FDR - Jean Edward Smith [76]
SEVEN
WAR
These dear, good people like W.J.B. [William Jennings Bryan] and J.D. [Josephus Daniels] have as much conception of what a general European war means as [four-year-old] Elliott has of higher mathematics.
—FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT, AUGUST 2, 1914
AFTER A YEAR as assistant secretary, FDR grew restive in Washington. While he relished the ceremonial trappings of his office and reveled in the proximity to national power, he was still a pale second to Secretary Daniels and relegated to department housekeeping rather than the grand strategy and high politics to which he aspired. Much of the day-to-day work in the Navy Department he found tedious. He could recommend, but final authority rested with Daniels. Senator Elihu Root had recognized the trait: Roosevelts were accustomed to ride in front. A southern wit like Addie Daniels, Josephus’s wife, would simply have said that Franklin was getting too big for his breeches.
Through Louis Howe, FDR kept tabs on New York politics. The state Democratic party was in more than the usual disarray, and Franklin maneuvered to exploit the confusion. If further advancement in Washington was temporarily blocked—as it clearly was—he would rekindle his career by seeking statewide office in New York. Roosevelt’s perspective was clouded by Potomac myopia, the affliction of self-importance that often causes senior Washington officials to overestimate their significance in their home states, and in FDR’s case he assumed that the governorship of the Empire State was within easy grasp.
“Plain Bill” Sulzer, who had been Tammany’s handpicked choice for governor, had run afoul of the organization and was removed from office in October 1913. He was replaced by the reliable Martin H. Glynn, a Democratic stalwart from Albany. But the heavy hand of Tammany had tainted the impeachment process and made Glynn vulnerable. He was also Catholic, the first of that faith to occupy the governor’s chair, and whether a Catholic could win a statewide election in 1914 was far from clear. In addition, New York had recently enacted the direct-primary law for which FDR had worked so diligently in the legislature. As Franklin saw it, that would limit Tammany’s ability to dictate the party’s nominee and open the way for a candidate with strong grassroots support—support that the name Roosevelt virtually ensured. Finally, FDR envisioned himself as the anointed candidate of the Wilson administration, departing Washington with the president’s blessing to smite the Murphy machine on behalf of political reform.
Wilson’s support was crucial to FDR’s campaign. Yet throughout late 1913 and early 1914 the president refused to commit himself. He may have savored the thought of a reform victory in New York, but he needed the votes of the state’s Tammany-dominated congressional delegation to put the New Freedom legislative program across. Howe launched a series of trial balloons for FDR in the New York press and did his utmost to hint at Wilson’s support, but it was wishful thinking.1 In March 1914, Roosevelt tried to force Wilson’s hand. Ralph Pulitzer of The New York World had asked FDR to write an article for his paper on the political situation in the Empire State. Franklin asked Wilson for guidance. Could he have five minutes of the president’s time to discuss the matter?2 Wilson declined. Instead, he sent