Eleanor Roosevelt: My Day (1947)

61

March 12, 1947

SAN FRANCISCO, Tuesday – A letter from a French missionary in East Africa to the manager of Liberty Carillons, Inc., was recently sent to me in the hope, I think, that I would be touched and would want to accede to the writer’s request. No one could help but feel the sincerity of Father Jean Delemer, but I found out that to grant his wish for a church bell would cost $800, even though no profit is made by Carillons. So I have decided to give an opportunity to my readers to join with me, if they are moved to do so, in contributing toward this sum, since I would not feel it right to other interests to which I am pledged to do this alone. Anything above the $800 which I receive will be turned over to the Father for help in education.

The letter comes from the White Fathers of Myaruonga, Bukoba Post Office, Tanganyika, East Africa.

"Dear Sir: I dare to write to you in my bad English (you will not mind, I am a French missionary) that to ask you for a big service. You may see now and then good people who come to buy bells at your store. Some bright day, could you not kindly ask one of them if he would not accept to do a wonderful action and buy two bells instead of one, and spare the second for an unknown, poor, faraway church in the African bush.

"I realize it is rather strange and bold to come to you in such an intrusive and direct manner, asking you for such an unusual commission. Even I am aware you may have little chance to find that splendid Catholic who could and would answer this call… There are so many distresses all over the world now, also everybody is forgetting us, and for years we find ourselves so sadly unable not only to develop but even to maintain our missionary works. That to call our black folk we have only an odd native drum with an old plate of iron from a petrol tank, not very harmonious you can imagine, but chiefly quite insufficient to be heard by our Christians or catechumens living far away from the mission.

"How miraculous for us and for them if we could ring the ‘Angelus’ with a real bell! They have never heard and cannot imagine the sweet voice of an ‘Ulaya’ (European true bell).

“You will pardon me, dear sir, thinking I am not troubling you for myself but for my black children, as ourselves the children of ‘Our Father Who art in Heaven.’ I am sure your good heart will understand and try to help. Beforehand I dare to tell you my gratitude.”

That letter was two months on the way, and when it came to me, I had to find out how much the cost would be, so another month has elapsed. The casting of the bell will take time. It will be a long time before Father Delemer’s bell actually reaches him. I am not a Catholic, but I love the bells from both the Catholic and Protestant churches, and I know that they can give inspiration when the spirit is weary and when human frailty makes one lag in well-doing. Those who try to help the people of Africa deserve our help, for theirs is an unselfish life. I hope you will be moved to give a little of the bell!

62

March 13, 1947

SAN FRANCISCO, Wednesday – As always, I am struck by California’s beautiful flowers. Ever since we have been here, people have been giving us flowers from their gardens – the loveliest camellias, irises, daffodils. In other words, spring is already here.

A violent controversy goes on in the city of San Francisco over the removal of the old cable cars. People are passionate about it and I can understand why, for to most of us the cable cars climbing these steep hills are among the first things we think of when we call this city to mind.

To me, however, the beautiful views of the bay and the bridges are the greatest charm that living here would hold. My young friend Mrs. Hershey Martin’s apartment on Telegraph Hill is like the deck of a ship. You would never have claustrophobia there. Miles and miles of space greet you as you look out of every window. There is nothing to impede your view.

The other day, we drove up into the hills near San Rafael to lunch with some young friends of mine – Mr. and Mrs. Evans Houghton. They are living in a little cottage deep among the redwoods. Their baby, as she grows up in the shadow of those immense trees, will certainly have a sense of time and space. Redwoods do not burn even in a forest fire – they simply blacken. There they stand, defiant of most of the things which wipe out our forests, and so they grow to be thousands of years old. I think they are the most awe-inspiring trees that we have in this whole country.

Yesterday morning, I took a stroll through Chinatown and visited my old friend Suey Chong. He is now receiving goods from China, but he deprecatingly said that silks were still very expensive and therefore the goods made from them were expensive. I am afraid we were not very good customers but our welcome was nevertheless a warm one. In looking into the shops here, one sees that some goods which were impossible to get during the war, such as rattan furniture, are being produced again, so that an order can be filled in a month or six weeks.

My old friend Miss Flora Rose, who used to be head of the College of Home Economics at Cornell, came over from Berkeley to have lunch with me yesterday. She is just as full of interests as ever, and is now conducting a Red Cross course for the wives of G.I.'s studying at the University of California. They have to live in cramped quarters and she has the greatest admiration for their fortitude and cheerfulness. I am sure that no one ever did so much active work after retirement as does Miss Rose.

In the afternoon, Mrs. Thomas Dillon drove us to her lovely home in the hills back of Oakland, where we sat with her and her husband and watched the sunset over the bay. We enjoyed every minute until it was time to go to my evening lecture for the YWCA in Oakland.

63

March 14, 1947

SAN FRANCISCO, Thursday – Before the President’s speech to Congress, the papers published statements by various senators who gave qualified approval or unqualified disapproval of whatever he might be going to say. It would seem to me that these gentlemen might better have stated their own attitudes if they wanted those attitudes to be of value to the President in forming his own. But to criticize his policy before it had even been stated seemed to have an element of the ludicrous about it.

I hope we are going to give aid to the countries in Europe that need it for relief and rehabilitation, and I hope we are going to see to it that what we give is administered impartially and is given to all people in need, regardless of their political beliefs. That was the reason we gave to the United Nations for refusing to join a new international relief organization to take the place of UNRRA. We felt that that organization was susceptible to the accusation of having been used politically, and therefore, in the future, we wished to control our own giving.

We must, however, be doubly careful that we are non-political in whatever we now give. Neither must it be possible to imply that anything we do is done to oppose the influence of any of our former allies. If we do that, we weaken the U.N. and find ourselves enmeshed in the old form of alliances and power politics.

We know that, with the growth of independence and individual power in the Latin American countries, we have had to recede from our old interpretation of the Monroe Doctrine. We no longer act alone – we act in cooperation with our neighbors in whatever we do in this hemisphere. That, on a larger scale, is the attitude that will uphold the U.N., and we must not forget it.

I was told a curious thing the other day. It seems that, here in California, there is a controversy raging over sex education – not over how it should be taught but over the teaching of it at all. There is a learned state senator who has discovered, that, in some way, this teaching is connected with Communism.

I have been a little confused about this since a young reporter first asked me my opinion. I told him I could not have an opinion as I did not know what the controversy was about. After he tried to explain, I was still at a loss to understand how sensible people could be making such a to-do about something which should be treated as naturally as the other ordinary things which we begin to teach children in their babyhood, hoping they will fully understand when they are grown.

We start teaching babies how to eat and how to dress themselves. We teach them habits of cleanliness, and we go on to good manners and the various necessary graces and morals. It seems to me that sex education is much like this type of education. It goes on in the home and in the school. We don’t talk about it, we just see that it is as well done as possible, because we know that it is essential to safeguard our children. Where the issue of Communism can possibly arise is still a mystery to me, but perhaps it is just a case of branding anything as Communistic which you do not know much about.

64

March 15, 1947

SAN FRANCISCO, Friday – I have been giving a good deal of troubled thought to the President’s speech. No one can view the state of the world today without grave concern, but it seems to me that there are parts of his speech which are based on premises that some of us feel unable to accept without further information.

For instance, why must this country accept Great Britain’s military responsibilities? Britain undertook them for reasons of her own, which may or may not seem good reasons to us. It does not seem as though a government could be completely stable, and representative of 85 percent of the will of the people, and still require military bolstering from the outside.

I do not question the absolute need to help both Greece and Turkey with relief and rehabilitation. They certainly are unable to cope with their economic problems alone. Without help, chaos would ensue. I think the part of the President’s speech which states that Communism follows economic chaos is entirely correct. The economy of Communism is an economy which grows in an atmosphere of misery and want.

Feeling as I do that our one hope for peace lies in the United Nations, I naturally grieve to see this country do anything which harms the strength of the . If we could have given help for relief and rehabilitation on a purely non-political basis, and then have insisted that the U.N. join us in deciding what should be done on any political or policing basis to keep Greece and Turkey free from all outside interference, and to allow her to settle her own difficulties in the way the majority of her people desired to have them settled, I would have felt far happier than I do now.

We seem to have decided not to let Greece make her own decisions but to make them for her. In other words, we seem to have accepted Great Britain’s policy without very much investigation. I hesitate to say this, however, because I realize that the men in power have much information which the average citizen cannot possibly have.

I am sure that the President and the Secretary of State and our Ambassador to Greece are anxious to do the most stabilizing and farseeing job that can be done, not only for Greece but for the world. In giving my personal reactions and fears, I hope that it may point the way so that our government representatives will give us the answers which we need so badly in order to support our Government fully and wholeheartedly in a situation which does require the support of the whole people of the U.S.

I realize that the lack of a military set-up within the United Nations makes it very difficult to use the U.N. in a situation requiring force. And of course, not having setup an international relief organization, we are now obligated to handle any situation of this kind, which requires vast sums of money, on the basis of relief by our nation alone. But it would seem to me wiser to strengthen the U.N. by having its influence brought upon these serious questions as they arise. And if force is deemed necessary, it might better be brought in from the individual nations at the behest of the U.N. until we have collective force to use.