The Pittsburgh Press (February 27, 1945)
I DARE SAY —
Let’s be fair
By Florence Fisher Parry
Those of us who have seen the magnificent newsreels of the epic Yalta meeting, whether we be for or against our President and his administration, must admit that Mr. Roosevelt looks bad.
And I think now is as good a time as any to protest the assumption, on the part of New Dealers, that any admission of the President’s impaired health is merely vicious propaganda. This would be doing injustice to all too many fair-minded and honestly concerned Americans whose anxiety over the President’s health is as natural as it is unprejudiced.
Compared with the faces of Mr. Churchill and Mr. Stalin, that of our President is old and tired.
Why is it not possible for the people of America to be calm and impersonal about the vitally important subject of the President’s health? Why must his defenders bristle when hint of his failing looks is brought up in conversation?
Why must we make such issue over a subject which, more than any other, directly affects this country as a nation and a people?
Honest concern
For nothing could be so paralyzing to this country as any tragedy that could possibly befall our President. This issue was brought up in our last presidential election, but was then, as now, dismissed by the New Deal party as vicious campaign propaganda.
Those of us who remember the final days of President Wilson’s administration, when every White House item had to wait the decision of the President’s wife, who had sole power to accept or reject petitions for the President’s attention – cannot be blamed for our natural apprehension about our present President, when we look at the telltale newsreels taken in Yalta.
There is no high office on earth which makes as relentless a call upon the health of its holder as does that of President of the United States. Twelve years of occupancy of this post is bound to take toll of the most vigorous and stout-hearted human being; and however ebullient our President’s temperament may be, it is folly for his admirers to refuse to face, with anything but acute and compassionate uneasiness and concern, the next three years of his tenure of office.
Is it unfair to ask: What provisions are being made in the event of a catastrophe? True, Mr. Roosevelt is surrounded by persons far more experienced than was Mrs. Wilson; men who have enjoyed unprecedented and undelegated (except by the President) powers. It will be a problem for the historians to set down the limitless powers that have been Harry Hopkins’ and Mrs. Roosevelt’s to enjoy. To what degree this assumption of power would be maintained if Mr. Truman were President is an interesting, if uneasy, speculation.
Time to be prepared
Would that more of us remembered those last days that President Wilson spent in the White House. It will probably never be known to what degree the public was kept in ignorance of President Wilson’s incapacity. That excellent motion picture Wilson glossed and glorified those pitiful last days.
I remember all too well the enemies he had, and how they wickedly capitalized upon his physical incapacitation. But underlying all this political division and bitterness, the people of this country were humanly concerned, were sorry, would have liked to ease the loneliness and bitterness of the President’s last days in the White House. The occasional pictures that were shown of him in those last days were not pounced upon by his enemies and used against his administration. They served rather to remind a stricken nation of the appalling tragedy of a President’s illness.
I really think that it is time for the pro-Roosevelts to recognize in their political antagonists the human attribute of a sincere concern for his health. No one reading of the occasional air transport accidents and the assassination of leaders, the most recent of which has been the Egyptian premier, killed only Saturday, can fail to feel genuine admiration for these brave men, Roosevelt, Churchill, Stalin and their personal retinues of advisors, who so willingly face danger and the risk of death to bring some kind of order and future to this now tragic world.