solutions to knotty problems. It is the job of the peoples of the world, and it will be done only if they put their strength back of their representatives and insist that the main objectives of keeping peace in the world shall always be in the forefront of everybody’s mind.

In the afternoon we gathered in the Assembly Hall in the New York City Building at Flushing Meadows. If one did not come with the cavalcade from the Waldorf-Astoria, it would not have been so easy to find the proper gate and get parked in the proper place. There was a constant stream of cars coming into the area. Nevertheless, promptly at 3:30 I was sitting in one of the seats assigned to the United States delegation.

I was looking up at the rostrum, back of which was a wonderful world map, flanked on either side by blue velvet curtains. The arrangements for the press and radio are really quite remarkable. There are two galleries along the sides and one at the back, and I was told that 300 seats are available for the press of the world. I saw many familiar faces among the photographers who crowded around us first. As the advisers and then the delegates began to gather, more and more acquaintances appeared upon the scene. Many of the representatives’ wives were present, and as they walked to their seats one got an exceptional preview of the latest fall styles in hats and gowns.

Almost before I knew it, there was a burst of applause and Mr. Spaak and Secretary General Trygve Lie were escorting the President of the United States and his aides into the hall. President Truman sat and listened while the two speeches of welcome were given before delivering his own address.

It is rather a terrifying thought that in this room peace or eventual annihilation are at stake. Human beings with all their weaknesses and faults have to play for these high stakes and many other human beings depend for their future upon what happens at Flushing Meadows in the next two months.

257

October 26, 1946

NEW YORK, Friday – It is interesting to know that while the United Nations General Assembly is holding its first plenary sessions in Flushing Meadows Park, there are studies being made of the United Nations Charter in other parts of the country that will lead to a more intelligent understanding of the work that is now being done. For instance, from October 21 to 25, Mundelein College in Chicago, sponsored a five-day institute for the study of the United Nations Charter. In addition, they held seminars to discuss such subjects as the world health organization, trade unions in the United States, and the world bank and stabilization fund.

That there is a live interest among students in the work of the United Nations is evidenced by the fact that as I sat in the cafeteria during lunch yesterday, several youngsters from high school papers came up to me to let me know that they were reporting on the sessions. Five wounded men from Halloran Hospital also came over to attend the sessions, and one of them fairly burst out of a telephone booth as I walked through the corridor and told me breathlessly that they were having a wonderful day. They told me that Secretary General Trygve Lie, and Senator Arthur H. Vandenberg had both been over to talk with them.

Many people from many countries are gravitating to the meetings of the General Assembly to get a glimpse of the delegates as they go in and out of the building. Among them I saw a woman for whom I have a deep admiration, Miss Louise Yim from Korea. I hope that she will have the opportunity to tell her story to the right person who can give her the advice she seeks and needs, for I know she has made valiant efforts to help the cause of education and liberty in her country.

We had a brief meeting yesterday of Committee #3 on Social and Humanitarian Affairs, for the purpose of electing a new chairman, since Peter Fraser, Prime Minister of New Zealand, who was our chairman in London, was unable to return for the present session. The delegate from Poland suggested that the present New Zealand delegate be elected as chairman and many delegates rose to second him.

The delegate from Canada explained, however, that we were not solely taking into consideration the geographical area but were also considering the individual’s capacity. He felt sure that we would have in His Excellency Sir Carl August Berendsen a very capable chairman. It is evident, of course, that while due consideration must be given to geographical representation, there must be equal consideration for the capacity of the individual for any position to which he is elected.

It looks as though there would be fewer plenary sessions during which delegates would speak on the reports of the Secretary General, of the Security Council and of the Economic and Social Council. Everyone was interested in the Secretary General’s report which he made orally to supplement his written report. I think it was well for him to remind us how difficult the work of the secretariat has been in view of the numerous moves and reorganizations which have had to take place.

There seems to be more interest in getting down to the work of the committees at this session. It is in these committees that the problems, which the Assembly must settle, will come up. And it is on the reports of these committees that the really interesting debates will come toward the latter part of the session.

258

October 28, 1946

HYDE PARK, Sunday – There is an article in one of the papers today which will bring chuckles to anyone who knows the younger set on Long Island. It is by a butler who tells what’s wrong with the employers he’s worked for. Although it is amusing and in some ways very true, there is another side to the picture, and I think both sides should be presented fairly.

There is no question but what in the past the employer did not provide “servants” with the type of comfortable living quarters to which they are entitled. But I think it is the exception today when an employer does not give comfortable rooms and furnishings.

I am entirely in accord that a change in the name is desirable. I have always disliked the word “servant.” Could one say domestic helper, or is there a better name? The job, if a family and a home are to be well cared for, is a skilled worker’s job.

I do not find the story of the woman who served 40 years in one family and then left all she had to her employer’s son rather than to her own relatives, a sad tale. I think she was undoubtedly happy in her work and loved those whom she served. That can be a very rare, close and satisfying relationship. No compensation in wages can possibly measure the tie that exists between employer and employee when years of love and respect have forged the bond.

I think the unionization of domestic employees will be salutary both for the employer and the employee. The employer would have to be more accurate in describing the job and less changeable. The employee would have to be well trained and live up to certain standards, both as to the manner in which the job was done and the time it took to execute. There would have to be definite achievement and skill in order to obtain certain wages.

The butler who writes this sad and partially true tale does not mention that many a couple in service today is demanding and receiving from $300 to $400 a month in addition to board and lodging, which at present living costs would probably mean an additional $200 a month. There are not many employers, young or old, who can afford that amount of money for help in their household tasks.

Forty or 50 years ago, the monthly rate of pay in households with several employees was $40 to $50 for a cook, $25 to $30 for a housemaid or waitress, and $18 to $20 for a kitchen maid, with room and board for all. These wages rose until about 20 years ago, when a cook received $80 to $100 a month, a butler about $70 or more, and the other employees between $60 and $70 a month. Costs of food and rent were far lower, so that for the salary received by a couple today, one could have a house completely staffed with four or five well-trained domestic employees. It meant less work for everyone, of course, but less pay. I am not sure that in the aggregate, however, those domestic employees of an earlier era really had such a bad time!

259

October 29, 1946

NEW YORK, Monday – The British decision to socialize basic industries in their zone in Germany marks the realization of a fact that very few people in the United States seem to understand.

Our free-enterprise system has been successful because we came to a new and rich country. We were able to obtain from the old countries certain financial backing and some of the necessary tools and materials. In that more than 150 years, our system has yielded wonderful opportunities for the making of great fortunes to a surprisingly large number of people. Of late years there has been some circumscribing of these opportunities, but we are still a nation with a great deal of undeveloped land and many natural resources, besides having, as a people, a certain inventive genius in mechanical things that has served us well.

But in the century and a half of our growth, we have never known, except perhaps for a short time in the South, the kind of devastation which at present faces the greater part of Europe.

Our system has offered new incentives to the enterprising. It has certain drawbacks to be sure. We still have slums; we still have people who cannot afford proper medical care; we have others who do not earn enough to eat properly and to give their children the proper environment in which to grow. A few years ago it was said that one-third of our nation was ill-clothed, ill-housed and ill-fed. So with that as a background, we should be able to picture to ourselves what it must be like in nations today where perhaps more than 90 percent of the people are ill-clothed, ill-housed and ill-fed.

I think Great Britain, in electing a Labor Government, faced the fact that new conditions demanded new remedies. Being closer to Europe than we are, and more realistic for that reason, she is facing the fact that, in the desire for rehabilitation, there may be only two ways open to the greater part of Europe, namely, the Socialist or the Communist way.

Communism made its great appeal in Russia because the great mass of people had so little that it was the way of hope for them. If we are looking at Europe today with the idea that the old type of investment and loan can serve the people, I am afraid we are not being very realistic. Some may be willing to build up and support the type of international cartel system that has flourished in certain great industries in the past, and has been used as a political weapon as well as an economic one. On the whole, however, I think that we, as a people, are opposed to doing that, since that system has so often fostered war.

There remains, therefore, a study to be made in how to cooperate with the British semi-socialist Government in the economic world and with the Communist economic system. This study would include recommendations on making our own system work where it is profitable and can serve the needs of the people, but accepting the fact that other economic systems, when they meet the needs of the people better, must be accepted and a way to work with them must be found.

This is a test in the economic field where we consider ourselves as able, if not more so, than any other people in the world. Here, at least, we should be able to lead in the finding of solutions. It requires imagination and understanding of the conditions that face people in other parts of the world. But if our industrial leaders fail in this vision, they are laying the foundations for the wiping out of our system in the future.

260

October 30, 1946

NEW YORK, Tuesday – Three very meek delegates, fully aware of their shortcomings, sat before a large group of the editors of high school papers in a conference room at the United Nations building, yesterday afternoon. They tried to give in a few words some impression of the work they had been doing in the past months, since the United Nations came into being. Then each answered questions touching their own individual subjects.

Mr. Chan of China had the hardest time because many of the boys were ex-GIs and they were interested in why the United Nations allowed war to continue anywhere in the world, and “wasn’t the war in China a menace to world peace?” Several questions they asked would have required a review of history to answer and much more time than ever is available in this kind of interview. This always happens with high school youngsters. Whether they are returned GIs or not, the pattern still seems to hold good!

What amused me most was to see the regular reporters listening to the questions asked, and then writing reams as the questions were answered.

As one goes about the building, one is constantly meeting many people, some of whom are previous acquaintances and some of whom are completely new. A gentleman from Denmark, Mr. Aage Heinberg, caught me long enough to give me a book on the two Roosevelts – President Theodore Roosevelt and President Franklin D. Roosevelt – which I was most grateful to receive. A gentleman from Canada gave me something to read as I was going out and said we would talk it over later. I only hope I have time to read it!

I stayed much later than I had expected to stay at the afternoon session, because I hoped to hear both the delegate from Poland and the delegate from France speak. Unfortunately the morning session was a little delayed, so they did not get in the full number of speeches and I had to leave right after the translations of the speech made by the delegate from Byelo Russia. His was a very interesting address, showing clearly how different the same circumstances can seem to different individuals. This is one of the valuable lessons we all learn in the United Nations. Given the same facts, two persons with different backgrounds and different training may reach entirely different conclusions.

It was first thought there might not be many speeches this week at the plenary sessions, so the work at Flushing Meadows might be over by Tuesday. It seems now, however, that the committees’ work will not begin until Thursday.

I went to the 60th anniversary dinner of the University Settlement last night and was presented the Settlement award, which was a great honor for me, I think, because I am probably one of the earliest of the volunteers who work in this particular settlement!

When I was asked to speak, at the Greenwich Presbyterian church, last week, on choosing a career someone suggested to me that I had had a career in social work. I had to tell them very quickly that I could not claim any such title to fame, for the small amount of work I had ever done was done as a volunteer and an amateur and while I felt that it had given me a great deal of valuable education, it had certainly not made me a trained social worker!