The Letters of Franklin K. Lane, Personal and Political (2024)

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and the Online Distributed Proofreading Team

Personal and Political

EDITED BY ANNE WINTERMUTE LANE AND LOUISE HERRICK WALL

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS

Prom the thousands of typewritten letters found in his files, andfrom the many holograph letters sent to me from his friends indifferent parts of the country, we have attempted, in this volume,to select chiefly those letters which tell the story of FranklinK. Lane's life as it unfolded itself in service to his countrywhich was his passion. A few technical letters have been included,because they represent some incomplete and original phases of thework he attempted,—work, to which he brought an intensity ofinterest and devotion that usually is given only to privateenterprise.

In editing his letters we have omitted much, but we have in no waychanged anything that he wrote. Even where, in his haste, therehas been an obvious slip of the pen, we have left it. Owing to hisdictating to many stenographers, with their varying methods ofpunctuation and paragraphing, and because the letters that hewrote himself were often dashed off on the train, in bed, or in ahurried five minutes before some engagement, we found in them nouniformity of punctuation. In writing hastily he used only afrequent dash and periods; these letters we have made agree withthose which were more formally written.

With the oncoming of war his correspondence enormously increased—the more demanded of him, the more he seemed able to accomplish.Upon opening his files it took us weeks to run through and destroyjust the requests for patronage, for commissions, passports,appointments as chaplains, promotions, demands from artists whodesired to work on camouflage, farmers and chemists who wishedexemption, requests for appointments to the War Department;letters asking for every kind of a position from that of night-watchman to that of Brigadier-General. For his friends, and eventhose who had no special claim upon him, knew that they couldcount on his interest in them.

One of his secretaries, Joseph J. Cotter, a man he greatlytrusted, in describing his office work says: "Whatever was ofhuman interest, interested Mr. Lane. His researches were by nomeans limited to the Department of the Interior. For instance, Iremember that at one time, before the matter had been given anyconsideration in any other quarter, he asked Secretary ofa*griculture Houston to come to his office, in the InteriorDepartment, and went with him into the question of the number ofships it would take to transport our soldiers to the other side.And as a result of this conference, a plan was laid before theSecretary of War. I remember this particularly because itnecessitated my looking up dead-weight tonnage, and other matters,with which I was entirely unfamiliar. …

"I have never known any one who could with equal facility followan intricate line of thought through repeated interruptions. Ihave seen Mr. Lane, when interrupted in the middle of an involvedsentence of dictation, talk on some other subject for five or tenminutes and return to his dictation, taking it up where he left itand completing the sentence so that it could be typed as dictated,and this without the stenographer's telling him at what point hehad been interrupted."

His letters are peculiarly autobiographical, for whenever hisactive mind was engaged on some personal, political, orphilosophical problem, his thought turned naturally to that friendwith whom he would most like to discuss the subject, and, if hecould possibly make the time, to him he wrote just what thoughtsraced through his mind. To Ambassador Page he wrote in 1918, "Ihave a very old-fashioned love for writing from day to day whatpops into my mind, contradicting each day what I said the daybefore, and gathering from my friends their impressions and theirspirit in the same way." And in another letter he says, "Now Ihave gossiped, and preached, and prophesied, and mourned, andotherwise revealed what passes through a wandering mind in half anhour, so I send you at the close of this screed, my blessing,which is a poor gift."

At home on Sunday morning before the fire, he would often writemany letters—some of them twenty pages in length and some merescrappy notes. He wrote with a pencil on a pad on his knee,rapidly stripping off the sheets for me to read, in his desire toshare all that was his, even his innermost thoughts.

To the many correspondents who have generously returned to metheir letters, and with no restrictions as to their use, I wishparticularly to express here my profound gratitude. The limits ofone volume have made it possible to use only a part of thosereceived, deeply as I have regretted the necessity of omitting anyof them. In making these acknowledgments I wish especially tothank John H. Wigmore, since to him we owe all the early letters—the only ones covering that period.

For possible future use I shall be grateful for any letters that Ihave not already seen, and if in the preparation of these lettersfor publication we have allowed any mistakes to slip in, I hopethat the error will be called to my attention.

Anne Wintermute Lane

March, 1922

I. INTRODUCTION

Youth—Education—Characteristics

II. POLITICS AND JOURNALISM. 1884-1894

Politics—Newspaper Work—New York—Buying into Tacoma News
—Marriage—Sale of Newspaper

LETTERS:
To John H. Wigmore
To John H. Wigmore
To John H. Wigmore
To John H. Wigmore

III. LAW PRACTICE AND POLITICAL ACTIVITIES. 1894-1906

Law—Drafting New City Charter—Elected as City and County Attorney—
Gubernatorial Campaign—Mayoralty Campaign—Earthquake
—Appointment as Interstate Commerce Commissioner

LETTERS:
To P. T. Spurgeon
To John H. Wigmore
To John H. Wigmore
To John H. Wigmore
To Lyman Naugle
To John H. Wigmore
To John H. Wigmore
To William R. Wheeler
To Orva G. Williams
To the Iroquois Club, Los Angeles, California
To Isadore B. Dockweiler
To Edward B. Whitney
To Hon. Theodore Roosevelt
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler
To William E. Smythe
To John H. Wigmore
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler
To William R. Wheeler
To John H. Wigmore
To William R. Wheeler

IV. RAILROAD AND NATIONAL POLITICS. 1906-1912

Increased Powers of Interstate Commerce Commission—Harriman
Inquiry—Railroad Regulation—Letters to Roosevelt

LETTERS:
To Edward F. Adams
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler
To Elihu Root
To E. B. Beard
To George W. Lane
To Charles K. McClatchy
To Lawrence F. Abbott
To John H. Wigmore
To Mrs. Franklin K. Lane
To Theodore Roosevelt
To John H. Wigmore
To William R. Wheeler
To Lawrence F. Abbott
To Charles K. McClatchy
To Charles K. McClatchy
To John Crawford Burns
To Theodore Roosevelt
To Samuel G. Blythe
To Sidney E. Mezes
To John H. Wigmore
To George W. Lane
To Carl Snyder
From Oliver Wendell Holmes
To Oliver Wendell Holmes
To John H. Wigmore
To Daniel Willard
To John McNaught

V. EXPRESS CASE—CABINET APPOINTMENTS 1912-1913

Politics—Democratic Convention—Nomination of Wilson —Report on
Express Case—Democratic Victory—Problems for New Administration
—On Cabinet Appointments

LETTERS:
To Albert Shaw
To Curt G. Pfeiffer
To George W. Lane
To Oscar S. Straus
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler,
To George W. Lane.
To John H. Wigmore.
To Timothy Spellacy.
To Adolph C. Miller.
To William F. McComba,
To Hugo K. Asher.
To Francis G. Newlands.
To Woodrow Wilson.
To William J. Bryan.
To James D. Phelan.
To Herbert Harley.
To Charles K. McClatchy.
To Ernest S. Simpson.
To Fairfax Harrison.
To James P. Brown.
To Adolph C. Miller.
To Edward M. House.
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To Sidney E. Mezes.
To John H. Wigmore.
To John H. Wigmore.
To Joseph N. Teal.
To Edward M. House.
To Mitchell Innes.

VI. SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR. 1913-1915

Appointment as Secretary of the Interior—Reorganization of the
Department—Home Club—Bills on Public Lands

LETTERS:

To John H. Wigmore.
To Walter H. Page.
To Edwin A. Alderman.
To Theodore Roosevelt.
To Lawrence F. Abbott.
To William M. Bole.
To Fairfax Harrison.
To Frank Reese.
To Mark Sullivan.
To Edward M. House.
To James H. Barry.
To Edward F. Adams.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson,
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To Albert Shaw.
To Charles K. Field.
To Frederic J. Lane.
To Edward E. Leake.
To William R. Wheeler.
To—.
To his Brother on his Birthday.
To Cordenio Severance.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Theodore Roosevelt.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Lawrence F. Abbott.

VII. EUROPEAN WAR AND PERSONAL CONCERNS. 1914-1915

Endorsem*nt of Hoover—German Audacity—LL.D. from Alma Mater
—England's Sea Policy—Christmas letters

LETTERS:
To William J. Bryan.
To John Crawford Burns.
To Alexander Vogelsang.
To John H. Wigmore.
To John Crawford Burns.
To Edward J. Wheeler.
To John Crawford Burns.
To William P. Lawlor.
To William G. McAdoo.
To John Crawford Burns.
To E. W. Scripps.
To George W. Wickersham.
To Frederic J. Lane.
To John Crawford Burns.
To Eugene A. Avery.
To John F. Davis.
To Dick Mead.
To John Crawford Burns.
To Sidney E. Mezes.
To Cordenio Severance.
To Frederick Dixon.
To Robert H. Patchin.
To Francis R. Wall.
To John H. Wigmore.
To Mrs. Adolph C. Miller.
To Mrs. Magnus Andersen.
To Mrs. Adolph C. Miller.

VIII. AMERICAN AND MEXICAN AFFAIRS.

On Writing English—Visit to Monticello—Citizenship for Indians—On
Religion—American-Mexican Joint Commission

LETTERS:
To William M. Bole.
To Mrs. Adolph C. Miller.
To Edward F. Adams.
To Carl Snyder.
To Mrs. Franklin K. Lane.
To Will Irwin.
To—.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Frederic J. Lane.
To Frank L Cobb.
To George W. Wickersham.
To H. B. Brougham.
To Frederic J. Lane.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Mrs. Franklin K. Lane.
To Mrs. Adolph C. Miller.
To Mrs. Franklin K. Lane.
To William R. Wheeler.
To James S. Harlan.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Alexander Vogelsang.
To Frederic J. Lane.
To Frank I. Cobb.
To R. M. Fitzgerald.
To James K. Moffitt.
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To Roland Cotton Smith.
To James H. Barry.

IX. CABINET TALK AND WAR PLANS. 1917

Cabinet Meetings—National Council of Defense—Bernstorff—War—Planfor Railroad Consolidation—U-Boat Sinkings Revealed—Alaska

LETTERS:
To George W. Lane.
To George W. Lane.
To George W. Lane.
To Frank I. Cobb.
To George W. Lane.
To George W. Lane.
To Edward J. Wheeler.
To George W. Lane.
To Frank I. Cobb.
To George W. Lane.
To George W. Lane.
To Frank I. Cobb.
To Will Irwin.
To Robert Lansing.
To Henry Lane Eno.
To George B. Dorr.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To John O'H. Cosgrave.

X. CABINET NOTES IN WAR-TIME. 1918

Notes on Cabinet Meetings—School Gardens—A Democracy Lacks
Foresight—Use of National Resources—Washington in War-time—The
Sacrifice of War—Farms for Soldiers

LETTERS:
To Franklin K. Lane, Jr.
To George W. Lane.
To Albert Shaw.
To Walter H. Page.
To John Lyon.
To Frank Lyon.
To Miss Genevieve King.
To John McNaught.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Allan Pollok.
To E. S. Pillsbury.
To William Marion Reedy.
Notes on Cabinet Meetings.
To Daniel Willard.
To James H. Hawley.
To Samuel G. Blythe.
To George W. Lane.
To Edgar C. Bradley.

XI. AFTER-WAR PROBLEMS—LEAVING WASHINGTON. 1919

After-war Problems—Roosevelt Memorials—Americanization—Religion
—Responsibility of Press—Resignation

LETTERS:
To E. C. Bradley.
To George W. Lane.
To George W. Lane.
To William Boyce Thompson.
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To E. S. Martin.
To George W. Lane.
To Van H. Manning.
To E. C. Bradley.
To Mrs. Louise Herrick Wall.
To—.
To M. A. Mathew.
To Herbert C. Pell, Jr.
To Henry P. Davison.
To George W. Lane.
To C. S. Jackson.
To John Crawford Burns.
To Frank I. Cobb.
To Mrs. Louise Herrick Wall.
To Mrs. M. A. Andersen.
To George W. Lane.
To Daniel J. O'Neill.
To Hamlin Garland.
To Hugo K. Asher.
To Admiral Gary Grayson.
To Herbert C. Pell, Jr.
To Hon. Woodrow Wilson.
To Frank W. Mondell.
To Robert W. De Forest.

XII. POLITICAL COUNSEL—LINCOLN'S EYES. 1920

Suggestions to Democratic Nominee for President—On Election of
Senators—Lost Leaders—Lincoln's Eyes—William James's Letters

LETTERS:
To William Phelps Eno.
To Roland Cotton Smith.
To James M. Cox.
To Timothy Spellacy.
To Edward L. Doheny.
To Franklin D. Roosevelt.
To Mrs. George Ehle.
To Isadore B. Dockweiler.
To Hall McAllister.
To Mrs. George Ehle.
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To John W. Hallowell.
To John W. Hallowell.
To Robert Lansing.
To Carl Snyder.
To William R. Wheeler.
To George Otis Smith.
To George W. Wickersham.
Lincoln's Eyes.
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt.
To Lathrop Brown.
To Timothy Spellacy.
To Frank I. Cobb.
To John G. Gehring.
To John W. Hallowell.
To John G. Gehring.

XIII. LETTERS TO ELIZABETH. 1919-1920

LETTERS:
To Mrs. Ralph Ellis.

XIV. FRIENDS AND THE GREAT HOPE. 1921

Need for Democratic Program—Religious Faith—Men who have Influenced
Thought—A Sounder Industrial Life —A Super-University for Ideas
—"I Accept"—Fragment

LETTERS:
To Mrs. Philip C. Kauffmann.
To Benjamin Ide Wheeler.
To Lathrop Brown.
To Mrs. George Ehle.
To Mrs. William Phillips.
To James H. Barry.
To Michael A. Spellacy.
To William R. Wheeler.
To V. C. Scott O'Connor.
Letter sent to several friends.
To John G. Gehring.
To Lathrop Brown.
To Lathrop Brown.
To Adolph C. Miller.
To John G. Gehring.
To John W. Hallowell.
To Curt G. Pfeiffer.
To John G. Gehring.
To D. M. Reynolds.
To Mrs. Cordenio Severance.
To Alexander Vogelsang.
To James S. Harlan.
To Adolph C. Miller.
To Lathrop Brown.
To John G. Gehring.
To John H. Wigmore.
To Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt.
To John W. Hallowell.
To John G. Gehring.
To Hall McAllister.
To Mrs. Frederic Peterson.
To Roland Cotton Smith.
To John G. Gehring.
To Adolph C. Miller.
To Robert Lansing.
To James D. Phelan.
To Mr. and Mrs. Louis Hertle.
To Alexander Vogelsang.
To John Finley.
To James H. Barry.
To Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt.
To friends who had telegraphed and written for news.—"I accept."
To Alexander Vogelsang.
To John W. Hallowell.
To Robert Lansing.
Fragment.

FRANKLIN K. LANE

FRANKLIN K. LANE With his younger brothers, George and Frederic.

FRANKLIN K. LANE At eighteen.

FRANKLIN K. LANE As City and County Attorney.

FRANKLIN K. LANE, MRS. LANE, MRS. MILLER, AND ADOLPH C. MILLER

FRANKLIN K. LANE WITH Ethan Allen, Superintendent of Rainier
National Park, Washington

FRANKLIN K. LANE AND George B. Dorr
In Lafayette National Park, Mount Desert Island, Maine.

FRANKLIN K. LANE IN 1917 Taken in Lafayette National Park.

"LANE PEAK," Tatoosh Range, Rainier National Park

1864. July 15. Born near Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island.1871-76. Taken to California. Went to Grammar School at Napa, California.1876. Went to Oakland, California. Oakland High School.1884-86. University of California, Berkeley, California. Special student.1885. Reporting on Alta California in San Francisco for John P. Irish.1887. Studied Hastings Law School.1888. Admitted to the Bar.1889. Special Newspaper Correspondent in New York for San Francisco Chronicle.1891. Bought interest in Tacoma News and edited that paper.1892. Campaigned in New York for Cleveland.1893. Married.1895. Returned to California. Practiced law.1897-98. On Committee of One Hundred to draft new Charter for San Francisco.1898. Elected City and County Attorney to interpret new Charter.1899. Reelected City and County Attorney.1901. Reelected City and County Attorney.1902. Nominated for Governor of California on Democratic and Non-Partisan Tickets.1903. Democratic vote in Legislature for United States Senator.1903. Nominated for Mayor of San Francisco.1905. December. Nominated by President Roosevelt as Interstate Commerce Commissioner.1906. June 29. Confirmed by Senate as Interstate Commerce Commissioner.1909. Reappointed by President Taft as Interstate Commerce Commissioner.1913. Appointed Secretary of the Interior under President Wilson.1916. Chairman American-Mexican Joint Commission.1918. Chairman Railroad Wage Commission.1919. Chairman Industrial Conference.1920. March 1. Resigned from the Cabinet.1920. Vice-President of Pan-American Petroleum Company.1921. May 18. Died at Rochester, Minnesota.

Franklin K. Lane was the eldest of four children.
Father: Christopher S. Lane.
Mother: Caroline Burns.
Brothers: George W. Lane.
Frederic J. Lane.
Sister: Maude (Mrs. M. A. Andersen).
He was married to Anne Wintermute, and had two children:
Franklin K. Lane, Jr. ("Ned").
Nancy Lane (Mrs. Philip C. Kauffmann).

INTRODUCTION

Youth—Education—Characteristics

Although Franklin Knight Lane was only fifty-seven years old whenhe died, May 18, 1921, he had outlived, by many years, the men andwomen who had most influenced the shaping of his early life. Ofhis mother he wrote, in trying to comfort a friend, "The mysteryand the ordering of this world grows altogether inexplicable. …It requires far more religion or philosophy than I have, to say areal word that might console one who has lost those who are dearto him. Ten years ago my mother died, and I have never beenreconciled to her loss." Again he wrote of her, to his sister,when their brother Frederic—the joyous, outdoor comrade of hisyouth—was in his last illness, "Dear Fritz, dear, dear boy, how Iwish I could be there with him, though I could do no good. … Eachnight I pray for him, and I am so much of a Catholic, that I prayto the only Saint I know, or ever knew, and ask her to help. Ifshe lives, her mind can reach the minds of the doctors. … I don'tneed her to intercede with God, but I would like her to intercedewith men. Why, Oh! why, do we not know whether she is or not? Thenall the Universe would be explained to me."

From those who knew him best from childhood, no word of him isleft, and none from the two men whose strength and idealitycolored his morning at the University of California—Dr. GeorgeH. Howison, the "darling Howison" of the William James' Letters,and Dr. Joseph H. Le Conte, the wise and gentle geologist. "Namesthat were Sierras along my skyline," Lane said of such men. To Dr.Howison he wrote in 1913, when entering President Wilson'sCabinet, "No letter that I have ever received has given me morereal pleasure than yours, and no man has been more of aninspiration than you."

The sealing of almost every source of intimate knowledge of theboy, who was a mature man at twenty-two, has left the record ofthe early period curiously scant. Fortunately, there are in hisletters and speeches some casual allusions to his childhood andyouth, and a few facts and anecdotes of the period from members ofhis family, from school, college, and early newspaper associates.In 1888, the story begins to gather form and coherence, for atthat date we have the first of his own letters that have beenpreserved, written to his lifelong friend, John H. Wigmore. Withmany breaks, especially in the early chapters, the sequence ofevents, and his moods toward them, pour from him with increasingfullness and spontaneity, until the day before he died.

All the later record exists in his letters, most of them writtenalmost as unconsciously as the heart sends blood to the remotestmembers of the body; and they come back, now, in slow diastole,bearing within themselves evidence of the hour and day and placeof their inception; letters written with the stub of a pencil oncopy-paper, at some sleepless dawn; or, long ago, in the wide-spaced type of a primitive traveling typewriter, and dated,perhaps, on the Western desert, while he was on his way to securewater for thirsty settlers; or dashed off in the glowing momentjust after a Cabinet meeting, with the heat of the discussionstill in his veins; others on the paper of the Department of theInterior, with the symbol of the buffalo—chosen by him—richlyembossed in white on the corner, and other letters, soiled andworn from being long carried in the pocket and often re-read, bythe brave old reformer who had hailed Lane when he first enteredthe lists. This is the part of the record that cannot betranscribed.

Franklin Knight Lane was born on July 15, 1864, on his father'sfarm near Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, Canada, the eldestof four children, all born within a few years. The low, whitefarmhouse that is his birthplace still stands pleasantlysurrounded by tall trees, and at one side a huge, thirty-foothedge of hawthorn blooms each spring. His father, Christopher S.Lane, was at the time of his son's birth a preacher. Later, whenhis voice was affected by recurrent bronchitis, he became adentist. Lane speaks of him several times in his letters as aPresbyterian, and alludes to the strict orthodoxy of his father'sfaith, especially in regard to an active and personal devil.

In 1917, when in the Cabinet, during President Wilson's secondterm of office, Lane wrote to his brother, "To-night we give adinner to the Canadians, Sir George Foster, the acting Premier,and Sir Joseph Polk, the Under-Secretary of External Affairs, who,by the way, was born in Charlottetown, Prince Edward Island, andsays that he heard our father preach."

But it was from his mother, whose maiden name was Caroline Burns,and who was of direct Scotch ancestry, that Franklin Lane drewmost of his physical and many of his mental traits. From her hederived the firmly-modeled structure of his face; the watchfulScotch eyes; a fine white skin, that weathered to an even brown,later in life; remarkably sound teeth, large and regular, givingfirm support to the round contour of the face; and the fresh lineof his lips, that was a marked family trait. A description of him,when he was candidate for Governor of California, at thirty-eight,was written by Grant Wallace. Cleared of some of the hot sweetnessof a campaign rhapsody it reads:—

"Picture a man a little above the average height … with the deepchest and deep voice that always go with the born leader of men;the bigness and strength of the hands … the clear eye and broad,firm, and expressive mouth, and the massive head that suggestsirresistibly a combination of Napoleon and Ingersoll."

These two resemblances, to Napoleon and to Robert Ingersoll, werefrequently rediscovered by others, in later years.

The description concludes by saying, "That Lane is a man ofearnestness and vigorous action is shown in … every movement.You sit down to chat with him in his office. As he growsinterested in the subject, he kicks his chair back, thrusts hishands way to the elbows in his trouser pockets and strides up anddown the room. With deepening interest he speaks more rapidly andforcibly, and charges back and forth across the carpet with theheavy tread of a grenadier." As an older man this impetuosity wassomewhat modified. What an early interviewer called his "frankman-to-manness" became a manner of grave and cordialconcentration. With the warm, full grasp of his hand in greeting,he gave his complete attention to the man before him. That, andhis rich, strong laugh of pleasure, and the varied play of hismoods of earnestness, gayety, and challenge, are what men rememberbest.

Lane's native bent from the first was toward public life. Hiscitizenship was determined when his father decided to take hisfamily to California, to escape the severity of the Canadianclimate. In 1902, Franklin Lane was asked how he became anAmerican. "By virtue of my father's citizenship," he replied, "Ihave been a resident of California since seven years of age,excepting during a brief absence in New York and Washington."

In 1871, the mother, father, and four children, after visiting twobrothers of Mrs. Lane's on the way, finally reached the town ofNapa, California.

"They came," says an old schoolmate of Napa days, "bringing withthem enough of the appearance and mannerisms of their formerenvironment to make us youngsters 'sit up and take notice,' forthe children were dressed in kilts, topped by handsome blackvelvet and silk plaid caps. However, these costumes were soondiscarded, for at school the children found themselves the centerof both good—and bad-natured gibes, until they were glad to dressas was the custom here." The "Lane boys," he says, were then putinto knee-trousers, "and Franklin, who was large for his age andquite stout, looked already too old for this style," and socontinued to be annoyed by the children, until he put a forcibleend to it. "He 'licked' one of the ringleaders," says thechronicler, and won to peace. "As we grew to know Franklin … hisright to act became accepted … . There was always somethingabout his personality which made one feel his importance."

The little California community was impressed by the closeintimacy of the home-life of the Canadian family—closer than wasusual in hurriedly settled Western towns. The father found time totake all three boys on daily walks. Another companion remembersseeing them starting off together for a day's hunting and fishing.But it was the mother, who read aloud to them and told themstories and exacted quick obedience from them, who was the realpower in the house. There were regular family prayers, and familysinging of hymns and songs.

This last custom survived among the brothers and sister throughall the years. Even after all had families of their own, and manycares, some chance reunion, or a little family dinner would, atparting, quicken memory and, with hats and coats already on,perhaps, in readiness to separate to their homes, they would standtogether and shout, in unison, some song of the hour or some oftheir old Scotch melodies with that pleasant harmony of voices ofone timbre, heard only in family singing.

Lane had a baritone of stirring quality, coming straight from hisbig lungs, and loved music all his life. In the last weeks of hislife he more than once wrote of his pleasure in his brother'ssinging. At Rochester, a few days before his operation, hereassured an anxious friend by writing, "My brother George ishere, with his splendid philosophy and his Scotch songs."

His love and loyalty to past ties, though great and persistent,still left his ideal of loyalty unsatisfied. Toward the end of hislife he wrote, "Roots we all have and we must not be torn up fromthem and flung about as if we were young things that could takehold in any soil. I have been—America has been—too indifferentto roots—home roots, school roots. … We should love stabilityand tradition as well as love adventure and advancement." But thepractical labors of his life were directed toward creating meansto modify tradition in favor of a larger sort of justice than thepast had known.

Resignation had no part in his political creed. "I hold with oldCicero 'that the whole glory of virtue is in activity,'" comesfrom him with the ring of authentic temperament. And of a friend'sbiography he wrote, "What a fine life—all fight, interwoven withfun and friendship."

[Illustration with caption: FRANKLIN K. LANE WITH HIS YOUNGER
BROTHERS, GEORGE AND FREDERIC]

All the anecdotes of his boyhood show him in action, moving amonghis fellows, organizing, leading, and administering rough-and-tumble justice.

From grammar school in Napa he went, for a time, to a privateschool called Oak Mound. In vacation, when he was eleven yearsold, he was earning money as messenger-boy, and at about thattime as general helper to one of the merchants of the little town.He left in his old employer's mind the memory of a boy"exceedingly bright and enterprising." He recalls a fight that hewas told about, between Lane "and a boy of about his size," "andFrank licked him," the old merchant exults, "and as he walked awayhe said, 'If you want any more, you can get it at the sameplace.'"

It was in Napa—so he could not have been quite twelve years old—that Lane started to study Spanish, so that he might talk morefreely to the ranchers, who drove to town in their rickety littlecarts, to "trade" at the stores.

In 1876, the family moved from the full sunshine of the valleytown, with its roads muffled in pale dust, and its hillsideslifting up the green of riotous vines, to Oakland, cool andcloudy, with a climate to create and sustain vigor. In Oakland,just across the bay from San Francisco, Lane entered the HighSchool. Again his schoolmates recall him with gusto. He wasmuscular in build, "a good short-distance runner." His hands—always very characteristic of the man—were large and well-made,strong to grasp but not adroit in the smaller crafts of tinkering."He impressed me," an Oakland schoolmate writes, "as a sturdyyoungster who had confidence in himself and would undoubtedly getwhat he went after. Earnest and straightforward in manner," andalways engrossed in the other boys, "when they walked down TwelfthStreet, on their way to school, they had their arms around eachother's shoulders, discussing subjects of 'vast importance.'"

His capacity for organized association developed rapidly. He hadpart in school orations, amateur plays, school and Sunday schoolclubs. Many of these he seems to have initiated, so that, with hisschool work, his life was full. He says somewhere that by the timehe was sixteen he was earning his own way. His great delight inpeople, and especially in the thrust and parry of controversialtalk, held him from the solitary pleasures of fishing and hunting,so keenly relished by his two younger brothers. One of them saidof him, "Frank can't even enjoy a view from a mountain-peakwithout wanting to call some one up to share it with him." Hewrites of his feeling about solitary nature to his friend GeorgeDorr, in 1917, in connection with improvements for the newNational Park, near Bar Harbor, "A wilderness, no matter howimpressive or beautiful does not satisfy this soul of mine (if Ihave that kind of a thing). It is a challenge to man. It says,'Master me! Put me to use! Make me more than I am!'" About his"need of a world of men," he was equally candid. To his wife hewrites, "I am going to dinner, and before I go alone into alonesome club, I must send a word to you. … The world is allpeople to me. I lean upon them. They induce thought and fancy.They give color to my life. Thrown on myself I am a strandedbark."…

His love for cooperation and for action, "dramatic action," someone says, never left him. In his last illness, in apoliticalcrisis, he rallied the energy of younger men. He wrote of the needof a Democratic program, suggested a group of compelling names,"or any other group," he adds, "put up the plan and ask them whatthey think of it—tentatively—just a quiet chat, but START!" Andabout the same matter he wrote, "The time has come. Now strike!"

To a friend wavering over her fitness for a piece of projectedwork, he said drily, "There is only one way to do a thing, andthat is to do it." Late in life, the summation of this creed ofaction seemed to come when he confessed, "I cannot get over thefeeling that we are here as conquerors, not as pacifists."

And words, written and spoken words, were to him, of course, theinstrument of conquest. But the search for the fit and shiningword for his mark did not become research. In a droll letter,about how he put simpler English into the Department of theInterior, he tells of finding a letter written by one of thelawyers of the Department to an Indian about his title to land,that was "so involved and elaborately braided and beaded andfringed that I could not understand it myself." So he sent theornate letter back and had it put into "straightaway English."

His own practicable English he believed he had learned through hisnewspaper training. He first worked in the printing office of theOakland Times, then became a reporter for that paper. He wentcampaigning and made speeches for the Prohibition candidate forGovernor in 1884—before he was twenty-one. The next year he wasreporting for the Alta California, edited by Colonel John P.Irish, himself a fiery orator, of the denunciatory type. ColonelIrish recalls that he was at once impressed with the "copious andexcellent vocabulary" of his ambitious reporter, who was, eventhen, he says, "determined upon a high and useful career." In aletter to Colonel Irish, in 1913, Lane wrote, "That simple littlecard of yours was a good thing for me. It took me for a minute outof the maelstrom of pressing business and carried me back, aboutthirty years, to the time when I was a boy working for you—anunbaked, ambitious chap, who did not know where he was going, butwas trying to get somewhere."

It is interesting to notice that in youth he did not suffer fromthe usual phases of revolt from early teachings. His father was aProhibitionist, and Lane's first campaign was for a Prohibitioncandidate for Governor; his father had been a preacher and Lane,when very young, thought seriously of becoming a minister, soseriously that he came before an examining board of thePresbyterian church. After two hours of grilling, he was, thoughfound wanting, not rejected, but put upon a six months' probation—the elders probably dreaded to lose so persuasive a tongue forthe sake of a little "insufficiency of damnation" in his creed.One of his inquisitors, a Presbyterian minister, went from theordeal with Lane, and continued to try to convert him to thetenets of Presbyterianism. Then suddenly, at some turn of thetalk, the clergyman abandoned his position and said carelessly,"Well, Lane, why not become a Unitarian preacher?"

The boy who had been walking the floor at night in the struggle toreconcile the teachings of the church with his own doubts—knowingthat Eternal Damnation was held to be the reward for doubt ofChrist's divinity—was so horrified by the casuistry of the manwho could be an orthodox minister and yet speak of preaching asjust one way to make a living, that he swung sharply from any wishto enter the church.

The strictness of the orthodoxy of his home had not served toalienate his sympathies, but he was chilled to the heart by thisindifference. He remembered the episode all his life with emotion,but he was not embittered by it. He was young, a great lover,greatly in love with life.

[Illustration with caption: FRANKLIN K. LANE AT EIGHTEEN]

In 1884, when he entered the University of California, it was as aspecial not as a regular student. "I put myself through college,"he writes to a boy seeking advice on education, "by working duringvacation and after hours, and I am very glad I did it." He seemsto have arranged all his college courses for the mornings andcarried his reporting and printing-office work the last half ofthe day.

College at once offered a great forum for debate, and a richercomradeship with men of strong mental fiber. Lane's eagerness indiscussion and love of large and sounding words made the studentscall him "Demosthenes Lane." In his letters it is easy to tracethe gradual evolution from his early oratorical style into a finalform of free, imaginative expression of great simplicity.Meanwhile, as he debated, he gathered to himself men who were tobe friends for the rest of his life. The "Sid" of the earliestletters that we have is Dr. Sidney E. Mezes, now President of theCollege of the City of New York, to whom one of his last letterswas addressed. His friendship for Dr. Wigmore, Dean of Law at theNorthwestern University, in Chicago, dates almost as far back.

In college, Lane seized what he most wanted in courses onPhilosophy and Economics. "His was a mind of many facets andhospitable in its interest," says his college and lifelong friend,Adolph C. Miller, "but his years at Berkeley were devoted mainlyto the study of Philosophy and Government, and kindred subjects.He was a leading figure in the Political Science Club, and intentin his pursuit of philosophy. Often he could be seen walking backand forth in a room in the old Bacon library, set apart for themore serious-minded students, with some philosophical book inhand; every line of his face expressing deep concentration, theoccasional light in his eye clearly betraying the moment when hewas feeling the joy of understanding."

In two years, not waiting for formal graduation, Lane was back inthe world of public affairs that he had scarcely left. In the sameshort-cut way he took his Hastings Law School work, and passed hisSupreme Court examination in 1888, in much less than the timeusually allowed for the work.

By the time he left the law school, "a full fledged, but not aflying attorney," his desire for aggressive citizenship was fullyformed. In fact, the whole active campaign, that was his life, wasmade by the light of early ideals, enlarged and reinterpreted ashis climb to power brought under his survey wider horizons.

The sketchiest summary of his early and late activities brings outthe singleness of the central purpose moving through his life. Hisfirst fight, in 1888, for Ballot Reform was made that the will ofthe people of the State might be honestly interpreted; later, inTacoma, Washington, he sided with his printers, against hisinterest as owner, in their fight to maintain union wages; oncemore in San Francisco, he took, without a retaining fee, the caseof the blackmailed householders whose titles were threatened bythe pretensions of the Noe claimants, and with his brother,cleared title to all of their small homes; he joined, with hisfriend, Arthur McEwen, in an editorial campaign against theSouthern Pacific, in the day of its tyrannous power over all theshippers of California; later he drafted into the charter of SanFrancisco new provisions to improve the wages of all cityemployees; as its young city and county attorney, he aggressivelyprotected the city against street railway encroachments,successfully enforcing the law against infractions; as InterstateCommerce Commissioner, he disentangled a network of injustices inthe relations between shippers and railroads, exposed rebating anddemurrage evils; formulated new procedures in deflating,reorganizing, and zoning the business of all the express companiesin the country; as Secretary of the Interior, he confirmed to thepeople a fuller use of Federal Lands, and National Park Reserves,laid the foundation for the development, on public domain, ofwater powers, and the leasing of Government oil lands, and builtthe Government railroad in Alaska; during the War, he contributedto the Council of National Defense his inexhaustible enthusiasmfor cooperation, with definite plans for swift action, to focusNational resources to meet war needs; and finally, his lastcarefully elaborated plan—killed by a partisan Congress—was toplace returned soldiers upon the land under conditions of hopefuland decent independence. These were some of the "glories" ofactivity into which he poured the resources of his energy andimagination.

But no catalogue of the work or the salient mental characteristicsof Franklin Lane gives a picture of the man, without taking intoaccount his temperament, for that colored every hour of his life,and every act of his career. The things that he knew seized hisimagination. Even when a middle-aged man he sang, like atroubadour, of the fertility of the soil; he was stirred by thevirtue and energy of what he saw and touched; his heart leaped atthe thought of the power of water ready to be unlocked for man'suse—most happy in that the thing that was his he could love.

"To lose faith in the future of oil!" he cries, in the midst of asober statistical letter, "Why! that is as unthinkable as to losefaith in your hands. Oil, coal, electricity, what are these butmultiplied and more adaptable, super-serviceable hands? They maytemporarily be unemployed, but the world can't go round withoutthem." A man who feels poetry in petroleum suffers from no wistful"desire of the moth for the star." To his full sense of life themoth and the star are of one essential substance, parts of oneglorious conquerable creation—and the moth just a fleck of star-dust, with silly wings.

In truth, both then and throughout most of the days of his life hewas completely oriented in this world, at home here, with hisstrong feet planted upon reality. He liked so many homely things,that his friendly glance responded to common sunlight withoutastigmatism.

That his sympathies should have outrun his repugnances was ofgreat practical moment in what he was able to achieve in a lifeshortened at both ends, for though he had to lose time by earninghis own professional equipment, he lost little energy in friction.He wrote to a political aspirant for high office, in 1921, "Pick afew enemies and pick them with discretion. Chiefly be FOR things."To a man who was making a personal attack on an adversary ofLane's, while in 1914, as Secretary of the Interior, he wasengrossed in establishing his "conservation-by-use" policy, inopposition to the older and narrower policy of conservation bywithdrawal, Lane wrote, "I have never seen any good come byblurring an issue by personal conflict or antagonisms. … I haveno time to waste in fighting people … to fight for a thing thebest way is to show its advantages, and the need for it … and myonly solicitude is that the things I care for should not be heldback by personal disputes." …

This lesson he had learned more from his own temperament than frompolitical expediency. It was bound up in his love of efficiencyand also in his sense of humor. During this same hot conservationcontroversy he writes to an old friend, "I have no intention ofsaying anything in reply to Pinchot. He wrote me thirty pages toprove that I was a liar, and rather than read that again I willadmit the fact."

This preoccupation with the main issue, in getting beneficialresults was one thing that made him glad to acclaim and use thegifts of other men. Through his sympathies he could follow as wellas lead, and he caught enthusiasms as well as kindled them. Hebelieved in enthusiasm for itself, and because he saw in it one ofthe great potencies of life. In writing of D'Annunzio's placingItaly beside the Allies, he rejoices in the beautiful spectacle ofthe spirit of a whole people "blown into flame by a poet-patriot."But "the ideal," he urges, "must be translated into the possible.Man cannot live by bread alone—nor on manna."

His gay and challenging attitude toward life expressed only onemood, for he paid, as men must, for intense buoyancy of temper byblack despairs. "Damn that Irish temperament, anyway!" he writes."O God, that I had been made a stolid, phlegmatic, non-nervous,self-satisfied Britisher, instead of a wild cross between a crazyIrishman with dreams, desires, fancies—and a dour Scot with hisconscience and his logical bitterness against himself—and hiseternal drive!"

His exaggerations of hope and his moods of broken disappointment,his ever-springing faith in men, and in the possibility of justinstitutions, were more temperamental than logical. Moods ofastonished grief, when men showed greed and instability, gaveplace to humorous and tolerant analysis of characters and events.Even his loyalty to his friends was subject to the slight magneticdeflections of a man of moods. He was true to them as the needleto the pole; and with just the same piquing oscillations, beforethe needle comes to rest at the inevitable North.

Because he had caught, in its capricious rhythms, the subtlemovements of human intercourse he trusted himself to express toother men the natural man within his breast, without fear ofmisconstruction. He contrived to humanize, in parts, even hisgovernment reports. They brought him, year by year, touchingletters of gratitude from weary political writers. The patient,logical Scot in him that said, "I am going to take this thing upbit by bit without trying to get a whole philosophy into thework," anchored him to the heaviest tasks as if he were a true-born plodder, while the "wild Irishman" with dreams and desireslighted the way with gleams of Will-o'-the-Wisp. The quicksilverin the veins of the patient Mercutio of railroad rates anddemurrage charges lightened his work for himself and others. Justas in the five years when he served San Francisco, as City andCounty Attorney, he labored to such effect that not one of hishundreds of legal opinions was reversed by the Supreme Court ofthe State, so he toiled on these same Annual Reports, so immersedthat, as he says, "I even have to take the blamed stuff to bedwith me." Fourteen and sixteen hours at his official desk were nothis longest hours, and sometimes he snatched a dinner of shreddedbiscuit from beside the day's accumulations of papers upon hisheaped-up desk. He laid upon himself the burden of labor,examining and cross-examining men for hours upon a single point ofessential fact—quick to detect fraud and intolerant of humbug,—but infinitely patient with those who were merely dull, evading nodrudgery, and, above all, never evading the dear pains ofbuilding-up and maintaining friendship.

LOUISE HERRICK WALL

MARCH, 1922

POLITICS AND JOURNALISM

1884-1894

POLITICS—NEWSPAPER WORK—NEW YORK—BUYING INTO TACOMA NEWS—MARRIAGE—SALE OF NEWSPAPER

FRANKLIN K. LANE'S earliest political association, in California,after reaching manhood, was with John H. Wigmore. Wigmore hadreturned from Harvard, in 1883, with a plan, already matured, forCivic Reform. The Municipal Reform League, created by Wigmore,Lane, and several other young men, was to follow the generaloutline of boss control, by precinct and ward organization, thedifference being that the League members were to hold no offices,enjoy no spoils, and work for clean city politics. Each member ofthe inner circle was to take over and make himself responsible fora definite city district, making a card index of the name of eachvoter, taking a real part in all caucus meetings—in saloonparlors or wherever they were held—and studying practicalpolitics at first hand. "Blind Boss Buckley" was the Democraticdictator of San Francisco, and against his regime the initialefforts of the League were directed.

It was a giant's task, an impossible task, for a small group ofnewspaper writers and college undergraduates. The short career ofthe Municipal Reform League ended when Wigmore went East to studylaw, leaving Lane determined to increase his efficiency by earninghis way through college and the Hastings Law School.

The first letters of this volume follow the theme of the politicalinterests of the two young men.

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Oakland, February 27, 1888

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—I am thinking of getting back in your part ofthe world myself, and this is what I especially wanted to writeyou about. I desire to see the world, to rub off some of myprovincialisms, to broaden a little before I settle down to aprosaic existence. So, as I say, I want to live in Boston awhileand my only possibility of so doing is to get a position on someBoston paper, something that will afford me a living and allowsome little time for social and literary life. However I don'tcare much what the billet is. I can bring letters ofrecommendation from all the good newspaper men in San Francisco,both as to my ability at editorial work (I have done considerablefor the San Francisco NEWS LETTER and EXAMINER), and at all kindsof reportorial work. …

I passed the law examination before the Supreme Court last month,so I am now a full-fledged—but not a flying, attorney. I have notdetermined definitely on going into law. …

Politically speaking we Mugwumps out here are happy. …California has been opposed to Cleveland on every one of his greatproposals (civil service reform, silver question, tariff reform),and yet the Republicans must nominate a very strong man to getthis State this year. The people admire old Grover's strength somuch, he is a positive man and an honest man, and when the peoplesee these two exceptional virtues mixed happily in a candidatethey grow to love and admire him out of the very idealism of theirnatures.

But I must not bother the Boston attorney any longer. Write me allyou know of opportunities there and believe me always your friend,

FRANK K. LANE

TO JOHN B. WIGMORE

Oakland, May 9, 1888

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—Of course I would have to stand my chances ingetting a position. Newspaper men, perhaps more than any otherclass, are rated by ability. Civil Service Reform principles rulein every good newspaper office to their fullest extent. When Iwrote you, I was unsettled as to my plans for the coming year. Mybrother desired to spend a year or so in Boston and I thought ofaccompanying him. He has changed his plans and so have I. … I amregularly on the Chronicle staff, chiefly writing sensationalstories. I get a regular salary of twenty-five dollars a weekbesides some extras, and have as easy and pleasant a billet asthere is on the paper, though editorial work would be more to myliking.

These arrangements do not interfere, however, with my Boston plan,for sooner or later I shall breathe its intellectual atmosphere,that I may outgrow provincialism and become intellectual by forceof habit rather than will. How long it will be before the wish canbe gratified I cannot tell. Probably next year. You see the law isnot altogether after my taste. I feel it a waste of time to spenddays quarreling like school-boys over a few hundred dollars. Ifeel all the time as if I must be engaged in some life work whichwill make more directly for the good of my fellows. I feel theneed which the world manifests for broader ideas in economics,politics, the philosophy of life, and all social questions.Feeling so, I cannot coop myself in a law library behind a pile ofbriefs, spending my days and nights in search of some authoritywhich will save my client's dollar. I am unsettled, however, as tomy permanent work. …

Oakland, September 20, 1888

… The copies of the Massachusetts law have been duly receivedand put to the best of use. On my motion our Young Men's Leagueappointed a Committee to draft a law for presentation to theLegislature. Judge Maguire, Ferd, [Footnote: Ferdinand Vassault, acollege friend. ] and two others, with myself, are on thatCommittee and we are hard at work. I send to-day a copy of theExaminer containing a ballot reform bill just introduced by theFederated Trades. It is based on the New York law but is veryfaulty. We are working with that bill as a basis, proposingvarious and very necessary amendments. We hope to get our billadopted in Committee as a substitute for the one introduced, andbelieve that the Federated Trades will be perfectly willing toadopt our measure. …

Tell me, please, how you select your election officials in yourlarge cities. Our mode of selection is really the weak point withus, for no matter how good a law we might procure, its enforcementwould be left to "boss" tools—corruptionists of the worstclass. …

Oakland, December 2, 1888

… Your letter breathes the sentiments of thousands ofRepublicans who voted against Cleveland. They are now "just alittle" sorry that so good a man is beaten. I never quiteunderstood your political position. Your letter to Ferd givingyour reason was, I must say, not conclusive, for I cannot believethat you can find a greater field of usefulness or power in theRepublican than in the Democratic party, surely not now that thenew Democracy—a party aggressive, filled with the reform spirit,and right in the direction it takes, now that such a party is inthe field.

You surely ought to join us on the tariff fight, but then I wishyou the best of fortune whatever your choice. Ferd and severalothers with myself are now organizing what will some day be agreat state, if not a great national institution. We call it theYoung Men's Democratic League [Footnote: This plan seems to havebeen to enlarge the influence of the League mentioned in a formerletter.]—it is to be made up of young men from twenty-one toforty-five; its scope—national politics, election of Presidentand Congressmen, and its immediate purpose to inform the people onthe tariff question. When our Constitution is published you shallhave one. We expect to organize branches all over the State and ina year or two will be strong in the thousands.

Your election article was of a singular kind but VERY good. I haveloaned it out among the old crowd. I spoke of it to JudgeSullivan, who is compiling authorities on the "intention of thevoter" as governing, where the spelling is wrong on a ballot.Sullivan ran for Supreme Justice and ran thousands ahead of histicket (the Democratic) but thinks that he was defeated by votesthrown out in Alameda and Los Angeles counties because ofirregularities in the ballot—in one case his initials wereprinted "J. D." instead of "J, F."—in another instance, his namewas printed a little below the title of the office, because of thenarrowness of the ticket. If these ballots were counted for him hethinks he would have won. …

Fourteen years later, when the electoral count was made ofFranklin K. Lane's ballots for Governor of the State ofCalifornia, between eight and ten thousand ballots were thrown outon similar ground of "irregularities," and he was counted out,"the intention of the voter" being again frustrated.

To John H. Wigmore

San Francisco, California, January 29, 1889

My dear Wigmore,— … I want to report progress. We now have ourbill complete. … The bill I send has been adopted by theFederated Trades and will be substituted by them for their billnow before the House. …

On Saturday evening there will be one of those huge "spontaneous"mass meetings (which require so much preparation) in support andendorsem*nt of the bill. The most prominent men in both Houses ofthe Legislature will speak. …

San Francisco, February 17, 1889

… I never have been busier in my life than in the last twoweeks. Ballot Reform has taken up a very great portion of my time.I have just returned from a lobbying trip to Sacramento. The billwill not pass, though the best men in both Houses favor it. I wentup on the invitation of the chairman of the Assembly Committee toaddress the Committee. I spoke for an hour and a half. At the endof that time only one man in the group openly opposed the scheme,and he confessed that the bill would do just what I claimed forit, and made this confession to the Committee. "But," said he, "ittends to the disintegration of political parties and as they areessential to our life we must not help on their destruction." …

The Committee of the Senate decided without any debate on the billto report adversely to it. I got them to reconsider their vote,and we will have a hearing at any rate before the bill is killed.The Legislature is altogether for boodle. …

Your book has been of the greatest assistance to me. I virtuallymade my speech from it and left the book with the chairman of theCommittee at his special request. … If it had come out a monthsooner we would have stood fifty per cent better chance of gettingthe bill through, because the papers would have come to the frontso much sooner and we would have been thirty days ahead with ourbill. I tell you I felt quite proud in addressing thedistinguished legislature to refer to "my friend Wigmore's book."…

San Francisco, May 10, 1889

… I am coming nearer to you. On Monday I leave to take up myresidence in New York, as correspondent for the San FranciscoChronicle. I do not know where I will be located, but mailaddressed to me at the Hoffman House will reach me when I arrive,which will be in about ten days.

My purpose is to breathe a new atmosphere for a while so that Imay broaden. We must make arrangements soon to meet. I want toknow your New York reform friends. …

New York, June 21, 1889

… This lapse of a couple of weeks means that I have beenenjoying the delights of a New York summer, in which only slaveswork and many of these find refuge in suicide. …

Not a single reformer, big or little, have I yet met. Your friendBishop [Footnote: Joseph Bucklin Bishop, editor of TheodoreRoosevelt and His Time.] I have not called on, though I have twicestarted to do so, and have been switched off. … I will go withina couple of days for the spirit must be revived. One day early inthis week I had an intense desire to visit you immediately and wasalmost on the verge of letting things go and rush off, but dutyheld me. …

I see that Bellamy has captured Higginson, Savage, and others andthat they are going to work over the Kinsley-Maurice business.Well, I would to God it would work. Something to make life happierand steadier for these poor women and men who toil and never getbeyond a piece of meat and a cot! There is justification here fora social-economic revolution and it will come, too, if things arenot bettered.

If you have a stray thought let me know it and soon.

Your friend,

F. K. L.

Lane's desire for stimulating companionship in New York wasquickly gratified. A spontaneous association of friendships, basedupon a young delight in life and a vast curiosity of the mind,sprang up among a little group of men of very diverse types. Allwere strangers in New York with no immediate home ties. "Womenplayed no part in our lives," one of them recalls. "We cametogether to discuss plays, poetry, politics, anything andeverything—the great actors, comic operas, the songs of thestreets, science, politics." John Crawford Burns, Lane, BrydonLamb, Curt Pfeiffer formed the nucleus of what spread outirregularly into larger groupings.

John Crawford Burns, who was slightly older than the rest, apurist, and something of a "dour Scot," was a man of conservativeand cultivated tastes and the dean of the group. He was in abusiness house that imported linens, and lived in a "glorious roomwith two outside windows, and ample seating capacity," so thefriends often met there and learned something of Gothicarchitecture and of the abominations of slang, in spite ofthemselves. With Burns, and of his firm, was Brydon Lamb, "also ofScotch descent, but born in America, a delightful combination ofstrength, sweetness and light. The simple grace of his manner, hisunhurried speech, his urbanity, captivated us all. We loved himfor what he was, and we considered him our arbiter elegantiarum"Of Lane at that period the same friend writes, "I remember a fine,stocky, muscular presence with a striking head. A massive,commanding man, he was, a persuasive and compelling leader." Butnone of the men had any sense of anything but complete friendly,boyish equality. "Lane was," Pfeiffer says, "interested in humanbeings, not problems, excepting as their solution might be madeserviceable to the needs of individuals. He had great tolerancefor the most unusual opinions. I don't think Lane ever had muchinterest in the dogmas of science, religion, or philosophy; helived by the spirit of them, that cannot be expressed in formulae.He had the peculiar sensitiveness of a poet for words, for colorsand sounds, and for moral beauty, and blended with it thestatesman's observant awareness of conditions in the world ofaffairs."

At the beginning of their friendship, in 1889, Curt Pfeifferhimself was only nineteen years old, a youth whose family had comefrom Holland and Germany. He appeared in the boarding-house on32nd near Broadway, where Burns lived, fresh from three months atthe Paris Exposition, a vacation that had followed a course ofscientific study at Zurich, Switzerland. The wonders of Paris,a-glitter with the blaze of undreamed-of electrical beauty, and thegreater wonder of the scientific discoveries and speculations, ofthe eighties, as taught at the University of Zurich, gave theyoung traveler an instant place among the others. Because of hislove for exact statement and his scientific approach indiscussion, young as he was, he contributed something very real tothe group whose chief preoccupation—aside from the joy of living-was with art, government, and literature.

They read separately, and when a book seemed intolerably good tothe discoverer, he brought it in and insisted on their readingparts of it together. Browning, Darwin, the Vedic Hymns,Stevenson, Taine, Buckle, Spencer, Kipling, Sir Henry Maine, onprimitive law, and Emerson! The relation of the men was almostimpersonal in the fervor of their explorations into life.Differences of blood and tradition were not only easily bridgedbut welcomed, because they assured, to the group as a whole,sharper angles of mental refraction—breaking the ray of truththey sought into more of its component colors.

Pfeiffer recalls that "one Saturday night, under the influence ofreading from the Vedic Hymns, and a talk on astronomy, we went upon the roof of our boarding-place, and observed a completerevolution of the starry heavens, from dusk to dawn. We driftedinto talk, … and when we finally descended to our beds on Sundaymorning, we found ourselves drenched to the skin from thedrizzling dew. We never forgot that experience, but we neverrepeated it either."

His political interests brought Lane into the Reform Club where
Progress and Poverty, Henry George's new book, was the center for
discussion upon the whole problem of the distribution of taxation.
Lane and Henry George established a cordial friendship.

John Crawford Burns says that in 1889 "Lane's chief hero wasCleveland, and his oracle Godkin, of the EVENING POST"—later, theNATION. "When I knew him in New York he represented a SanFrancisco newspaper, the CHRONICLE, I think, as correspondent. Hewas not whole-heartedly in sympathy with his proprietor, norindeed with the sensational aspect of journalism, and he alwaysscoffed at the idea of newspaper writers constituting a modernpriesthood. He laughingly justified his association with theCHRONICLE by saying he gave tone to it. For this and otherservices, he received, I think, two thousand dollars a year, whicheven thirty years ago did not admit of luxury and riotous living."

Lane's whole stay in New York was less than two years in length,but the vital ideas that he shared with disinterested minds madeof this period the seed-bed for future intellectual growth.

In 1891, in spite of the delights of personal friendships, in NewYork, Lane grew increasingly dissatisfied with the limitations ofnewspaper corresponding. He wanted a paper of his own, in which hecould express without reserve the ideals of social and politicalbetterment with which his mind was teeming. In this mood, thefirst acclaim of the rapid growth of the pioneer towns of the farNorthwest reached him. He saw in this his opportunity, and actedquickly and decisively. He gathered together his own savings,borrowed from his friend, Sidney Mezes, a few more thousanddollars and went to Tacoma, Washington, to buy the Tacoma EveningNews.

As soon as the transfer was well made, Lane threw himselfenthusiastically into the politics of the new town, alreadysuffering from boss rule. By his editorials he succeeded instirring up the City Hall, and drove into Alaskan exile the Chiefof Police—who, by the way, was said to have become immensely richin Alaska while Lane's paper was running into bankruptcy inTacoma. But Lane's misadventure was not wholly due to his civicvirtue. He had "bought in" at just the moment when the instrumentswere tuning up for the prelude to the great panic crash of 1893.Tacoma, and the whole Northwest, had been mainly developed bycasual investments of speculative Eastern capital, and thiscapital, sensitive to change, was being withdrawn to meet homeneeds. Investors, to protect real interests, were willing tosacrifice their "little Western flyers," at almost any discount.

As the terminal of the new Northern Pacific Railroad, Tacoma—lying on the bluffs overlooking the great inland sea of PugetSound, guardianed by the vastness of its mountain—was backed byforests whose wealth could scarcely be exaggerated, even bypromoter's advertisem*nts. She was noisily proclaimed to be the"Gateway to the Orient," but trade was not yet firmly establishedwith the Orient, and, indeed, what was Washington's wealth ofuncut timber when the capital to develop it was slowly ebbingEastward?

No paper without heavy capitalization, could have sustained apolicy of political reform, when, in the picturesque vernacular ofthe time and place, "the bottom had dropped out of the town." Arival newspaper, the LEDGER, in order to retrench, began a war onthe Printers' Union, to break wages. Lane repudiated the effortmade to "rat" his paper and to force the Union out. He sustainedhis men in their fight to keep the Union rate, and lent them hispresses to carry on their propaganda. In after years he said, "Asto my labor record, it is a consistent one of thirty years length,ever since I stood by the Union in Tacoma, and went broke." Againhe wrote to an acquaintance, "I often think of the old days inTacoma. We were a fighting bunch, and I think most of us arefighting for the same things that we fought for then; a little bitmore decency and less graft in affairs, and a chance for a man torise by ability and not by pull alone."

In April, 1893, Lane had married Anne Wintermute—he needed allhe could find of cheer in those depressing days. The whole townwas beaten to its knees by loss and fore-closure. Lane wasstruggling to hold together his paper, and save his friend'sinvestment and his own little stake. The one bright interlude ofthat time for him lay in reading, and in his new friendships. Heloved to chant aloud to a group of stranded young fellows gatheredin his rooms, in his gay trumpeting way, brave passages from theBarrack-Room Ballads, of Kipling, that were lifting the spiritsof the English-speaking world with their freshness and daring.Stevenson, too, with his polished optimism delighted Lane. "I canremember," says one of the group, "just how I heard him read aloudthe last words from Stevenson's essay, Aes Triplex, in thosemelancholy Tacoma days—'those happy days when we were somiserable!'":—

"All who have meant good work with their whole hearts, have donegood work, although they may die before they have the time to signit. … Does not life go down with a better grace, foaming in fullbody over a precipice, than miserably straggling to an end insandy deltas? When the Greeks made their fine saying that thosewhom the Gods love die young, I cannot help believing they hadthis sort of death also in their eye. For surely, at whatever ageit overtake the man, this is to die young. Death has not beensuffered to take so much as an illusion from his heart. In thehot-fit of life, a-tip-toe on the highest point of being, hepasses at a bound on to the other side. The noise of the malletand chisel is scarcely quenched, the trumpets are hardly doneblowing, when, trailing with him clouds of glory, this happy-starred, full-blooded spirit shoots into the spiritual land."

Still believing in the good work he had meant with his wholeheart, Lane turned from the bankruptcy of his paper, sold atauction, to write to his friend of new adventures.

To John H. Wigmore

Tacoma, October 25, 1894

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—I have not heard from you for a year. You are inmy debt at least one, and I think two, letters. I have sent you anoccasional paper, just to let you know I was alive and I amhazarding this letter to the old address. …

My affairs here have not prospered and I am thinking of goingsomewhere else. … Do you think Japan has anything to offer aman such as myself? Would there be any chance there for anewspaper run by an American? Are there any wealthy Americansthere who would be likely to put up a few thousands for such anenterprise? … Life is not the "giddy, reeling dream of love andfame" that it once was, and I have decided on gathering a fewessential dollars. Now Japan may not be the place I am lookingfor, … but unless I am greatly mistaken, a man who is up onAmerican affairs and alive to business opportunities could do wellin Japan. But then this is all a guess, and I want you to put meright …

Yours very truly,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

LAW PRACTICE AND POLITICAL ACTIVITIES 1894-1906

Law—Drafting New City Charter—Elected as City and County
Attorney—Gubernatorial Campaign—Mayoralty Campaign—Earthquake
—Appointment as Interstate Commerce Commissioner

Late in the fall of 1894 Lane returned to San Francisco and forsome months associated himself with Arthur McEwen, on ArthurMcEwen's Letter, a lively political weekly which attacked variousforms of civic corruption in San Francisco, and made an especialtarget of the Southern Pacific Railroad, then in practical controlof the State.

He also formed a law partnership with his brother, George W. Lane,under the firm name of Lane and Lane. In 1895 a curious case,estimated as involving about sixty million dollars worth ofproperty, was brought to the young attorneys. The Star, of SanFrancisco, described the issue at stake by saying, "One Jose Noeand four alleged grand-children of Jose Noe appear, who pretendthat they can show a clear title to an undivided one-half interestin nearly forty-five hundred acres within the city, on which landreside some five thousand or more owners, mostly men of smallmeans."

Upon investigation Lane and his brother became convinced that thesuit had been instituted as a blackmailing scheme, in an attemptto force the owners to pay for quit-claim deeds; they took andenergetically fought the case for the defendants, without askingfor a retainer. Their clients formed themselves into what theycalled the San Miguel Defense Association. In a year the title ofthe householders to their little homes was established beyondperadventure.

With the warmth of Latin gratitude this service was remembered. In1898 when Lane ran for his first political office, as City andCounty Attorney, the San Miguel Defense Association revived itsenergies, formed a Franklin K. Lane Campaign Club and sent outvivid circulars about Franklin K. Lane, "who nobly fought for us.… It is now our turn to stand by him and see that he is electedby a very large majority." Their proclamation ended with theappeal, "Vote for Franklin K. Lane, the Foe to Blackmailers."

As Lane's plurality in this first election was eight hundred andthirty-two votes, there is little doubt that his grateful clientsplayed a real part in that success.

The Tacoma printers had also sent a testimonial, which was widelydistributed in the campaign, as to Lane's friendship to labor,saying that they, in gratitude, had made him an honorary member oftheir Typographical Union. The campaign was made on the rights ofthe plain people, for its chief issue.

In the letter that follows, Lane, in 1913, tells of his formalentry into politics, in 1898.

To P. T. Spurgcon Herald, McClure Newspaper Syndicate

Washington, December 30, 1913

DEAR MR. SPURGEON,—In reply to your inquiry of December 29,permit me to say that I got into politics in this way:—

One day, while on my way to lunch, I met Mayor Phelan, of SanFrancisco, who asked me if I would become a member of thecommittee to draft a charter for the city. I said I would, and wasappointed. At that time I was practising law and had no ideawhatever that I would at any time run for public office, or takeany considerable part in public affairs. I helped to draft thecharter, and as it had to be submitted to the people forratification, I stumped the city for it. Later, when the firstelection was held under it, my friends on the charter committeeinsisted that I should accept the Democratic nomination for CityAttorney. Under the charter, the City Attorney was the legaladviser of all the city and county officials, and it was hisbusiness to define and construe this organic law, and the friendsof the charter wished some one who was in sympathy with theinstrument to give it initial construction.

I was nominated by the Democratic party by an independent movementand was elected; later re-elected, and elected for a third term.After an unsuccessful candidacy for the governorship, I wasappointed a member of the Interstate Commerce Commission byPresident Roosevelt.

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John H. Wigmore

San Francisco, November 14, 1898

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—This is a formal note of acknowledgment of theservice rendered me in the campaign, which has just closedsuccessfully. There were only three Democrats elected on thegeneral ticket, the Mayor, Assessor, and myself. I ran fourthousand five hundred votes ahead of my ticket. It was a splendidtribute to worth! I never before realized how discriminating theAmerican public is. A man who scoffs at Democratic institutionsmust be a tyrant at heart, or a defeated candidate. I tell you thepeople know a good man when they see one.

My opponent was the present Attorney General of the State, W. F.Fitzgerald, a very capable man, and probably the best man on theRepublican ticket. He has been steadily in office for thirtyyears, in Mississippi, Arizona, and California, and this is hisfirst defeat; and I sincerely regret that I had to take a fall outof such a gentleman.

Now, the perplexing problem arises as to how long I shall holdoffice. The term is for two years. The new charter comes up beforethe coming Legislature for approval in January, and thatinstrument provides for another election next fall, to fill allCity and County offices. …

I don't want to stay in politics, two years in the office will belong enough for me. I hope that I shall make a creditable record.I can foresee that strong pressure will be brought to bear upon meto act with the Examiner in making things disagreeable for thecorporations, and I will have no easy task in gaining the approvalof my own party, and of my conscience and judgment at the sametime.

Let me thank you again very earnestly for what you did, andbelieve me. Yours sincerely,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The City Charter that Lane had helped to draft, with its many newprovisions, never before adjudicated, made his first term as Cityand County Attorney one requiring an especial amount of laboriouslegal study. To meet the pressing need, Lane organized his corpsof assistants to include several men of marked legal ability andthe industry that the task demanded, appointing his brother,George W. Lane, as his first assistant.

It was partly due to the good team-work of the office that hisopinions rendered in four years were as "numerous as thoseheretofore rendered by the department in about sixteen years," andthat during one of the years of his incumbency "snot a dollar ofdamages was obtained against the city."

[Illustration with caption: FRANKLIN K. LANE AS CITY AND COUNTY
ATTORNEY]

To John H. Wigmore

San Francisco, September 25, [1899]

MY DEAR WIGMORE,— … As an evidence of what I am doing I sentyou a brief three or four days ago in the Charter case. I haveanother just filed on the question of county officers holding overunder the Charter, a third on the new primary law which is a grandthing if we can make it stick, and a fourth on the taxation ofbonds of quasi-public corporations, and a fifth on the taxation ofNational Bank stock.

I have hardly seen my baby for six weeks; have been at the officefrom nine A.M. to eleven P.M. regularly. And now that I am nearlydead a new campaign is on and I must run again. And, of course, Ihave enemies now which I hadn't last year.

Thank you once again for so kindly remembering me.

Yours sincerely,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Lane's first child, a son, was born in the spring of 1898. He isthe "Ned" of the letters—Franklin K. Lane, Jr. Lane's attitudetoward children is shown in many of his letters. His own boy gavea strong impetus to his most disinterested social ideals. Inwriting of the birth of a friend's baby he said, "For the child weact nobly, its call to us is always to our finer side.

To John H. Wigmore

San Francisco, November 10

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—This is to be a mere bulletin. I am elected onceagain—10,500 majority, the largest received by any candidate. Youexpected me to run for Mayor I know. Well, it was offered me—thenomination, I mean—and all my campaign expenses promised. But Icouldn't accept, having told the Labor Union people that I was acandidate for City Attorney and not for Mayor. This Labor UnionParty is a new one, the outgrowth of the recent strike. They haveelected their Mayor, a musician named Schmitz, a decent,conservative young man, who will surprise the decent moneyedpeople and anger the laboring people with hisconservatism.[Footnote: Lane lived to smile at his too charitablecharacterization of this San Francisco Mayor.] I didn't have onesingle word of praise from a newspaper in the campaign. Theyhardly mentioned the fact that I was a candidate. It was jollygood therefore to win as I did.

And my congratulations to you, my honored friend, Dean Wigmore.Next year I am to publish my Opinions, a copy of which, of course,will go to you, but not by virtue of your office, old man. You arearriving, of course, but there is something better in store. AFederal Judgeship is the thing for you; and when I get into theCabinet you shall have it. But don't wait till then. I'm gray andbald now and my boy patronizes me. So don't wait, but get yourlines out, and one of these days you'll make it. Where next Ishall land I don't know, probably in a law office, praying forclients. … Always yours,

F. K. L.

Lane's first majority in 1898 of 832 votes was increased to 10,500in 1899, when he was re-elected; and two years later he won by astill larger majority. A number of his opinions, as City Attorney,were collected and bound in a volume, as none of them had beenreversed by the Supreme Court of the State.

He took much pleasure in a dinner club that he helped to form. Themembers were University professors, lawyers, newspaper men, and afew business men. "But," says one of them, "in spirit they werepoets, philosophers and prophets. They were aware that theirsolutions of problems vexing to the brains of other men, would beUtopian, but as they were not willing to be classed with ordinaryUtopians they named their club Amaurot, after the capital ofUtopia, thus signifying that while they dwelt in Utopia, they werenot subject to it but were lords of it—the teachers of its wisdomand the makers of its laws."

His home life absorbed much of his leisure. He and his family hadmoved into a modest house on Gough Street, in San Francisco, witha view of the bay, Alcatraz Island, and the Marin Hills from theupstairs living-room window—for no house was a home to Lane thathad no view—and in the back-yard, among its red geraniums andcosmos bushes, he played Treasure Island and Wild West with hisboy.

In the summer of 1902, Lane was nominated as the Democratic andNon-Partisan candidate for Governor of California. At theDemocratic Convention at Sacramento, an onlooker described theexcitement among the delegates before a selection was made,"Throughout the night until late afternoon of the second day,without any clear solution of the problem, came the roll-call ofthe counties, then a wild stampede for the young City and CountyAttorney of San Francisco, who was borne to the platform. …

"It was Franklin K. Lane who stood a goodly and confident figure,waving a palm-leaf fan for quiet. He said:—

"'I was in the rear of the hall when Governor Budd made his speechand voiced the call of the party for a winner, and, in response tohis call, I have taken this platform.'"

This note of joyous truculence, with the little out-thrust of theunderlip, brought, as so often before and since, laughter andapplause.

A hot and spirited campaign followed. California is naturallyRepublican, and Lane had many times challenged and attacked thegreat powers of the State. He made as his chief issues,Irrigation, Prison Reform, and a fairer share in the world's goodsfor all the people. He traveled far and fast, often speaking sixtimes in a day, at different places, and sometimes riding ahundred and fifty miles in twenty-four hours, over the rough roadsof remote counties.

While campaigning he outlined his notion of public service in thisway, "No man should have a political office because he wants ajob. A public office is not a job, it is an opportunity to dosomething for the public. Once in office it remains for him toprove that the opportunity was not wasted. …" And again hesaid,—"There is nothing that touches me so, in the little that Ihave seen in political life, as this, that while it is a game inwhich men can be mean, contemptible and dastardly, it is a gamealso that brings out the finer, better, and nobler qualities. Iknow why some men are in politics to their own financial loss.Because they find it is a great big man's game, which calls formen to fight it, and they want to stand beside their fellows anddo battle."

In regretting that he could not attend a Democratic meeting, at
Richmond, California, he sent this letter,—

TO LYMAN NAUGLE

MY DEAR MR. NAUGLE,— … The cause of Democracy is being givenmore sincere and thoughtful interest this campaign than for manyyears. One of its cardinal principles is that the individual ismore important to the State than mere property, and that thewelfare of the majority of our citizens must always be paramountand their rights prevail, no matter what the weight of influencein the other side of the balance. It is work and personal worthwhich make a State great both politically and industrially, and inmy estimation they are to be found in largest proportions in theDemocratic party. For these reasons I believe there will be a verylarge change in the vote of this State in our coming election.Reports have reached me from many parts of the State, and I amentirely satisfied that we shall win this fight provided that wedo our full share of earnest work, if that be lacking we don'tdeserve it. … Yours for honest victory,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

At first Hearst's powerful paper, the San Francisco Examiner, tooka negative tone toward Lane's candidacy but soon becamedangerously, if covertly, antagonistic. Of Hearst's methods ofattack Lane wrote, in detail, on July 3, 1912, to Governor WoodrowWilson, then Democratic nominee for the Presidency. Afterenumerating one specific count after another against the ExaminerLane said:—

"When a boy putting myself through college I was business managerof a temperance paper which advocated prohibition. He [Hearst]published extracts from this paper and credited them to me, and onthe morning of election day sent a special train throughout thewhole of Northern California containing an issue of his paper,appealing to the saloon-keepers and wine-growers for my defeat.

"… No editorial word of his disfavor appeared, but in every newsarticle there was in the headline a cunning turn or twist,calculated to arouse prejudice against me. I notice in thismorning's issue of the American the same policy is being pursuedregarding you.

"Now the great mistake I made was in not boldly telling the publicjust what I knew. … I felt that it was a personal matter withwhich the public was not concerned, but I know now, as I havegotten older and seen more of politics, that it was a publicmatter of the first importance, as to which the public should havehad knowledge.

"Later when he [Hearst] budded as a candidate for President, in1904, he sought an interview with me and said that he was not toblame for the policy that had been pursued. Our interview closedwith this dialogue:—

"'Mr. Lane, if you ever wish anything that I can do, all you willhave to do will be to send me a telegram asking, and it will bedone.'"

"To which I responded, 'Mr. Hearst, if you ever get a telegramfrom me asking you to do anything, you can put that telegram downas a forgery.'"

In a State like California, one of whose chief industries was thegrowing of wine-grapes, and where the Examiner was the farmer'spaper, at least one phase of the attack upon Lane bore heavyfruit. Upon election day the count between Lane and Dr. GeorgePardee, the Republican candidate, was found to be close. In theend several thousand votes, unmistakably intended for Lane, werethrown out upon technicalities. Lane was defeated, and Dr. Pardeetook office. It was a bitter blow.

The night when the final bad news was brought to Lane in his home,he called his son, of four, to him, leaning down he put his armaround the boy very gravely and tenderly, and said, "Ned, it isn'tmy little son, it is Dr. Pardee's little boy that is going to havethat white pony."

The boy caught the emotion in his father's voice, and saidcheerily, "O, that's all right, Dad. That's all right."

Lane found that in spite of the loss of the Governorship hiscircle of personal contacts had been greatly widened by hiscampaign. He had come to know, and be known by, the men mostprominent in California public affairs and he had made, andconfirmed, many friendships with men who had given themselveswhole-heartedly to his advancement. Of these friendships he wrote,in 1920, to his friend Timothy Spellacy, "Eighteen years I haveknown you and never a word or act have I heard of, or seen, thatdid not make me feel that the campaign for Governor was worthwhile because it gave me your acquaintance, friendship,affection. … When I get mad, as I do sometimes, over somethingthat the Irish do, I always am tempted to a hard generalizationthat I am compelled to modify because of you and Mike and DanO'Neill, in San Francisco—and a few more of the Great Irish."

Lane's second child, Nancy, was born January 4, 1903.

Early in that year Lane was given the complimentary vote of hisparty in the California Legislature for United States Senator.

He was chosen in April to go to Washington to argue the case ofthe need of the City of San Francisco for a pure water supply fromthe Hetch-Hetchy Valley, an unused part of the Yosemite Park.

A curious opposition to this measure had been worked up in theEast by a small group of well-intentioned nature lovers who didnot, perhaps, realize that this was one of many thousand valleysin the Sierras, and one not, in any sense, unique in its beauty.The plan proposed to convert a remote, mosquito-haunted marsh,dreaded even by hunters because of the "bad-going" into a largelake-reservoir to feed the city of San Francisco. This was thefirst of Lane's fights to assure to man the use of neglectedresources, and at the same time, by great care, to protect naturalbeauty for his delight.

While in Washington on this errand, he met President Rooseveltseveral times. Their informal talks served to increase Lane'sstrong liking for the vigorous man of action, then at the heightof his powers.

To his friend he writes of all this.

To John H. Wigmore San Francisco, May 9,1903

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—My trip East was a great success. After leavingyou I stayed three or four days in Washington, where I found theDepartment of the Interior pretty well stacked against me; I,however, succeeded in having a day fixed upon which an argumentwould be listened to, and after this victory went to New York,where I met many old friends and made some new ones. …

Upon my return to Washington I had several days of argument beforethe Department, saw the President [Roosevelt] twice and lunchedwith him, and then went South; was invited by the Legislature ofTexas to speak before them, which I did with much satisfaction,especially as there were but two Republicans in both houses.

I stopped with my old friend Mezes, in Austin, who is the dean ofthe University, … and easily the most influential man socially,politically, and educationally in the institution. …

I am having an extremely disagreeable time. The Democrats hereinsist upon my running for Mayor, urging it as a duty which I oweto the party, because they say I am the only man who can beelected; and as a duty to the city, because they say that thescoundrels who are now in office will continue, and worse onescome in, unless we can elect some clean Democrat. I urgeeverything against the thing, that comes to my mind, including mypoverty, the fact that I made four campaigns in five years, mypersonal aversion to the office of Mayor, the inability of any oneto please the people of San Francisco as Mayor, the conspiracy ofthe newspapers that exists against a government that is notcontrolled by them, and the fact that to insist upon my takingthis office would be an act of political murder on the part of myfriends. … Yours as always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Heavy and continued pressure, through the spring and summer, wasbrought, by his party, to bear upon Lane to accept the nominationfor Mayor of San Francisco. His letters show his reluctance anddistress. The appeal was made personal, with reminders ofsacrifices made for him. He at last agreed to run. His judgment ofthe situation was fully confirmed in the final event. His defeatwas unequivocal. San Francisco had no idea of accepting aDemocratic mayor with a leaning toward reform. Lane analysed thepolitical situation in this letter:—

To John H. Wigmore

San Francisco, January 26, 1904

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—What the effect of my defeat for Mayor will be,it is of course impossible to say. Its immediate effect has beento throw me into the active practice of law, and thus far I havenot starved. It will, of course, not lead to my retirement frompolitics, but it will postpone no doubt, the realization of someambitions. I think I wrote you just what my state of mind wasprevious to the nomination. I did not wish to make the fight, dideverything that was in my power to avoid the nomination, and evenwent so far as to hold up the convention in a formal letter whichI addressed to it, telling them that I did not wish to be Mayor ofSan Francisco and begging them to get some one else.

The fight was along class lines entirely; the employers on oneside and the wage earners on the other. The Republican nomineerepresented the employers, the Union Labor nominee, the wageearners. I stood for good government, and in the battle my voicecould hardly be heard. It was a splendid old fight in which everyinterest that was vicious, violent, or corrupt was solidly againstme. And while I did not win the election, I lost nothing inprestige by the defeat, save among politicians who are alwayslooking for availability. It was not, in the nature of things, upto me to run for Mayor, but my people all believed that I wasassured of election and felt that I was the only man who couldpossibly be elected. I acted out of a sense of loyalty to my partyand a desire to do something to rid the city of its present cursedadministration. However, it may in the end be a very fortunatething, for I know no career more worthless than that of aperpetual office-seeker.

I received a letter from a friend in New York yesterday telling methat Senator Hill [Footnote: In campaigning New York forCleveland, Lane had met David B. Hill.] had told him that the NewYork delegation would cast its vote for me for Vice-President atthe Democratic National Convention, and that he regarded me as themost available man to nominate; but, of course, I sent back wordthat that was not to be considered.

I should judge from the EXAMINER here, that Hearst was making avery strong fight for a delegation from Illinois. His boom seemsto me to be increasing. That it is possible for such a man toreceive the nomination, is too humiliating to be thought of. …Very sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The day after his defeat Lane had written to thank a generousfriend:—

TO WILLIAM R. WHEELER

San Francisco, Wednesday [November, 1908]

MY DEAR WILL,—I can't go to the country without saying to youonce more that your self-sacrifice and manliness throughout thiscampaign have endeared you to me to a degree that words cannotconvey.

I had hoped the last day or two that I would be able to make yourcritics ashamed to look you in the face, and that they would intime come pleading to you for recognition. But now you must becontent with knowing that you did a man's part, and set a standardin friendship and loyalty which my boy shall be taught to strivefor.

I earnestly hope that your business relations will not bedisturbed by this trouble into which I got you. Had I been out ofit Crocker couldn't have won. My vote would largely have gone forSchmitz.

Give my love to Mrs. Wheeler and believe me, always your friend,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Wheeler, himself a Republican, belonged, at the time, to a firm ofirreconcilable Republicans, who had expressed sharp disapproval ofhis activity in Lane's behalf.

Out of office and back to the practise of the law, Lane soon builthis private practise on a firmer basis than before. His closeidentification with the Democratic Party was not impaired, but thefrequent demands for attendance at public conventions and meetingshe could not leave his practise to accept. In declining one ofthese invitations he replied:—

TO ORVA G. WILLIAMS IROQUOIS CLUB, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS

San Francisco, April 7, 1904

… Permit me to say that we of the West look to you who arecloser to the center of things for leadership. … This means onlythat we must be true to the principles that make us Democrats. …The law must not be severe or lenient with any man simply becausehe is rich nor because he is poor. It must not become the tool ofclass antagonism for either the persecution of the well-to-do orfor the repression of the masses of the people.

… We must resist the base opportunism which would abandon ourstrong position of devotion to these fundamental principles ofgood government for the sake of gaining temporary strength fromsome passing passion of the hour. To identify our party with anidea which springs from class distrust or class hatred is to gaintemporary stimulation at the expense of permanent weakness. If weare to heed the voice which bids us cease to be Democrats in orderthat we may win, we shall find that we have lost not only thevictory of being true, but also the victory at the polls, whichcan be ours only in case we are true.

… Our creed is simple and clear, but it cannot be recited bythose who would make our organization an annex to the Republicanparty by catering to that conservatism which seeks only to bringgreater benefit to the already wealthy, nor by those who wouldmake it an annex to the Socialist party by joining in everyattack, no matter how unjust, upon the wealthy. Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To the Iroquois Club of Los Angeles on the same day he wrote,—"Itbecomes us to consider well the meaning of the signs of the times.Miracles may not be worked with these waves of prosperity. It isin no man's power to say 'Peace, be still' and quiet the troubledsea of panic. But we may make sure that men of steady nerve, ofclear head and highest purpose are at the helm. I expect to seethe time when the Democratic party will, by fixed adherence to awell-defined course, gain and hold the approval and support of themajority of our people, not for a single election but for a longseries of elections, and if we begin now with this end in view wecertainly will be prepared for whatever may happen—victory ordefeat; and in both alike we will be proud of our party and give aguarantee for the future."

While campaigning California for Governor, in 1902, Isadore B.
Dockweiler ran on Lane's ticket, for the office of Lieutenant
Governor, and Dockweiler still looked to him for counsel.

TO ISADORE B. DOCKWEILER

San Francisco, April 16, 1904

MY DEAR DOCKWEILER,—You ask in your favor of the 14th whether
California will send a delegation to St. Louis pledged to Mr.
Hearst and if this program has been agreed upon, as is the report
in Los Angeles.

I cannot tell what the Democrats of California will do, but I knowwhat they should do. A delegation should go from this state thatis free, unowned, unpledged, made up of men whose prime interestis that of their party and whom the party does not need to bindwith pledges. To pledge the delegation is to make the delegatesmere pawns, puppets, counters, coins to trade with,—so muchpolitical wampum.

The object in holding a national convention is not to please thevanity nor gratify the ambition of any individual, but to select anational standard bearer who will proudly lead the party in thecampaign and be a credit to the party and an honor to the nation,if elected. Surely the Democracy of California can selectcandidates who can be depended upon to be guided by theseconsiderations. To tie the delegates hand and foot, toss them intoa bag, and sling them over the shoulder of one man to barter as hemay please, is not consistent with my notion of the dignity oftheir position, nor does it appeal to me as the most certainmanner of making them effective in enlarging and emphasizing thepower of the state. …

As to your suggestion of a program to deliver this state to onecandidate—if there is such a program—I am not a party to it,never have been, and never will be. … The Democrats ofCalifornia … will do much for the sake of harmony so long asparty welfare and public good are not sacrificed; but they must bepermitted to make their own program irrespective of the personalalliances, affiliations, or ambitions of politicians.

Personally, I am not in active political life. My views upon partyquestions I do not attempt to impose upon my party, yet I know ofno reason why I should hesitate to give them expression. I cannotbut believe that if many a man were more indifferent to hisfuture, he would be more certain to have a future.

There is one reason which to my mind should forbid my activedirection of any organized movement against Mr. Hearst, namely theattitude of his paper during my recent campaign for thegovernorship. I do not wish it to be said or thought that I amseeking to use our party for purposes of personal retaliation.Whatever reasons for bitterness I may have because of thatcampaign I am persuaded it does not affect my judgment that it isthe part of wisdom to send an unpledged delegation to the nationalconvention.

The Democrats of California should determine with calmness andwithout passion what course will be most likely to prove a matterof pride to themselves, their state, and the nation, and in thatsober judgment act fearlessly.

Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The Pacific Coast, in 1904, still suffered from transportationproblems of great complexity. The railroads, whose terminals werehere, were few and extraordinarily powerful and had, heretofore,controlled rail traffic, to a large extent, in their own interest.They wanted no regulation or interference from the InterstateCommerce Commission and no Pacific Coast representative on thatCommission. The fruit, wheat, and lumber producers of the WesternCoast, on the other hand, felt the need of a strong representativeto protect their interests against the railroads, and to stabilizefreight rates. Lane's record for independence of sinister control,his legal training and energy made him the natural choice of theshippers for this position.

Benjamin Ide Wheeler, President of the University of California,was a friend of Lane's and also a friend of President Roosevelt's.While in the East, in the spring of 1904, Wheeler had a talk withRoosevelt, about Lane's qualifications for the Interstate Commerceappointment. He told Roosevelt why the producers in Californianeeded a man that they could trust to be fair to their interestson the Commission. Roosevelt heartily concurred, and promised toname Lane for the next vacancy.

When the vacancy occurred, however, just after an overwhelmingRepublican victory, Roosevelt impulsively gave the appointment toan old friend—Senator co*ckrill of Missouri, a Democrat. Wheelerat once telegraphed the President reminding him of the oversight,and to this Roosevelt telegraphed this reply:—

"Am exceedingly sorry, had totally forgotten my promise about Laneand have nothing to say excepting that I had totally forgotten itwhen Senator co*ckrill was offered the position. I can only say nowthat I shall put him in some good position suitable to his greattalents and experience when the chance occurs. Of course when Imade the promise about Lane the idea of getting co*ckrill for theposition could not be in any one's head. This does not excuse mefor breaking the promise, which I should never have done, and ofcourse, if I had remembered it I should not have offered theposition to co*ckrill. I am very sorry. But as fortunately I haveanother term, I shall make ample amends to Lane later."

In September, 1905, while matters were in this position, Lane wentto Mexico, as legal adviser for a western rubber company. InOctober, Roosevelt announced his intention to place Lane on theInterstate Commerce Commission, to fill the annual vacancy thatoccurred in December. The announcement caused much newspapercomment, especially in the more partisan Republican press, as thecoming vacancy would leave two Republicans and two Democrats onthe Commission.

When Lane reached the United States he wrote:—

TO EDWARD B. WHITNEY

San Francisco, November 13,1905

MY DEAR WHITNEY,—I have just returned from a two months' tripthrough Mexico, from the Rio Grande to Guatemala, and from theGulf to the Pacific, and know nothing whatever concerning theInterstate Commerce Commissionership, save what I have seen in thepapers since my return. … I have not put myself in the positionof soliciting, either directly or indirectly, this appointment; Ihave never even stimulated to a slight degree the activity … ofmy friends on my behalf. There is some misgiving in my own mind asto whether acceptance of the position would be of benefit to meeither politically, or otherwise. I have no doubt the nominationfor Governor can be mine next year without effort, and what theoutcome of an election would be in 1906, even in a RepublicanState, is not now to be prophesied, in view of the somersaults inOhio and Pennsylvania of a week ago. Of course, … it is a greatopportunity to prove or disprove the capacity of this governmentto control effectively the corporations which seem determined tobe its master.

It does look to me as if the problem of our generation is to bethe discovery of some effective method by which the artificialpersons whom we have created by law can be taught that they arenot the creators, the owners, and the rightful managers of thegovernment. The real greatness of the President's policy, to mynotion, is that he has determined to prove to the railroads thatthey have not the whole works, and the policy that they havefollowed is as short-sighted as it can be. It will lead, ifpursued as it has been begun, to the wildest kind of a craze forgovernment ownership of everything. Just as you people in New YorkCity were forced, by the delinquency and corruption of the gascombine, to undertake the organization of a municipal ownershipmovement, so it may be that the same qualities in the railroadswill create precisely the same spirit throughout the country.

I appreciate thoroughly your position in New York. … [Hearst]knows public sentiment and how to develop it very well, and willbe a danger in the United States, I am afraid, for many years tocome. He has great capacity for disorganization of any movementthat is not his own, and an equal capacity for organization of anymovement that is his personal property. He feels with the people,but he has no conscience. … He is willing to do whatever for theminute the people may want done and give them what they cry for,unrestrained by sense of justice, or of ultimate effect. He is thegreat American Pander.

Reverting again to the Interstate Commerce Commissionership, Ithink the railroads here are determined that no Pacific Coast manshall be appointed. That has been the policy of the SouthernPacific since the creation of the Commission. …

One of the amusing reports that has come to me is that therailroad feels friendly toward me. I think probably the extent oftheir friendliness is in acknowledging that I am not ablackmailer. They know that I would not hold them up, just as wellas they know that I could not be held up. In the various campaignsthat I have made, it has never been suggested that the railroadshad any more influence with me than they ought to have, or thatanybody else had, and in my fight for the Governorship they didnot contribute so much as a single postcard, nor did an individualrailroad man contribute a dollar to the campaign fund. Isay this because I heard yesterday that word had gone to thePresident that I was something of a railroad man, which is aboutthe most amusing thing that I have heard for sometime. The chargenever was made in any of my five campaigns, and certainly is madeonly for foreign consumption, end not for home consumption.

Do not in any way put yourself out regarding this matter. I amsatisfied that the President will do just what he wants to do andjust what he thinks right, without much respect to what anybodysays to him, and I don't want to bring pressure to bear upon him;but, of course, I want him to know that I have friends who thinkwell of me. I am very appreciative of your offer and efforts, andhope that, whether I am given this position or not, I shall beforevery long have the opportunity of seeing you in New York. Verysincerely,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HON. THEODORE ROOSEVELT THE WHITE HOUSE

San Francisco, December 9, [1905]

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—I have not written you before because ofmy expectation that I would see you soon, but as there now seemssome doubt as to immediate confirmation I will not longer delayexpressing the deep gratification which the nomination gave me.You gave the one answer I could have wished to the whisperedcharge that I was bound by obligation of some sort to therailroads—a charge never made in any form here, not even in thehottest of my five campaigns. My honor stood pledged to you—bythe very fact of my willingness to accept the post—that I wasfree, independent, self-owned, capable of unbiased action. Andthat pledge remains.

As to my confirmation, it has been suggested that it was thecustomary and expected thing for me to go to Washington and helpin the fight. This I feel I should not do and have so written toSenator Perkins and others. I do not wish to appear indifferent inthe slightest degree to the honor you have done me, or to theoffice itself, but I feel that you will appreciate without mysetting them forth on paper the many reasons which hold me here.This is no time for an Interstate Commerce Commissioner to be onhis knees before a United States Senator or to be thought to be inthat position. Very respectfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Benjamin Ide Wheeler President, University of California

San Francisco, December 15, 1905

MY DEAR MR. WHEELER,—I enclose copy of a letter sent this morningto Mr. Smythe of San Diego, who is temporarily with SenatorNewlands in Washington.

I wanted to tell you last night that I had written to thePresident thanking him for the confidence he had shown in me, andtelling him that I did not think it was the right thing for me togo to Washington under present circ*mstances. He may have adifferent notion in this respect, and of course I should be guidedby his judgment … I have no doubt that many of the Senatorswould be quite willing to let the President have the law if theycould have the Commission …

Personally I should be most pleased to meet these criticalgentlemen of the Senate and give them a very full account of myeventful career. But the fact that I am a Democrat could not bedisproved by my presence in Washington, and I am not likely toapologize for what one of my kindly Republican critics calls "thiserror of his boyhood." I am concerned in this matter because I donot wish to cause the President any embarrassment. He is fightingfor far larger things than this appointment represents. He knowshis own game, and I am quite willing to stand on a side line andsee him play it to a finish, or get in and buck the center if I amneeded. I must apologize for troubling you with this matter, but Ido not wish you to regard me as indifferent or unappreciative. Andif you think that I am too far up in the clouds I want you franklyto tell me so. Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To William E. Smythe

San Francisco, December 15,1905

MY DEAR MR. SMYTHE,—I have been out of town for a few days, elseI would have acknowledged your kind letter of congratulationsooner. I sent a note the other day to our friend Senator Newlandsin recognition of the effort he has been making to secure actionupon my appointment, and I certainly regard myself as veryfortunate in having one who knows me upon that Committee.[Footnote: The Interstate Commerce Committee.]

According to the press despatches here I am regarded as somethingof a monster by the more conservative Senators, a sort of crossbetween Dennis Kearney and Eugene Debs with a little of Herr Mostthrown in … I wish for confirmation, but not at the price ofhaving it thought that I in any way compromised myself to obtainthe Senate's favorable action. I know that you are not alone inthis view as to the wisdom of my going on, for I have receivedother messages to the same effect. But, as you know, the Presidentmade this appointment upon grounds quite superior to those ofpolitical expediency and upon recommendations not at all politicalin their nature … Very truly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John H. Wigmore

San Francisco, December 21, [1905]

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—Your letter bore good fruit … As forconfirmation it is not as likely as I could wish. However, I amenjoying the situation hugely, and if the fight is kept up I mayenlarge into a national issue.

The Press of California (notice the respectful capital) ispractically a unit for me … My information is that the Presidentwill stand pat. But the fight with the Senate is growing so largethat no one can tell what will happen. I have been urged to go toWashington and meet the Senators, but I have refused. … Am I notright?

Remember me very kindly to your wife, and to you both a Merry
Christmas. As always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Benjamin Ide Wheeler President, University of California

San Francisco, December 22, [1905]

MY DEAR MR. WHEELER,—It was mighty good of you to bring me thatmessage of good cheer last night. I have not told you, and cannotnow tell you the very great pleasure and gratification you havegiven me by the many evidences of your personal friendship. To meit is better to have that kind of friendship than any office.

I have just received a letter from the President [Roosevelt] thatis so fine I want you to know of it at once—but the original Ikeep for home use. Here it is:—

"… I thank you for your frank and manly letter. It is just thekind of a letter I should have expected from you. You areabsolutely right in refraining from coming here. I shall make andam making as stiff a fight as I know how for you. I think I shallcarry you through; but of course nothing of this kind is evercertain. …"

Please remember me most kindly to Mrs. Wheeler and believe mealways, faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The California earthquake, of April 18, 1906, occurred at aboutfive o'clock in the morning. Lane was living in North Berkeley,across the bay from San Francisco. His house built of light woodand shingles, rocked, and his chimneys flung down bricks, in thesuccessive shocks, but with no serious damage. Meanwhile SanFrancisco sprang into flames from hundreds of broken gas mains.Lane reached the city early in the morning, and was at once put,by the Mayor, upon the Committee of Fifty to look to the safety ofthe City.

Will Irwin wrote this picturesque story of the episode afterhaving heard his friend describe this adventure:—

"Lane has said since that, although he was brought up in the oldWest, his was a city life after all. He had never tested himselfa*gainst primitive physical force, tried himself out in anemergency, and he had always longed for such a test before hedied. When the test came it was a supreme one: the San Franciscodisaster. …

"On the last day but one of this visitation the fire, smolderingslowly in the redwood houses, had taken virtually all the districteast of Van Ness Avenue, a broad street which bisects theresidence quarter. … By this time the authorities had given updynamiting. Chief Sullivan, the one man among them who understoodthe use of explosives in fire fighting, was dead. The work hadbeen done by soldiers from the Presidio, who blew up buildings tooclose to the flames and so only scattered them. Lane stood on theslope of Russian Hill, watching the fire approach Van Ness Avenue,when a contractor named Anderson came along. 'That fire alwayscatches at the eaves, not the foundations,' said Lane. 'It couldbe stopped right here if some one would dynamite all the blockbeyond Van Ness Avenue. It could never jump across a strip sobroad.' 'But they've forbidden any more dynamiting,' saidAnderson. 'Never mind; I'd take the chance myself if we could getany explosive,' replied Lane. 'Well, there's a launch full ofdynamite from Contra Costa County lying right now at Meigs'sWharf,' said Anderson. Just then Mr. and Mrs. Tom Magee arrived,driving an automobile on the wheel rims. Lane despatched them toMeigs's Wharf for the dynamite. He and Anderson found an electricbattery, and cut some dangling wires from a telephone pole. Bythis time the Magees were back, the machine loaded with dynamite;Mrs. Magee carrying a box of detonators on her lap. Lane,Anderson, and a corps of volunteers laid the battery and strungthe wires. 'How do you want this house to fall?' asked Anderson,who understands explosives. 'Send her straight up,' replied Lane.

"'And I've never forgotten the picture which followed,' Lane hastold me since. 'Anderson disappeared inside, came out, and said:"All ready." I joined the two ends of wire which I held in myhands. The house rose twenty feet in the air—intact, mind you! Itlooked like a scene in a fairy book. At that point I rolled overon my back, and when I got up the house was nothing but dust andsplinters.'

"They went down the line, blowing up houses, schools, churches.Then came bad news. To the south sparks were catching on the eavesof the houses. Down there was a little water in cisterns.Volunteers under Lane's direction made the householders stretchwet blankets over the roofs and eaves. Then again bad news fromthe north. There the fire had really crossed the avenue. Itthreatened the Western Addition, the best residence district. Thecause seemed lost. Lane ran up and looked over the situation. Onlya few houses were afire, and the slow-burning redwood wassmoldering but feebly. 'Just a little water would stop this!' hethought. The whole water system of San Francisco was gone, orsupposedly so, through the breaking of the mains. 'But I had ahunch, just a hunch,' said Lane, 'that there was water somewherein the pipes.' He had learned that a fire company which had givenup the fight was asleep on a haystack somewhere in the WesternAddition. He went out and found them. They had been working forthirty-six hours; they lay like dead men. Lane kicked the soles ofthe nearest fireman. He returned only a grunt. The next fireman,however, woke up; Lane managed to get him enthusiastic. He found awrench, and together he and Lane went from hydrant to hydrant,turning on the co*cks. The first five or six gave only a faintspurt and ceased to flow. Then, and just when the fireman wasgetting ready to go on strike, they turned a co*ck no morepromising than the others, and out spurted a full head of water.No one knows to this day where that water came from, but it wasthere! They shut off the stream. 'It will take three engines topump it to that blaze,' said the fireman. He, Lane, and Andersonscattered in opposite directions looking for engines. When twentyminutes later, Lane returned with an engine and company two othershad already arrived. But they had not yet coupled the hose up. Thecompanies were quarreling as to which, under the rules of thedepartment, should have the position of honor close to thehydrant! Lane settled that question of etiquette with speed andforce. They got a stream on the incipient fire, and the water heldout. The other side of Van Ness Avenue gradually burned out andsettled down into red coals. The Western Addition was saved, andthe San Francisco disaster was over."

A few days later Lane started to Washington in an attempt to raisemoney for the rebuilding of San Francisco. When he found thatCongress would not act in this matter, he, with Senator Newlands,of Nevada, and some others, went to the President and theSecretary of the Treasury to see if Federal help could be securedfor the ruined city.

To William R. Wheeler

New York, June 23, [1906]

MY DEAR WILL,—I have just returned from Washington, where I hopewe have accomplished some good for San Francisco, although it wasmighty hard to move anyone except the President and the Secretaryof the Treasury. But I did not intend to write of anything butyour personal affairs. Yesterday, on the train, I discovered thatyou had met with another fire. This is rubbing it in, hitting aman when he is down. The Gods don't fight fair. The decent rulesof the Marquis of Queensberry seem to have no recognition onOlympus, or wherever the Gods live. I can quite appreciate thestrain you are under and the monumental difficulties of yoursituation, dealing as you are with dispirited old men andindifferent young ones, I hope this last blow will have somebenefit which I cannot now perceive, else it must come like almosta knock-out to the concern. Brave, strong, bully old boy, no oneknows better than I do what a fight you have been making theselast few years and how many unkindnesses fortune has done you.There is not much use either in preaching to one's self or toanother, the advantages of adversity. I don't believe that men aremade by fighting relentless Fate, the stuff they have is sometimesproved by struggle,—that is the best that can be said for suchphilosophy.

More power to you my dear fellow! I took occasion to give M … awarm dose of Bill Wheeler. He is an old sour-ball who thinks he isalive but evidently has been in the cemetery a long time. Hetalked all right about you, but all wrong about San Francisco …

Give my regards to the dear wife whose heart is stout enough tomeet any calamity, and remember me most warmly to the Boy.Sincerely and affectionately yours, FRANKLIN K. LANE

The Hepburn Bill provided for seven men on the Interstate CommerceCommission, instead of five. Roosevelt intimated that he wouldappoint two Republicans. All opposition to Lane was thenwithdrawn.

To John H. Wigmore

New York, June 27, [1906]

MY DEAR WIGMORE,—Thanks, and again thanks, for your letter toSenator Cullom and yours to me. It looks now as if with a sevenman Commission the objection to my Democracy would cease. SenatorCullom's letter is very reassuring, and I wish that I had met himwhen in Washington. …

Before another week this business of mine will have come to ahead, and I hope soon after to start West, via Chicago.

If the report to-day is true that Harlan of Chicago is to go onthe Commission, you will have two friends on the body. Ipersonally think most highly of Harlan and would be mighty proudto sit beside him. His political fortune seems to have been akinto mine, and we have one dear and cherished enemy in common.

Remember me most kindly to your wife and believe me, faithfullyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Telegram. To John H. Wigmore

New York, June 30, [1906]

Confirmation has to-day arrived thanks to a friend or two like
Wigmore.

LANE

To William R. Wheeler

Washington, July 2, [1906]

MY DEAR BILL,—I have waited until this minute to write you, thatI might send you the first greeting from the new office. I havejust been sworn in and signed the oath, and to you I turn first toexpress gratitude, appreciation, and affection.

My hope is to leave here tomorrow and go to Chicago at once onyour affair, and then West.

Remember me most affectionately to your wife, and believe mealways most faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

At the same time an affectionate letter of appreciation went to
Benjamin Ide Wheeler.

RAILROAD AND NATIONAL POLICIES

1906-1912

Increased powers of Interstate Commerce Commission—Harriman
Inquiry—Railroad Regulation—Letters to Roosevelt

During the late summer of 1906, Lane was in Washington ortraveling through the South and West to attend the hearings of theInterstate Commerce Commission. The Hepburn Act of 1906, amongother extensions of power to the Commission, brought the expresscompanies of the United States under its jurisdiction, and theCommission began the close investigation into the rates, rules,and practises, that finally resulted in a complete reorganizationand zoning of the companies. The new powers given the Commission,by this Act, inspired fresh hope of righting old abuses,associated with railroad finance, over-capitalization and stock-jobbing. The Commission set itself to finding a way out of theancient quarrel between shippers and railroads in the matters ofrebating and demurrage charges.

In the latter part of the year, President Roosevelt called animportant meeting at the White House, for the purpose of decidingwhether an inquiry should not be made into the merging of theWestern railroads, then under the control of E. H. Harriman. ElihuRoot, then Secretary of State; William H. Taft, Secretary of War;Charles Bonaparte, Attorney General, were present; Chairman MartinA. Knapp and Franklin K. Lane of the Interstate CommerceCommission, and the special Counsel for the Commission—Frank B.Kellogg. The matter of the proposed inquiry was discussed, eachman being asked, in turn, to express his opinion. Root and Knappwere not in favor of beginning an investigation of the railroadmerger, Bonaparte, Kellogg, and Lane favored an immediate inquiry.Lane declared that, in a few weeks, when the report of theInterstate Commerce Commission was published, it would beimpossible to avoid making the inquiry.

At this point, President Roosevelt turned to William H. Taft, whoas yet had expressed no opinion, saying, "Will, what do you thinkof this?" Mr. Taft said quietly, "It's right, isn't it? Well, damnit, do it then." And the plans for the famous Harriman Inquiry,the first real step taken toward curbing the power of publicutilities, were then taken under consideration.

During the inquiry, when E. H. Harriman was on the stand forhours, the Commissioners trying to extract, by round-aboutquestioning, the admission from him that he would like to extendhis control over the railroads of the country, Lane, who had beensilent for some time, suddenly turned and asked Harriman thedirect question. What would he do with all the roads in thecountry, if he had the power? With equal candor and simplicity,Harriman replied that he would consolidate them under his ownmanagement. This answer rang through the country.

TO EDWARD F. ADAMS

Washington, February 16, 1907

MY DEAR ADAMS,— … I think the standpoint taken by our railroadfriends in 1882 is that which possesses their souls to-day. I amconscious each time I ask a question that there is deep resentmentin the heart of the railroad official at being compelled toanswer, but that he is compelled to, he recognizes. The operatingand traffic officials of the railroads are having a very hard timethese days with the law departments. They can not understand whythe law department advises them to give the information we demand,and I have heard of some most lively conferences in which thecounsel of the companies were blackguarded heartily for beingcowards, in not fighting the Commission. You certainly tookadvanced ground in 1882, … —there can be no such thing as abusiness secret in a quasi-public corporation. … Very trulyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

Washington, March 31,1907

MY DEAR MR. WHEELER,— … I have taken the liberty of giving Mr.Aladyin, leader of the Group of Toil in the Russian Duma, a noteof introduction. He's an immensely interesting young man, a finespeaker and comes from plain, peasant stock. He will talk to yourboys if you ask him. During these days of panic in Wall Street thePresident [Roosevelt] has called me in often and shown in manyways that he in no way regrets the appointment you urged. I havebeen much interested in studying him in time of stress. He is oneof the most resolute of men and at the same time entirely andaltogether reasonable. No man I know is more willing to takesuggestion. No one leads him, not even Root, but no one need fearto give suggestion. He lives up to his legend, so far as I candiscover, and that's a big order. The railroad men who are wisewill rush to the support of the policies he will urge before thenext Congress, or they will have national ownership to face as animmediate issue, or a character of regulation that they willregard as intolerable.

You will be here again soon and I hope that you will come directlyto our house and give us the pleasure of a genuine visit. …Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ELIHU ROOT

Washington, February 14, 1908

My DEAR MR. SECRETARY,—I have lately been engaged in writing anopinion upon the jurisdiction of the Interstate CommerceCommission over ocean carriers engaged in foreign commerce, and ithas occurred to me that an extensive American merchant marinemight be developed by some legislation which would permit Americanships to enjoy preferential through routes in conjunction with ourrailroad systems. The present Interstate Commerce Law, as Iinterpret it, gives to the Commission jurisdiction over carriersto the seaboard. It is the assumption of the law that rates willbe made to and from the American ports and that at such ports allships may equally compete for foreign cargo.

Might it not be possible to extend the jurisdiction of theCommission over all American vessels engaged in foreign trade, andwith such ships alone—they alone being fully amenable to our law—permit the railroad which carries to the port to make throughjoint rates to the foreign point of destination? There is so vasta volume of this through traffic that the preference which couldthus be given to the American ship would act as a most substantialsubsidy. There may be objections to this suggestion arising eitherout of national or international policy which render it unworthyof further consideration. It has appealed to me, however, aspossibly containing the germ of what Mr. Webster would have termeda "respectable idea." Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO E. B. BEARD

Washington, December 19, 1908

MY DEAR MR. BEARD,—I have not seen the article in the CALL, towhich you refer, but have heard of it from a couple ofCalifornians, much to my distress. Of course I appreciate that ata time of strain such as that which you shippers and business menof California are now undergoing, it is to be expected that themost conservative language will not be used. … The trouble iswith the law. … It is only upon complaint that an order can bemade reducing a rate, and I understand that such complaints are atpresent being drafted in San Francisco and will in time comebefore us but such matters cannot be brought to issue in a weeknor heard in a day, and when I tell you that we have on hand fourhundred cases, at the present time, you will appreciate how greatthe volume of our work is, and that you are not alone in yourfeeling of indignation or of distress. If you will examine thedocket of the Commission, you will find that the cases of thePacific Coast have been taken care of more promptly within thelast two years than the cases in any other part of the UnitedStates. I have seen to this myself, because of the long neglect ofthat part of the country. …

I want to speak one direct personal word to you. You are nowprotesting against increased rates. I have outlined to you theonly remedy [a change in the law] that I see available against thecontinuance of just such a policy on the part of the railroads,and I think it might be well for you to see that the Senators andRepresentatives from California support this legislation. It isnot calculated in any way to do injustice or injury to therailroads. … This is a plan which I have proposed myself, andfor which I have secured the endorsem*nt of the Commission. TheSan Francisco Chamber of Commerce has endorsed it. The wholePacific Coast should follow suit enthusiastically.

Please remember that I am not the Commissioner from California;that I am a Commissioner for the United States; and that it is notmy business to fight the railroads, but to hear impartially whatboth sides may have to say and be as entirely fair with therailroads as with the shippers. I am flattered to know that therailroad men of the United States do not regard me as a deadheadon this Commission. My aggressiveness on behalf of the shippingpublic has brought upon my head much criticism, and it would bethe greatest satisfaction for those who have been prosecuted forrebating or discovered in illegal practises to feel that they wereable in any degree to raise in the minds of the shippers anyquestion of my loyalty to duty.

I expect to be in California during January, for a few days, andhope that I may see you at that time. Very sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, February 13, 1909

MY DEAR GEORGE,—… I suppose you haven't seen my interview onthe Japanese question. I gave it at the request of the President[Roosevelt], because he said that the Republican Senators andCongressmen would not stand by him if it was going to be apartisan question in California politics. So I said that I wouldgive the value of my name and influence to the support of hispolicy, so that Flint, Kahn, ET AL., could quote me as against anyattack by the Democrats. The President has done great work for theCoast. Congress never would have done anything at this time, andby the time it is willing to do something the problem willpractically be solved. I am expecting to be roasted somewhat, inCalifornia, but I felt that it was only right to stand by the manwho was really making our fight without any real backing from theEast, and without many friends on the Pacific—so far as the"pollies" are concerned.

… The Harriman crowd seems to think that they will all be ongood terms with Taft, but unless I'm mistaken in the man they willbe greatly fooled. …

Have you noticed that nice point of constitutional law, dug up bya newspaper reporter, which renders Knox ineligible as Secretaryof State? He voted for an increase in the salary of the Secretaryof State three years ago. They will try to avoid the effect of theconstitutional inhibition by repealing the act increasing thesalary. Technically this won't do Knox any good, altho' it willprobably be upheld by the Courts, if the matter is ever taken intothe Courts.

Roosevelt is very nervous these days but as he said to me theother day, "They know that I am President right up to Marchfourth." I took Ned and Nancy to see him and he treated them mostbeautifully. Gave Ned a pair of boar tusks from the Philippinesand told him a story about the boar ripping up a man's leg justbefore he was shot, and to them both he gave a personal card.

F. K. L.

With this letter he sent a copy of a verse written by hisdaughter, not yet seven.

"On through the night as the willows go weeping
The daffodils sigh,
As the wind sweeps by
Right through the sky."

TO CHARLES K. MCCLATCHY SACRAMENTO BEE

Washington, March 20, 1909

My Dear McClatchy,—I am just in receipt of your letter of March15th, with reference to my running for Governor next year.

There is nothing in this rumor whatever. I have been approached bya good many people on this matter, and perhaps I have not said asdefinitely as I should that I had no expectation of re-enteringCalifornia politics. When I was last in California some of myfriends pointed out to me the great opening there would be for meif I would become a Republican and lead the Lincoln-Rooseveltpeople. There does not seem to be any line of demarcation betweena Democrat and a Republican these days, so that such a changewould not in itself be an act of suicide. My own personal beliefis that the organization in California on the Republican sidecould be rather easily beaten, and we could do with Californiawhat La Follette did with Wisconsin. But I am trying not to thinkof politics, and I told those people who came to me that I thoughtmy line of work for the next few years was fixed.

… No one yet knows from Mr. Taft's line of policy what kind of aPresident he will make. Everybody is giving him the benefit of thedoubt. The thing, I find, that hangs over all Presidents and otherpublic men here to terrify them is the fear of bad times. Thegreatness of Roosevelt lay, in a sense, in his recklessness. Thesepeople undoubtedly have the power to bring on panics whenever theywant to and to depress business, and they will exercise that poweras against any administration that does not play their game, andthe "money power," as we used to call it, allows the President andCongress a certain scope—a field within which it may move but ifit goes outside that field and follows policies or demandsmeasures which interfere with the game as played by the highfinanciers, they do not hesitate to use their "big stick," whichis the threat of business depression. …

There are a lot of things to be done in our State yet before weboth pass out. … As always, very truly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO LAWRENCE F. ABBOTT OUTLOOK

Washington, September 22, 1909

MY DEAR ABBOTT,— … President Taft's suggestion of a CommerceCourt is a very sensible one. We suggested the institution of sucha Court some years ago, so that the question of nullifying ourorder will be brought up before men who have special experience.… The trouble with the Courts is that they know nothing aboutthe question. Fundamentally it is not … law but economics thatwe deal with. The fixing of a rate is a matter of politics. Thatis the reason why I have always held that the traffic manager isthe most potent of our statesmen. So that we should have a Courtthat will pass really upon the one question of confiscation—theconstitutionality of the rates fixed—and leave experienced mento deal with the economic questions. …

I have long wanted to see you and have a talk about our work. Attimes it is rather disheartening. The problem is vast, and we passfew milestones. The one great accomplishment of the Commission, Ithink, in the last three years, has been the enforcement of thelaw as against rebating. We have a small force now that is used inthis connection under my personal direction, and I think thegreatest contribution that we have made, perhaps, to the railroadshas been during the time of panic when they were kept from cuttingrates directly or indirectly and throwing each other into thehands of receivers.

The great volume of our complaints comes from the territory westof the Mississippi River and practically all of the larger citiesin the inter-mountain country have complaints pending before usattacking the reasonableness of the rates charged them, and it isto give consideration to these that the Commission, as a body,goes West the first of the month. …

I have just returned from a trip to Europe, and I find that what Isaid two or three years ago about the United States being the mostConservative of the civilized countries is absolutely true.

By the way, at the Sorbonne at Paris they are exhibiting the chairin which President Roosevelt will sit when he comes to deliver hisaddress and I am thinking that he will have quite as hearty areception in Paris as in any of our cities.

Very truly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Washington, December 3, 1909

MY DEAR DOCTOR,—… I think there is but little doubt that DeVries will receive the appointment, though of course everythinghere is in absolute chaos. … The best symptom in my own case isthat I have been called in twice to consult over proposedamendments to the law, and the President's [Taft's] referencethereto in his forthcoming message. He seems to think my judgmentworth something—more than I do myself, in fact—for down in myheart, though I do not let anybody see it, I am really a modestcreature.

Since my return from the West we have had one merry round ofsickness in the house … but all are on their feet once more andas gay as they can be with a more or less grumpy head of thehousehold in the neighborhood, (assuming for the nonce that I amthe head of the household).

The President is going to appoint Lurton. [Footnote: To theSupreme Bench.] He should have said so when he made up his mind todo it, which was immediately after Peckham's death. He would havesaved himself an immense amount of trouble. Lurton seems to havebeen very hostile to the Interstate Commerce Commission, and istoo old, but otherwise I hear nothing said against him. I reallywould like to see Bowers put on the bench very much. He has made avery favorable impression here, and is a clear lawyer, a verystrong man, and in sympathy with Federal control that's real.

By the way, I had a talk the other day with Attorney GeneralWickersham regarding the treatment of criminals, and I believe youcan secure through him the initiation of an enlightened policy inthis matter. He told me that he was going to make somerecommendations in his report, and perhaps the President may dealwith the matter slightly in his message. Wickersham is athoroughly modern proposition, and as he has charge of all thepenitentiaries, and his recommendations, with relation to paroleand such things, absolutely go with the President, I believe youcould do more good in an hour's talk with him than you couldeffect in a year otherwise. If you could run down, during theholiday vacation, I would bring you two together for a talk onthis matter, and you, also, might take up the very live questionwith the President of cutting off red-tape in the courts. Give mylove to Mrs. Wigmore, and tell her, too, that we would be mostdelighted to see her here. Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

On December 9,1909, President Taft reappointed Franklin K. Lane asa member of the Interstate Commerce Commission.

TO MRS. FRANKLIN K. LANE

En route to California, Monday, March [1910]

… I have spent a rather pleasant day reading, and looking atthis great desert of New Mexico and Arizona. No one on board thatI know or care to know, but the big sky and my books keep me busy.Do you remember that picture in the Corcoran Gallery with a weeline of land at the bottom and a great high reach of blue skyabove, covering nine-tenths of the canvas? I have thought of itoften to-day—"the high, irrepressible sky." It is moonlight andthe rare air gives physical tone, so that I feel a bit more likemyself, as was, than is ordinary. …

I have thought of a lecture to-day and you must keep this letter
as a reminder and make me do it one of these days: THE PROBLEMS OF
RAILROAD REGULATION. THE TRAFFIC MANAGER AS A STATESMAN: THE
UNEARNED INCREMENT OF OUR RAILROADS.

And another: THE NEED OF A WORLD BANK: INTERNATIONAL ANDINDEPENDENT FINANCIAL AUTHORITY, which shall fix standards ofvalue, based on no one metal or commodity, but on a great numberof staples.

I have thought much of the farm. It will be so far away and soimpracticable of use! But such an anchor to windward, for two mosthand-to-mouth spendthrifts! …

TO THEODORE ROOSEVELT

Washington, April 29, 1910

MY DEAR MR. ROOSEVELT,—Mr. Kellogg tells me that he expects tosee you in Europe, and I avail myself of his offer to carry a wordof welcome to you, inasmuch as I must leave for Europe the dayafter your arrival in New York, the President having appointed meas a delegate to the International Railway Congress at Berne.

The country is awaiting you anxiously—not out of mere curiosityto know what your attitude will be, but to lead it, to give itdirection. The public opinion which you developed in favor of the"square deal" is stronger to-day than when you left, and yourpersonal following is larger to-day than it ever has been. Thereis no feeling (or if there is any it is negligible) that thePresident [Taft] has been consciously disloyal to the policieswhich you inaugurated or to his public promises. He is patriotic,conscientious, and lovable. This was your own view as expressed tome, and this view has been confirmed by my personal experiencewith him. It is also, I believe, the judgment of the country atlarge. But the people do not feel that they control the governmentor that their interests will be safeguarded by a relationship thatis purely diplomatic between the White House and Congress. Inshort we have a new consciousness of Democracy, largely resultingfrom your administration, and it is such that the character ofgovernment which satisfied the people of twenty years ago is foundlacking to-day. Practically all the criticism to which thisadministration has been subjected arises out of the feeling of thepeople that their opinions and desires are not sufficientlyconsulted, and they are suspicious of everything and everybodythat is not open and frank with them.

Outside of a few of the larger states the entire country isinsurgent, and insurgency means revolt against taking orders. Theprospect is that the next House will be Democratic, but theDemocrats apparently lack a realization of the many new problemsupon which the country is divided. Their success would notindicate the acceptance of any positive program of legislation; itwould be a vote of lack of confidence in the Republican partybecause it has allowed apparent party interest to rise superior topublic good. The prospect is that every measure which Congresswill pass at this session will be wise and in line with yourpolicies, but the people do not feel that THEY are passing thebills.

I have presumed to say this much, thinking that perhaps you wouldregard my opinion as entirely unbiased, and in the hope that Imight throw some light upon what I regard as the fundamentaltrouble which has to be dealt with. Whether you choose to re-enterpolitical life or not, men of all parties desire your leadershipand will accept your advice as they will that of none other.

Pardon me for this typewriting, but I thought that you mightprefer a letter in this form which you could read to one in my ownhand which you could not read. Believe me, as always, faithfullyyours.

FRANKLIN K. LANE

From Berlin, Lane received from Theodore Roosevelt, dated May 13,1910, these lines,—

" … I think your letter most interesting. As far as I can judgeyou have about sized up the situation right. With hearty goodwishes, faithfully yours,

THEODORE ROOSEVELT

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Washington, March 2, 1911

MY DEAR JOHN,—No other letter that I have received has done me asmuch good or given me as much pleasure, or has been as much of astimulus, as has yours. The fact that you took the time to gothrough the REPORT so carefully is an evidence of a friendshipthat is beyond all price, and of which I feel most unworthy. Ihave had the figures checked over, resulting in some slightchanges, and will send you a revised copy as soon as it isprinted. The newspaper criticisms are generally very friendly,although the FINANCIAL CHRONICLE, the WALL STREET JOURNAL, andother railway organs are extremely bitter. The Western papers donot seem to have been very much elated over the decision. It hasappeared to me from the beginning as if they had been "fixed" inadvance and that their reports were always biased for therailroads, but the country at large will realize, I think, beforelong, that the decisions are sound, sensible, and in the publicinterest. Some of the least narrow of the railroad men also takethis view. The best editorial I have seen is in the New YorkEVENING POST. Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

P. S. I got this note from Roosevelt this morning, headed THE
OUTLOOK:—

"Fine! I am really greatly obliged to you, and I shall read theREPORT with genuine interest. More power to your elbow! Faithfullyyours."

"This report was known," Commissioner Harlan explains, "as theWestern Advance Rate Case. It was one of the first of the greatcases covering many commodities and applying over largely extendedterritories. In his opinion denying the rate advances proposed bythe carriers, Commissioner Lane discussed the Commission's newpowers of suspending the operation of increased rates pendinginvestigation and the burden of proof in such cases. He marshalleda vast array of facts and figures and announced conclusions thatwere accepted as convincing by the public at large. He thenpointed out that the laws enforced by the Commission soughtdominion over private capital for no other purpose than to securethe public against injustice and thereby make capital itself moresecure."

TO WILLIAM R. WHEELER TRAFFIC BUREAU, MERCHANTS' EXCHANGE SANFRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA

Washington, June 27, 1911

DEAR SIR,—Adverting to yours of June 22, IN RE express rates, Ibeg to advise that nothing can be added to my previous letterunless it is the expression of my personal opinion that a rateshould not be made for the carriage of 20,000 pound shipments byexpress.

We are receiving daily similar complaints to yours, respecting thenonadjustment of express rates, and if you will call at thisoffice we shall be pleased to reveal the reason for our failure,hitherto, to grant the relief desired. It is extremely warm inWashington at the present time, but if anything could add to thedisagreeableness of life in the city it is the unreasoninginsistence on the part of the traffic bureaus of the country thatexpress rates shall be fixed overnight.

I desire to say that I have given some year or two of more or lessprofane contemplation to this question, and have now engaged alarge corps of men, under the direction of Mr. Frank Lyon asattorney for the Commission, to seek a way out of the inextricablemaze of express company figures. Whether we will be able to findthe light before the Infinite Hand that controls our destiniescuts short the cord, is a question to which no certain answer canbe given. Would you kindly advise the importunate members of amost worthy institution, that express rates to San Franciscopossess me as an obsessment. My prayer is at night interfered withby consideration of the question—"What should the 100 pound ratebe by Wells Fargo & Co. from New York to San Francisco?" And atnight often I am aroused from sleep, feeling confident in mydreams that the mystic figure of "a just and reasonable rate,"under Section One, on 100-pound shipments to San Francisco, hadbeen determined, and awaken with a joyous cry upon my lips, todiscover that life has been made still more unhappy by the tortureof the subconscious mind during sleep.

No doubt your shippers are being treated unfairly, both by theexpress companies and by the Interstate Commerce Commission. Thisis a cruel world. Congress itself adds to the torture, by almostdaily referring to us some bill touching express rates or parcelspost, or some such similar service, and while the thermometerstands at 117 degrees in the shade we are requested to advise asto whether express companies should not be abolished. It has onlybeen by the exercise of a rare and unusual degree of self-controlon my part, and by long periods of prayer, that I have refrainedfrom advising Congress that I thought express companies should beabolished and designating the place to which they should berelegated.

As perhaps you may have heard, I shall visit the Pacific Coast inperson during the next few weeks, and there I trust I may have thepleasure of meeting you and your noble Governing Committees, towhom I shall explain in person and in detail the difficultiesattaching to the solution of this problem. … Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO LAWRENCE F. ABBOTT OUTLOOK

Washington, December 4, 1911

MY DEAR ABBOTT,— … We are making history fast these days, andat the bottom of it all lies the idea, in the minds of theAmerican people, that they are going to use this machine they callthe Government. For the centuries and centuries that have passed,government has been something imposed from above, to which thesubject or citizen must submit. For the first century of ournational life this idea has held good. Now, however, the peoplehave grown in imagination, so that they appreciate the fact thatthe government is very little more than a cooperative institutionin which there is nothing inherently sacred, excepting in so faras it is a crystallization of general sentiment and is a goodworking arrangement. And the feeling with relation to bigbusiness, when we get down to the bottom of it, is that if menhave made these tremendous fortunes out of privileges granted bythe whole people, we can correct this by a change in our laws.They do not object to men making any amount of money so long asthe individual makes it, but if the Government makes it for him,that is another matter.

I have been meeting … with some of the committees, in Congressand out, that are drafting bills regulating trusts, and I expectsomething by no means radical as a starter.

You ask as to leadership in both Houses. There is not much in theLower House that can be relied upon to do constructive work, sofar as I can discover. Our Democratic leaders all wear hobbleskirts. But in the Senate there is some very good stuff.

I expect to be in New York in January, and then I hope to see you.
Very truly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

When he was running for Governor in 1902, Lane made prison reformone of the foremost issues of his campaign. Several years laterwhen a movement was started petitioning the Governor to paroleAbraham Ruef, who had served a part of his term in thepenitentiary for bribery in San Francisco, Lane signed thepetition. This brought a letter of remonstrance from his friendCharles McClatchy, editor and owner of the Sacramento Bee, whofelt that such a movement was ill-timed and not in the interest ofthe public good.

TO CHARLES K. MCCLATCHY SACRAMENTO BEE

Washington, December 12, 1911

MY DEAR CHARLES,—I have your letter regarding the paroling ofAbraham Ruef, and, far from taking offense at what you say, I knowthat it expresses the opinion of probably the great body of ourpeople, but I have long thought that we dealt with criminals in amanner which tended to keep them as criminals and altogetheropposed to the interests of society. I am not sentimental on thisproposition, but I think I am sensible. We are dealing with menconvicted of crime more harshly and more unreasonably than we dealwith dogs. Our fundamental mistake is that we utterly ignore thefact that there is such a thing as psychology. We are treatingprisoners with the methods of five hundred years ago, beforeanything was known about the nature of the human mind. … Thereare, of course, certain kinds of men who should for society's sakebe kept in prison as long as they live, just as there are kinds ofinsane people that should be kept in insane asylums until theydie. …

I think if you will get the thought into your mind that ourpresent penal system is Silurian and unscientific—the same to-dayas it was 10,000 years ago—you will see my stand-point. Ourpenitentiaries develop criminals, they make criminals out of menwho are not criminals to begin with—boys, for instance. Theydebase and degrade men. The state by its system of punishmentreaches into the heart of a man and plucks out his very soul. I amspeaking of men who are when they enter responsive to goodimpulses. …

I thoroughly appreciate the spirit in which you have written me,and I hope that you will get my point of view. I have known AbeRuef for over twenty-five years. He was a perfectly straight youngman and anxious to help in San Francisco. I do not know theinfluences that turned him into the direction that he took, but Iam absolutely certain that that man has suffered mental torturesgreater than any that he would have ever suffered if he had goneto a physical hell of fire. He may appear brave, but he is infact, I will warrant you, a heart-broken man, because he hasfailed of realizing his own decent ideals. … He never was myfriend, politically, socially, or otherwise, but my judgment isthat society will be better off if he is allowed the limitedfreedom that a parole gives and given an opportunity to live up tohis own ideal of Abe Ruef.

Regards to Val, your wife, and family. As always, faithfullyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO CHARLES K. MCCLATCHY SACRAMENTO BEE

[Washington, January, 1912]

MY DEAR CHARLES,—I have your note regarding Ruef. … It seems tome you have made one good point against me, and only one,—thatthere are poor men in jail who ought to be paroled at the end of ayear. Very well, why not parole them? If they are men who havebeen reached by public opinion and are subject to it, I see noreason why they should be kept in jail. Every case must be dealtwith by itself and to each case should be given the same kind oftreatment that I give to Ruef. You will be advocating this thingyourself one of these days, calling it Christian and civilized anddenouncing those who do not agree with you as being barbarians. Itmay be that Ruef fooled me when he was just out of college, but Iwas a member of the Municipal Reform League which John H. Wigmore,now Dean of the Northwestern University Law School, Ruef andmyself started. It did not last very long, but I think that Ruefwas as zealous as any of us for good government.

With many wishes for the New Year, believe me always, my dear
Charles, yours faithfully,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS LONDON, ENGLAND

December 13, 1911

MY DEAR BURNS,—I have felt grievously hurt, at hearing fromPfeiffer several times, that you had written him, and nary a wordto me. The idea that I should write to you when you had nothing inthe world to do but write me, never entered my head. I want you tounderstand distinctly the position which you now occupy in theminds of your friends. You are a gentleman of leisure, travelingin Europe with an invalid wife, necessarily bored, and anxious tomeet with anything that will give you an interesting life. Underthe circ*mstances, you may relieve your mind at any time, of anyintellectual bile, by correspondence. … If you wish somethingserious to do, I will formally direct you to make a report uponRailway Rates and Railway Service in Europe. This will give yousome diversion in between your attacks of religion andarchitecture.

Pfeiffer, I presume, has returned from the Far West, but so far Ihave not heard from him. The last letter I got was from theYosemite. He seems to have been enchanted with that country. Hesays there is nothing in Europe to compare with it. It is splendidto see a fellow of his age, and with all of his learning, keep uphis enthusiasm. It seems to me that he is more appreciative andbuoyant than he was twenty years ago, and he is really very sane.His sympathies, unlike yours, are with the present and not withthe dead past.

You will be interested in knowing that Mr. T. Roosevelt is likelyto be the next Republican nominee for President. Within the lastsix weeks it has become quite manifest that Taft cannot beelected. … And so you see, the whirligig of time has madeanother turn. Big Business in New York is looking to Roosevelt asa statesman who is practical. The West regards him as the championof the plain people. He is keeping silent, but no doubt like thenegro lady he is quite willing to be "fo'ced."

On the Democratic side all of the forces have united to destroyWilson, who is the strongest man in the West. The bosses are allagainst him. They recently produced an application which he hadmade for a pension, under the Carnegie Endowment Fund forTeachers, which had been allowed to lie idle, unnoticed for a yearor so after its rejection, but owing to campaign emergencies wasproduced, at this happy moment, to show that Wilson wanted apension. As a Philadelphia poet whom you never heard of says:—

"Ah, what a weary travel is our act,
Here, there, and back again, to win some prize,
Those who are wise their voyage do contract
To the safe space between each others' eyes."

This line is in keeping with my reputation as an early Victorian.… Do write me some good long letters. You have a better literarystyle than any man who ever wrote a letter to me, and I love youfor the prejudices that are yours. Give my love to your wife. Asalways yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANES

TO THEODORE ROOSEVELT

Washington, December 10, 1911

MY DEAR COLONEL,—I have been thinking over what I said yesterday,and I am going to presume upon my friendship and, I may say, myaffection for you to make a suggestion:

Even though the call comes from a united party and undercirc*mstances the most flattering, do not accept it unless you areconvinced of two things: (1) that you are needed from a nationalstandpoint and not merely from a party standpoint; (2) that youare certain of election.

Sacrifice for one's country is splendid, but sacrifice for one'sparty is foolish. You must feel assured before acceding to thecall, which I believe will certainly come, that it is more thanparty-wide, and that it is sufficiently strong to overcome thetrend toward Democratic success. If I were asked I would say thatI think both of these conditions are present—that the desire tohave you again is much broader than any party, and so large thatit would insure your victory;—but no man is as wise a judge ofthese things as the man himself whose fortunes are at stake.

Thanking you again for the pleasure of a luncheon, believe me, asalways, faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Roosevelt in a letter marked PRIVATE AND CONFIDENTIAL replied:—… "That is a really kind and friendly letter from you, and Iappreciate it. Now I agree absolutely with you that I have nobusiness under any circ*mstances to accept any such call, even inthe greatly improbable event of its coming, unless I am convincedthat the need is National, a need of the people and not merely aneed of the Party. But as for considering my own chances in anysuch event, my dear fellow, I simply would not know how to goabout it. I am always credited with far more political sagacitythan I really possess. I act purely on public grounds and thenthis proves often to be good policy too. I assure you with allpossible sincerity that I have not thought and am not thinking ofthe nomination, and that under no circ*mstances would I in theremotest degree plan to bring about my nomination. I do not wantto be President again, I am not a candidate, I have not theslightest idea of becoming a candidate, and I do not for onemoment believe that any such condition of affairs will arise thatwould make it necessary to consider me accepting the nomination.But as for the effect upon my own personal fortunes, I would notknow how to consider it, because I would not have the vaguest ideawhat the effect would be, except that according to my own view itcould not but be bad and unpleasant for me personally. From thepersonal standpoint I should view the nomination to the Presidencyas a real and serious misfortune. Nothing would persuade me totake it, unless it appeared that the people really wished me to doa given job, which I could not honorably shirk. …"

TO SAMUEL G. BLYTHE

Washington, January 6, 1912

MY DEAR SAM,—… I, too, have been reading William James. HisVARIETIES OF RELIGIOUS EXPERIENCE is the only philosophic workthat I was ever able to get all the way through. This thing gaveme real delight for a week.

Have just read Mr. John Bigelow's REMINISCENCES, or bits thereof,and find that the aforesaid John is much like another John that weknow in this city, the fine friend of the Pan-American Bureau. Heseems to have been a dignified and solemn gentleman who carried oncorrespondence with a great many men for a number of years,without … having indulged in a flash of humor in all hisrespectable days. …

Will you support me for Supreme Court Justice? I see that I ammentioned. Between us, I am entirely ineligible, having a sense ofhumor. As always yours,

LANE

TO SIDNEY E. MEZES PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS

Washington, February 15,1912

MY DEAR SID,—Your weather has been no worse than ours, I want youto understand; in fact, not so bad. I think the glacial period isreturning and the ice cap is moving down from the North Pole.

The Supreme Bench I could not get because I am a Democrat, and thePresident could not afford to appoint another Democrat on theBench. I do not know when McKenna goes out, and I am not going tobe disturbed about it anyway. If I had not been unlucky enough tobe born in Canada I could be nominated for President this year.Things are in a devil of a condition. We could have electedWilson, hands down, if it had not been for Hearst's malevolentinfluence. He is at the bottom of all this deviltry. His aim is tokill Wilson off and nominate Clark, and Clark is in the lead now,I think. God knows whether he can beat Taft or not. It looks to meas if Taft will be nominated. I have a feeling somehow that theRoosevelt boom won't materialize.

My love to the Missis and to Mr. House. As always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Washington, February 19, 1912

MY DEAR JOHN,—For two weeks there has been standing on my desk amost elegantly bound set of your CASES ON TORTS sent to me byLittle, Brown & Co. at your request. You do not need to be told, Iknow, how much I appreciate a thing that comes from you and howpoverty stricken I am when it comes to making adequate return. Ican prove that I have been working hard, but my work does notcrystallize into anything which is worth sending to a friend.

The fact is that I have never worked as hard in my life as I havelately. I get to my office about nine, and without going out of myroom (for I take my lunch at my desk), stay until six, and work athome every night until half past eleven, and then take a volume ofessays or poems to bed with me for half or three-quarters of anhour, and so to sleep.

If the man in the White House had as much sense as I have, hewould name you for the Supreme Bench without asking, and "draft"you, as Roosevelt says. By the way, I gave the suggestion of"draft" in a talk I had with him a month or so ago.

The political situation is interesting, but altogether un-lovely.
… It looks as if Clark might be the nominee on the Democratic
side. Taft is gaining in strength, and somehow I cannot feel that
Roosevelt will ever be in it, although you know how I like him.
The situation seems a bit artificial.

Give my love to Mrs. John. As always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, February 23, 1912

MY DEAR GEORGE,— … Yesterday I delivered an address before theUniversity of Virginia on A Western View of Tradition—which whenit is printed I will send out to you—and in the afternoon wastaken up to Jefferson's home, Monticello. It is on a mountain, thetop of which he scraped off. It overlooks the whole surroundingcountry, most of which at that time he owned. He planned the wholehouse himself, even to the remotest details, the cornices and thecarvings on the mantels, the kind of lumber of which the floorswere to be made, the character of the timbers used, the carving ofthe capitals on the columns, the folding ladder that was used towind up the clock over the doorway, the registers on the porchthat recorded the direction in which the wind was coming, as movedby the weather-vane on the roof, the little elevator beside thefireplace … and a thousand other details.

… I would like nothing better if I had any kind of skill inusing my hands than to take a year off and build a house. It is areal religion to create something, and you do not need a greatdeal of money to make a very beautiful little place. You must haveone large room, and the house must be on some elevation, and youmust get water, water, and water. … It is water that makes landvaluable in California or anywhere else. Affectionately yours,

F. K. L.

TO CARL SNYDER

Washington, March 6, 1912

MY DEAR CARL,—I have this minute for the first time seen the copyof COLLIER'S, for February 24, 1912, and therefore for the firsttime my eyes lighted upon your most delicious roast of theCommerce Court. …

I do not know what the outcome of this movement will be. The onlysettled policy of government is inertia. The House ofRepresentatives Committee on Appropriations, I believe, proposesto abolish the appropriation for the Court, which looks like acowardly way to get at the thing, but perhaps it is mosteffective. However, I really doubt if they will have the nerve todo this. It is a mighty critical year, I think, in our history. Itlooks to me as if the reactionaries were going to get possessionof both parties, and that a third party will be needed and nobodywill have the nerve to start it. Roosevelt has got everything westof the Mississippi excepting Utah and Wyoming, in my judgment.That he will be able to get the nomination I am not so sure; buthe does not care a tinker's damn whether he gets it himself ornot. That is the worst of it because the people won't giveanything to a man that he does not want. … Well, we are livingin mighty interesting times anyway.

As always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

On February 22, 1912, Lane delivered the annual address at theUniversity of Virginia. He spoke on American Tradition, sayingthat as Americans are physically, industrially, and socially the"heirs of all the ages" our supreme tradition is a "hatred ofinjustice." That one of the great experiments that a Democracyshould make is to find a more equitable distribution of wealth"without destroying individual initiative or blasting individualcapacity and imagination." This address brought a letter fromOliver Wendell Holmes, Justice of the Supreme Court.

TO FRANKLIN K. LANE

March 17, 1912

MY DEAR SIR,—Let me thank you at once for your Virginia address,which I have just received and just read—read with the greatestpleasure. I admire its eloquence, its imagination, its style. Isympathize with its attitude and with most of its implications. Igain heart from its tone of hope. I am old—by the calendar atleast—and at times am more melancholy, so that it does me good tohear the note of courage. One implication may carry conclusions towhich I think I ought to note my disagreement,—the reference tounequal distribution. I think the prevailing fallacy is toconfound ownership with consumption of products. Ownership is agate, not a stopping place. You tell me little when you tell methat Rockefeller or the United States is the owner. What I want toknow is who consumes the annual product, and for many years I havebeen saying and believing that to think straight one should lookat the stream of annual products and ask what change one wouldmake in that under any REGIME. The luxuries of the few are a dropin the bucket—the crowd now has all there is. The differencebetween private and public ownership, it seems to me, is mainly inthe natural selection of those most competent to foresee thefuture and to direct labor into the most productive channels, andthe greater poignancy of the illusion of self-seeking under whichthe private owner works. The real problem, under socialism as wellas under individualism, is to ascertain, under the externaleconomic and inevitable conditions, the equilibrium of socialdesires. The real struggle is between the different groups ofproducers of the several objects of social desire. The bogeycapital is simply the force of all the other groups against theone that is selling its product, trying to get that product forthe least it can. Capital is society purchasing and consuming—Labor is society producing. The laborers unfortunately are oftenencouraged to think capital something up in the sky which they arewaiting for a Franklin to bring down into their jars. I think thatis a humbug and lament that I so rarely hear what seem to me thecommonplaces that I have uttered, expressed. Your fine address hasset me on my hobby and you have fallen a victim to the charm ofyour own words. Very truly, yours,

O. W. HOLMES

P. S. Of course I am speaking only of economics not of politicalor sentimental considerations—both very real, but as to which allthat one can say is, if you are sure that you want to go to theshow and have money enough to buy a ticket, go ahead, but don'tdelude yourself with the notion that you are doing an economicact. I make the only return I can in the form of the single speechI have made for the last nine years.

TO OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES JUSTICE OF THE SUPREME COURT

Washington, March 20, 1912

MY DEAR MR. JUSTICE,—I sincerely thank you for the warmth andgenerosity of your comment on my Virginia speech. Your economicphilosophy is fundamentally, I think, the same as mine—that thewealth produced is a social product. And men may honestly differas to how best that stream of foods and other satisfactions may beincreased in volume, or more widely distributed. May I carry yourfigure of the stream further by suggesting that the riparian ownerin England has the superior right, but in an arid country thecommon law rule is abandoned because under new conditions it doesnot make for the greatest public good? The land adjoining feelsthe need of the water, and society takes from one to give to theother.

The last century was devoted to steaming up in production. Thiscentury, it appears to me, will devote itself more definitely todistribution. It is nonsense, of course, to say that because therich grow richer the poor grow poorer; but the poor are not thesame poor, they, too, have found new desires. Civilization hasgiven them new wants. Those desires will not be satisfied withlargesse, and with the machinery of government in their hands thepeople are bound to experiment along economic lines. They willcertainly find that they get most when they preserve the captainof industry, but may it not be that his imagination andforethought may be commanded by society at a lower share of thegross than he has heretofore received, or in exchange forsomething of a different, perhaps of a sentimental nature? …Please pardon this typewritten note, but my own hand, unlike yourcopper-plate, is absolutely illegible. I have been raised in atypewriter age.

Again thanking you for your letter, believe me, with the highestregard, faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Washington, April 3, 1912

MY DEAR JOHN,—You overwhelm me. … You have no right to say suchnice things to an innocent and trusting young thing like myself.The flat, unabashed truth is that I appreciate your letter morethan any other that I have received concerning that speech. By wayof indicating the interest which it has excited I send you copiesof some correspondence between Mr. Justice Holmes and myself.

Our plans for the summer are very unsettled. The probability isthat we will go up to Bras D'Or Lakes, in Cape Breton, where wecan have salt-water bathing and sailing and be most primitive. Ishould like greatly to run over with you to Europe, and, by way ofmaking the temptation harder to resist, let me know how you expectto go, and where.

Give my love to the Lady Wigmore. As ever yours,

F, K. L.

TO DANIEL WITTARD PRESIDENT, BALTIMORE AND OHIO RAILROAD COMPANY

Washington, June 19, 1912

MY DEAR MR. WILLARD,—That was a warm cordial note that you sentme regarding my University of Virginia address, and what you sayof my sentiments confirms my own view that property must look tomen like yourself for protection in the future—men who are notblind to public sentiment and whose methods are frank. The worstenemy that capital has in the country is the man who thinks thathe can "put one over" on the people. An institution cannot remainsacred long which is the creator of injustice, and that is whatsome of our blind friends at Chicago do not see. Very truly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN MCNAUGHT NEW YORK WORLD

Washington, March 23, 1912

MY DEAR JOHN,—I am very glad indeed to hear from you and to knowthat you are in sympathy with my "eloquent" address at theUniversity of Virginia. You give me hope that I am on the righttrack. As for Harmon and representative government, you won't geteither. … Please see Mr. R. W. Emerson's Sphinx, in which occursthis line:

"The Lethe of Nature can't trance him again
Whose soul sees the perfect, which his eye seeks in vain."

Fancy me surrounded by maps of the express systems of the UnitedStates, digging through the rates on uncleaned rice from Texas tothe Southeast, dribbling off poetry to a man who sits in a talltower overlooking New York, who once had poetry which has pernecessity been smothered! Dear John, read your Bible, and inSecond Kings you will find the story of one Rehoboam, that son ofSolomon, who was also for Harmon and representative government.

I am looking out of the window at the funeral procession for theMaine dead, and it strikes me that our dear friend Cobb hasoverlooked one trick in his campaign against T. R. Of course hehas other arrows in his quiver, and no doubt this one will comelater, but why not charge T. R. with having blown up the Maine? Noone can prove that he did not do it. He then undoubtedly wasplanning to become President and knew that he never could beunless he was given a chance to show his ability as a soldier-patriot. He stole Panama of course, and is there any reason tobelieve that a man who would steal Panama would hesitate atblowing up a battleship?

I hope you … are giving over the life of a hermit—not that Iwould advise you to take to the Great White Way, but the sidestreets are sometimes pleasant. As always, devotedly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

EXPRESS CASE—CABINET APPOINTMENTS

1912-1913

Politics—Democratic Convention—Nomination of Wilson —Report on
Express Case—Democratic Victory—Problems for New Administration
—On Cabinet Appointments

TO ALBERT SHAW REVIEW OF REVIEWS

Washington, April 30, 1912

MY DEAR DOCTOR,— … You certainly are very much in the right.Everything begins to look as if the Republican party would proveitself the Democratic party after all. Our Southern friends are soobstinate and so traditional, and so insensible to the problems ofthe day, that while they are honest they are too often found inalliance with the Hearsts and Calhouns. The Republican party, onthe other hand, seems to have courage enough to take a purgativeevery now and then.

We must find ways of satisfying the plain man's notion of what thefair thing is, or else worse things than the recall of judges willcome to pass. Every lawyer knows that the law has been turned intoa game of bridge whist. People are perfectly well satisfied thatthey can submit a question to a body of fair-minded and honestmen, take their conclusion, and get rid of all our absurd rules ofevidence and our unending appeals.

And as to economic problems, people are going to solve a lot ofthese along very simple lines. I think I see a great body ofopinion rising in favor of the appropriation by the Government ofall natural resources.

We saw a lot of the Severances while they were here. Cordy made agreat argument in the Merger Case, but if he wins, we won't getanything more than a paper victory—another Northern Securitiesvictory.

Please remember me very kindly to Mrs. Shaw, and believe me, asalways sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO CURT G. PFEIFFER

Washington, May 21, 1912

MY DEAR PFEIFFER,—I am acknowledging your note on the day whenOhio votes. This is the critical day, for if T. R. wins more thanhalf the delegation in Ohio, he is nominated and, I might almostsay, elected. But I find that the Democrats feel more sure of hisstrength than the Republicans do. Have you noticed how extremelysmall the Democratic vote is at all of the primaries, notamounting to more than one-fourth of the Republican vote?

… The Democrats are in an awkward position. If Roosevelt isnominated, one wing will be fighting for Underwood, to get thedisaffected conservative strength, while the other wing will befighting for Bryan, so as to hold as large a portion of theradical support as possible. Oh, well, we have all got to come toa real division of parties along lines of tendency and temperamentand have those of us who feel democratic-wise get into the samewagon, and those who fear democracy, and whose first interest isproperty, flock together on the tory side. As always, yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, July 2, 1912

MY DEAR GEORGE,—I am off tomorrow for Baddeck, Cape Breton, where
I shall probably be until the 1st of September or thereabouts—if
I can endure that long period of country life and absence from the
political excitement of the United States.

It looks, as I am writing, as if Wilson were to be nominated atBaltimore. If he is he will sweep the country; Taft won't carrythree states. [Footnote: Taft carried Vermont and Utah.] Wilson isclean, strong, high-minded and cold-blooded. To nominate him wouldbe a tremendous triumph for the anti-Hearst people. I have beenover at the convention several times. Hearst defeated Bryan fortemporary chairman by making a compact with Murphy, Sullivan andTaggart. … Bryan has fought a most splendid fight. I had a talkwith him. He was in splendid spirits and most cordial. TheCalifornia delegation headed by Theodore Bell has been made tolook like a lot of wooden Indians. Bell himself was shouted downwith the cry of "Hearst! Hearst!", the last time he rose to speak.The delegation is probably the most discredited one in the entireconvention. …

My summer, I presume, will be put in chiefly in sailing a smallyawl with Gilbert Grosvenor, rowing a boat, fishing a little, andwalking some. My diet for the next two months will consistexclusively of salmon and potatoes, cod-fish and potatoes, andmutton and potatoes.

I have just completed my report in the Express Case, a copy ofwhich will be sent you. It has been a most tremendous task, andthe work has not yet been completed for we have to pass upon therates in October; but I am in surprisingly good condition—largely, perhaps, because the weather has been so cool for thelast month …

All happiness, old man! Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

"Lane had a long look ahead," says James S. Harlan, "that often
reminded one of the extraordinary prevision of Colonel Roosevelt.
One striking instance of this was in connection with this Express
Case.

"Early in the progress of the investigation of express companiesundertaken by him in 1911, at the request of the InterstateCommerce Commission, Lane warned a group of high express officialsgathered around him that unless they promptly coordinated theirservice more closely to the public requirements, revised theirarchaic practices, readjusted and simplified their rate systems soas to eliminate discriminations, the frequent collection of doublecharges and other evils, and gave the public a cheaper and abetter service, the public would soon be demanding a parcel post.

"The suggestion was received with incredulous smiles, one of theexpress officials saying, apparently with the full approval ofthem all, that a parcel post had been talked of in this countryfor forty years and had never got beyond the talking point, andnever would. As a matter of fact, there was little, if any,movement at that time in the public press or elsewhere for such aservice by the government. But Lane's alert mind had sensed in thecurrent of public thought a feeling that there was need of aquicker, simpler, and cheaper way of handling the country's smallpackages, and he saw no way out, other than a parcel post, if theexpress companies stood still and made no effort to meet thispublic need.

"Within scarcely more than a year Congress, by the Act of August24, 1912, had authorized a parcel post and such a service was inactual operation on January 1, 1913. It was not until December ofthe latter year that the express companies were ready to file withthe Commission the ingenious and entirely original system Lane haddevised for stating express rates. The form was so simple thateven the casual shipper in a few minutes' study could qualifyhimself for ascertaining the rates, not only to and from his ownhome express station but between any other points in the country.But by that time the carriage of the country's small parcels hadpermanently passed out of the hands of the express companies intothe hands of the postal service, by which Lane's unique form forstating the express rates was adopted as the general form ofshowing its parcel post charges."

TO Oscar S. Straus

Washington, July 8, 1912

MY DEAR MR. STRAUS,—I thank you heartily for your appreciativenote regarding my University of Virginia talk. I wanted to saysomething to those people, especially to the younger men, thatwould make them doubt the wisdom of staying forever with systemsand theories not adapted to our day.

As I write, word comes that Woodrow Wilson has been nominated. Ido not know him, but from what I hear he promises if elected to bea real leader in the war against injustice. The world wantsearnest men right now—not cynics, but men who BELIEVE, whetherrightly or wrongly; and the reason that the East is so much lessprogressive as we say, than the West, is because the East is madeup so largely of cynics.

Thanking you once more for your appreciative words, believe me,sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

Baddeck, Nova Scotia, July 81, [1912]

MY DEAR MR. WHEELER,—Your letter followed me here, where at leastone can breathe. This really is a most beautiful country filledwith self-respecting Gaelic-speaking Scotch from the islands ofthe north—crofters driven here to make place for sheep and fineestates on their ancestral homes in the Highlands.

I am proud of your words of commendation. The express job is thebiggest one yet. I believe we've done a real service both to thecountry and to the express companies. The latter will probablylive if their service and their rates improve. Otherwise theGovernment will put them out of business, requiring the railroadsto give fast service for any forwarder, as in Germany.

Politically, things look Wilson to me. Taft won't be in sight atthe finish. It will be a run between Wilson and T. R. I can't namefive states that Taft is really likely to carry. My friends inMassachusetts say Wilson will win there, and so in Maine. Well, Isuppose you and I are in the same sad situation—eager to breakinto the fight but bound not to do it. Do you know I believe thatT. R. has discovered, and just discovered, that it is our destinyto be a Democracy. Hence the enthusiasm which Wall Street callswhiskey. … Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K, LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, September 17, 1912

MY DEAR GEORGE,—I am mighty glad to get your Labor Day letter,but sorry that its note is not more cheerful and gay. I can quiteunderstand your position though. We are all obsessed with thedesire to be of some use and unwilling to take things as they are.I do not know a pair of more rankly absurd idealists than you andmyself, and along with idealism goes discontent. We do not see thething that satisfies us, and we can not abide resting with thething that does not satisfy us. We are of the prods in the world,the bit of acid that is thrown upon it to test it, the spur whichmakes the lazy thing move on.

This summer I saw a great deal of a man … [who was] perfectlycomplacent. … And I noticed that he took no acids of any kind—never a pickle, nor vinegar, nor salad—but would heap half aroll of butter on a single sheet of bread and eat sardines whole.And I just came to the conclusion that there was something in afellow's stomach that accounted for his temperament. If I ever getthe time I am going to try and work out the theory. The contentedpeople are those who generate their own acid and have an appetitefor fats, while the discontented people are those whose craving isfor acids. A lack of a sense of humor and a love for concretefacts, as opposed to dreams, goes along with the firsttemperament. You just turn this thing over and see if there is notsomething in it. I am long past the stage of trying to correctmyself; I am just trying to understand a lot of things—why theyare. …

F. K L.

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Washington, July 3, 1912

MY DEAR JOHN,—Of course you may keep the Napoleon book. It isintended for you. Your criticism of T. R.'s literary style isappreciated, and no doubt he lacks in precision of thought.

Now we shall have a chance to see what a college president can doas President of the United States. I believe Wilson will beelected. What a splendid jump in three years that man has made!They tell me he is very cold-blooded. We need a cold-bloodedfellow these days …

September 21, 1912

… You will by this time have picked up all the politics of thetime. Wilson is strong, but not stronger than he was whennominated. T. R. is gaining strength daily, that is my best guess.He has the laboring man with him most enthusiastically but notunanimously, of course. The far West—Pacific Coast—is his. Allthe railroad men and the miners …

I am not sure of Wilson. He is not "wise" to modern conditions, Ifear. Tearing up the tariff won't change many prices. Doesn't heseem to talk too much like a professor and too little like astatesman? Hearst is knifing him for all he is worth. He has fixedin the workingmen's minds that Wilson favors Chinese immigration.

Well, when am I to see you again? And how is Mrs. John? How I dowish you were here! As always,

F. K. L.

To Timothy Spellacy

Washington, September 30, 1912

MY DEAR TIM,—I have your fine, long letter of September 23, andthis is no more than just an acknowledgment. I am glad to knowthat you are taking so hearty an interest in the campaign. It isreally too bad that you did not stay longer in Baltimore and seeBryan win out all along the line.

I don't want a position in the Cabinet. I am not looking for anyfurther honors, but I want to help Wilson make a success of hisadministration, for I think he will be elected. I am afraid thathe will become surrounded by Southern reactionaries—men of hisown blood and feeling, who are not of the Northern and moreprogressive type. We have got to cut some sharp corners in doingthe things that are right. By this I don't mean that we will doanything that is wrong; but from the standpoint of the SouthernDemocrat it is illegal to have a strong central government—onethat is effective—and we have got to have such a government if weare going to hold possession of the Nation. The people want thingsdone. Wilson is a bit too conservative for me, but maybe when herealizes the necessity for strength he will be for it.

I am sorry for B—. Poor chap! His alliance with Hearst undidyears of good work … As always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Adolph C. Miller

Washington, October 18, 1912

MY DEAR ADOLPH,—I have postponed until the last minute writingyou regarding my proposed visit in California. I see now clearlythat it is impossible for me to get out there this fall. TheExpress Case … is still on my hands, and with all of my energy Ishall not be able to get rid of it until the first of the year atleast … Moreover (and this is a personal matter that I wish youwould not say anything about) … I am doing my work in a greatdeal of pain, and have been for the last three or four weeks … Icannot work as hard as I did some time ago …

I rebel at sickness as much as I do at death. The scheme ofexistence does not appeal to me, at the moment, as the mostperfect which a highly imaginative Creator could have invented. Mytranscendental philosophy seems a pretty good working article whenthings are going smoothly, but it is not quite equal to hardpractical strain, I fear.

Politically things look like Wilson, though I suppose T. R. willget California and a lot of other states. I think he will beatTaft badly. The new party has come to stay, and it will be atremendous influence for good. I don't take any stock in the talkabout T. R's personal ambition being his controlling motive. Ithink that he has found a religious purpose in life to which hecan devote himself the rest of his days, not to get himself intooffice but to keep things moving along right lines.

Remember me most kindly to your wife and President Wheeler. Asalways yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To William F. McCombs Chairman, Democratic National Committee

Washington, October 19,1912

Dear Mr. McCombs,—I cannot go to California and make speeches forGovernor Wilson without resigning from the Commission. Four yearsago two Republican members of the Commission were strongly urgedat a critical time in the campaign to get into Mr. Taft's fight soas to help with the labor vote. I insisted that they should not doit, and the matter was brought before the Commission, and we thendecided that no member of the Commission should take part inpolitics. So you see when the telegrams began to come in thisyear, urging that I go out to California and the other PacificCoast states, I was compelled to say that I was stopped by myposition of four years ago.

I have never wanted to get into a campaign as much as I have thisone. Governor Wilson represents all that I have been fighting for,for the last twenty years in my State; but I think that it wouldbe almost fatal to the independence and high repute of thisCommission for its members to take part in a national campaign. Wehave so much power that we can exercise upon the railroads andupon railroad men that any announcement made by a member of thisCommission could properly be construed as a threat or a suggestionthat should be heeded by the wise. I know that this view of thematter will appeal to you as entirely sensible when you reflectupon it, and to my impatient friends in California, to whom it hasbeen very hard to say no.

I am glad to see that you are holding the fight up so hard at thetail end of the campaign. That is when Democratic campaigns haveso often been lost. Governor Wilson is maintaining himselfsplendidly, and our one danger has been over-confidence. Sincerelyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

About the political situation he wrote to one of his former
Assistants in the City and County Attorney's office in San
Francisco

To Hugo K. Asher

Washington, October 22,1912

MY DEAR HUGO,—I have your long letter which you promised in yourtelegram. Now, old man, I want to have a perfectly open talk withyou. I understand your attitude of affectionate ambition for me,and I am mighty proud of it, that after the years we wereassociated together, the ups and downs we had, you feel the wayyou do.

Wilson is going to be elected unless some miracle happens, and Iwould tremendously like to get out to California and speak to thepeople once more. You do not know just how the old lust for battlehas come over me. Following your telegram came a letter fromMcCombs, the Chairman of the National Committee, saying that hehad received a lot of telegrams urging him to have me go and thatGovernor Wilson would like me to. But I wrote him precisely as Ihave you. If the members of this Commission once get intopolitics, the institution is gone to hell, for we can make orunmake any candidate we wish. This is the most powerful body inthe United States, and we must act with a full sense of theresponsibility that is on us …

As for being a member of Wilson's Cabinet, I don't want to be. Inthe first place I can't afford it. There is no Cabinet man herewho lives on his salary, and as you know, I have got nothing else.I save nothing now out of the salary that I get, and if the socialobligations of a Cabinet position were placed upon me I would haveto run in debt …

Furthermore, I am doing just as big work and as satisfactory workas any member of the Cabinet. The work that a Cabinet officerchiefly does is to sign his name to letters or papers that otherpeople write. There is very little constructive work done in anyCabinet office. While the glamour of intimate association with thePresident—the honor that comes from such a position—appeals tome, for I still have all my old-time vanity and love of dignityand appreciation; yet the position that I occupy is one of so muchpower, and I am conscious so thoroughly of its usefulness, that Ido not want to change it. I should be more or less close to thePresident anyway, I presume. His friends are my friends, and Ishall have an opportunity to help make his administration asuccess by advising with him, if he desires my advice.

Now, old man, I have talked to you very frankly, and I know thatyou will understand just what I mean. If I were out of office Iwould have been in Wilson's campaign a year ago. If I wanted aCabinet position now I would resign from the Commission and go outto help him. I think probably if I felt that California's vote wasnecessary to Wilson's success and that I could help to get it, Iwould take the latter course, although it is not clear that thatwould be my duty, in view of conditions in the Commission.

With warmest regards, believe me, as always, faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Francis G. Newlands Reno, Nevada

Washington, October 28, 1912

MY DEAR SENATOR,—I am delighted at the receipt of your longletter, for I have been very anxious to know how you felt aboutyour own State. Of course it has been a foregone conclusion forsome time that Wilson would carry the United States, but I wasdesirous that you should carry Nevada for your own sake …

In my judgment the Interstate Trades Commission needs all of yourconcentrated energy for the next year. The bill should be yourbill, and you should be the leading authority upon the matter.

Wilson should look to you for advice along this line of dealingwith the trust problem. He will, if you have the greater body ofinformation upon the subject. Of course Roosevelt did not knowwhere he was going as to his Trades Commission, and he would nothave had any opportunity were he elected to go any farther, …because that Commission has got to feel its way along. Wilson, youcan see from his speeches, has swallowed Brandeis' theory withoutknowing much about the problem, but he certainly has handledhimself well during the campaign … What he does will verylargely depend, I think, upon those who surround him. He must haveaccess to sources of information outside of the formaladministrative officers who make up his Cabinet. This is a verydelicate way of saying that he must have a sort of "kitchencabinet" made up of men like you and myself who will be willing totalk frankly to him, and whom he will listen to with confidenceand respect. If he can get the Southerners into line with theNorthern Democrats he can make over the Democratic Party and giveit a long lease of life. If he cannot do this, and his partysplits, Roosevelt's party will come into possession of the countryin four years, and hold it for a long time …

I am glad to see that you have been able to take so personal anddirect an interest in the campaign. Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Following the news of the Democratic victory, in the election of
Woodrow Wilson to the Presidency, Lane sent these letters:—

To Woodrow Wilson Trenton, N. J.

Washington, November 6, 1912

MY DEAR GOVERNOR,—The door of opportunity has opened to theProgressive Democracy. I know that you will enter courageously.The struggle of the next four years will be to persuade our timidbrethren to follow your leadership, "gentlemen unafraid." I ampersuaded from my experience here that no President can be asuccess unless he takes the position of a real party leader—thepremier in Parliament as well as a chief executive. Thetheoretical idea of the President's aloofness from Congress—of aPresident dealing with the National Legislature as if he were anindependent government dealing with another—is wrong, because ithas been demonstrated to be ineffective and ruinous. We needdefiniteness of program and cooperation between both ends ofPennsylvania Avenue. There is generally one end of the Avenue thatdoes not know its own mind, and sometimes it is one, and sometimesthe other.

Your friends have been made happy through the campaign by themanner in which you have conducted yourself. You spoiled so manybad prophecies.

With heartiest of personal congratulations, believe me, faithfullyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To William Jennings Bryan Washington, November 6, 1912

MY DEAR MR. BRYAN,—The unprecedented heroism of your fight atBaltimore has borne fruit, and every man who has fought with youfor the last sixteen years rejoices that this victory is yours.Now comes the time when it is to be proved whether we are worthyof confidence. We shall see whether Democrats will follow a wise,aggressive, modern leadership. Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To James D. Phelan Washington, November 6, 1912

DEAR PHELAN,—Hurrah! Hurrah! and again Hurrah! You have donenobly. The victory in California came late, but it was none theless surprising and gratifying. We can dance like Miriam, as wesee the enemies of Israel go down in the flood.

I shall expect to see you here before long. With warmestcongratulations to you personally. As always, sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Herbert Harley

Washington, November 18, 1912

MY DEAR MR. HARLEY,—… There are many hopeful signs, as you say,not the least of which is that the Supreme Court has at last beenmoved to amend its equity rules. The whole agitation for judicialrecall will do good because it will not lead to judicial recallbut to the securing of a superior order of men on the bench and tosimplified procedure. I find that it is better to decide matterspromptly and sometimes wrongly than to have long delays. Thepeople have very little confidence in our courts, and this isbecause of one reason: Our judges are not self-owned; either theyare dominated by a political machine or by associations of an evenworse character. Few men on the bench are corrupt; many of themare lazy, and others are chosen from the class who feel withproperty interests exclusively. I am heartily in sympathy with amovement such as that you are promoting. It is in my opinion avery practical way—perhaps the only practical way—of heading offuniversal judicial recall. This is a Democracy and the people aregoing to have men and methods adopted that will give them the kindof judicial procedure that they want. They are not going to beunfair unless driven to be radical by intolerable conditions. …

Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Immediately after Woodrow Wilson's election in November, telegramsand letters from different parts of the country, and especiallyfrom his many friends in California, began to reach Lane askingthat he should consider himself available for a Cabinet position,offering support and requesting his permission for them to make astrong effort in his behalf. This he emphatically refused, sayingthat he was not a candidate, but in spite of his refusals,editorials began to appear in many Western papers.

To Charles K. McClatchy Sacramento Bee

Washington, November 25, 1912

MY DEAR CHARLES,—I received your note and this morning have acopy of the paper containing the cartoon on "Unfinished Business,"the original of which, by the way, I should like to have for mylibrary. …

I know absolutely nothing about the suggestion made by the Call asto my being appointed to the Cabinet. I rather think that it wasErnest Simpson's friendly act, though I have not heard from him atall. Three men have been to me from the Coast who wanted to be inthe Cabinet, and I have told each one the same thing:—That I wasnot a candidate; that no one would speak to the President for mewith my consent; but that I would not say that I would not acceptan appointment, because I would do almost anything to makeWilson's administration a success, for I believe that he has facedthe right way and the only difficulty that he will have will be insecuring strong enough support to carry out his own policies. Ithink he lacks somewhat in adroitness and that his campaign wasmuch less radical than he would voluntarily have made it. I do notknow him and shall not go near him unless he sends for me. If hedoes send for me I shall tell him the truth regarding anybody ofwhom he speaks to me. I shall advocate nobody. I am not going tobe a job peddler or solicitor. My present position makes all thedemand upon my imagination, initiative, and capacity that myabilities justify. I could not work any harder or do any betterwork for the people in any position that the Government has togive. I am not at all enamored of the honor of a Cabinet place.

Now, I am talking to you in the utmost frankness as if you weresitting just across the table from me. Of course what I am sayingto you is absolutely private and personal. …

We will just let this matter rest "on the knees of the gods," andI shall try to serve with as little personal ambition moving me asis possible with a man who has some temperament.

Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Ernest S. Simpson San Francisco, Cal.

Washington, November 26, 1912

MY DEAR SIMPSON,—How it ever entered into your head to give me sosplendid a boom for a position in Wilson's Cabinet I do not know.Someone suggested that the tip came from Ira Bennett at this end,and I see that the Sacramento Bee suggests that the railroads wishto remove me from my present sphere of troublesomeness; but my ownguess is that your own good heart and our long-time friendship wasthe sole cause of this most kindly act.

Some of the California papers, I notice, have had editorialssaying I should stay where I am (which is not a disagreeable fateto be condemned to, barring a slight surplus of work), but ofcourse Wilson is not going to appoint anyone to his Cabinetbecause of pull. He has a more difficult job than any Presidenthas ever had since Lincoln, because he has to reconcile aprogressive Northern Democracy with a conservative SouthernDemocracy, and satisfy one with policies and another with offices.My guess is that he will have to turn over the whole question ofpatronage practically to his Cabinet and that he will become theactual leader of his party and attempt to formulate thelegislative policies of the party. He has a distinct ideal of whatthe Presidency may be made. Whether he can make good underconditions so apparently irreconcilable is a question that timeonly can answer. His political family he will choose for himself.They ought to be the very largest men that our country canproduce, and I am not fool enough to think that I am entitled tobe in such a group.

With the warmest thanks, my dear Simpson, for your kindness,believe me, as always, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Fairfax Harrison

Washington, November 26, 191L

MY DEAR MR. HARRISON,—That is an exceedingly interesting andphilosophical presentation of your reason for adherence to theProgressive Party. I understand your point of view and Isympathize with it thoroughly. I had the hope that ColonelRoosevelt would carry several of the Southern states. TheDemocratic party of the North is distinct from the Democraticparty of the South, at least I fear that it is. The next fouryears will demonstrate the possibility of these two elementsliving together in effective cooperation. If Governor Wilson is amere doctrinaire the present victory will be of no value to theDemocratic party, but may be of great value to the country, forthe horizontal cleavage in the two parties will become manifest,unmistakable, and open, and out of the breaking up will come a re-alignment upon real lines of tendency. If President Wilsonattempts to do anything which satisfies the reasonable demand ofthe progressive North he will run counter to the traditionalpolicy of the South; that is to say, effective regulation of childlabor, of interstate corporations—railroad and industrial—floodwaters, irrigation projects. [These,] and a multitude of othermatters make necessary the wiping out of state lines to the extentthat a national policy shall be supreme over a state policy. Asour good Spanish friend said some centuries ago, "Where two menride of a horse one must needs ride behind."

This fact is stronger than any written word, and facts are thethings which statesmen deal with. If the South is large enough tosee this—if it has grown to have national vision—the hope of theNorthern Democrat can be realized. Otherwise the traditionalistsof both North and South will make a party by themselves, and therest of the country will follow in your lead into THE new party orA new party.

With warm regards, believe me, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To James P. Brown

Washington, November 27, 1912

MY DEAR JIM,—I see your point of view and am glad you have takenthe position that you have, because you can demonstrate whetherthere is anything excepting a sawed-off shot-gun that will compelsome editors to tell the truth. …

I shall not read your pamphlet because I have too much otherreading that I am compelled to do. My own guess, being totallyignorant on the subject, is that you have violated the ShermanLaw, but everybody knows that the Sherman Law should be amendedand the conditions stated upon which there may be combination. Doget out of your head, however, the idea that a railroadcorporation and an industrial corporation are subject to the samephilosophy, as to competition. One is necessarily a monopoly andtherefore must be regulated; the other is not necessarily amonopoly, and the least regulation that it can be subjected to thebetter. We have let things go free for so long that we havecreated a big problem that sane men must deal with sensibly; notadmitting all there is to be right, but recognizing every naturaland legitimate economic tendency. With warm regards, believe me,as always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ADOLPH C. MILLER

Washington, December 4, 1912

MY DEAR ADOLPH,—Hon. J. J. London, Minister from the Netherlandsto the United States, left last night for San Francisco and willbe there about the ninth of the month. I have told him somewhat ofyou and I want you to call on him. He is one of the most charmingmen in Washington, really a poet in nature. He loves the beautifuland good things of the world and is totally unspoiled by successand position. …

It is very good to know that you and President Wheeler have a sortof mutual agreement on me for a Cabinet position, but I don'tthink of it for myself. … I find that I do not have the ambitionthat I once had, excepting to do the work in hand just as well aspossible, and I am altogether impatient with the way I do it. Ishould like to see you Secretary of the Treasury. There is to besome change made in our currency laws during the next four years,and a man of perfectly sane, level mind is tremendously needed toguide Wilson in this matter, for I guess he is very ignorant uponthe subject. Especially is this true if Bryan goes into theCabinet. E. M. House, who is Sid Mezes' brother-in-law, is asclose to Wilson as any other man, and I will drop him a note,telling him something about you, for I know that he is interestedin selecting Cabinet officers as he has been talking to me aboutpossible Attorney Generals. I have told him that I wanted nothing.…

Mezes is the same adroit diplomat that he has always been, sincereceiving the Presidency at Texas. He is doing big things for hisUniversity and says that in two or three years he will be in aposition to retire, and will retire and spend the most of his timein Europe; but unless my guess is wrong, his ambition has at lastbeen fired and he will look for other worlds to conquer if heachieves what he is after in Texas. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO EDWARD M. HOUSE

Washington, December 13, 1912

MY DEAR MR. HOUSE,—Another suggestion as to the AttorneyGeneralship. … Have you ever heard of John H. Wigmore who is nowDean of the Law Department of the Northwestern University? He isone of the most remarkable men in our country. … He has writtenthe greatest law book produced in this country in half a century,WIGMORE ON EVIDENCE, besides several minor works. There is nolawyer at the American bar who is not familiar with his name andhis work. …

… Wigmore is a Progressive democrat with a capital P. and asmall d; can give reason for his faith based on his philosophy ofgovernment. He has national vision and has rare good common sense.The man who can write a good law book is rarely one who would makea good lobbyist, although Judah P. Benjamin was this sort ofgenius. So with Wigmore. He is practical, wise, in the sense thatthis word is used by the boys on the street; knows men and knowshow to deal with them; never lets theory get the better ofjudgment; commands as much respect for his strength as for hisreasonableness; has the enthusiasm of a boy for all good things;and has infinite capacity for hard work; can say "No" withoutdeveloping personal bitterness; and is above all a gentleman inface, manner, and nature. All this I have said with enthusiasm,but every word of it is true. I have known him for thirty years.…

He would not thank me for writing this letter, I know. The onlyway he could be had to serve would be by persuading him that he isabsolutely needed. …

You have brought this long letter upon your own head by thegracious nature of your invitation to me to advise with you. Verytruly yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA

Washington, December 23, 1912

DEAR DR. WHEELER,—What you say regarding the President-to-be isextremely interesting. That he is headstrong, arbitrary, andpositive, his friends admit. These are real virtues in this day ofslackness and sloppiness. I have just returned from New York whereI have talked with McAdoo and House who are extremely close tohim, and advising him regarding his Cabinet, and they tell me heis a most satisfactory man to deal with. He listens quitepatiently and makes up his mind, and then "stays put." His Cabinetwill be his advisers but no one will control him.

I heard him make that speech at the Southern Society dinner, whichwas really much larger than the audience could understand. It wasa presentation of the theory that the thought of the nationdetermined its destiny and that we could only have prosperity ifour ideal was one of honor. His warning to Wall Street, that anartificial panic should not be created, was done in a mostimpressive way. …

I was asked to give the names of men from California who wouldmake good Cabinet material, and I named Phelan and Adolph Miller.The currency question will be the big problem in the next two orthree years, and I should like Wilson to have the benefit of assane a mind as Miller's; but I fancy that even if everything elsewas all right there might be some difficulty in getting a collegeprofessor to appoint another college professor.

I hope we shall see you here soon. With holiday greetings to Mrs.
Wheeler and the Boy, believe me, as always, faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO SIDNEY E. MEZES PRESIDENT, UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS

Washington, December 23, 1912

MY DEAR SID,—I have your letter enclosing a telegram from Miller.I received a note from him acknowledging the telegram. He wasevidently extremely delighted at being remembered. The sturdy,strong old Dutchman has a whole lot of sentiment in him; and hemakes few friends, has drawn pretty much to himself, I think, andfalls back upon those whom he has known in earlier days. I sent anote to Mr. House regarding him. He would be a splendid man tohave here in some capacity connected with the Government, now thatwe are to deal with currency matters. I told Mr. House that hecould find out all about Miller from you.

I saw House a couple of times in New York. He certainly is anadroit and masterful diplomat. The fact is I do not know that Ihave seen a man who is altogether so capable of handling adelicate situation. By some look of the eye or appreciative smileat the right moment he gives you to understand his sympathy withand full comprehension of what you are saying to him. They tell mein New York that he is really the man closest to Wilson, and hetells me that Wilson is a delightful man to deal with because hehas got a mind that is firm as a rock. …

I send my Christmas greetings to you both. We have a sick littlegirl on our hands, but she is coming along all right now. Asalways yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John H. Wigmore

Washington, January 8,1913

MY DEAR JOHN,—… You may not know it, but I suggested your name
to Mr. House, an intimate of President-elect Wilson, for Attorney
General. … He told me that he gave the letter to Governor
Wilson. …

Like so many of the Southerners, I fear that Wilson's idea is thathe can declare a general policy and be indifferent as to the menwho carry it out. There is a certain lack of effectiveness runningthrough the South which makes for sloppiness and a lack ofprecision. I have found that generalizations do not get anywhere.The strength of any proposition lies in its application. Therailroads and the trusts and the packers, and all the others whoare violating the statutes, are indifferent as to how big the lawis and upon what sound principles it is based, provided they havea lot of speechmakers to enforce the law. They don't care what thelaw is; their only concern is as to its enforcement. I am going togive the Democratic Party four years of honest trial, and then ifit has not more precision, definiteness, and clearness of aim, amgoing to call myself a Progressive, or a Republican, or somethingelse.

Wilson is strong, capable of keeping his own counsel, and capableof making up his own mind. In these three respects he differsmaterially from our present President whose last flop on thearbitration of the Panama Canal proposition is characteristic. …

Now, old man, let me say to you that you must take the very bestof care of yourself, for we need you more than anybody else inthis country, right at this time. As always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John H. Wigmore Washington, January 20, 1913

MY DEAR JOHN,—I have received both of your letters, and I am veryglad that you made that mistake regarding my address for itbrought me two letters instead of one. I received your ContinentalLegal History months ago and thought that I had acknowledged itwith all kinds of appreciation, but perhaps I only thought thethings. … I turned the book over to Minister Loudon of theNetherlands who knew the Dutch professor who had written one ofthe articles, and the rascal has not returned the book, but Ishall get it from him one of these days. … Washington is nowgreatly stirred because Wilson has frowned upon the InauguralBall—a very proper frown, to my way of thinking—but inasmuch asall of the merchants who advance money for the inauguralceremonies recoup themselves from the receipts from the InauguralBall, there is much weeping and wailing and gnashing of teeth, andWilson will enter Washington, in my judgment, a very unpopularpresident, locally. The fact is, I think, he is apt to prove oneof the most tremendously disliked men in Washington that ever hasbeen here.

He has a great disrespect for individuals, and so far as I candiscover a very large respect for the mass. His code is a littlenew to us; and I feel justified in proceeding upon the theory thatevery man should help him, and that it is within his (Wilson's)proper function to throw Mr. Everyman down whenever public goodrequires it, and that his silence never estops him frominterfering at any time. Perhaps you cannot make out just whatthis means. I am dictating, sitting in my room at home with a verybad cold, and perhaps I do not know precisely what I mean myself;but I am trying to say that under all circ*mstances Wilson regardshimself as a free man, and that he is bound by no ties whatever todo anything or to follow any course; that he recognizes no suchthing as consistency, or logic, or gratitude, as in the slightestembarrassing him. …

I do hope that the President will get some capable effectiveadministration officers who will take the burden of patronage offhis shoulders and give him a chance to think on the moneyquestion, which is his big problem. I like his Chicago speech, Ilike his New York speech, but I do not find many people whounderstand him, because he is really a sort of philosopher. Heteaches the psychology of new thought, the influence and effect ofthought upon government.

I have written an article for the World's Work which is to appearin March, entitled What I Am Trying To Do, but it is really sortof an answer to one or two articles that they have had upon therailroad side of the question of regulation—a demonstration ofthe chaotic condition of things that existed prior to theestablishment of the Commission; and that the effect of regulationhas been to increase railroad earnings and put things upon astable and more satisfactory basis. … I find that I have a copyof the proofs in the office and I am going to send it to you andask you to criticise it. …

With my love to your good wife, believe me, as always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Joseph N. Teal

Washington, January 20, 1913

MY DEAR JOE,—… You know we practically have the power now tomake a physical appraisem*nt. … We should not ourselves attemptto arrive at cost. That is a very hard thing for the railroads tofurnish. They have taken good care to destroy most of the booksand papers that would show cost.

Politically, I hear of no news. Wilson is able to keep his owncounsel more perfectly than anybody I have ever known, and nobodycomes back from Trenton knowing anything more than when he went.… The money question is going to be the big one, and it looks tome as though certain gentlemen were preparing to intimidate himwith a panic, which they won't do because he will appeal to thecountry. He has got splendid nerve, and while Washington won'tlike him a little, little bit, the country, I think, will put himdown as a very great President. As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Edward M. House

Washington, January 22, 1913

DEAR MR. HOUSE,—You ask me what is the precise politicalsituation on the Pacific Coast as to various candidates for theCabinet.

As I have told you, I am to be eliminated from consideration.California has but one candidate, one who was in Governor Wilson'sprimary campaign and who made the fight for him in that state, inthe person of James D. Phelan whom you have met. … Recognitiongiven to Phelan will be given to the foremost man in theprogressive fight in California. … He is a brilliant speaker anda man of excellent business judgment. … He has fine socialquality and sufficient money to maintain such a position in properdignity. Not to recognize him in some first-class manner would bea triumph for his enemies—and his enemies are the crooks of thestate.

Joseph N. Teal who is spoken of from Oregon as a possibleSecretary of the Interior, is a good lawyer and a most public-spirited man who has been identified with every sane movement forprogress in that state. He is a man of means and is deeplyinterested in questions of conservation and the improvement of ourwaterways. …

… As a matter of party politics I do not think that any PacificCoast state can be made Democratic by the appointment of a memberof the Cabinet from it; as a matter of national politics, it seemsto be necessary that that part of the country should have a voicein the council of the President.

Now, I want to say a word or two on a more important matter. Yourealize, I presume (and Governor Wilson evidently does) that thereis talk of a probable panic in the air. He dealt with this mattermasterfully in his New York speech. Worse things than panic canbefall a nation. We must preserve our self-respect as a self-governing people. But what is the cause of this loose talk?Apprehension. The business interests of the country do not knowwhat they are to expect. As a party we are too much given togeneralization; we have too little precision of thought. You willnotice how the New York papers of yesterday speak of GovernorWilson's bill regarding the regulation of trusts. This issomething definite, and does not frighten because it is known. Theproblems we have to deal with—the tariff, currency, and trusts—should all be dealt with in this same manner. The Administrationshould have a definite program on each one of these questions; andI mean by that, bills framed in conference between the leaderswhich should be presented as party measures at the very firstpossible moment. I have information that the banks are alreadysaying that they will stop loans until these questions are dealtwith. This is the way by which panic can be produced. The countryis too prosperous to allow a widespread industrial panic if themeasures favored by the Government commend themselves to thepeople as sane and necessary. Why can't we, as the boys on thestreet say, "beat them to it"? If Congress is called by the middleof March, and the tariff is quickly put out of the way, and acurrency bill promptly follows, we can restore the mind of thecountry to its normal state by midsummer. You know that thisproblem of government is largely one of psychology. The doctormust speak with definiteness and certainty to quiet the patient'snerves, and the doctor is the party as represented in thePresident and Congress.

With warm regards to Mrs. House, believe me, as always, cordiallyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Mitchell Innes

Washington, February 26, 1913

MY DEAR MR. INNES,—I received your pamphlet and have read itthrough with the deepest interest. These young men [Footnote: Agroup of young men organized for social and political betterment,who sought advice.] are deserving of the strongest encouragement.I have no criticism whatever to make of their prospectus—for thatword, I presume, without slight, can be properly used.

My conviction is that we can find no solution for the problems ofsocial, political, economic, or spiritual unrest. "The man's theman" philosophy has taken hold of the world. We have lost alltraditional moorings. We have no religion. We have no philosophy.Our age is greater than any other that the world has seen. We havebeen lifted clear off our feet and taken up into a high placewhere we have been shown the universe. The result has been atremendous and exaggerated growth of the ego, and we have regardedourselves as masters of everything, and subject to nothing.Agnosticism led to sensualism, and sensualism had its foundationin hopelessness. We are materialists because we have no faith.This thing, however, is being changed. We are coming to recognizespiritual forces, and I put my hope for the future, not in areduction in the high cost of living, nor in any scheme ofgovernment, but in a recognition by the people that after allthere is a God in the world. Mind you, I have no religion, Iattend no church, and I deal all day long with hard questions ofeconomics, so that I am nothing of a preacher; but I know thatthere never will come anything like peace or serenity by a mereredistribution of wealth, although that redistribution isnecessary and must come.

If I were these young men and wished to concentrate upon someeconomic question, I should put my time in on the cost ofdistribution. … That is the economic problem of the nextcentury—how to get the goods from the farm to the people with thelowest possible expenditure of effort; how to get the manufacturedproduct from the factory to the house with the least possibleexpense. I have an idea that we have too many stores, too manymiddlemen, too much waste motion. So that I have only two thoughtsto suggest: The first is that the ultimate problem is tosubstitute some adequate philosophy or religion for that which wehave lost; and the second is to concentrate on the simple economicproblem. Have we the cheapest system of distribution possible? …Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR 1913-1915

Appointment as Secretary of the Interior—Reorganization of the
Department—Home Club—Bills on Public Lands

His appointment, as Secretary of the Interior, came to Lane in aletter from President-elect Wilson, stating that he was being"drafted" by the President for public service in his Cabinet. Theletter was written about the middle of February, 1913. The urgentmanner of the appointment was caused by Lane's frankly-expressedreluctance to leave his work on the Interstate CommerceCommission, where opportunity for yet fuller accomplishment hadbeen assured by his recent appointment as Chairman of theCommission. Seven years of application to the intricate problemsof adjustment between the conflicting claims of the public, theshippers, and the railroads, did not solve all the issues involvedin new and profoundly interesting cases coming up foradjudication. In addition to this natural desire to expand andperfect the technique of administration of his Commission, Lanedreaded the great increase in social and financial demandsinvolved in a Cabinet position. In addition to these reasons, thechange in service would mean work with men that he knew onlyslightly, if at all, and under a President whom he had never met.Perhaps the consideration that weighed more heavily than any ofthese, in his feeling of reluctance, was that the portfolio of theDepartment of the Interior, with its congeries of ill-assortedbureaus was in itself unattractive to a man with Lane's love oflogical order. His liking for strong team-work and for thebuilding of morale among a force of mutually helpful workersseemed to have no possible promise of gratification among bureauchiefs as unrelated as those of the General Land Office, theIndian Office, the Bureau of Pensions, Patent Office, Bureau ofEducation, Geological Survey, Reclamation Service, and Bureau ofMines.

It was, therefore, with something of the spirit of a drafted manthat Lane set his face toward his new work. Members of hisimmediate family recall days of depression after the appointmentfirst came, but the cordial response of the press of the countryto his appointment, the flooding in of many hundreds of lettersand telegrams of congratulation, and President Wilson's owncordiality—lifted Lane's mood to its normal hopefulness.

In relating the history of the appointment itself, Arthur W. Page,of the World's Work, writes, after talking with E. M. House of thematter, "House recommended Lane, as perhaps the one man available,adapted to any Cabinet position from Secretary of State down. Atone time Lane was slated for the War Department, at another timeanother department and finally placed as Secretary of the Interiorbecause being a good conservationist, as a Western man he couldpromote conservation with more tact and less criticism than anEastern man."

Confronted by a complex and definite task, Lane's mind quickenedto the attack. The situation of the Indian seized his sympathy. Inhis first official report he wrote, "That the Indian is confusedin mind as to his status and very much at sea as to our ultimatepurpose toward him is not surprising. For a hundred years he hasbeen spun round like a blindfolded child in a game of blindman'sbuff. Treated as an enemy at first, overcome, driven from hislands, negotiated with most formally as an independent nation,given by treaty a distinct boundary which was never to be changedwhile water runs and grass grows,' he later found himself pushedbeyond that boundary line, negotiated with again, and then setdown upon a reservation, half captive, half protege."

With this at heart Lane wrote a letter of vigorous appeal to John
H. Wigmore to become his First Assistant.

To John H. Wigmore

Washington, March 9,1913

MY DEAR JOHN,—I want you as my First Assistant. It is absolutelyessential that I should have you!! I am aiming to gather around methe largest men whom I can secure and to form a cabinet of equals.Four years of this life here would bring a great deal ofsatisfaction to you. You would meet the distinguished men of theworld. It is the center of all the great law movements of theworld,—for peace, international arbitration, reform in procedure,and such matters. Beside that, we have two or three of thegreatest problems to meet and solve that have ever been presentedto the American people. First in the public mind is the landproblem. How can we develop our lands and yet save the interest ofthe Nation in them? Second, and I think perhaps this should befirst, is the Indian problem. Here we have thousands of Indians,as large a population as composes some of the States, owninghundreds of millions of dollars worth of property which is rapidlyrising in value. I am their guardian. I must see that they areprotected. They have schools over which we have absolute control—the question of teachers that they are to have, the question ofthe kind of education that they are to be given, the question ofindustry that they are to pursue. Their morals, I understand, arein a frightful state, largely owing to our negligence and the lackof enforcement of our laws. We can save a great people; and theFirst Assistant has this matter as his special care. I do not knowof any place in the United States which calls for as much wisdomand for as great a soul as this particular job. I will give youmen under you over whom you will have entire control and who willbe to your liking. I will give you men to sit beside you at thetable who will be of your own class. You can do more good in fouryears in this place than you can possibly do in forty where youare now. There are a lot of men who can teach law, and lots of menwho can write the philosophy of the law, but there are few men whocan put the spirit of righteousness into the business, social, andeducational affairs of an entire race. Think of that work! Besidethat you have the constructive work in framing and helping toframe a line of policy as to the disposition of our nationallands—the opening of Alaska.

Now, John, I have looked over the entire United States and you arethe only man that I want. The salary is five thousand a year. Youcan live on that here without embarrassment. The President will bedelighted to have you, and you will find him treating you with thesame consideration and giving you the same dignity that he doesall the members of his Cabinet; all the Supreme Court. I havenever seen a man more considerate, more reasonable. Dr. Houston,who has become Secretary of Agriculture, left WashingtonUniversity in St. Louis, under an arrangement by which he canreturn at the end of his term. You, doubtless, could make asimilar arrangement, and if you wish to, you will have plenty ofopportunity to give one or two courses of lectures in theUniversity during the year,

I have thought seriously of going out to see you, but with Cabinetconditions as they are it is impossible, for we are passing uponimportant questions now that prevent that. I am very selfish inurging you to this, but I am also giving you an opportunity to dowork that will be more congenial than any you have ever done, andto be with a more congenial lot of people. If there is any doubtin your mind let me know, but don't say "No" to me. The countryneeds you. You have done a great work. There is nothing higher tobe done in your line. Now come here and help in a greatconstructive policy. Sincerely and affectionately,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Walter H. Page Worlds Work

Washington, March 12, 1918

MY DEAR PAGE,—I have just now seen your letter of March 2nd, elseit would have had earlier recognition.

The President is the most charming man imaginable to work with.Most of us in politics have been used to being lied about, butthere has been a particularly active set of liars engaged ingiving the country the impression that W. W. was what we call outWest a "cold nose." He is the most sympathetic, cordial andconsiderate presiding officer that can be imagined. And he sees soclearly. He has no fog in his brain.

As you perhaps know, I didn't want to go into the Cabinet, but Iam delighted that I was given the opportunity and accepted it,because of the personal relationship; and I think all the Cabinetfeel the way that I do. If we can't make this thing a success, theDemocratic Party is absolutely gone, and entirely useless.

I hope next time you are down here I shall see you. Cordiallyyours, FRANKLIN K LANE

To Edwin Alderman President, University of Virginia

Washington, March 17,1913

MY DEAR DR. ALDERMAN,—Your letter of the 14th gives meexceptional satisfaction, … because it brings with it extremelygood news. You say you will win in your fight [Footnote: After along serious illness Dr. Alderman was regaining health.] and thatrejoices me even more than it does to be told of the realsatisfaction that you get out of my appointment.

It was a surprise to me. It came at the last minute. I had tointroduce myself to the President-elect the day before theinauguration. I find him consideration itself in Cabinet meetingsand he never seems to be groping. In my mental processes I findmyself constantly like a man climbing a mountain, pushing throughbelts of fog, but his way seems clear and definite.

You certainly would feel at home around the Cabinet table, and allof us would rejoice to see you there. … I shall take your notehome to Mrs. Lane and show it to her with much pride. …Sincerely yours, FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Theodore Roosevelt

Washington, March 24, 1913

MY DEAR COLONEL,—I have received a great many hundred letters,but I think I can honestly say that no other one has given me thepleasure that yours has. I am struggling hard to get the reins ofthis six-horse team in my hands and every day I feel more acutelythe weight of the responsibility that I bear. The last few weekshave been put in being interviewed by Senators and Congressmen,who wish to name men for the few positions in the office. It hasbeen rather enjoyable, and they have been fair and by no meansperemptory. The hardest place I have to fill is that ofCommissioner of Indian Affairs. How absurd to try to get a man tohandle the interests of an entire race, owning a thousand milliondollars' worth of property, and have to offer a salary of $5,000 ayear!

I hope that you will feel free to give me the benefit of anyadvice as to the conduct of my department that may happen to cometo you out of your great experience. As always, faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO LAWRENCE F. ABBOTT OUTLOOK

Washington, April 9, 1913

MY DEAR LAWRENCE,—The Japanese are reducing the value ofCalifornia lands by buying a piece in a picked valley, paying anyprice that is demanded. They swarm then over this particular pieceof property until they reduce the value of all the adjacent land.No one wishes to be near them; with the result that they buy orlease the adjoining land, and so they radiate from this centeruntil now they have possession of some of the best valleys. Reallythe influx of the Japanese is quite as dangerous as that of theChinese. The proposed legislation in California is not to excludeJapanese alone, but to make it impossible for any alien to ownland, at least until he declares his intention to become acitizen. Inasmuch, of course, as Orientals can not becomecitizens, this disbars them from owning land.

There is, of course, as in all things Californian, a good deal ofhysteria over this matter, and I think your Progressive friendsare trying to put the Democrats in a bit of a hole by making itappear that the Democrats are being influenced by the FederalGovernment to take a more conservative course than theProgressives desire.

My information is that some restrictive legislation will be passedby the legislature, no matter what Japan's attitude may be, butJapan's face will be saved and every need met if the legislationis general in terms. …

April 20, 1913

… I do not like the sudden turn that Johnson seems to have takenin the last day or two but I still have faith that those peopleout there will do the sensible thing and allow us to save Japan'sface while very properly excluding the Japanese from owning landin California; and I have no objection whatever to excluding allthe Englishmen and Scotchmen who flock in there without anyintention of becoming citizens. As always, yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO WILLIAM M. BOLE GREAT FALLS TRIBUNE

Washington, May 26, 1913

MY DEAR MR. BOLE,—That is just the kind of a letter that I wantand that is helpful to me. As to the settler, I have one policy—to make it as easy as possible under the law for the bonafidesettler to get a home, and to make it just as difficult aspossible for the dummy entryman to get land, which he will sellout to monopolies. These Western lands are needed for homes forthe people, not as a basis of speculation.

As to the Reclamation Service … There really was a very badshowing made by the Montana projects. It was disheartening to feelthat we had spent so many million dollars and that the Governmentwas looked upon as a bunko sharp who had brought people intoMontana where they were slowly starving to death. The Governmenthas returned to Montana almost as much as her public lands haveyielded, whereas in other states, like Oregon and California, lessthan a quarter of the amount they have yielded has been returnedto them.

Ever since I came here Senators and Congressmen have beenoverwhelming me with curses upon the Reclamation Service, and Ithought I ought to find out for myself just what the facts were. Igave every one a chance to tell his story. Now I am beingoverwhelmed with protests against the discontinuance of this work.Every state is insisting that I shall now start up some newenterprises or continue some old ones, and I do not know where themoney is going to come from. We are bound to be short of fundseven to continue existing work, if we can get no money out ofprojects that are really under way, and there seems to be aunanimity of opinion among Western Senators and Congressmen thatpayment by the settlers must be postponed, because they are havinga hard enough time as it now is. I certainly am not going to be aparty to gold-bricking the poor devil of a farmer who has beentold by everybody that he is being charged twice as much as heought to be charged by the Government … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K LANE

To Fairfax Harrison

Washington, June 10, 1913

MY DEAR MR. HARRISON,—I have not had a minute for a personalletter in a month. Hence my shabbiness toward you. Condorcet's Viede Turgot, I am sorry to say, I have not read. Does he sayanything as to how to make a reclamation project pay, or as towhat is the best method of teaching Indians, or how much work ahomesteader should do on his land before being entitled to patent?These are the great and momentous questions that fill my mind.

I had thought perhaps that as a member of the Cabinet I would havean opportunity, say once a month or so, to think upon questions ofstatecraft and policy, but I find myself locked in a cocoon—nowings and no chance for wings to grow.

As to my inability to get to you of a Sunday, let me tell you thatthat is the one day when somewhat undisturbed I catch up with theweek's work. "Ah, what a weary travel is our act, here, there andback again to win some prize."

I hope some of these nights to be able to make you acquainted withsome of my colleagues. They are a charming lot. Every one has asense of humor and as little partisanship as possible, and stillbear the title of Democrat. You would enjoy every one of them,including Bryan, who is fundamentally good.

With kindest regards, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Frank Reese

Washington, July 2, 1913

MY DEAR FRANK,—I am delighted to get your letter and to know thatI still stand well with my California friends, especiallyyourself, but I am not going to run for United States Senator. Ofcourse, I am not making a virtue of not running, and I certainlyam gratified to know that you at least think that I could beelected. My work here is just as interesting as any work that aSenator has. Under this primary system I do not believe there isany chance for a man who has not got a great deal of money. Thecandidate must devote practically a year of his time to make therace, must be able to support his family and himself in themeantime. … Now, when I knew you first I had no money. I havethe same amount to-day, so that you see there is no possibility ofmy getting into such a fight. Furthermore, we have Phelan as acandidate, and it seems to me he ought to be acceptable. There wasalso some talk of Patton getting into the race, and he is a goodman.

Thankfully and cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Early in July, 1913, Lane started on a tour of investigation ofNational Reclamation projects, Indian reservations and NationalParks. With him went Adolph C. Miller, who had become the Directorof the Bureau of National Parks in May. They turned to theNorthwest, beginning in Minnesota and then proceeding to Montana,Wyoming, and Washington. That he might be thoroughly informed asto conditions in each place, Lane sent ahead of him an old friendand trusted employee, William A. Ryan, whose part it was to goover each project or reservation and find what the causes forcomplaint were, where poor work had been done, what groups andindividuals were dissatisfied, and why. In no way was William Ryanto let it be suspected that he was in any way identified with theDepartment of the Interior. Traveling in this way, two weeks aheadof the Secretary, Ryan was able to put a complete report of eachproject in Lane's hands some time before he arrived, so that theSecretary was thoroughly familiar with all complaints andconditions before he was met on the train by the representativesof the Department, who naturally wished to show him only the bestwork. In addition to this, Lane everywhere held public meetings,inviting all settlers to meet him and make their complaints.

This plan enabled him to cover the ground touched by hisDepartment in a comparatively short time. He traveled by night,wherever possible, and interviewed all those who wished to see himupon business from seven in the morning until twelve or one atnight. Sometimes, in a day, he went a hundred and fifty miles inan automobile, spoke to many groups of farmers in differentplaces, heard their complaints against the Department, and toldthem what the Government was trying to do for them.

During this first tour of inspection Lane reached Portland,Oregon, the latter part of August, and received a telegram fromthe President asking him to go directly to Denver, there torepresent the President and address the Conference of Governors,on August 26th.

Lane left the completion of the proposed itinerary ofinvestigation, in Oregon, to Miller and turned back to Colorado.He made the opening address at the Governors' Conference and thenrejoined his party in San Francisco, the first of September. Here,after several days of conferences and speeches, while standing inthe sun reviewing the Admission Day parade of the Native Sons, hecollapsed. This proved to be an attack of the angina pectoriswhich, several years later, returned with violence. For threeweeks he was ill, but at the end of that time, against thedoctor's orders, he insisted upon returning to Washington to hiswork.

To Mark Sullivan Collier's Weekly

Washington, November 6, 1913

MY DEAR SULLIVAN,—I want to thank you for your sympathetic noticeregarding my hard luck out in California, and to let you know thatI am in just as good shape now as I have been for twenty years.

[Illustration with caption: FRANKLIN K. LANE, MRS. LANE, MRS.
MILLER, AND ADOLPH C. MILLER]

At the end of your little comment you spoke of conditions in thelower grades of the Department as being almost as bad as if theywere corrupt. I have not your article before me, but I think thisis the meat of it. I wish you would tell me just what you mean bythis. I know that lots of things come to men like you that do notreach my ears, although I have retained pretty well my oldnewspaper faculty of smoking things out.

If we have anything here that is almost rotten, I want to know itbefore it gets thoroughly rotten. I have found a lot of thingsthat were wrong, and have set most of them right. There hasalready been a great improvement; for instance, in Indianaffairs. Under the last Administration, for example, the highestbid on 200,000 acres of Indian oil lands was one-eighth royaltyand a bonus of one dollar an acre. We recently leased 10,000 ofthese same acres at one-sixth royalty and a bonus of $500,000.

I have had an examination made into probate matters, in Oklahoma,and found an appalling condition of things. In one county wherethere are six thousand probate cases pending, all involving theinterests of Indian minors, the guardians in three thousand caseswere delinquent in filing reports, and otherwise in complying withthe law. This week I have arranged with the Five Civilized Tribesto institute a cooperative method of checking up all of theseaccounts and giving them personal consideration; especiallyappointing an attorney to look after the interests of these minorsin each of the counties in eastern Oklahoma. We are to aid theOklahoma courts in cleaning up the State.

Let me have any facts that will be of help. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Edward M. House

Washington, November 19, 1913

MY DEAR COLONEL,—I had a call last Sunday morning from Mr. Blankof New York, who came to feel me out on the reorganization of theDemocratic party in New York City, with particular reference tothe question of how to treat one William R. Hearst …

… [He] has been working for some years, evidently in more orless close but indirect alliance with Hearst, through ClarenceShearn and a man named O'Reilly, who is Hearst's politicalsecretary. In re-creating the Democratic organization in New York,he felt it necessary to take Hearst's assistance.

I was perfectly frank with him, saying that Hearst would bepleased no doubt to reorganize a new Tammany Hall, or any otherDemocratic organization, provided he could run it. He would standin with anybody and be as gentle as a queen dove for the purposeof destroying the existing organization, but that he was a veryoverbearing and arbitrary man, with whom no one could work increating a new organization, unless he regarded himself as anemployee of Hearst. Moreover, I did not see how it was possible totake Hearst and his crowd, even on a minority basis, so long asthey were fighting the Administration, and that I understoodHearst had recently more emphatically than ever read himself outof the Democratic Party. I told Blank that … I should not expectany cooperation between the Federal Government and an organizationin which Hearst was a factor. However, I said that I knew nothingwhatever as to the feeling of any member of the Cabinet or thePresident respecting the matter, because I had not discussed thematter with them.

… I am writing this because I want you to know what is going on.Evidently Blank came over from New York on the midnight train andhad no other business here except to see me, and perhaps others,on this matter. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

When President Wilson took Franklin K. Lane from the InterstateCommerce Commission to put him in his Cabinet there arose thequestion of his successor, on the Commission. After consultingLane, the President appointed in his place, John Marble, also ofCalifornia. A few months after his appointment Mr. Marble diedsuddenly, and Lane lost one of his closest friends.

To James H. Barry San Francisco Star

Washington, December 1, 1913

MY DEAR JIM,—I didn't get your telegram until Monday, but I hadtaken care of you in the same way that I took care of myself, inregard to flowers. I bought three bunches, one for you, one forMrs. Lane, and one for myself.

The most surprising thing, my dear Jim, is the manner in whichMrs. Marble has taken John's death. We took her to our house,where the morning after his death she told me that she had talkedwith him; that he had chided her on breaking down constantly.Since then, both morning and evening, she says she has seen himand talked with him. The result is a spirit on her part almost ofgayety, at times. She is really reconciled to his going, becausehe has told her that it was best and that he has other work to do.

I don't know what to say of all this. It mystifies me. It hastended greatly to support me against the depth of sorrow which Ifelt at the beginning. There is no evidence of hysteria on herpart, whatever. She dictated to Mrs. Lane, who was sitting besideher, some of the things that John said to her. It certainly is aglorious belief, at such a time, and I am not prepared to say thatit is not so, and that its manifestations are not real.

… It is an impossible thing to get a man to take his place,either on the Commission or in our hearts. I believe that heworked himself to death … Affectionately yours,

F. K. L.

To Edward F. Adams

Washington, January 10, 1914

MY DEAR MR. ADAMS,— … Our most difficult problem is that ofwater. Colorado, for instance, claims that all of the water thatfalls within her borders can be used and should be usedexclusively for the development of Colorado lands. SouthernCalifornia has made a protest against my giving rights of way inthe upper reaches of the Colorado for the diversion of water on toColorado lands saying that Imperial Valley is entitled to the fullnormal flow of the Colorado. The group of men who hold land inMexico south of the Imperial Valley make the same claim. Arizonawishes to have a large part of this water used on her soil, andthe people of Colorado are divided as to whether the water shouldbe carried over on to the eastern side of the Rockies or allowedto flow down in its natural channel on the western side.

We have a similar trouble as to the Rio Grande, which rises inColorado, where the Coloradans claim all the water can be used andcan be put to the highest beneficial use. New Mexico, Texas, andOld Mexico all claim their right to the water for all kinds ofpurposes. If we recognize Colorado's full claim there is probablyenough water in Colorado to irrigate all of her soil, but portionsof Wyoming, Nebraska, Arkansas, Texas, New Mexico, Arizona, andUtah would remain desert.

If you can tell me how to solve this problem so as to recognizethe right that you claim Colorado has, and to maintain the rightsthat the Federal Government and the adjoining States have, I shallcertainly be deeply grateful.

With all good wishes for the New Year, believe me as always,affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The Hon. Woodrow Wilson The White House

Washington, March 11, 1914

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—I have your note of yesterday referring tome the correspondence between yourself and the Civil ServiceCommission on the question of the participation of women CivilService employees in woman suffrage organizations. I think perhapsI am a prejudiced partisan in this matter for I believe that thewomen should have the right to agitate for the suffrage.Furthermore, I think they are going to get the suffrage, and thatit would be politically unwise for the administration to createthe impression that it was attempting to block the movement. Ishould think it the part of wisdom for you personally to make theannouncement that women Civil Service employees will be protectedin the right to join woman suffrage organizations and toparticipate in woman suffrage parades or meetings. This ispractically what the Civil Service Commission says, but in a morecareful, lawyer-like manner, whereas whatever is said should besaid in a rather robust, forthright style. The real thing that weare after in making regulations as to political activity is tokeep those who are in the employ of the Government from usingtheir positions to further their personal ends or to serve somepolitical party. What they may do as individuals outside of theGovernment offices is none of our business, so long as they donothing toward breaking it down as a merit service, do notdiscredit the service, or render themselves unfit for it …

The spoils system is a combination of gratitude and blackmail. Themerit system is an attempt to secure efficiency withoutrecognizing friendship or fear. We can safely allow theparticipation of merit system employees in an agitation so long asthey do not go to the point where official advantage may be hadthrough the agitation by securing a reward through party success…

I believe you might well make a statement of two or three hundredwords in which you could state your decision with the philosophythat underlies it, in such a manner as to make the womenunderstand that you are taking a liberal attitude and yetprotecting the full spirit of the Civil Service idea. Cordiallyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

In March 1914, for the second time, Lane was invited to theUniversity of California to receive a degree. This was an honorfrom his Alma Mater that he greatly desired. The previous year,the reorganization of his Department and the pressure of new work,had made it impossible for him to leave Washington. But this yearhe had promised to go.

To Benjamin Ide Wheeler President, University of California

Washington, 13 [March, 1914] [The day I was to be with you.]

MY DEAR DOCTOR,—I was prepared to leave last Friday—tickets,reservations all secured. I had made a mighty effort. Myconservation bills were not all out of Committee but I hadarranged to get them out. The House was to caucus and the Senateto confer, and I had written pleading letters and made my prayersin person that my bills should be included in the program. OnThursday, the War Department refused the use of an engineer forthe Alaskan railroad. In one day I drafted and secured the passageof a joint resolution giving me the man I wanted. The war scarehad subsided and I had seen the Mediators who said that nothingwould be doing for two weeks. So I went to the Cabinet meetingprepared to say goodbye. Then came a bomb—two European powersserved notice that they would hold us responsible for what waslikely to happen in Mexico City upon the incoming of Zapata andVilla, and wanted to know how prepared we were. We left theCabinet divided as to what should be done. A group of us met inthe afternoon and decided to ask for another meeting. I carriedthe message. The reply was that the matter must be held over tillthe next meeting, and meanwhile we were asked to suggest aprogram. Then I sent my message to you. I have told this to no onebut Anne. You deserve no less than the fullest statement from me.Please treat it as the most sacred of secrets. Always gratefullyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The following letter, written about a year after Lane's entry intothe Cabinet, shows what, in the course of a year, he had been ableto accomplish in building the men of his heterogeneous departmentinto a cooperative social unit by means of what he called his"Land Cabinet" and the Home Club.

To Albert Shaw Review of Reviews

Washington, April 8,1914

MY DEAR MR. SHAW,—Of course I saw the Review for April beforeyour copies arrived, for somebody was good enough to tell me thatthere was a good word in it for me, and no matter how busy I am Ialways manage to read a boost …

You ask what I am doing to bring about team-work in theDepartment. Many things. As you probably don't know, this has beena rather disjointed Department. It was intended originally that itshould be called the Home Department, and its Secretary theSecretary for Home Affairs. How we come to have some of thebureaus I don't know. Patents and Pensions, for instance, wouldnot seem to have a very intimate connection with Indians andIrrigation. Education and Public Lands, the hot springs ofArkansas, and the asylum for the insane for the District ofColumbia do not appear to have any natural affiliation. The resulthas been that the bureaus have stood up as independent entities,and I have sought to bring them together, centering in thisoffice.

One of the first things I did was to form what is called a LandCabinet, made up of the Assistant Secretaries, the Commissioner ofthe Land Office, and the Director of the Geological Survey. Wemeet every Monday afternoon and go over our problems together. TheReclamation Commission is another organization of a similar sort,and we have constant conferences between the heads of bureauswhich have to do with different branches of Indian work, lands,irrigation, and pensions.

Some time ago in order to develop greater good feeling between theheads of the bureaus we organized a noonday mess, at which all thechiefs of bureaus and most of their assistants take their luncheon…

But the largest work, I think, in the way of promoting the rightkind of spirit within the Department was the organization of theHome Club. This is a purely social institution, which the membersthemselves maintain. We have now some seventeen hundred members,all pay the same initiation fee and the same dues, and all meetupon a common ground in the club. Our club house is one of thefinest old mansions in this city, formerly the residence ofSchuyler Colfax … It is a four-story building in LaFayetteSquare, within a half a block of the White House. This house wehave furnished ourselves in very comfortable shape without thehelp of a dollar from the outside, and we maintain it upon dues offifty cents a month. Each night during the week we have some formof entertainment in the club—moving pictures, or a lecture, or adance, or a musicale.

I organized this club for the purpose of showing to these peopleof moderate salaries what could be done by cooperation. It ismanaged entirely by the members of the Department. There is nocaste line or snobbery in the institution, and for the first timethe people in the different bureaus are becoming acquainted witheach other, and enjoy the opportunities of club life. The ideashould be extended. We should have in the city of Washington agreat service club, covering a block of land, containing fifteenor twenty thousand members, in which for a trifle per month wecould get all of the advantages of the finest social and athleticclub that New York contains. In the Home Club we have a billiardroom, card rooms, a library, and a suite of rooms especially setaside for the ladies. We are fitting up one of the larger rooms asa gymnasium for the young men and boys, and expect to have bowlingalleys, and possible tennis courts on a near-by lot. In this way Imeet many of those who work with me, whom I never would seeotherwise, and from the amount of work that the Department isdoing, which is increasing, I am quite satisfied that it hashelped to make the Department more efficient. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Charles K. Field Sunset Magazine

Washington, April 18, 1914

MY BEAR CHARLES,— … My picture on the cover of the May Sunsetis altogether the best one I have had taken for some time, and theDemocratic donkey is encouragingly fat.

I wish in some way it were possible to impress upon our WesternSenators and Congressmen the advisability of putting through thebills that I have before Congress in line with my report—ageneral leasing bill, under which coal, oil, and phosphate landscould be developed by lease, and a water power bill. As it is now,a man runs the risk of going to jail to get a piece of coal landthat is big enough to work; and the very bad situation in the oilfield in California is entirely due to the inapplicability of ouroil land laws. We have a couple of million acres of good phosphatelands withdrawn, totally undeveloped because no one can get holdof them, and no capital will go into our Western power sitesbecause we can give at present only a revocable permit, whereascapital wants the certainty of a fixed term.

I have tried to draft laws, copies of which I inclose, that arethe best possible under the circ*mstances. I mean by that, thatthey are reasonable and will be passed by Congress if the West canonly show a little interest in them, but so far the men who havebeen fighting them are Westerners. Why? For no better reason thanthat these gentlemen are in favor of having all of the publiclands turned over to the states. It is useless to argue thisquestion as to whether it is right or wrong, because Congresswould never do it, so that opposition to these bills is simplyopposition to further development of the West.

Now if you can punch these people up a bit in some way and makethem understand that the West should want to go ahead, rather thanblock development for all time, … you will be rendering a publicservice.

With these few remarks I submit the matter to your prayerfulconsideration. As always, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Frederic J. Lane

Washington, April 27, 1914

MY DEAR FRITZ,—I have just received your letter in relation toStuart. I sent you a letter on Saturday saying that Daniels wasgoing to recommend him. Of course, if he can't pass the physicalexamination that is the end of it, but I would let him try …

Ned is a great deal like Stuart—smart and lazy, but you know thatall boys can't be expected to come up to the ideal conduct oftheir fathers at sixteen and eighteen. They go through life a damnsight more human. I don't see any reason why a fellow should workif he can get along without it, and the trouble is that your boyis spoiled by you, and my boy is spoiled by his mother! You haveraised Stuart on the theory that he was a millionaire's son and,as such, he can't take life very seriously.

I am figuring now on getting Ned off to some boarding-school wherehe will have more discipline than I can give him. The truth isthat both of us, having had rather a prosaic Christian bringingup, have cultivated the idea in our youngsters that it is a goodthing to be a sport, and the aforesaid youngsters are living up toit. If there was a school in the country where they taught boysthe different kinds of trees, and the different rocks and flowers,birds, and fish, with some good sense, and American history, Iwould like to send Ned to it … Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Edward E. Leake

Treasury Department

San Francisco, California

Washington, May 26, 1914.

MY DEAR ED,—I have yours of the 21st. I know that you aresincere, old man, when you tempt me with the governorship, and youwrite in such a winning manner that my blood quickens, but reallyit is quite out of the question. I want to see California lined upstrongly on the Democratic side. I also want to see Phelan come tothe Senate and I am ready to do all that I can to help out the oldState, but my work is cut out for me here and until I have putover some of the things that I believe will benefit the West as awhole, I do not believe I should relinquish the reins of thisparticular portfolio. It is an honor to me, a big one, to beconsidered by my friends for the governorship and I know that theywould stand gallantly behind me, and when I send this negativeanswer, you must believe me when I say that I send it withconsiderable regret.

I shall be very glad to see you at this end, when you are here,and you need no excuse to camp on my doorstep.

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To William R. Wheeler

Washington, June 6, 1914

MY DEAR BILL,—I am extremely sorry to hear of your being robbed.That comes from being wealthy. Poor Lady Alice Isabel! Howoutraged and disconsolate she must be! If that diamond tiara Igave her is gone tell her I will replace it the first time I visitTiffany's. Of course this only holds good as to the one I gaveher. … You know, I have often wondered if a burglar should getinto our house what he would find worth taking away. I have somesmall burglary insurance on my house, but this was so I could turnover and sleep without coming down stairs with a shotgun. Whatwere you doing, going to Sacramento, anyway? Any fellow who goesto Sacramento gets into trouble. That is the home of Diggs,Caminetti, and Hiram Johnson. I see that Johnson is going to bere-elected Governor, and that the other two are going to jail. Ihope that all three will lead better lives in the future.

Well, old man, if you need a new suit of clothes or anything inthe line of underwear, let me know. I have gotten to the pointwhere I have been wearing what Ned does not take, and I will passsome of them along to you. …

There is nothing new here. I fear that I shall not get up toAlaska, as I promised myself, for Congress will be in session forsome time, and I am striving desperately to get my conservationbills through. Moreover, just what phase the Mexican situationwill take cannot be foreseen, from day to day. I was broken-hearted at not being able to get out to California, but just atthat particular time—while I was about to go, tickets andeverything purchased—the President called upon me to do somethingwhich held me back. The toll bills will probably pass next week,by a majority of nine. Then the trust bills will come up in theSenate and every man will have to make a speech. …

Cordially yours,

F. K. L.

The next letter has been included because it shows Lane's directand unequivocal method when defending a subordinate whom hethought unfairly criticized. He quoted, and in office practised,Roosevelt's maxim of giving a man his fullest support as long ashe thought him worthy to be entrusted with public business. Thenames are omitted here for obvious reasons.

To—

Washington, June 10, 1914

MY DEAR BILLY,—I have your letter of June 9th, relating to summerresidence homesteads, and referring sneeringly several times toBlank. I wonder if you realize that Blank is my appointee and myfriend. [He] has done you no wrong, and he intends to do thepublic no wrong. He is as public-spirited as you are, but youdiffer with him as to certain phases of our land policy, thoughnot so widely as you yourself think. Is that any reason why youshould discredit him? Is it not possible for men to differ withyou on questions of public policy without being crooks? Your talkhas started Chicago talking; nothing definite, just whispers. Isthis fair to Blank? Is it fair to me? … Is the test of a man'spublic usefulness decided by his views as to whether the desertlands should be leased or homesteaded?

I am saying this to you in the utmost friendliness, because Ithink that your attitude is not worthy of your own ideal ofyourself, and it certainly does not comport with my ideal of you,which I very much wish to hold. Surely honest men may differ as towhether grazing lands should be leased, and if Blank is not honestthen it is your duty to the public service and to me to show thisfact.

At the bottom of your letter you say, "This report will introduceyou to Mr. Blank." Now it just so happens that that line shouldread "This report will introduce you to Mr. Lane," for I amresponsible for that report. It was not written until after he hadconsulted with me, and I dictated an outline of its terms. … Asalways, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To his Brother on his Birthday

Washington, [August, 1914]

… This is somewhere around your birthday time, isn't it? Well,if it is, you are about forty-nine years of age and I look uponyou as the one real philosopher that I know. I'd trade all that Ihave by way of honors and office for the nobility and serenity ofyour character. You feel that you have not done enough for theworld. So do we all. But you have done far more than most of us,for you have proved your own soul. You have made a soul. You havetaught some of us what a real man may be in this devilish world ofselfishness. What other man of your acquaintance has the affectionof men who know him for the nobility of his nature? I don't knowone. You know many who are lovable, like—sympathetic like myself,brilliant, sweet-tempered,—lots of them. But who are the nobleones? Who look at all things asking only, "What is worthy?" Anddoing that thing only. You tell the world that you will notconform to all its littlenesses. That, I haven't at all thecourage to do. You tell the world that you are not willing to feedyour vanity with your everlasting soul. Where are the rest of us,judged by that test?

Ah, my dear boy, you have inspired many a fellow you don't knowanything about, with a desire to emulate you, and always toemulate something that is genuine and big in you—not a trick ofspeech or a small quality of mind or manner. I envy you—and so domany. Nancy could tell you why you are worth while. She knows thegenuine from the spurious. She knows the metal that rings truewhen tests come.

So there, … put all this inside of your smooth noddle and take adrink to me—a drink of "cald, cald water."

And I just want you to understand that I am in no self-deprecatory mood right now, for I am in my office at eight o'clockof a Saturday evening, working away with all my might on somedamned land cases, having had a dinner at my desk, consisting oftwo shredded-wheat biscuits with milk, and one pear. Now you canrealize what a virtuous, self-appreciative mood I am in. No mandenies himself dinner for the sake of work without being reallyvain.

And what is this I hear about your having neuritis and going tothe hospital? Damn these nerves, I say! Damn them! I have toswelter here because I can't let an electric fan play on my face,nor near me, without getting neuralgia. And swelter is the word,for it has been 104-5 degrees, with humidity, to boot, this week.

Nerves—that means a wireless system, keen to perceive, to feel,to know the things hidden to the mass. I look forward to years oftorture with the accursed things. The only thing that relieves,and of course it does not cure, is osteopathy, stimulating thenerve where it enters the spine. But never let them touch the soreplace. That is fatal. It raises all the devils and they beginscraping on the strings at once.

Well, by the time this reaches you I hope you will be quite a bitfitter. Avoid strain. Don't lift. Don't carry. If you stretch theinfernal wires they curl up and squeal.

May the God of Things as they Are be good to you. … Mother mayknow all about us. How I wish I could know that it was so. Youhave the philosophy that says—"Well, if it is best, she does." Iwish I had it. My God, how I do cling to what scraps of faith Ihave and put them together to make a cap for my poor head. Withall the love I have.

Frank

To Cordenio Severance

Washington, September 24,1914

My dear Cordy,—I have just received your note. Why don't you comedown here and spend three or four days resting up? Nancy and Annewill be delighted to cart you around in the victoria and show youall the beautiful trees and a sunset or two, and we will give yousome home cooking and put you on your feet, and then you will havean opportunity to beg forgiveness for not having gone up to Essex.I am mighty sorry that you have been ill. If we had had thefaintest notion that you were, we would have stayed in New York tosee you, but as it was we came down on the Albany boat and we wentdirectly from the boat to the train. I think that we would havestopped over two or three hours and seen you anyway if it had notbeen for the presence of our dog, who was regarded by the women asthe most important member of the family.

Did you ever travel with a dog? We came down through Lake George,and the Secretary of the Interior sat on a beer box in the prow ofthe steamship, surrounded by automobiles and kerosine oil cans andcooks and roustabouts, because they would not let a dog go on thesalon deck. Only my sense of humor saved me from beating my wifeand child, and throwing the dog overboard. On the train somemember of the family had to stay with the dog and hold his pawwhile he was in the baggage car. The trouble with you and me isthat we are not ugly enough to receive such attention. If we hadundershot jaws and projecting teeth and no nose, we probably wouldbe regarded with greater tenderness and attention.

Ned is at Phillips-Exeter and is the most homesick kid you everheard of. He writes two letters a day and has sent for his Bible,and tells us he is going to church. If that is no evidence, then Iam no judge of a psychological state.

Come on down. Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Hon. Woodrow Wilson

The White House

Washington, October 1, 1914

DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—Mother Jones called on me yesterday and I hada very interesting and enjoyable chat with her. During our talksome reference was made to the sterling qualities of yourSecretary of Labor, for whom she entertains the highest regard.She told me this little story about him:—

One evening sometime ago, when there was a strike of some workmenin Secretary Wilson's town, she was in the Secretary's homewaiting to see him. The Secretary was engaged in another room withrepresentatives of those opposed to the strikers, and sheoverheard their talk. One of the men said, "Mr. Wilson, you have amortgage on this house, I believe."

The reply was in the affirmative.

"Then," said the speaker, "if you will see that this strike iscalled away from our neighborhood—we don't ask you to terminateit, but merely to see that the strikers leave our town—if youwill do this, we will take pleasure in presenting you with a largepurse and also in wiping off the mortgage on your home."

Mr. Wilson arose, his voice trembling and his arm lifted, andsaid, "You gentlemen are in my house. If you come as friends andas gentlemen, all of the hospitalities that this home has to offerare yours. But if you come here to bribe me to break faith with mypeople, who trust me and whom I represent, there is the door, andI wish you to leave immediately."

Mother Jones concluded by saying, "Mr. Wilson never tells thisstory, but I heard it with my own ears, and I know what a real manhe is."

I wish that you could have heard the story yourself. I am tellingit to you now, for I know how pleased you will be to hear of it,even in this indirect way. Faithfully yours, FRANKLIN K. LANE

On November 30, 1914 Colonel Roosevelt wrote to Lane saying,—

"That's a mighty fine poem on Uncle Sam's Thanksgiving! I wish youwould give me a chance to see you sometime.

"I do not know Mr. Garrison and perhaps he would resent my sayingthat I think he has managed his Department excellently; but if youthink he would not resent it, pray tell him so. I hear nothing butgood of you—but if I did hear anything else I should not pay anyheed to it. …"

To Theodore Roosevelt

Washington, December 3, 1914

MY DEAR COLONEL,—I have just received your note of November 30th,and I am very much gratified at your reference to my Thanksgivinglines. You may be interested in knowing that the Home Club, beforewhich I read these lines, is an institution that I organized sincebecoming Secretary, for the officers and employees of myDepartment. …

You may rest assured that I shall convey your message to Mr.Garrison, and I know that he will be just as pleased to receive itas I am in being able to carry it.

… The work of the Department keeps me pretty closely to my desk,so that I have few opportunities of getting away from Washington.I certainly shall not let a chance of seeing you go by withouttaking advantage of it.

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Hon. Woodrow Wilson

The White House

Washington, January 9, 1915

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—That was a bully speech, a corker! You mayhave made a better speech in your life but I never have heard ofit. Other Presidents may have made better speeches, but I havenever heard of them. It was simply great because it was the properblend of philosophy and practicality. It had punch in everyparagraph. The country will respond to it splendidly. It wasjubilant, did not contain a single minor note of apology and thecountry will visualize you at the head of the column. You knowthis country, and every country, wants a man to lead it of whom itis proud, not because of his talent but because of hispersonality,—that which is as indefinable as charm in a woman,and I want to see your personality known to the American people,just as well as we know it who sit around the Cabinet table. Yourspeech glows with it, and that is why it gives me such joy that Ican't help writing you as enthusiastically as I do. Sincerelyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Lawrence F. Abbott

Outlook

Washington, January 12, 1915

MY DEAR MR. ABBOTT,—I enclose you two statements made withreference to our public lands water power bill and our westerndevelopment bill. The power trust is fighting the power bill,although as amended by the Senate Committee it is especiallyliberal and fair and will bring millions of dollars into the Westfor development of water power. There seems to be no realopposition to the western development bill, generally called theleasing bill, excepting from those who believe that all of ourpublic lands should be turned over to the States.

These are non-partisan measures. They have been drafted inConsultation with Republicans and Progressives, as well asDemocrats, and I regard them as the ultimate word of generosity onthe part of the Federal Government, because all of the moneyproduced is to go into western development. If these bills arekilled, I fear that the West will never get another opportunity tohave its withdrawn lands thrown open for development upon terms assatisfactory to it.

It is easy to understand why men who already have great powerplants on public land should be opposing such a bill as our powerbill, and equally easy to understand why the coal monopolistsshould be fighting off all opportunity for any competitor to getinto the field. The oil men are anxious for such legislation. Ofcourse this legislation is not ideal, because it is the result ofcompromise between minds, as to methods. The power bill is vitallyright in one thing; that the rights granted revert at the end offifty years to the Government, if the Government wishes to takethe plant over. The development bill is right, because it setsaside a group of archaic laws under which monopoly and litigationand illegal practices have thrived. Both of these bills havepassed the House, and are before the Senate. I trust that thefixed determination of those who are hostile to them will notprevail.

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

This letter, duplicated, was sent to several editors ofmagazines, to inform the public as to pending legislation.

EUROPEAN WAR AND PERSONAL CONCERNS

1914-1915

Endorsem*nt of Hoover—German Audacity—LL.D. from Alma Mater
—England's Sea Policy—Christmas letters

TO WILLIAM JENNINGS BRYAN

Washington, November 17, 1914

MY DEAR MR. SECRETARY,—If it is true that the State Department isnot informed regarding Mr. Hoover and his entire responsibility, Ican send to you to-day his attorney, Judge Curtis H. Lindley, ofSan Francisco, who stands at the head of our bar.

I know of Mr. Hoover very well. He is probably the greatest miningengineer that the world holds to-day, and is yet a very young man.He is a graduate of Stanford University.

I suppose that you do not wish to make any statement regarding Mr.Hoover, but I should fancy that there is no objection to Mr.Fletcher making any statement that he desires. There are hundredsof thousands of people in the United States to-day who are anxiousto know how the things that they are preparing for the differentEuropean countries, especially for the Belgians, can be sent tothem. Some information along this line might be very helpful.

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

ROME, ITALY

Washington, January 22, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—I have often thought of you during these last fewmonths, and wished for a good long talk so some of the kinks in myown brain might be straightened out. It looks to me very much asif the war were a stalemate. Even if England throws anothermillion men into the field in May I can't see how she can getthrough Belgium and over the Rhine. Germany is practically self-supported, excepting for gasoline and copper, and no doubt aconsiderable amount of these are being smuggled in, one way oranother. The Christians are having a hard time reconcilingthemselves to existing conditions. … England is making a fool ofherself by antagonizing American opinion, insisting upon rights ofsearch which she never has acknowledged as to herself. If shepersists she will be successful in driving from her the opinion ofthis country, which is ninety per cent in her favor, althoughpractically all of the German-Americans are loyal to their homecountry. We have some ambition to have a shipping of our own, andEngland's claim to own the seas, as Germany puts it, does notstrike the American mind favorably. No doubt this will be regardedby you as quite an absurdity, that we should have any such dream,but I find myself from day to day feeling a twinge or two ofbitterness over England's stubbornness, which seems to be asirremovable a quality as it was in some past days. …

Your little Nancy is no longer little. She is up to my ear, hasgone out to several evening parties, is at last going to schoollike other girls, keeps up her violin, and is very much of ajoy. …

I knew that you would like our Ambassador. Cultivate him everychance you get.

Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

On February 20, 1915, Lane went to San Francisco and formallyopened the Panama Pacific Exposition, as the personalrepresentative of the President. He spoke on "That slender,dauntless, plodding, modest figure, the American pioneer, …whose long journey … beside the oxen is at an end."

TO ALEXANDER VOGELSANG

En route, near Ogden, Utah, February 22, 1915

MY DEAR ALECK.—You are the best of good fellows, and I don't seeany reason why I should not tell you so, and of my affection foryou. Don't mind the slaps and raps that you get, regarding thehigh duty you perform. The people respect you as an entirelyhonest and efficient public servant. It did my heart good to hearthe men I talked with speak so appreciatively of you. I enjoyed mytwo days with you as I have not enjoyed any two days for manyyears. The best thing in all this blooming world is the friendshipthat one fellow has for another. I would truly love to have thePresident know our Amaurot crowd, but I can't quite plan out a wayby which it could be done. … As always, affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

En route to Chicago, February 25, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—I have read your preface with great satisfaction.It will, no doubt, renew your self-confidence to know that it hasmy approval. You make some profound suggestions which would neverin the world have occurred to me. The American believes that thedoctrine of equality necessarily implies unlimited appeal. This ismy psychological explanation for the unwillingness to give ourjudges more power. Another explanation is that the American peopleare governed by sets of words, one formula being that this is agovernment by law, hence the judge must have no discretion andrules must be arbitrary and fixed.

I had a roaring good time in San Francisco. Spoke to fiftythousand people, and more, who could not hear me. Made a rottenspeech and met those I loved best, so I am not altogetherdispleased with having taken the trip after all.

Hope your arm is doing finely. Give my love to your dear wife.
Affectionately yours,

F. K. L.

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

ROME, ITALY

Washington, March 3, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—All things are so large these days that I can notcompress them within the confines of a letter. I mean, don't youknow, that there is no small talk. We are dealing with life anddeath propositions, life or death to somebody all the time.

I suppose if you were a few years younger you would be over in thetrenches, or up in England getting ready. From all we hear, theScotchmen are the only fellows that the Germans really are afraidof or entirely respect. The position of a neutral is a hard one.We are being generously damned by the Germans and the aggressiveIrish for being pro-British, and the English press people andsympathizers in this country are generously damning us as thegrossest of commercialists who are willing to sell them into theeternal slavery of Germany for the sake of selling a few bushelsof wheat. Neither side being pleased, the inference is reasonablethat we are being loyal to our central position. …

I went out recently and opened the San Francisco Fair, parading atthe head of a procession of a hundred thousand people. The Fair istruly most exquisitely beautiful. There are many buildings thatwould even, no doubt, please your most fastidious eye.

We have tried to get a Shipping Bill through which would allow usto get into South American and other trade, but the Republicanshave blocked us, not because they feared we would get mixed upwith the war but because they don't want us to do a thing thatwould further Government ownership of anything.

The Administration is weak, east of the Alleghanies; and strong,west of the Alleghanies. Bryan is a very much larger man and morecompetent than the papers credit him with being. The President isgrowing daily in the admiration of the people. He has little ofthe quality that develops affection, but this, I think, comes fromhis long life of isolation.

We regard ourselves as very lucky in the men we have in theforeign posts, notwithstanding the attacks made upon us by yourpress. …

I wish you would convey my hearty respects to His Excellency, theAmbassador, and to your wife, of whose return to health I amdelighted to hear. Cordially yours,

LANE

TO EDWARD J. WHEELER

CURRENT OPINION

Washington, March 4, 1915

DEAR MR. WHEELER,—I am extremely obliged to you for yourappreciative letter regarding my speech, [Footnote: On theAmerican Pioneer.] but don't publish it in the Poetry Departmentor you will absolutely ruin my reputation as a hard workingofficial. No man in American politics can survive the reputationof being a poet. It is as bad as having a fine tenor voice, orknowing the difference between a Murillo and a Turner. The onlyreason I am forgiven for being occasionally flowery of speech isthat I have been put down as having been one of those literaryfellows in the past. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

ROME, ITALY

Washington, March 13, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—I have received three letters from you within thelast two weeks, greatly to my joy. Your first and longest letter,but not a word too long, I thought so very good that I had itduplicated on the typewriter and sent a copy to each member of theCabinet, excepting Bryan, whom you refer to in not toocomplimentary a manner. On the same day that I received thisletter I received one from Pfeiffer, presenting the Americanmerchants' point of view, who desire to get goods from Germany, acopy of which I inclose. So I put your letter and his together,and told them all who you both are. Thus, old man, you have becomea factor in the determination of international policy. Severalmembers of the Cabinet have spoken with the warmest admiration ofyour letter, one scurrilous individual remarking that he wasastonished to learn that I had such a learned literary gent as anintimate friend.

We are just at present amused over the coming into port of theGerman converted cruiser Eitel, with the captain and the crew ofthe American bark, William P. Frye, on board. The calm gall of thething really appeals to the American sense of humor. Here is aGerman captain, who captured a becalmed sailing ship, loaded withwheat, and blows her up; sails through fifteen thousand miles ofsea, in danger every day of being sunk by an English cruiser, andthen calmly comes in to an American port for coal and repairs. Thecheek of the thing is so monumental as to fairly captivate theAmerican mind. What we shall do with him, of course, is a veryconsiderable question. He can not be treated as a pirate, Isuppose, because there can not be such a thing as a pirate shipcommanded by an officer of a foreign navy and flying a foreignflag. But he plainly pursued the policy of a pirate, and I amexpecting any day to find Germany apologizing and offering amends.But there may be some audacious logic by which Germany can justifysuch conduct. Talking of Belgium, I was referred the other day tothe report of the debates in the House of Commons found in the10th volume of Cobbett's Parliamentary Reports, touching theattack on Copenhagen by England in 1808, in which the Ministryjustified its ruthless attack upon a neutral power in almostprecisely the same language that Von Bethmann Hollweg used injustifying the attack on Belgium, and Lord Ponsonby used the sortof reasoning then, in answer to the Government, that England isnow using in answer to Germany. I was distrustful of thequotations that were given to me and looked the volume up, andfound that England was governed by much the same idea that Germanywas—just sheer necessity. Of course, your answer is that we havetraveled a long way since 1808.

Doesn't it look to you an impossible task for England and Franceto get beyond the Rhine, or even get there? England, of course,has hardly tried her hand in the game yet and if the Turk iscleaned up she will have a lot of Australians and others to helpout in Belgium. Sir George Paish told me they expect to have amillion and a half men in the field by the end of this summer.

Pfeiffer comes here to-day to spend a couple of days trying to dosomething for the State Department; I don't know just what, but Ishall be mighty glad to see the old chap. I haven't seen anythingof Lamb since his return.

Do write me again. Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

On the sixteenth of March Lane again started for San Francisco,crossing the continent for the third time within a month. Vice-President Marshall, Adolph C. Miller, now of the Federal ReserveBoard, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, assistant Secretary of the Navy,who were going out to visit officially the Exposition, were theprincipal members of the party. In Berkeley, on March twenty-third, 1915, Lane received his degree from the University ofCalifornia. In conferring this degree President Wheeler said:—

"Franklin K. Lane,—Your Alma Mater gladly writes to-day your nameupon her list of honour,—in recognition not so much of yourbrilliant and unsparing service to state and nation, as of yoursympathetic insight into the institutions of popular government asthe people intended them. An instinctive faith in the righteousintentions of the average man has endowed you with a singularpower to discern the best intent of the public will. Men followgladly in your lead, and are not deceived.

"By direction of the Regents of the University of California Iconfer upon you the degree of Doctor of Laws:—

"Creative statesman in a democracy; big-hearted American." OnDecember 7, 1915, upon receiving a copy of the diploma Lane wrotein acknowledgement to Dr. Wheeler,—"I have the diploma which ithas taken all the talent of the office to translate. I had one manfrom Columbia, another from the University of Virginia, one fromNebraska, and one at large at work on it. Thank you. It takes theplace of honor over my mantel."

TO WILLIAM P. LAWLOR

JUSTICE, SUPREME COURT OF CALIFORNIA

Washington, April 13, 1915

MY DEAR JUDGE,—I have read Eddy O'Day's poem with great delight.Along toward the end it carries a sentiment that our dear oldfriend John Boyle O'Reilly expressed in his poem Bohemia, in whichhe speaks of those,

"Who deal out a charity, scrimped and iced, In the name of acautious, statistical Christ."

I have never been able to write a line of verse myself, although Ihave tried once in a while, but long ago my incapacity was proved.Pegasus always bucks me off.

I am sorry you took so seriously what I had to say of the weddinginvitation, but you know I am one of those very sentimental chaps,who loves his friends with a great devotion, and when anythinggood comes to them I want to know of it first, and no betterfortune can come to any man than to marry a devoted, high-mindedwoman.

Your rise has been a joy to me, because neither you nor I came tothe bar nor to our positions by conventional methods. The unionspirit is very strong among lawyers, and if a man has ideasoutside of law, or wishes to humanize the law, he is regarded withsuspicion by his fellows at the bar. You have proved yourself andarrived against great odds. No man that I know has ever had such atestimonial of public confidence as you received in the lastelection. I hope that with the hard work much joy will come toyou.

Mrs. Lane has just dropped in and wishes me to send you her warmregards. Always sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO WILLIAM G. MCADOO

SECRETARY OF THE TREASURY

Washington, April 27, 1915

MY DEAR MAC,—Here is a man for us to get next to. He is aHarriman, a Morgan, a Huntington, a Hill, a Bismarck, a Kuhn Loeb,and a damn Yankee all rolled into one! Can you beat it? Hisdaughter also looks like a peach. I do not know the purpose ofthis financial congress in which these geniuses from the hot beltare to gather; but unless I am mistaken you are looking around forsome convenient retreat to go to when this Riggs litigation isover and you are turned out scalpless upon a cruel world. Here isyour chance! Tie up with Pearson. He has banks, railroads, cows,horses, mules, land, girls, alfalfa, clubs, and is connected withevery distinguished family in North and South America.

This man, Dr. Hoover, is a genius. When I knew him he was givinglessons in physical training; but, now, like myself, he is anLL.D., and, of course, as a fellow LL.D. I have got to treat hisfriend properly. So I pass him along to you. Please see that hehas the front bench and is called upon to open the congress withprayer, which, being a Yankee and a pirate, he undoubtedly can doin fine fashion.

When he comes, if you will let me know, I shall go out to meet himin my private yacht; take him for a drive in my tally-ho; give hima dinner at Childs', and take him to the movies at the Home Club.

I shall also ask Redfield to invite him to the much-heralded shadluncheon, to which I have received the fourth invitation. Do youthink he would like to meet my friend, Jess Willard?

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

A letter from John Burns, from Rome, spoke sarcastically of theAmerican attitude of neutrality toward the European war, and ofwhat he called the "new American motto—'Trust the President.'"

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

ROME, ITALY

Washington, May 29, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—I saw Pfeiffer, Lamb, and Mezes the other day up inNew York. Mezes lives among Hebrews, Lamb is broken-hearted thathe can not get into the war, and Pfeiffer is trying to get Englandto let his German goods through Holland. Lamb and Pfeiffer do notagree as to England's duty to allow non-contraband on neutralships to pass unmolested.

England is playing a rather high game, violating international lawevery day. … England's attempt to starve Germany has been afizzle. Germany will be better off this summer than she was twoyears ago, have more food on hand. There are no more men inGermany outside of the Army. Practically every one has been calledout who could carry a gun, but the women are running the mills andthe prisoners are tilling the farms. Von Hindenburg will come downupon Italy, when he has lured the Italians up into some pass andgiven them a sample of what the Russians got in East Prussia.

You see I am in quite a prophetic mood this afternoon.

Tell me if you understand Italy's position—just how she justifiesherself in entering the war? I have seen no authoritativejustification that I thought would hold water.

The Coalition ministry in England is weaker than the Liberalministry. Lord Northcliffe, who is the Hearst of England, hasbecome its boss. Inasmuch as you object to our new motto, "Trustthe President," I offer as a substitute, "Trust Lord Northcliffe,Bonar Law, and the Philosopher of Negation." The dear bishopswon't give up their toddy, so England must go without ammunition.Germany is standing off Belgium, England and France, with herright hand; Russia with her left, and is about to step on Italy.Germany has not yet answered our protest in the Lusitania matter.Neither has England answered our protest, sent some three monthsago, against the invasion of our rights upon the seas. I was veryglad to read the other day that while only eighty per cent ofEnglish-made shells explode, over ninety per cent of American-madeshells explode.

Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO E. W. SCRIPPS

SCRIPPS MCRAE SYNDICATE

Washington, June 1, 1915

MY DEAR MR. SCRIPPS,—I am extremely glad to get your letter—andsuch a hearty, noble-spirited letter. It came this morning, andwas so extraordinary in its patriotic spirit that I took it to theWhite House and left it with the President.

I am sure that great good will come of the effort you are makingto gather the people in support of the President. The poor man hasbeen so worried by the great responsibilities put upon him that hehas not had time to think or deal with matters of internalconcern. … He is extremely appreciative of the spirit you haveshown. I have a large number of matters in my own Department—Alaskan railroad affairs and proposed legislation—that I ought totake up with him; but I can not worry him with them whileinternational concerns are so pressing.

I feel that at last the country has come to a consciousness of thePresident's magnitude. They see him as we do who are in closetouch with him. … My own ability to help him is very limited,for he is one of those men made by nature to tread the wine-pressalone. The opportunity comes now and then to give a suggestion orto utter a word of warning, but on the whole I feel that heprobably is less dependent upon others than any President of ourtime. He is conscious of public sentiment—surprisingly so—for aman who sees comparatively few people, and yet he never takespublic sentiment as offering a solution for a difficulty; if hecan think the thing through and arrive at the point where publicsentiment supports him, so much the better. He will loom verylarge in the historian's mind two or three decades from now.

In the fall I am going to ask you to lend a hand in support of myconservation bills, which look like piffling affairs now incontrast with the big events of the day.

Once more I thank you heartily for your letter. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. WICKERSHAM

Washington, July 18, 1915

MY DEAR AND DISTINGUISHED SIR,—I once knew a vainglorious chapwho wrote a poem on the Crucifixion of Christ. The refrain was,—

"Had I been there with three score men, Christ Jesus had notdied."

All of us feel "that-a-way" once in a while when we think ofGermany, Mexico, and such. I shall have a few words to say uponthe German note next Tuesday. [Footnote: Day of Cabinet meeting.]They will be short and somewhat ugly Anglo-Saxon words, utterlyundiplomatic, and I hope that some of them will be used.

There is no man who has a greater capacity for indignation thanthe gentleman who has to write that note, and no man who has asincerer feeling of dignity, and no man who dislikes more to havea damned army officer, filled with struttitudinousness, spit uponthe American Flag—a damned goose-stepping army officer!

This morning comes word that they tried to torpedo the Orduna, butfailed by a hair. This does not look like a reversal of policy. Ofcourse those chaps think we are bluffing because we have been toopolite. We have talked Princetonian English to a water-frontbully. I did not believe for one moment that our friends, theGermans, were so unable to see any other standpoint than theirown.

I saw ex-secretary Nagel here the other day. We were at the sametable for lunch at the Cosmos Club. One of the men at the tablesaid, "I think Lane ought to have been appointed Secretary ofState." Nagel's usual diplomacy deserted him, and with a faceevidencing a heated mind replied, "Oh, my God, that would neverdo, never do; born in Canada." So you see I am cut out from allthese great honors. Is this visiting the sins of the fathers uponthe children?

I wish you joy in your work and I wish I could lay some of mytroubles on your shoulders. Mrs. Lane and I are going up to seeyou just as soon as we get the chance. I had to decline to addressthe American Bar Association because I did not want to be awayfrom here for a week. This is Sunday, and I am trying to catch upsome of my personal mail which has been neglected for six weeks.Thus you may know that I am in the Government Service.

I send you by this mail a copy of my speech in San Francisco,which has been gotten up to suit the artistic taste of my privatesecretary. As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO FREDERIC J. LANE

Washington, July 21, 1915

MY DEAR FRITZ,—I wish I could think of something I could do foryou dear people back there. I haven't heard from George for a longwhile, but I hope he is getting something in mind that makes himthink life worth living. It is strange that every lawyer I knowwould like to be situated just as George is, with a little farm ina quiet dell. Last night I talked with Senator Sutherland. It ishis hope sometime to reach this ideal. And the other night Italked with Justice Lamar, and told him of George's life, and hesaid that he had dreamt of such an existence for fifty years buthas never been able to see his way to its realization.

There is no chance of our getting out to the Coast this year. ThePresident expects us to be within call, and I am very muchinterested in the Mexican question, as to which I have presented aprogram to him which so far he has accepted. These are times ofterrible strain upon him. I saw him last night for a couple ofhours, and the responsibility of the situation weighs terriblyupon him. How to keep us out of war and at the same time maintainour dignity—this is a task certainly large enough for the largestof men.

Conditions politically are very unsettled, and much will turn Isuppose on what Congress does. More and more I am getting tobelieve that it would be a good thing to have universal militaryservice. To have a boy of eighteen given a couple of months fortwo or three years in the open would be a good thing for him andwould develop a very strong national sense, which we much lack.The country believes that a man must be paid for doing anythingfor his country. We even propose to pay men for the time they putin drilling, so as to protect their own liberties and property.This is absurd! We must all learn that sacrifices are necessary ifwe are to have a country. The theory of the American people,apparently, is that the country is to give, give, give, and buyeverything that it gets.

Hope things are going well with you. Drop me a line when you can.
Affectionately,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

ROME, ITALY

Washington, July 30, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—Things have come to such a tension here that Idoubt the wisdom of my discussing international politics with you;nevertheless, I want you not to be weary in well-doing, butcontinue to give me the views of the Tory Squire. I hope that youradmiration for Balfour will prove justified. Of course, our press,which can not be said to sympathize strongly with the conservativeside, makes it appear that Lloyd George is now bearing a greatpart in the work of securing ammunition. This is the inevitableresult of allowing the people to vote. The man who has thepeople's confidence proves to be the most useful in a time ofemergency. However, it may be that Balfour is himself directingall that Lloyd George does.

This morning's papers contain an official statement from Petrogradsuggesting that the English get to work upon the west line. Thisseems to me extremely unkind, inasmuch as the English have alreadylost over 300,000 and have furnished a large amount of money toRussia, I understand.

Pfeiffer sent me an article the other day from a German professor,in which he said that the three million men that Kitchener talkedabout was all a bluff. Pfeiffer keeps sending me long protestsagainst England's attitude regarding our trade, which seem to meto be fair statements of international law.

The word that I get rather leads me to believe that the war willlast for at least another year and a half, which is quite in linewith Kitchener's prophecy, but where will all these countries befrom a financial standpoint at the end of that time? I fancy someof them will have to go into bankruptcy and actually repudiatetheir debt, and what will become by that time of the high-spiritedFrench, who are holding three hundred and fifty miles of lineagainst eleven held by the British and thirty by the Belgians?

Yesterday I received a request from a German Independence Leaguefor my resignation, as I was born under the British flag and wassupposed to be influential with the President, who has recentlysent a very direct and business-like letter to Germany. My answerwas that they had mistaken my nationality. My real name was Langeand my father had stricken out the G.! Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO EUGENE A. AVERY

Washington, August 2, 1915

MY DEAR AVERY,—I am very glad to hear from you and to get yourverse. I had a glorious time at Berkeley. I could have received nohonor that would have given me greater satisfaction, but oh! as Ilook over that old list of professors and associate professors! Idon't know a tenth of them, and I never heard of half of them. Howfar I am removed from the scholastic life, and how far we both arefrom those old days when you used to sit with your pipe in yourmouth, in front of your cabin, and discourse to me upon God andmen!

Well, we don't any of us know any more about God, but we knowsomething more about man. But after all is said and done, I guessI like him about as much, as I did in the enthusiastic days whenwe used to quiz old Moses. The streak of ideality that I had thenI still retain. The reason that I have remained a Democrat isbecause I felt that we gave prime concern to the interests of men,as such, and had more faith that we could help on a revolution.

These are times of trial. The well we look into is very deep. Thestars are not very bright. It is hard to find our way, but thepilot has a good nerve. I know the trouble that Ulysses had withScylla and Charybdis.

Thank you, old man, very heartily for your word of cheer.
Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN F. DAVIS

Washington, August 2, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,—I am very glad to get your letter of July 28,telling me your views regarding the last note. I believe theparagraph to which you refer was absolutely essential to makeGermany understand that we meant business; that she could not havetaken our opposition seriously is evidenced by her previous note,and which, I think, was as insulting as any note ever addressed byone power to another. Think of the absurd proposition, that weshould be allowed a certain number of ships to be prescribed byGermany upon which our people could sail! Of course, if weaccepted her conditions, we would have to accept the conditionsthat any other belligerent, or neutral, for that matter, mightimpose. What becomes of a neutral's rights under these conditions?

The Leenalaw case shows that Germany can do exactly what we havebeen asking her to do; namely, give people a chance to get off theship before they blow her up. This is good sense and good morals;and the whole neutral world is behind us. If, in response to ournote, Germany had said, "We regret the destruction of Americanlives, and are willing to make reparation, and have directed oursubmarines that they shall not torpedo any ships until the shiphas been given an opportunity to halt," there would have been notrouble; but Germany evidently did not take us seriously. OurEnglish was a bit too diplomatic.

I am writing you thus frankly, and in confidence, of course,because I respect your opinion greatly. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

In the middle of August, Lane joined his family at Essex-on-Champlain, New York, for a few days. While there he went with Mr.and Mrs. James S. Harlan to Westport, some miles further south onthe lake, to see the summer boat races and water sports. Mr.Harlan's motor-boat, the Gladwater, which had been built on hisdock by Dick Mead, won the race, and that evening on their returnLane gave the following letter to the successful builder:—

August 21, 1915

To "Dick" Mead on winning the race at Westport in the Gladwater.

We wonder sometimes why man was made, so full is life of thingsthat terrorize, that sadden and embitter. This life is a sea;tranquil sometimes but so often fierce and cruel. And you and Iare conscript sailors. Whether we will or no we must sail the seaof life, and in a ship that each must build for himself. To eachis given iron and unhewn timber, to some more and to some less,with which to fashion his craft. Then the race really starts.

Some of us build ships that are no more than rafts, formless, lazythings that float. Fair weather things for moonlight nights. Butothers, high-hearted men of vision, will not be satisfied to driftwith the current or accept the easy way. They know that they cando better than drift, and they must! The timber and the ironbecome plastic under their touch. The dreams of the long nightthey test in the too-short day. They make and they unmake; theydrop their tools perhaps for a time and drift; they despair andcurse their impatient and unsatisfied souls. But rising, they setto work again, and one day comes the reward, the planks fittogether, and feeling the purpose of the builder, clasp each otherin firm and beautiful lines; the unwilling metal at last meltsinto form and place and becomes the harmonious heart of the whole—and so a ship is born that masters the cruel sea, that cuts thefierce waves with a knife of courage.

To dream and model, to join and file, to melt and carve, tobalance and adjust, to test and to toil—these are the making ofthe ship. And to a few like yourself comes the vision of the trueline and the glory of the victory. Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

ROME, ITALY

Washington, August 31, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,— … I met three friends of yours in New York theother day, Lamb, Fletcher, and Pfeiffer, to whom I told in mydismal way, the correspondence that we have been carrying on, andall sympathized with me very sincerely.

Things look brighter now. The President seems to have been able tomake Germany hear him at last. I am very much surprised that youthink we ought to enter the war. Now that you have secured Italyto intervene, what is the necessity? What have you to offer by wayof a bribe? I see that you are distributing territory generously.Or do you think that we should go in because we were threatened asEngland was—although she says it was Belgium that brought her in?Fletcher is very much for fighting; Lamb says that the Allies willwin in the next two weeks. Pfeiffer thinks that nobody will win. Ican't tell you what I think. If I were only nearer I would havemore fun with you. Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO SIDNEY E. MEZES

PRESIDENT OF THE COLLEGE OF THE CITY OF NEW YORK

Washington, September 7, 1915

MY DEAR SID,—I enclose a more formal letter for presentation toyour friend, Baron de—. Why in hell you should plague me withthis thing, except that I am the only real good-natured manconnected with the Government, I don't understand. Speaking ofgood nature reminds me that you are a clam; in fact, a clam isvociferous alongside of you.

As you know I have been guiding the affairs of this Government forthe past three months, and have received advice from every man,woman, and child in the country, including the German-AmericanUnion, the Independent Union, the Friends of Peace, the Sons ofHibernia, and all the other troglodytes that live; and yet, youalone have not thought me of sufficient consequence to advise meas to what to do with the Kaiser or Carranza or Hoke Smith orRoosevelt.

Before you go back to work why don't you come down here and spenda day or two? We can have a perfectly bully time, and I will tellyou how to run your University and you can tell me how to run theGovernment. …

I have not seen House nor heard from him, though I have wanted totalk with him more than with any other human being, these threemonths gone. Yours as always,

F. K. L.

TO CORDENIO SEVERANCE

Washington, September 13, 1915

MY DEAR CORDY,—I envy you very much the opportunity that you haveto entertain Miss Nancy Lane. [Footnote: Born January 4, 1903.]When she is herself, she is a most charming young lady. She haspowers of fascination excelled by few. If she grows angry, owingto her artistic temperament, and throws plates at you or chasesyou out of the house with a broom, you must forgive her becauseyou know that great artists like Sarah Bernhardt often have thisfailing.

Perhaps you do not know it, but she used to be a great violinistin her younger days. I doubt if she knows one string from anothernow. The only strings that she can play on are your heart strings,or mine, or any other man's that comes into her neighborhood. Ishall rely upon your honor not to propose to her, because she isalready engaged to me; in fact, we have been engaged nearly twelveyears, and if she should become engaged to you, I will sue you forstealing her affections and will engage the firm of Davis Kelloggand Severance to prosecute my suit. If she says anything about adesire to get back to school, you can put it down as a bluff, andI trust that you will not swamp her with attentions and withcompany lest it should turn her head. She is accustomed to thesimple life—a breakfast of oatmeal porridge, a luncheon of boiledmacaroni, and a dinner of hash—these are the three things thatshe is used to. If she shows any disposition to be affectionatetoward you or Aunt Maidie, I trust that you will repress her withan iron hand. The young women of this day, as you know, are veryforward, and these new dances seem to be especially designed todestroy maiden modesty.

… You may tell her that her brother seems to be very anxious tohear from her, being solicitous two or three times a day as to themail. I judge from this that he is expecting a letter from her—orsomeone else.

You are very good to be giving my little one such a fine time. Mylove to Maidie. Cordially yours,

F. K. L.

TO FREDERICK DIXON

CHRISTIAN SCIENCE MONITOR

Washington, October 7, 1915

DEAR MR. DIXON,—I have your letter of October 1st. You have askedme a very difficult question, which is really this:—How to getinto a man's nature an appreciation of our form of government andits benefits?

I cannot answer this question. There are certain natures which donot sympathize with the exercise of or the development of commonauthority, which is the essence of Democracy. They areinstinctively monarchists. They love order more than liberty. Theydo not see how a balance can be struck between the two. By forceof environment and education their sons may see otherwise. I knowof no other way of making Americans, than by getting into them byenvironment and education a love for liberty and a recognition ofits advantages. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ROBERT H. PATCHIN

Washington, November 27, 1915

MY DEAR PATCHIN,—Mrs. Lane and I would be delighted to join inyour fiesta to Mrs. Eleanor Egan, but we just can't. Why? Becausewe have a dinner on December 2nd, also because we are neutral. …

We can not countenance any one who has been in jail. To have beenin jail proves poverty. Nor do we regard it as fitting that ayoung woman should have been torpedoed and spent forty-fiveminutes in the water splashing around like Mrs. Lecks or Mrs.Aleshine. If she was torpedoed why didn't she go down or up like aheroine? Then she would have had an atrocious iron statue erectedin her honor among the other horrors in Central Park. After herexperience she will doubtless be more sympathetic toward those ofus who are torpedoed daily and weekly and monthly and have tosplash around for the amusem*nt of a curious public.

I hope your dinner of welcome and rejoicing will be as gay as thecherubic smile of the Right Honorable Egan. Cordially,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO FRANCIS R. WALL

Washington, November 27, 1915

MY DEAR WALL,—I wish that I had time for a long letter to you,such as yours to me. But I am only to-day able to get at mypersonal correspondence which has accumulated in the last sixweeks. These have been times of annual reports and estimates, andwe have a large number of internal troubles which need constantattention.

I am afraid that we are going to have a great deal of trouble ingetting our preparedness program through, because of dissension inour own ranks and because the Republicans are so anxious to takeadvantage of this emergency to raise the tariff duties and to gaincredit for whatever is done in the way of preparation. We are toomuch dominated by partisanship to be really patriotic. This is avery broad indictment, but it seems to be justified. Of course,the people like Bryan and Ford, and the women generally, are movedby a philosophy that is too idealistic, and some of them are onlymoved, I fear, by an intense exaggerated ego. If I would have toname the one curse of the present day, I would say it is the loveof notoriety and the assumption by almost everyone that hisjudgment is as good as that of the ablest. Of course, the troublewith the ablest people is that they are so largely moved by forcesthat do not appear on the surface, that one does not know that theviews they express are really their own judgment. Democracy seemsto be government by suspicion, in large part. We have faith inourselves, but not in each other. A man to be a good partisanseems called upon to believe that every man of different view is acrook or a weakling. This is the Roosevelt idea. And half of it isthe Bryan idea.

I wish that I could see you, old man, and have one of our old timetalks. …

I shall bear in mind what you say as to the availability of yourservice, but I hope it may not be necessary to take you from thatland of sunshine and dreams that seems so remote from this centerof intrigue and trouble. Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN H. WIGMORE

Washington, December 8, 1915

MY DEAR JOHN,— … Things are not looking at all nice as toGermany and Austria. I know that the country is not satisfied, atleast part of it, with our patience, but I don't see just whatelse we can do but be patient. Our ships are not needed anywhere,and our soldiers do not exist. To-day brings word of the blowingup of an American ship. Of course, we do not know the details butthe thing looks ugly.

Wasn't the President's message on the hyphenated gentlemen bully?You could not have beaten that yourself. And your dear friend T.Roosevelt, did certainly write himself down as one large andglorious ass in his criticism of the message. He hates Wilson so,that he has just lost his mind. I wish I didn't have to say thisabout Roosevelt, because I am extremely fond of him (which you arenot), but a poorer interview on the message could not have beenwritten. … As always yours,

F. K. L.

The following letter was written to Mrs. Adolph Miller when shewas in a hospital in New York.

TO MRS. ADOLPH C. MILLER

Washington, December 12, [1915]

MY DEAR MARY,—We have just returned from Church and all morning Ihave been thinking of you and Adolph—praying for you I supposein my Pagan way.

Poor dear girl, I know you are brave but I'd just like to holdyour hand or look steadily into your eyes, to tell you that youhave the best thing that this world gives—friends who are onewith you. I can see old Adolph with his grimness and his greatlove, which makes him more grim and far more mandatory, what asturdy old Dutch Calvinist he is! He really is more Dutch thanGerman—Dutch modified by the California sun—and Calvinistsweetened by you and Boulder Creek, and Berkeley and William Jamesand B. I. Wheeler and his Saint of a Mother. Well, let him pass,why should I talk of him when you really want me to talk ofmyself!

Last night we had the GRIDIRON dinner, and the President made anexalted speech. He is spiritually great, Mary, and don't you daresmile and think of the widow! We are all dual, old Emerson said itin his ESSAY ON FREE WILL, and Adolph can tell you what old Greeksaid it. And this duality is where the fight comes in, and the twopeople walk side by side, to-day is Jekyll's day, and tomorrow isHyde's, and so they alternate.

Well, the GRIDIRON was a grind on Bryan and Villard and Ford, anda boost for preparedness and Garrison and the Army and Navy. TellAdolph they had a Democratic mule, two men walking together undera cover, the head end reasonable, the hind end kicking—the frontend of course represented the Wilson crowd and the hind end theBryan-Kitchin,—and the two wouldn't work together. The wholething was splendidly done and was a lesson to the few Democratswho were there—which they won't learn.

Nancy went to her second party last night—a joyous thing in a newevening cloak of old rose, which made her feel that Cleopatra andthe Queen of Sheba and Mrs. Galt and all other exalted ladies hadnothing on her. What a glorious thing life would be if we couldremain children, with all the simple joys and none of the horrorsthat age brings on. There is certainly a good fifty per centchance that this fine spirit will marry some damn brute who willworry and harass the soul out of her. For so the world goes. Ihope she'll be as fortunate as you have been.

To-night we go to the Polks to see Mrs. Martin Egan who was on atorpedoed ship in the Mediterranean, and although she couldn'tswim floated forty-five minutes till rescued. You must know thePolks well. She has very real charm and your old Mormon of ahusband will desert his other fairies for her.

Now I have gossiped and preached and prophesied and mourned andotherwise revealed what passes through a wandering mind in half anhour, so I send you, at the close of this screed, my blessing,which is a poor gift, and I would send you the parcel post limitof my love if it weren't for Anne and Adolph, who are narrow-minded Dutch Calvinists. May good fortune betide you and bring youback very soon to the many whose hearts are sympathetic.

FRANK

TO MRS. MAGNUS ANDERSEN

Washington, D.C., December 24, [1915]

MY DEAR MAUDIE,—It is Christmas eve, and while Nancy and Anne arefilling the mysterious stockings, I am writing these letters tothe best of brothers and sister. It has been a long, adisgracefully long time since I wrote you, but I have kept intouch pretty well through George and Anne. … So you have now aphilosophy—something to hang to! I am glad of it. The standpointis the valuable thing. There are profound depths in the idea thatlies under Christian Science, but like all other new things itgoes to unreasonable lengths. "Be Moderate," were the wordswritten over the Temple on the Acropolis, and this applies to allthings. This world is curiously complex, and no one knows how toanswer all our puzzles. Sometimes I think that God himself doesnot. There is a fine poem by Emerson called, THE SPHINX, which isthe most hopeful thing that I have found, because it recognizesthe dual world in which we live, for everything goes not singlybut in pairs—good and evil, matter and mind. Then, too, you maybe interested in his essay on FATE.

Dear Fritz—dear, dear boy, how I wish I could be there with him,though I could do no good. … Each night I pray for him, and I amso much of a Catholic that I pray to the only Saint I know or everknew and ask her to help. If she lives her mind can reach theminds of the doctors just as surely as there is such a thing astransmission of thought between us, or hypnotism. I don't need herto intercede with God, but I would like her to intercede with man.Why, oh why, do we not know whether she is or not! Then all theuniverse would be explained to me. The only miracle that I careabout is the resurrection. If we live again we certainly havereason for living now. I think that belief is the foundation hopeof religion. Anne has it with a certainty that is to me nothingless than amazing. And people of noble minds, of exalted spirits,not necessarily of greatest intellects have it. George has it inhis own way, and he is certainly one of the real men of the earth.The President has it strongly. He is, in fact, deeply, trulyreligious. The slanders on him are infamous.

… We are to have the quietest possible Christmas. No one butourselves at dinner—I give no presents at all—for financiallywe are up to our eyebrows. I probably will work all day except foran hour or two which I shall use in playing with Nancy, for hergay spirit will not allow anything but the Christmas spirit toprevail. She is so like our Dear One, so determined, cheerful,hopeful, courageous, yet very shy. Ned will be out all night atdances and tomorrow too, for he is a most popular chap and verywell-behaved indeed. His manners are excellent and he has plentyof dash. He is learning these things now which I learned onlyafter many years, the little things which make the conventionalman of the world.

I hope that you will find the New Year one of great peace of mindand real serenity of soul. May you commune with the Spirit of theInfinite and find yourself growing more and more in the spiritualimage of the Dear One.

My tenderest love to you and to your good high-hearted man, and tothe Boy.

FRANK

TO MRS. ADOLPH C. MILLER

Washington [1915]

This is a Christmas letter and is addressed:—"To a Brave YoungWoman." I am afraid it is not just as cheery and merry as itshould be because, you see, it's like this, I am poor—very, verypoor, and I have very good taste—very, very good taste. Nowthose two things can't get on together at Christmas. Then, too, Iam busy—very, very busy, so I don't have time to shop. Now if youwere very, very poor and had very, very good taste and were very,very busy and couldn't shop—how in heaven could you buy anythingfor anyone?

I did take half an hour or so to look at things, and things wereso ugly that were cheap that of course I couldn't buy them withoutconfessing poor taste, or they were so very expensive that Icouldn't buy them without confessing bankruptcy. Now there youare! So what could a poor boy do but come home empty-handed,nothing for Anne or Nancy or Ned or you—not even something formyself! And I need things, socks and pipe, and better writingpaper than this, and music and toothpaste and some new clothes,and a house near your palace, and a more contented spirit andanother job and Ahellofalotof things. Don't get nervous about me,because I'm not going to kill myself for lack of all these things,although a true-born Samurai, loyal to Bushido might do so. For itis dishonor not to be rich at Christmas time; not to feel rich,anyway. But then let me see what I've got! There's Anne! I expectif sold on the block, at public auction, say in Alaska, wherewomen are scarce, she would bring some price; but her digestionisn't very good and her heart is quite weak and her hair isfalling out. But these things, of course, the auctioneer wouldn'treveal. She would make a fine duch*ess, but the market just now isoverstocked with duch*esses. And she is a good provider whenfurnished with the provisions.

Now there is Ned—he could hire out as a male assistant to afemale dancer and get fifty a week, perhaps. Nancy couldn't evendo that. They are both liabilities. So there you are, withduch*esses on the contraband list, and Nancy not old enough tomarry a decayed old Pittsburg millionaire, I will be compelled tokeep on working. For my assets aren't what your noble husbandwould call quick, though they are live. I really don't know whatto do. I shall wait till Anne comes home and then, as usual, dowhat she says.

I really did look for something for you. But the only thing I sawthat I thought you would care for was a brooch, opal and diamondsfor seven hundred and seventy-five dollars, so I said you wouldn'tcare for it. But I bought it for you A LA Christian Science. Youhave it, see? I think you have it, that I gave it to you. And thatAdolph doesn't know it, see?

Well you have the opal and I am happy because you are enjoying it.Such fire! What a superb setting! And such refined taste,platinum, do you notice! oh, so modest! No one else has any suchjewel. How Henry will admire it—and how mystified Adolph is!Tell him you bought it out of the money you saved on corned beef.How I shall enjoy seeing you wear it, and knowing that it bears inits fiery heart all the ardent poetry that I would fain pour out,but am deterred by my shyness. But you will understand! Each nightyou must take it out just for a glimpse before saying yourprayers. The opal is from Australia, the platinum from Siberia,the diamonds from Africa, the setting was designed in Paris. Andhere it is, the circle of the world has been made to secure thislittle thing of beauty for you. What symbolism!

I hope it will make you happy, and cause you to forget all yourpain and weakness. It has given me great happiness to give youthis little gift. And so we will both have a merry Christmas.

FRANK

AMERICAN AND MEXICAN AFFAIRS

1916

On Writing English—Visit to Monticello—Citizenship for Indians—On
Religion—American-Mexican Joint Commission

TO WILLIAM M. BOLE

GREAT FALLS TRIBUNE

Washington, December 29, 1915

DEAR BOLE,—I am very much gratified by the manner in which youtreated my annual report. Certainly my old newspaper training hasstood me in good stead in writing my reports. In fact it alwayshas, for while I was Corporation Counsel in San Francisco, and amember of the Interstate Commerce Commission, I wrote legalopinions that were intelligible to the layman, and I tried topresent my facts in such manner as to make their presentationinteresting. The result was that the courts read my opinions andsustained them, but whether they were equally impressive upon thestrictly legal mind, I have my doubts, because you know inside the"union" there is a strong feeling that the argot of the bar mustbe spoken and the simplest legal questions dealt with in profound,philosophic, latinized vocabulary.

I remember that after I was elected Corporation Counsel, when Iwas almost unknown to the bar of San Francisco, I began to hearcriticism from my legal friends that my opinions were written inEnglish that was too simple, so I indulged myself by writing adozen or so in all the heavy style that I could put on, writing inas many Latin phrases and as much old Norman French as waspossible. This was by way of showing the crowd that I was still amember of the union.

I find that all our scientific bureaus suffer from the samemalady. These scientists write for each other, as the women saythey dress for each other. One of the first orders that I issuedwas that our letters should be written in simple English, in wordsof one syllable if possible, and on one page if possible.

Soon after I came here I found a letter from one of our lawyers toan Indian, explaining the conditions of his title, that was soinvolved and elaborately braided and beaded and fringed that Icould not understand it myself. I outraged the sensibilities ofevery lawyer in the Department, and we have five hundred or moreof them, by sending this letter back and asking that it be put instraightaway English. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO MRS. ADOLPH C. MILLER

Washington, [January 1, 1916]

Having just sent a wire to you I shall now indulge myself in a fewminutes talk with that many-sided, multiple-natured, quiteobvious-and-yet-altogether-hidden person who is known to me asMary Miller.

The flash of brilliant crimson on the eastern side of the opal, doyou catch it? Now that is the flash of courage, the brilliantflame that will lead you to hold your head high. … I like verymuch what you say as to wearing our jewel "discreetly butconstantly." No combination of words could more perfectly expressthe relationship which this bit of sunrise has established betweenus—devotion, loyalty, telepathic communication without publicity.I am sure you are belittling yourself. … you are a game bird,—good, you understand, but with a tang, a something wild in flavor,a touch of the woods and mountain flowers and hidden dells inbosky places, and wanderings and sweet revolt against captivity.…

This is my first line of the New Year. Anne is a true daughter ofMartha this morning—her heart is troubled with many things,getting ready for the raid of the Huns this afternoon. She saysshe will write when she repossesses herself of her right arm. Goodhealth!

Some days later

… I have been receiving your wireless messages all week, my dearMary, and not one was an S. O. S. Good! The fair ship MARY MILLERis safe. Hurrah! She never has been staunch, but she was thegayest thing on the sea, and when her sails were all set from jibto spanker she made a gladsome sight, and some speed.

Of course, being so gay she was venturesome. That's where theDevil comes in. He is always looking about for the gay things. Hehates anything that doesn't make medicine for him. If you are gayyou are likely to be venturesome, and if venturesome, you can beled astray. So the good ship MARY MILLER instead of hugging theshore took a try at the vasty deep and got all blown to pieces.Then she sent out a cry for help. The wireless worked and now witha little puttering along in the sunshine and a lazy sea, she willbe her gay self once more, and like Kipling's Three Decker will"carry tired people to the Islands of the Blest."

That was a most charming letter you sent me, a real bit ofintimate talk. Anne read it first. She is very careful as to myreading. And I was glad to know that she could discover nothing init which might injuriously affect my trustful young mind. Anne isreally a good woman. I don't believe in husband's abusing theirwives, publicly. Good manners are essential to happiness inmarried life. We are short on manners in this country, and thatexplains the prevalence of divorce. How much better, as our friendL. Sterne once said, "These things are ordered in France."

F. K L.

TO EDWARD F. ADAMS

SAN FRANCISCO CHRONICLE

Washington, January 11, 1916

MY DEAR ADAMS,—I have yours of the 2nd. Of course, you can notsue the United States to get possession of its property withoutthe consent of the United States; but I will forgive you for allyour peculiar and archaic notions regarding government lands andschools and sich, because I love you for what you are and notbecause of your inheritance of old-fashioned ideas.

As I am dictating this letter I look up at the wall and discoverthere the head of a bull moose, and that bull moose makes me thinkof all the things you said four years ago about Roosevelt. And nowhe is to be again the master of your party—perhaps not acandidate, because he may be guilty of an act of self-abnegationand put away the crown, or take it in his own hands and place itupon some one else's brow.

I remember the manner—the scornful, satirical, sometimes pitifuland sometimes abusive manner—in which you treated the Bull Moose;and so we are going to have a great spectacle, the Bull Moose andthe Elephant kissing each other at Chicago; and seated on theElephant's shoulders will be the crowned mahout with the bigbarbed stick in his hand, telling you which way to turn and whento kneel!

Of course, you will abuse us all for our land policies, butoverlook the fact that the brutalities of these policies werecommitted in other days—those good, old Republican days. Itreally is a wonder that you are not cynical and that you stillhave enthusiasm. I should not be surprised if you said yourprayers and had belief in another world, where all the badDemocrats would sizzle to the eternal joy of the good Republicans.In those days I shall look up to you and I know that you will notdeny me the drop of cold water.

I shall be very much interested in seeing what kind of a fist ourman Claxton makes out of your school system, and I hope you canuse him as a means of arousing interest in the schools. That isone trouble with the public school system, because we get oureducation for nothing we treat it as if it was worth nothing—Imean those of us who are parents. We never know that the schoolexists except to make some complaint about discipline or taxes.

May you live long and be happy. Always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

From time to time as vacancies occurred on the Supreme Bench,letters and telegrams came to Lane from friends that begged him toallow them to urge his appointment to this office. In 1912, 1914,and 1916 the newspapers in different parts of the countrymentioned him as a probable appointee. While, as a young lawyer,this office had seemed to him to be one greatly to be desired,after he came to Washington and knew more of the nature of thecases that necessarily formed the greater part of the work passedupon by the Supreme Court, his interest waned. As early as 1913 hewrote of the decisions of the Interstate Commerce Commission, "Ifwe are wise, we are not to be terrorized by our own precedents."An office in which there was little opportunity for constructiveor executive work grew to have less and less attraction for him.

To Carl Snyder

Washington, January 22, 1916

MY DEAR CARL,—I am your most dutiful and obedient servant; theaforesaid modest declaration being induced by your letter ofJanuary fifth, offering to place me on the Bench. I regret greatlythat you are not the President of the United States, but he seemsto have a notion that it would be a shame to spoil an excellentSecretary of the Interior.

Talking of robes, there is an idea in Chesterton that is not bad,that all those who exercise power in the world wear skirts—thejudge, who can officially kill a man; the woman, who canunofficially do the same thing; and the King, who is the State;likewise the Pope, who can save the souls of all.

Garrett was in to-day, and if you haven't seen him since hisreturn, edge up next to him. He is full of facts, some of whichare new to us.

I guess I am to credit you with that little editorial in
Collier's, eh? Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Mrs. Franklin K. Lane

Atlantic City

Washington, February 5, 1916

MOST RESPECTED LADY,—Having just returned from luncheon and beingin the enjoyment of a cigar of fine aroma I sit me down for aquiet talk. I am visualizing you as by my side and addressing youin person.

First, no doubt, you will care to hear of the reception given atthe White House last evening. According to your directions, Ifirst dined with the Secretary of Agriculture, his wife, and alady from Providence. … Going then to the White House wesocialized for a few minutes before proceeding down stairs. ThePresident expressed himself as regretting your absence, and thePresident's lady, having heard from you, expressed solicitude asto your health. I loitered for a few minutes behind the line andthen betook me to the President's library, where I spent most ofthe evening hearing the Postmaster General tell of the greatburden that it was to have a Congress on his hands. Bernard Shawwrites of the Superman, and so does, I believe, the crazyphilosopher of Germany. I was convinced last night that I had metone in the flesh. …

The President is cheerful, regarding his Western tour as one oftriumph. His lady still wears the smile which has given her suchpre-eminence. Mrs. Marshall was in line, looking like a girl oftwenty. Those absent were the Wife of the Secretary of War, thewife of the Secretary of the Interior, and the wife of theSecretary of Labor. …

You have two most excellent children, dear madam—a youth of someeighteen years who has a frisky wit and a more frisky pair offeet. Your daughter is a most charming witch. I mean by this notto refer to her age … but to that combination of poise,directness, tenderness, fire, hypocrisy, and other femininevirtues which go to make up the most charming, because the mostelusive, of your sex. I am inclined to believe that Mr. Ruggles,of Red Gap, would not regard either your son or your daughter asfitted for those high social circles in which they move by reasonof the precision of their vocabulary or their extreme reserve inmanner, both being of very distinct personality. One is flint andthe other steel, I find, so that fire is struck when they cometogether. While engaged, however, in the game of draw poker, theseantipathetic qualities do not reveal themselves in such a manneras to seriously affect domestic peace. I have spent two entireevenings with your children, much to my entertainment. That I willnot be able to enjoy this evening with them is a matter of regret,but I am committed to a dinner with the Honorable Kirke Porter,and tomorrow evening I believe that I am to dine with the lady onR. Street, the name of the aforesaid lady being now out of mymind, but you will recall her as having a brilliant mind and veryslight eyebrows.

Neither the President nor myself alluded to the late lamentedoversight on his part, and on meeting the members of the SupremeCourt I did not find that by the omission to appoint me on saidCourt the members thereof felt that a great national loss had beensuffered. No one, in fact, throughout the evening alluded to thismiscarriage of wisdom. …

… Much solicitude was expressed by many of those presentregarding your health. I told them in my off-hand manner that Iwas enjoying your absence greatly. …

Having now had this most enjoyable talk with you, I shall delightmyself with an hour's discussion of oil leases upon the OsageReservation with one Cato Sells.

Believe me, my dear madam, your most respectful obedient, humble,meek, modest, mild, loyal, loving, and disconsolate servant,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO WILL IRWIN

Washington, February 11, 1916

DEAR WILL,—So you are off for the happiest voyage you have evermade, with the girl of your heart, to see the whole world beingchanged and a new world made. What a joy! Don't put off returningtoo long. Remember that books must be timely now, and after youhave a gizzard full of good chapter headings, come back and grind.

Nancy entirely approves of your wife and her books. As alwaysyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO—

Washington, February 29, 1916

… It is none of my business, but I have just seen an articlecoming out over your name respecting Pinchot, the wisdom of whichI doubt. I have never found any good to come by blurring an issueby personal contest or antagonisms. You asked me when you left ifyou might not come in once in a while and talk with me, and I amtaking the liberty in this way of dropping in on you, for I amdeeply interested in water power development and want to seesomething result this Session.

I have no time to waste in fighting people, and I have found thatby pursuing this policy I can promote measures that I favor. Tofight for a thing, the best way is to show its advantages and theneed for it, and ignore those who do not take the same view,because there is an umpire in Congress that must balance the twopositions, and therefore I can rely upon the strength of myposition as against the weakness of the other man's position. Ifthose who are in favor of water power development get to fightingeach other, nothing will result.

I am giving you the benefit of this attitude of mine for your ownguidance. It may be entirely contrary to the policy that you, oryour people, wish to pursue and my only solicitude is that thethings I am for, should not be held back any longer by personaldisputes. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HON. WOODROW WILSON

THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, March 13, 1916

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—I shall be pleased to go to the San DiegoExposition, on my way to San Francisco, and say a word as yourrepresentative at its opening.

I hope that you may find your way made less difficult than nowappears possible, as to entering Mexico, My judgment is that tofail in getting Villa would ruin us in the eyes of all Latin-Americans. I do not say that they respect only force, but likechildren they pile insult upon insult if they are not stopped whenthe first insult is given. If I can be of any service to you byobservation or by carrying any message for you to anybody, while Iam West, I trust that you will command me. I can return by way ofArizona and New Mexico. … Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Lane re-opened the California International Exposition at SanDiego, where, voicing the President's regret that he could nothimself be present, Lane said,—"He had intended to make this triphimself; but circ*mstances, some to the east of him and some tothe south of him, made that impossible. … Pitted against him arethe trained and cunning intellects of the whole world, … and noone can be more conscious than is he that it is difficult toreconcile pride and patience. I give you his greeting therefore,not out of a heart that is joyous and buoyant, but out of a heartthat is grave and firm in its resolution that the future of ourRepublic and all republics shall not be put in peril."

[Illustration with caption: FRANKLIN K. LANE WITH ETHAN ALLEN,
SUPERINTENDENT OF RAINIER NATIONAL PARK]

From San Diego he went north to San Francisco, to see his brotherFrederic J. Lane, who had been ill for some months. After a fewdays with him Lane returned to his desk, in Washington.

TO FREDERIC J. LANE

Washington, April 26, 1916

MY DEAR FRITZ,— … I certainly will not despair of your beingcured until every possible resource has been exhausted. The odds,it seems to me, are in your favor. Whenever Abrams and Vecchi saythat they have done all that they can, if you are still incondition to travel, I want you to try the Arkansas Hot Springsand I will go down there to meet you. …

I wrote you from the train the other day on my way to HarpersFerry, where I took an auto and went down through the ShenandoahValley and across the mountains to Charlottesville, where theUniversity of Virginia is. I went with the Harlans. Anne joined usat Charlottesville. … We visited Monticello, where Jeffersonlived, and saw a country quite as beautiful as any valley I knowof in California, not even excepting the Santa Clara Valley, inprune blossom time. Those old fellows who built their houses ahundred years ago knew how to build and build beautifully. We haveno such places in California as some that were built a hundred andfifty years ago in Virginia, and they did not care how far theygot away from town, in those days.

Jefferson's house is up on the top of a hill, as are most of theothers,—there are very few on the roads. Most of them are from amile to five miles back, and although the land is covered withtimber they built of brick, and imported Italian laborers to dothe wood-carving. When I think of how much less in money and introuble make a place far more magnificent in California, I wonderour people have not lovelier places. Of course, the difference isthat in Virginia there were just three classes of people—thearistocrat, the middle class, and the negroes. The aristocracy hadthe land, the middle class were the artisans, and the negroes theslaves. The only ones who had fine houses were the aristocracy,whereas with us the great mass of our people are business andprofessional men of comparatively small means and we have few menwho build palaces.

Things have blown up in Ireland, I see, and the Irish are going tosuffer for this foolish venture. This man Casem*nt who is posingas the George Washington of the Irish revolution, has held officeall his life under the English Government and now draws a pension.His last position was that of Consul General at Rio de Janeiro. Igot a pamphlet from him a year or so ago, in which he proposed analliance between Germany, the Republic of Ireland, and theRepublic of the United States, which should control the politicsof the world. …

Doesn't the thought of Henry Ford as Presidential candidate …surprise you? It looks to me very much as if the Ford votedemonstrates Roosevelt's weakness as a candidate. Last night Iwent to dinner at old Uncle Joe Cannon's house, and as I came outSenator O'Gorman pointed to Uncle Joe and Justice Hughes talkingtogether and said, "There is the old leader passing over the wandof power to the new leader." …

Well, old man, I know that I do not need to tell you to keep yourspirits up and your faith strong. Give me all the news, good aswell as bad. Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO FRANK I. COBB

NEW YORK WORLD

Washington, May 8, 1916

MY DEAR COBB,—Here is a memorandum that has been draftedrespecting the leasing bill, that we are now pushing to have takenup by the Senate. This bill, as you know, covers oil, phosphate,and potash lands. … There are three million acres of phosphatelands, two and a half million acres of oil lands, and a smallacreage of potash lands, under withdrawal now, that cannot bedeveloped because of lack of legislation. …

The situation here is tense. Of course, nobody knows what will bedone. I favor telling Germany that we will make no trade with her,and if she fails to make good her word we will stop talking to heraltogether. I am getting tired of having the Kaiser and Carranzavent their impudence at our expense, because they know we do notwant to go to war and because they want to keep their own peoplein line. … Cordially yours,

LANE

TO GEORGE W. WICKERSHAM

Washington, May 17, 1916

MY DEAR WICKERSHAM,—I am just back from a trip to South Dakota,where I, by ritual, a copy of which is inclosed for your perusal,made citizens out of a bunch of Indians who never can becomehyphenates, and for this reason your letter has remainedunanswered.

And just because we love you, and love ourselves even better, wewill break all rules, precedents, promises, appointments,agreements, and covenants of all kinds whatsoever, and steal overto see you a week from Saturday. Just what hour I will wire you,and what time we can stay depends upon things various and sundry.But you may depend upon it that it will be as long a time as avery flexible conscience will permit.

Remember me, in terms of endearment, to that noble lady whodesolated Washington by her departure. As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO H. B. BROUGHAM

Washington, May 20, 1916

DEAR MR. BROUGHAM,— … I recently returned from the YanktonSioux Reservation in South Dakota where I admitted some onehundred and fifty competent Indians to full American citizenshipin accordance with a ritual. … The ceremony was reallyimpressive and taken quite seriously by the Indians. Why shouldnot some such ceremony as this be used when we give citizenship toforeigners who come to this country? Surely it tends to instilpatriotism and presents the duties of citizenship in a manner thatleaves a lasting impression. Here is a story that should beinteresting to all, if properly presented. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

INDIAN RITUAL ADMISSION TO CITIZENSHIP

The Secretary stands before one of the candidates and says:—

"Joseph T. Cook, what was your Indian name?"

"Tunkansapa," answers the Indian.

"Tunkansapa, I hand you a bow and arrow. Take this bow and shootthe arrow."

The Indian does so.

"Tunkansapa, you have shot your last arrow. That means you are nolonger to live the life of an Indian. You are from this dayforward to live the life of the white man. But you may keep thatarrow. It will be to you a symbol of your noble race and of thepride you may feel that you come from the first of all Americans."

Addressing Tunkansapa by his white name.

"Joseph T. Cook, take in your hands this plough." Cook does so."This act means that you have chosen to live the life of the whiteman. The white man lives by work. From the earth we must all getour living, and the earth will not yield unless man pours upon itthe sweat of his brow.

"Joseph T. Cook, I give you a purse. It will always say to youthat the money you gain must be wisely kept. The wise man saveshis money, so that when the sun does not smile and the grass doesnot grow he will not starve."

The Secretary now takes up the American flag. He and the Indianhold it together.

"I give into your hands the flag of your country. This is the onlyflag you ever will have. It is the flag of free men, the flag of ahundred million free men and women, of whom you are now one. Thatflag has a request to make of you, Joseph T. Cook, that you repeatthese words."

Cook then repeats the following after the Secretary.

"Forasmuch as the President has said that I am worthy to be acitizen of the United States, I now promise this flag that I willgive my hands, my head, and my heart to the doing of all that willmake me a true American citizen."

The Secretary then takes a badge upon which is the American eagle,with the national colors, and, pinning it upon the Indian'sbreast, speaks as follows:—

"And now, beneath this flag, I place upon your breast the emblemof citizenship. Wear this badge always, and may the eagle that ison it never see you do aught of which the flag will not be proud."

TO FREDERIC J. LANE

Washington, June 6, 1916

MY DEAR FRITZ,—We have a letter from Mary this morning saying youare holding your own pretty well, which is mighty good news, andthat Abrams is still convinced that he is right, which is alsogood news. By the same mail I learn that Hugo Asher was hit by atrain and nearly killed. Whether he will recover or not is aquestion. Asher is a most lovable fellow and loyal to the core. Itwould break my heart to have him go. I got into my fight withHearst over Asher. His people demanded that I should fire Asher,and I refused to do it.

I guess you are beaten on Roosevelt, old man. The word that we gethere is that he is done for at Chicago. Of course before this getsto you the nomination will be made. My own thought has been thathe laid too much stress on the support of big business. To haveGary, and Armour, and Perkins as your chief boomers doesn't makeyou very popular in Kansas and Iowa. Hughes may be the easiest manto beat, after all, because he vetoed the Income tax amendment inNew York, a two-cent fare bill, and other things which are prettypopular. He is a good man, honest and fine, but not a liberal. Thewhole Congressional push has been for Hughes for months, but Ihaven't believed that he would accept the nomination. I made theprophesy to some newspaper men the other day that Roosevelt wouldget in and endorse Hughes with both fists. They were inclined todoubt this, but I still believe that I am right. …

To-day, comes word that Kitchener has been drowned and Yuan ShiKai poisoned. Heaven knows whose turn comes next. Just think ofthree such events within a week as that sea battle off Denmark,the greatest naval battle of the world; the torpedoing of theSecretary of War and all of his staff; and the poisoning of theEmperor of China. I doubt if there ever was a period in the wholehistory of the world when things moved as fast and there was asmuch that was exciting. Of course now we have it all thrown onto ascreen in front of our faces, whereas a hundred years ago we wouldhave had to wait for perhaps a year before knowing that theEmperor of China had been killed. Nevertheless I think there ismore passion and violence on exhibition to-day than at any time ina great many years.

I had a talk with the President the other day which was verytouching. He made reference to the infamous stories that are beingcirculated regarding him with such indignation and pathos that Ifelt really very sorry for him. I suppose that these stories willbe believed by some and made the basis of a very nasty kind ofcampaign. But there is no truth in them and yet a man can't denythem. It is a strange thing that when a man is not liable to anyother charge they trump up some story about a woman. …

Now my dear boy, may you have a continuance of courage, for thereis no telling what day the tide may turn and things swing yourway. We know so damned little about nature yet. Affectionatelyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HON. WOODROW WILSON

THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, June 8, 1916

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—I see by the papers that it is repeatedlyannounced that you are writing the platform. Now I want to takethe liberty of saying that this is not altogether good news to me.Our platform should contain such an appreciation of you and youradministration, that you could not write it, much less have itknown that you have written it. It should be one long joyful shoutof exultation over the achievements of the Administration, and Ican't quite see you leading the shout.

The Republican party was for half a century a constructive party,and the Democratic party was the party of negation and complaint.We have taken the play from them. The Democratic party has becomethe party of construction. You have outlined new policies and putthem into effect through every department, from State to Labor.Therefore, our platform should be generously filled with words ofboasting that will hearten and make proud the Democrats of thecountry; a plain tale of large things simply done.

If there is any truth at all in the newspaper statement and anypurpose in making it, perhaps the end that is desired might bereached by a statement that you are not undertaking to write theplatform, but that at the request of some of the leaders you aregiving them a concrete statement of your foreign policy.Faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO MRS. FRANKLIN K. LANE

ESSEX ON CHAMPLAIN, N. Y.

Washington, June 22, 1918

MY DEAR ANNE,—I am just back this minute from Brown [University]where I had a right good time. I arrived in the morning early andkept the Dean waiting for me for a half an hour. …

After breakfast I went over to the University grounds, which arevery quaint, on the crest of a hill with fine old buildings, andthere found that Hughes was the hero of the day, of course; everystep he took he was cheered. He was very genial about it. Wemarched in our robes, down through the winding streets of this oldNew England town to a meeting house one hundred and seventy-fiveyears old, and there we sat in pews, while the President of Brown,Mr. Faunce, gave the degrees in Latin. I have not heard so muchLatin since I left school. There were a pretty good looking lot ofboys, about half of them New Englanders and about half of themWesterners. We heard some orations by the students and thenmarched up the hill again where we had lunch, and then went overto a great tent on the campus where William Roscoe Thayer—whowrote the life of Hay—President Faunce, Judge Brown, Mr. Hughes,and I spoke.

I spoke for about half an hour. My speech fitted in very well,because Thayer preceded me, and he spoke of the lack of anAmerican spirit; I had already prepared a speech upon theabundance of American spirit, [Footnote: Speech published in bookentitled, The American Spirit.] so that I answered Thayer, andanswered him with scorn. I told him that if New England wasgrowing weak in her American pride or her vigor that we would takethese boys and carry them out West where there was not any lack ofvirility or hardiness or red blood, and that if they wanted toknow whether the American was willing to fight or not, to go toany recruiting office of the United States to-day and see howcrowded it was. I told them about our pioneers, who were taking upten or twelve million acres of land, the men who had gone toAlaska, and then turned upon the real proposition which was thatthere was a difference between national spirit and martial spirit.

War used to be the only opportunity for glory or romance orachievement, while there are a million other opportunities nowopen, because man's imagination has grown. In the morning theCollege had given honorary degrees of LL.D. to Brand Whitlock andHerbert Hoover. So when I came to the close of my talk I told themabout Hoover's Belgian work, and that Brand Whitlock had refusedto leave Brussels; and while there was no English and no Frenchand no Italian and no Spanish and no other flag in Brussels, theStars and Stripes in front of the American Legation had never comedown, and the Belgian peasant when he went to his work in themorning took his hat off in honor of our flag, and I asked thosepeople to stand with me in front of that peasant to take theirhats off and take heart.

Well, I had the crowd with me right along. Then Hughes came and hetook American Spirit as his text, and he made it quite evidentwhat his campaign is going to be; that it is going to be a charge,veiled and very poorly supported by facts, that we have not knownwhere we were going, that we were vacillating, that we did nothave any enthusiasm, that we did not arouse the people and makethem feel proud that they were Americans. How in the mischief heis going to get away with this, I do not understand. Whom were weto be mad at—England, or Germany, or everybody in the world? Werewe to war with the entire outfit? He seems to be able to havesatisfied the Providence Journal, which is run by an Australianwho has been running the spy system for the British Embassy, andhas been printing a lot … about Germany and all the Germanpress. If he can get away with this he is some politician. I seethat Teddy has had an understanding with him. Von Meyer was thereyesterday to hold a conference with him.

But I do not think that we lost anything in the discussion ofyesterday. There were not any Democrats there who were not ontheir toes at the end of the meeting; but, of course, practicallyeverybody in Rhode Island is a Republican. It is the closest thingto a proprietary estate that I have ever seen.

… I left at 6 o'clock and on my way back met President Vincent,of Minneapolis, and George Foster Peabody. You knew that FrankKellogg was nominated, [Footnote: For the United States Senate.]didn't you, Clapp running third? …

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO MRS. ADOLPH MILLER

Washington, July 4, 1916

… I see you with blooming cheeks and star-lit eyes peeping outfrom under a sun-bonnet, enshrined in all the glories of themountain redwoods, and I long to be with you if only to get someof the freshness and joy of the California mountains into myrather desolate soul.

How is the old clam? Do his lips come together in that precisePrussian way, and does he order the universe about? Or does a newspirit come over him when he gets with nature? Is she a soothingmistress who smooths his stiff hair with her soft hand, and patshis cheek and nestles him in her arms, and with her cool breathmakes him forget a federal, or any other kind, of reserve?

Why has nature been so unkind to me as to make me a lover butalways from afar, never to come near her, never to compel me to asweet surrender, never to give me peace and contentment, never toso surround me as to keep out the world of fools and follies andpharisees?

You know, I would like to write some servant girl novels. Ibelieve I could do it. My love-making would either be rather tameand stiff or too intensely early Victorian. But I should like toswing off into an ecstasy of large turgid words and let my mindhear the mushy housemaid cry, "Isn't that just too sweet!" …

I enclose a copy of my speech made at Brown University. Perhaps itwill interest that old farmer potato bug. He does not deserve tohave it said, but I miss him very much. Please obey him an youlove me. Cut out all social activities, giving yourself up to theacquisition of a few more of the right kind of corpuscles in yourtoo-blue blood. As always, yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Mrs. Franklin K. Lane

Essex-on-Champlain

Washington, July 4, 1916

… There is no news that I can give you. The weather is verywarm. Politics is growing warmer. I think Heney will run forSenator in California, probably against Hiram Johnson. WillCrocker is also said to be a candidate for the Republicannomination. I could get the nomination by saying that I wouldaccept. Phelan told me yesterday that he would see that all thenecessary money was raised,—that I could win in a walk.Dockweiler says the same thing. The latter is here and we haveseen much of each other. What do you say if I run for Senator? Ireally feel very much tempted to do it at times because thingshave been made so uncomfortable by some of my fool colleagues whohave butted in on my affairs; and then I feel I would like theexcitement of the stump and to make the personal appeal once more.You could go round with me over the State in an automobile. WhileI would not insist upon your making speeches for me, I know thatyour presence would add greatly to my success.

There is no telling what way this campaign may go. It may be alandslide for Wilson, it may be a landslide the other way. We havethe hazards because we have the decision of questions. There isbound to be a lot of objection to whatever course we take withregard to Mexico. I fear from what Benjamin Ide Wheeler told methe other day that Germany any day may decide to put hersubmarines into active service again on the old lines, especiallyif things on land go as they have been going lately against theTeutons.

… I shall not decide in favor of accepting the nomination untilI hear from you. In the meantime don't lose any sleep over it. Andso my Nancy has a beau? Well, the little rascal must be given somegood advice now. So I shall turn my attention to her …

F.K.L.

Washington, July 24, 1916

… To-day I have spent most quietly,—had Bill Wheeler up for
breakfast and then went to the Cosmos Club for lunch with
Dockweiler. He is very anxious to get a Catholic on the Mexican
Commission and so am I. I want Chief Justice White, but I fear the
President won't ask him …

Dear old Dockweiler is an awfully good man … From youth he hasgauged every act by his conception of the will of God, and indoubt has asked God's representative, the priest. What acomforting thing to have a church like that; it makes forhappiness, if it does not make for progress. Why is it thatprogress must come from discontent? The latter is the divine sparkin man, no doubt,

"O to be satisfied, satisfied,
Only to lie at Thy feet."

is a hymn we used to sing in church. We yearn to be satisfied andyet we know because we are not satisfied we grow . …

"The mystical hanker after something higher," is religion, and yetit should not be all of religion; for man's own sake there shouldbe some cross to which one can cling, some Christ who can hear andgive peace to the waves. I wish I could be a Catholic, and yet Ican not feel that once you have a free spirit that it is right togo back into the monastery, and shut yourself up away from doubts,making your soul strong only through prayer. There are twoprinciples in the world fighting all the time, and the one makesthe other possible. There is no "perfect," there is a "better"only. And in this fight one does not become better by prayer—prayer is only the ammunition wagon, the supply train, where onecan get masks for poison gas and cartridges for the guns.

Pfeiffer said a good thing the other day, quite like him to sayit, too. We were talking of churches and he said he never went toone because he did not believe in abasing or prostrating himselfbefore God, he saw no sense in it; God didn't respect one for it,and moreover he was part of God himself and he couldn't prostratehimself before himself. I asked him if he didn't recognizehumility as a virtue, and he said, "No, the higher you hold yourhead the more God-like you are."

Humility, to me, seems to be the basis of sympathy. We stoop toconquer in that we are not self-assertive and self-assured, for ifwe "know" that we are right we can not know how others think orfeel. We can not grow.

You know there are two great classes of people, those who arechallenged by what they see, and those who are not. Now the onlykind who grow are the former. But what is it to grow? If we"evermore come out by that same door wherein we went" surely thereis no object in being curious. Can there be growth when we are inan endless circle? …

Now after all my struggle, I fall back not on reason but oninstinct, on a primal desire, and perhaps this is my rudimentarysoul, the mystical hanker after something higher. That is a realthing. The purpose of nature seems to be to put it into me andmake it very important to me. That being so I can not overlook it,and must obey it. The thing that pleases me as I look back uponit, is the thing I must do; that sets the standard for me; that ismorals and religion. If there is any chap who the day after singswith joy over being a devil—that man I never heard of—but if hetakes delight in what he did that was fiendish, then he mustfollow and should follow that bent until he SEES that it isfiendish. He has to have more light. But I really don't believethere is any such fellow, who clearly sees what he did andrejoices in it. All of us sing, "I want to be an angel." THERE isthe whole of revelation, and all things that tend to make usgratify that desire are good. I guess that is pragmatism, in wordsof one syllable.

You see that all religion comes from a desire to know somethingdefinite. We prayed logically, in the old time, to the devil andtried to propitiate him, so that harm would not come to us. Thatis stage number one in our climb. Then we find the good spirit andpray to him to whip the devil, which is stage number two. Then weask the good spirit to give us strength to whip the devilourselves. That is stage number three. Buddha and Christ come inthe number three stage, and that is where we are. We may find, asstage number four, that the good spirit is only a muscle in ourbrain or a fluid in our nerves, which we strengthen, and becomemasters of ourselves—greater, stronger, more clear-sighted—without any OUTSIDE Great Spirit. That we are all things inourselves, and that we are, in making ourselves, making the God. Ifancy that is Pfeiffer's idea. It is Mezes', I believe. Then comesin the mystery of transmitting that highly developed spirit. Awoman of such a super-soul may marry a man of most carnal naturewhose children are held down to earth and gross things, and herfine spirit is lost, unless it lives elsewhere. So we come back tothe question, how is the good preserved? "Never any bright thingdies," may be true, but if so it means an immortality of thespirit. This is all confusion and despair. We do not see where weare going. But we must climb, we must grow, we must do better, forthe same reason that our bodies must feed. The rest we leave withall the other mysteries …

July 28, 1916

I am going to dinner … and before I go alone into a lonesomeclub, I must send a word to you. Not that I have any particularword to say, for my mind is heavy, nor that you will find in whatI may say anything that will illumine the way, but why should wenot talk? What! may a friend not call upon a friend in time ofvacancy to listen to his idle babble? O these pestiferous dealersin facts and these prosy philosophers, the world must havesurcease from them and wander in the great spaces. To idletogether in the sweet fields of the mind—this is companionship,when thoughts come not by bidding, and argument is taboo; to havethe mind as open as that of a child for all impressions, and speakas the skylark sings, this is the mood that proves companionship.

I shall be lonely to-night, going into a modern monastery anddriving home alone. The world is all people to me. I lean uponthem. They induce thought and fancy. They give color to my life.They keep me from looking inward, where, alas! I never find thatwhich satisfies me. For of all men I am most critical of myself.Others when they go to bed or sit by themselves may chuckle overthings well done; or find satisfaction in the inner life, asGeorge does; but not so with me. Thrown on myself I am a strandedbark upon a foreign shore. And this I know is not as it should be.Each one should learn to stand alone and find in contemplation andin fancy the rich material with which to fashion some new fabric,or build more solidly the substance of his soul.

I like to have you talk, as in your latest letter, of the makingof yourself. It seems so much more possible than that I could dothe same. But I am a miserable groping creature, cast on a sea ofdoubt, rejecting one spar to grasp another, and crying all thetime against the storm, for help. I do not know another man whohas tortured himself so insistently with the problems that areunsolvable. You are firmer in your grasp, and when you getsomething you cling to it and push your way like a practicalperson toward the shore, that shore of solid earth which is NOT,but by the pushing you realize the illusion, or the reality, ofprogress.

Here I am talking loosely of the greatest things, and perhapspedantically; well, we agreed to talk, didn't we, of anything andeverything? You have the birds, the lake, the mountains beyond,the children next door, and the Fairy all our own, and I have mydesk to look at and outside brick blocks and the sky. If I ever dohypnotize myself into any kind of faith, or find contentment inany one thing, it will be the sky. The reason I like the water isbecause it is so much like the sky. There is an amplitude in itthat gives me chance for infinite wanderings. The clouds and thestars are somehow the most companionable of all things that do notwalk and talk.

Well, we have walked a bit together and have come to the edge ofthe field where we look off and see the unending stretch ofprairie and the great dome. …

FRANK

To William R. Wheeler

Washington, August 21, 1916

MY DEAR BILL,—Owing to your departure I have been laid up in bed,ill for a week. You left on Thursday and on Friday night I went tobed … The doctors don't know what I had, excepting that I hadthings with "itis" at the end of them. I have had allopaths,Christian Scientists, osteopaths, and Dockweilers. The latter hasbeen my nurse at night, his chief service being to keep meinterested in the variety of his snoring. I really have had onedamn hell of a time. The whole back and top of my head blew out,and I expected an eruption of lava to flow down my back. The onlyexplanation of it is a combination of air-drafts and a little toomuch work and worry. I am now somewhat weak, but otherwise inpretty good condition …

I have no intention of saying anything in reply to Pinchot. Hewrote me thirty pages to prove that I was a liar, and rather thanread that again I will admit the fact.

My regards to the Lady Alice Isabel. As always affectionatelyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LAKE

To James Harlan

[August, 1916]

MY DEAR JIM,—I am writing you from my bed where I have been laidup for a few days with a hard dose of tonsillitis. Don't know whathappened but the wicked bug got me and I have suffered more thanwas good for my slender soul.

I am so glad to hear of your Mother's improvement. Bless her nobleheart! I hope she lives a long time to give you the inspiration ofthat beautiful smile.

The Mexican business does not hasten as I had hoped. Brandeis'withdrawal was a great surprise to us and I can't quite understandit. Meantime the railroad situation engrosses our attention fully,and Mexico can wait …

Hughes' speeches have been a surprise and disappointment to me …One might fancy a candidate for Congress doing no better but not aman of such record and position. I think your dear old partyrelies upon holding the regular party men out of loyalty andprotection, and buying enough Democrats and crooks to get themajority. But I don't believe it can be done. The Republicanorganization is perfect, but the people are not as gullible asonce they were.

Tell me some more about the Latin-American. How much form should Iput on? Can you warm up to them? How do you get the truth out ofthem? And how do you get them to stay by their word? What are theysuspicious of, silence or volubility? Do they expect you to askfor more than you expect to get? Do they appreciate candor andfair dealing, or must you be crafty and indirect? If they expectthe latter I am not the man for the job, but I can be patient andlisten. My love to the Lady Maud.

FRANK

To Hon. Woodrow Wilson

The White House

Washington, August 28, 1916

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—I have had talks this morning with threemen, all of them Democrats, all of them strongly for you under anycirc*mstances. None of them are related to railroads or to laborunions. Two of them have recently been out of this city andbelieve that they have a knowledge of the feeling of the country.All express the same view and I want to tell it to you in case youwrite a message to Congress.

They say that the people do not grasp the meaning of yourstatement that society has made its judgment in favor of an eight-hour day. This, the people think, is a matter that can bearbitrated. They ask why can't it be arbitrated? They say that thecountry feels that you have lined yourself up with the laborunions irrevocably for an eight-hour day, as against the railroadswho wish to arbitrate the necessity for putting in an eight-hourday immediately, and irrespective of the additional cost to therailroads. They say that the men are attempting to bludgeon therailroads into granting their demand which has not been shown tothe people to be reasonable. This demand is that the men shouldhave ten hours pay for eight hours work or less. They say that ifthis question cannot be arbitrated, the railroads must yield onevery question and that freight rates and passenger rates insteadof going down, as they have for the past twenty years, mustinevitably increasingly go up. They say that the people do notrealize that you have been willing to entertain any propositionmade by the railroads, but that you have stood steadfastly forsomething which the men have demanded.

Now, all of this indicates a lack of knowledge of what yourposition has been. I am giving you the gist of these conversationsbecause they represent a point of view so that if you desire youmay meet such criticism.

You must remember, Mr. President, that the American people havenot had for fifty years a President who was not at this period ina campaign bending all of his power to purely personal andpolitical ends. Your ideality and unselfishness are so rare thatthings need to be made particularly clear to them. Faithfullyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

In the beginning of September Lane was appointed Chairman of the
American-Mexican Joint Commission, the other Americans being Judge
George Gray, of Delaware, and John R. Mott, secretary of the Young
Men's Christian Association. The Mexican members were Luis
Cabrera, Minister of Finance, Alberto Pani, and Ignatio Bonillas,
afterward Ambassador to Washington.

It was the hope of the Administration that this Commission wouldlay the foundation for a better understanding between America andMexico. The Commission started its work in New London, but lateras the hearings dragged on, they went to Atlantic City.

Just before this Commission was named, Lane wrote to his brother,"I have been turned all topsy turvy by the Mexican situation. Ihave suggested to the President the establishment of a commissionto deal with this matter upon a fundamental basis, but Carranza isobsessed with the idea that he is a real god and not a tin god,that he holds thunderbolts in his hands instead of confetti, andhe won't let us help him."

To Alexander Vogelsang

Acting Secretary of the Interior American-Mexican Joint Commission

September 29, 1916

MY DEAR ALECK,—Don't worry about yourself. Don't worry about theoffice. You will be all right, and so will the office. I am notworrying about you because I haven't got time to. I'll take yourjob if you will take mine. The interpreting of a city charter isnothing to the interpreting of the Mexican mind. Dealing withCongress is not so difficult as dealing with Mexican statesmen. Ihave had some jobs in my life, but none in which I was put to itas I am in this. Now I have not only a question as to what to doin the making of a nation, the development of its opportunity, theeducation of its people, the establishment of its finances, andthe opening of its industries in the establishment of itsrelations with other countries, but also the problem as to wherethe men can be found that can carry out the program, once it ismade. If I were only Dictator I could handle the thing, I think,all right. The hardest part of all is to convince a proud andobstinate people that they really need any help.

… Remember me to the noble bunch of fellows who add loyalty topluck, pluck to capacity. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Frederic J. Lane

American-Mexican Joint Commission

September 29, 1916

MY DEAR FRITZ,—I sent you a wire the other night just to let youknow that I was thinking of you. I am now steaming down LongIsland Sound in the midst of a rainstorm and with fog all aroundus, in the Government's boat Sylph. We are on our way to AtlanticCity where the conference will continue, the hotel at New Londonhaving been closed. …

It looks to me at long range as if Johnson would surely carryCalifornia. Whether Wilson will, or not, is a question. I hope toGod he may. Whether I shall get an opportunity to get out andstump for him depends entirely upon this Commission, which isholding me down hard. We are working from ten in the morning tilltwelve at night, and not making as rapid progress as we shouldbecause of the Latin-American temperament. They want to start agovernment afresh down there; that is, go upon the theory thatthere never was any government and that they now know how agovernment should be formed and the kind of laws there should be,disregarding all that is past, and basing their plans upon idealswhich sometimes are very impracticable. They distrust us. Theywill not believe that we do not want to take some of theirterritory.

I despair often, but I take new courage when I think of you, ofthe struggle you are making and the brave way in which you aremaking it. What a superbly glorious thing it would be if you couldmaster the hellish fiend that has attacked you! …

My best love to you, dear Fritz, affectionately yours, F. K. L.

To Frank I. Cobb New York World

American-Mexican Joint Commission Atlantic City, November 11, 1916

MY DEAR COBB,—My very warm, earnest, and enthusiasticcongratulations to you. You made the best editorial campaign thatI have ever known to be made. I would give more for the editorialsupport of the New York World than for that of any two papers thatI know of. The result in California turned, really as the resultin the entire West did, upon the real progressivism of theprogressives. It was not pique because Johnson was not recognized.No man, not Johnson nor Roosevelt, carries the progressives in hispocket. The progressives in the East were Perkins progressives whocould be delivered. THE WEST THINKS FOR ITSELF. Johnson could notdeliver California. Johnson made very strong speeches for Hughes.The West is really progressive. …

Speaking of the election, there are two things I want you to beardistinctly in mind, my dear Mr. Cobb. One is that the states whichthe Interior Department deals with are the states which electedMr. Wilson. … And the second is that we kept the Mexicansituation from blowing up in a most critical part of the campaign,which is also due to the Secretary of the Interior, damn you! Infact, next to you, I think the Secretary of the Interior is themost important part of this whole show! Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To R. M. Fitzgerald American-Mexican Commission

Atlantic City, November 12, 1916

DEAR BOB,—I am very glad to get your telegram. I know that ittook work, judgment, and finesse to bring about the result thatwas obtained in California. What a splendid thing it is to haveour state the pivotal state! The eastern papers are attempting tomake it appear that the state turned toward Wilson because of theslight put upon Johnson by Hughes. These people in the East arenot large enough to understand that the people think forthemselves out West, and are not governed by little personalities,that we don't play "Follow the leader," as they do here. The realfact is that Roosevelt undertook to deliver the progressives andcould not do it in the West. Now we must hold all these forward-looking people in line with us and make the Democratic partyrealize the dream that you and I had of it when we were boys,thirty years ago, and took part in our first campaign. There isroom for only two parties in the United States, the liberal andthe conservative, and ours must be the liberal party. Cordiallyyours,

Franklin K. Lane

To James K. Moffitt

Atlantic City, November 12, 1916

My dear Jim,—It was fine of you to send me that telegram, and Iam not too modest to "allow" as Artemus Ward used to say, as howthe Interior Department is rather stuck up over the result. TheDepartment certainly had not been very popular in the West. …All of us will be taken a bit more seriously now, I guess. I wiredCushing and the others who led in the fight and I am going towrite a note to Benjamin Ide Wheeler, who from the first, be itsaid to his credit, claimed California for Wilson. Wheeler iscertainly a thoroughbred. I wish I could get your way soon and seeyou all, and rejoice with you.

I have just received a telegram from Bryan, reading:—

"Shake. Many thanks. It was great. The West, a stone which thebuilders rejected, has become the head of the corner." Cordiallyyours,

Franklin K. Lane

To Benjamin Ide Wheeler

Atlantic City, November 14,1916

Dear Mr. Wheeler,—I know that you rejoice with all of us. Youwere the first man to tell me that Wilson would carry California,and I never believed it as truly as you did, but I have taken manyoccasions lately to say that you were a true prophet. And speakingof prophets, what a lot have been unmade! Did you see that Iwanted to bet a hat with George Harvey that he could not name fourstates west of the Alleghenies that would go for Hughes? The truthabout the thing, as I see it, is that you can't deliver theWestern man and you can't deliver the true progressive, anyhow.The people of the East are in a far more feudal state than thepeople of the West. Here they live by sufferance, by favor; theyare helpless if they lose their jobs. Out there hope is high intheir hearts and they feel that there is a fair world around them,in which they have another chance. The resentment was strongagainst Roosevelt undertaking to turn over his vote. Of course Iam glad of Johnson's election, as he is a strong, stalwart chap,capable of tremendous things for good. He will probably be apresidential candidate four years from now, and I see no man nowwho can beat him, nor should he be beaten unless we have a gooddeal better material than our run of … rank opportunists.

I am working on a treadmill here. Perhaps by the time you come onin December I will be able to report something accomplished. Butoh! the misery of dealing with people who are eternally suspiciousand have no sense of good faith!

We went with the Millers to the James Roosevelt place up at HydePark on the Hudson, just before election, and had an exquisitetime. I put in four or five days campaigning, and this was the endof my trip. My speeches were all made in New York where I thoughtthey might count, but the organizations were too perfect for us.

President Wilson will leave a mere shadow of a party, unless hetakes an interest in reorganizing it. He has drawn a lot of youngmen to him who should be tied together, as we were in the earlyCleveland days. Of course, we must have a cause, not merely aslogan.

Mrs., Lane is here while I am writing this and she sends her loveto both you and your wife, as do I. As always, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Roland Cotton Smith

Sunday, [January 7? 1917]

MY DEAR DR. SMITH,—I know that you are human enough to likeappreciation and so I am sending you this word,—no more than Ifeel!

Your address of this morning was a bit of real literature. Itproduced the effect you desired without making a bid for it. Itwas as subtle and full of suggestion as Jusserand's book on Franceand the United States. You gave an atmosphere to the old buildingas an institution, which made every one of us feel something moreof ennobling standards and traditions. You touched emotion. Manyan old chap there felt called upon suddenly and apologetically toblow his nose. And the crowning bit of fine sentiment was askingus all to rise, as you read the list of the distinguished ones whohad worshipped there. You have the art of making men better by notpreaching to them. So here is my hand in admiration and ingratitude. Sincerely,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To James H. Barry San Francisco Star

Washington, [January 9, 1917]

MY DEAR JIM,—That card of yours spoke to me so directly andwarmly from the heart, that it revived in my memory all the longyears of our friendship, and made me feel that the world had beengood to me beyond most men, in that it had brought a "few friendsand their affection tried." These are to be trying years—thesenext four—and it will take courage and rare good sense to keepthis old ship on her true path. You have a part and so have I. Wetake our turn at the wheel. May God give us strength andsteadiness!

Please give my greetings to your fine boys, and to all the oldgroup that are still with you, and know that always I hold you indeep affection. Sincerely,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

CABINET TALK AND WAR PLANS

1917

Cabinet Meetings—National Council of Defense—Bernstorff—War—
Plan for Railroad Consolidation—U-Boat Sinkings Revealed—Alaska

To George W. Lane

Washington, February 9,1917

MY DEAR GEORGE,—I am going to write you in confidence some of thetalks we have at the Cabinet and you may keep these letters incase I ever wish to remind myself of what transpired. A week agoyesterday, (February 1st), the word came that Germany was to turn"mad dog" again, and sink all ships going within her war zone.This was the question, of course, taken up at the meeting of theCabinet on February 2nd. The President opened by saying that thisnotice was an "astounding surprise." He had received no intimationof such a reversal of policy. Indeed, Zimmermann, the GermanMinister of Foreign Affairs, had within ten days told Gerard thatsuch a thing was an "impossibility." At this point Lansing saidthat he had good reason to believe that Bernstorff had the notefor fully ten days before delivering it, and had held it offbecause of the President's Peace Message to Congress, which hadmade it seem inadvisable to deliver it then. In answer to aquestion as to which side he wished to see win, the President saidthat he didn't wish to see either side win,—for both had beenequally indifferent to the rights of neutrals—though Germany hadbeen brutal in taking life, and England only in taking property.He would like to see the neutrals unite. I ventured the expressionthat to ask them to do this would be idle, as they could notafford to join with us if it meant the insistence on their rightsto the point of war. He thought we might coordinate the neutralforces, but was persuaded that an effort to do this publicly, ashe proposed, would put some of the small powers in a delicateposition. We talked the world situation over. I spoke of thelikelihood of a German-Russian-Japanese alliance as the naturalthing at the end of the war because they all were nearly in thesame stage of development. He thought the Russian peasant mightsave the world this misfortune. The fact that Russia had been, buta short time since, on the verge of an independent peace withGermany was brought out as evidencing the possibility of a breakon the Allies' side. His conclusion was that nothing should bedone now,—awaiting the "overt act" by Germany, which would takehim to Congress to ask for power.

At the next meeting of the Cabinet on February 6th, the mainquestion discussed was whether we should convoy, or arm, ourmerchant ships. Secretary Baker said that unless we did our shipswould stay in American ports, and thus Germany would have useffectively locked up by her threat. The St. Louis, of theAmerican line, wanted to go out with mail but asked the right toarm and the use of guns and gunners. After a long discussion, thedecision of the President was that we should not convoy becausethat made a double hazard,—this being the report of the Navy,—but that ships should be told that they MIGHT arm, but thatwithout new power from Congress they should not be furnished withguns and gunners.

The President said that he was "passionately" determined not toover-step the slightest punctilio of honor in dealing withGermany, or interned Germans, or the property of Germans. He wouldnot take the interned ships, not even though they were beinggutted of their machinery. He wished an announcement made that allproperty of Germans would be held inviolate, and that internedsailors on merchant ships could enter the United States. If we areto have war we must go in with our hands clean and without anybasis for criticism against us. The fact that before Bernstorffgave the note telling of the new warfare, the ships had beendismantled as to their machinery, was not to move us to any actthat would look like hostility.

February 10

Yesterday we talked of the holding of Gerard as a hostage. Lansingsaid there was no doubt of it. He thought it an act of war initself. But did not know on what theory it was done, except thatGermany was doing what she thought we would do. Germany evidentlywas excited over her sailors here, fearing that they would beinterned, and over her ships, fearing that they would be taken. Isaid that it seemed to be established that Germany meant to dowhat she said she would do, and that we might as well act on thatassumption. The President said that he had always believed this,but thought that there were chances of her modifying her position,and that he could do nothing, in good faith toward Congress,without going before that body. He felt that in a few dayssomething would be done that would make this necessary.

So there you are up to date—in a scrappy way. Now don't tell whatyou know. Ned is flying at Newport News. He sent me a telegramsaying that the President could go as far as he liked, "the bunch"would back him up. Strange how warlike young fellows are,especially if they think that they are preparing for someusefulness in war. That's the militaristic spirit that is bad.Much love to you and Frances. Give me good long letters telling mewhat is in the back of that wise old head.

F. K.

To George W. Lane

February 16, [1917]

MY DEAR GEORGE,—That letter and proposed wire were received andyour spirit is mine—the form of your letter could not be improvedupon—and you are absolutely sound as to policy.

At the last meeting of the Cabinet, we again urged that we shouldconvoy our own ships, but the President said that this was notpossible without going to Congress, and he was not ready to dothat now. The Navy people say that to convoy would be foolishbecause it would make a double target, but it seems to me theright thing to risk a naval ship in the enforcement of our right.

At our dinner to the President last night he said he was not insympathy with any great preparedness—that Europe would be man andmoney poor by the end of the war. I think he is dead wrong inthis, and as I am a member of the National Council of Defense, Iam pushing for everything possible. This week we have had ameeting of the Council every day—the Secretary of War, Navy,Interior, Commerce, and Labor—with an Advisory Commissionconsisting of seven business men. We are developing a plan for themobilization of all our national industries and resources so thatwe may be ready for getting guns, munitions, trucks, supplies,airplanes, and other material things as soon as war comes—IF NOTTOO SOON. It is a great organization of industry and resources. Ithink that I shall urge Hoover as the head of the work. HisBelgian experience has made him the most competent man in thiscountry for such work. He has promised to come to me as one of myassistants but the other work is the larger, and I can get on witha smaller man. He will correlate the industrial life of the nationagainst the day of danger and immediate need. France seems to beahead in this work. The essentials are to commandeer all materialresources of certain kinds (steel, copper, rubber, nickel, etc.);then have ready all drawings, machines, etc., necessary in advancefor all munitions and supplies; and know the plant that canproduce these on a standard basis.

The Army and Navy are so set and stereotyped and stand-pat that Iam almost hopeless as to moving them to do the wise, large,wholesale job. They are governed by red-tape,—worse than anyUnion.

The Chief of Staff fell asleep at our meeting to-day—Mars and
Morpheus in one!

To-day's meeting has resulted in nothing, though in Mexico, Cuba,Costa Rica, and Europe we have trouble. The country is growingtired of delay, and without positive leadership is losing itskeenness of conscience and becoming inured to insult. OurAmbassador in Berlin is held as a hostage for days—our Consuls'wives are stripped naked at the border, our ships are sunk, ourpeople killed—and yet we wait and wait! What for I do not know.Germany is winning by her bluff, for she has our ships interned inour own harbors.

Well, dear boy, I'm not a pacifist as you see. Much love,

FRANK

To George W. Lane

Washington, February 20, [1917]

DEAR GEORGE,—Another Cabinet meeting and no light yet on what ourpolicy will be as to Germany. We evidently are waiting for the"overt act," which I think Germany will not commit. We are all,with the exception of one or two pro-Germans, feeling humiliatedby the situation, but nothing can be done.

McAdoo brought up the matter of shipping being held in our ports.It appears that something more than half of the normal number ofships has gone out since February 1st, and they all seem to begetting over the first scare, because Germany is not doing morethan her former amount of damage.

We were told of intercepted cables to the Wolfe News Agency, inBerlin, in which the American people were represented as beingagainst war under any circ*mstances—sympathizing strongly with aneutrality that would keep all Americans off the seas. Thus doesthe Kaiser learn of American sentiment! No wonder he sizes us upas cowards! …

F. K. L.

To Frank I. Cobb

Washington, February 21, 1917

MY DEAR COBB,—I have told Henry Hall that he should come downhere and give the story of how Bernstorff handled the newspapermen, and thus worked the American people, … He ought to get outof the newspaper men themselves, and he can, the whole atmosphereof the Washington situation since Dernberg left,—Bernstorff'slittle knot of society friends, chiefly women, the dinners thatthey had, his appeals for sympathy, the manner in which he wouldoffset whatever the State Department was attempting to get beforethe American people. He would give away to newspaper men news thathe got from his own government before it got to the StateDepartment. He would give away also the news that he got from theState Department before the State Department itself gave it out,and he had a regular room in which he received these newspapermen, and handed them cigars and so on, and carried on a propagandaagainst the policy of the United States while acting as Ambassadorfor Germany, the like of which nobody has carried on since Genet;and worse than his, because it was carried on secretly andcunningly. …

Hall will be able to get a ripping good story, I am satisfied,—agood two pages on "Modern Diplomacy," which will reveal how long-suffering the United States has been. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To George W. Lane

Washington, February 25, 1917

MY DEAR GEORGE,—On Friday we had one of the most animatedsessions of the Cabinet that I suppose has ever been held underthis or any other President. It all arose out of a very innocentquestion of mine as to whether it was true that the wives ofAmerican Consuls on leaving Germany had been stripped naked, givenan acid bath to detect writing on their flesh, and subjected toother indignities. Lansing answered that it was true. Then I askedHouston about the bread riots in New York, as to whether there wasshortage of food because of car shortage due to vessels not goingout with exports. This led to a discussion of the great problemwhich we all had been afraid to raise—Why shouldn't we send ourships out with guns or convoys? Daniels said we must not convoy—that would be dangerous. (Think of a Secretary of the Navy talkingof danger!) The President said that the country was not willingthat we should take any risks of war. I said that I got no suchsentiment out of the country, but if the country knew that ourConsuls' wives had been treated so outrageously that there wouldbe no question as to the sentiment. This, the President took as asuggestion that we should work up a propaganda of hatred againstGermany. Of course, I said I had no such idea, but that I feltthat in a Democracy the people were entitled to know the facts.McAdoo, Houston, and Redfield joined me. The President turned onthem bitterly, especially on McAdoo, and reproached all of us withappealing to the spirit of the Code Duello. We couldn't get theidea out of his head that we were bent on pushing the country intowar. Houston talked of resigning after the meeting. McAdoo will—within a year, I believe. I tried to smooth them down by recallingour past experiences with the President. We have had to push, andpush, and push, to get him to take any forward step—the TradeCommission, the Tariff Commission. He comes out right but he isslower than a glacier—and things are mighty disagreeable,whenever anything has to be done.

Now he is being abused by the Republicans for being slow, and thiswill probably help a bit, though it may make him more obstinate.He wants no extra session, and the Republicans fear that he willsubmit to anything in the way of indignity or national humiliationwithout "getting back," so they are standing for an extra session.The President believes, I think, that the munitions makers areback of the Republican plan. But I doubt this. They simply want tohave a "say"; and the President wants to be alone and unbothered.He probably would not call Cabinet meetings if Congress adjourned.Then I would go to Honolulu, where the land problem vexes.

I don't know whether the President is an internationalist or apacifist, he seems to be very mildly national—his patriotism iscovered over with a film of philosophic humanitarianism, thatcertainly doesn't make for "punch" at such a time as this.

My love to you old man,—do write me oftener and tell me if youget all my letters.

F. K L.

To George W. Lane

Washington, March 6, [1917]

Well my dear George, the new administration is launched—smoothlybut not on a smooth sea. The old Congress went out in disgrace,talking to death a bill to enable the President to protectAmericans on the seas. The reactionaries and the progressivescombined—Penrose and La Follette joined hands to stop alllegislation, so that the government is without money to carry onits work.

It is unjust to charge the whole thing on the La Follette group;they served to do the trick which the whole Republican machinewished done. For the Penrose, Lodge people would not let any billsthrough and were glad to get La Follette's help. The Democratsfought and died—because there was no "previous question" in theSenate rules.

The weather changed for inauguration—Wilson luck—and the eventwent off without accident. To-day, we had expected a meeting ofthe Cabinet to determine what we should do in the absence oflegislation, but that has gone over,—I expect to give theAttorney General a chance to draft an opinion on the armed shipmatter. I am for prompt action—putting the guns on the ships andconvoying, if necessary. Much love.

K.F.

To Edward J. Wheeler Current Opinion

Washington, March 15, 1917

MY DEAR MY. WHEELER,—I wish that I could be with you to honor Mr.Howells. But who are we, to honor him? Is he not an institution?Is he not the Master? Has he not taught for half a century thatthis new and peculiar man, the American, is worth drawing? Why,for an American not to take off his hat to Howells would be tofail in appreciation of one's self as an object of art—anunlikely, belittling, and soul-destroying sin.

I do not know whether Howells is a great photographer or a greatartist; but this I do know, that I like him because he seesthrough his own eyes, and I like his eyes. If that be treason,make the most of it. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To George W. Lane

Washington, April 1, 1917

MY DEAR GEORGE,—I took your letter and your proposed wire as toour going into war and sent them to the President as suggestionsfor his proposed message which in a couple of days will come out—what it is to be I don't know—excepting in spirit. He is to befor recognizing war and taking hold of the situation in such afashion as will eventually lead to an Allies' victory overGermany. But he goes unwillingly. The Cabinet is at last a unit.We can stand Germany's insolence and murderous policy no longer.Burleson, Gregory, Daniels, and Wilson were the last to come over.

The meetings of the Cabinet lately have been nothing less thancouncils of war. The die is cast—and yet no one has seen themessage. The President hasn't shown us a line. He seems to thinkthat in war the Pacific Coast will not be strongly with him. Theydon't want war to be sure—no one does. But they will not sufferfurther humiliation. I sent West for some telegrams telling of thelocal feeling in different States and all said, "Do as thePresident says." Yet none came back that spoke as if they feltthat we had been outraged or that it was necessary for humanitythat Germany be brought to a Democracy. There is little pride orsense of national dignity in most of our politicians.

The Council of National Defense is getting ready. I yesterdayproposed a resolution, which was adopted, that our contracts forships, ammunition, and supplies be made upon the basis of a threeyears' program. We may win in two years. If we had the nerve toraise five million men at once we could end it in six months,

The first thing is to let Russia and France have money. And thesecond thing, to see that Russia has munitions, of which they areshort—depending largely, too largely, upon Japan. I shouldn't besurprised if we would operate the Russian railroads. And ships,ships! How we do need ships, and there are none in the world.Ships to feed England and to make the Russian machine work.Hindenburg is to turn next toward Petrograd—he is only threehundred miles away now. I fear he will succeed. But that does notmean the conquest of Russia! The lovable, kindly Russians are notto be conquered,—and it makes me rejoice that we are to be withthem.

All sides need aeroplanes—for the war that is perhaps thegreatest of all needs; and there Germany is strongest. Ned will goamong the first. He is flying alone now and is enjoying the risk,—the consciousness of his own skill. Anne is very brave about it.

This is the program as far as we have gone: Navy, to make a lineacross the sea and hunt submarines; Army, one million at once, andas many more as necessary as soon as they can be got ready.Financed by income taxes largely. Men and capital both drafted.

I'm deep in the work. Have just appointed a War-Secretary of myown—an ex-Congressman named Lathrop Brown from New York, who is tosee that we get mines, etc., at work. I wish you were here but theweather would be too much for you, I fear. Very hot right now!

Sometime I'll tell you how we stopped the strike. It was a bigpiece of work that was blanketed by the Supreme Court's decisionnext day. But we came near to having something akin to Civil War.Much love, my dear boy.

F. K. L.

Grosvenor Clarkson, Director of the Council of National Defense,in recording the activities of that body says:—

"It is, of course, well known that Secretary Lane, as a member ofthe Council of National Defense, played a dramatic and successfulpart in the settlement of the threatened great railroad strike ofMarch, 1917. By resolution of the Council of National Defense ofMarch 16, 1917, Secretary Lane and Secretary of Labor Wilson, asmembers of the Council, and Daniel Willard, President of theBaltimore and Ohio Railroad, and Samuel Gompers of the AdvisoryCommission, were designated to represent the government, at themeeting in New York with the representatives of the railroadbrotherhoods and railroad executives—the meeting that stopped thestrike."

TO FRANK I. COBB NEW YORK WORLD

Washington, April 13, 1917

MY DEAR FRANK,—I have your note and am thoroughly in sympathywith it. The great need of France at this moment is to get shipsto carry the supplies across the water. It is a secret, but afact, that France has 600,000 tons of freight in New York andother harbors waiting to ship. I am in favor of taking all theGerman ships under requisition, paying for their use eventually,but this is a matter of months. Immediately, I think we shouldtake all the coastwise ships, or the larger portion of them. TheNavy colliers and Army transports can be put into the business ofcarrying supplies to France.

We are to have a meeting of the Council of National Defense to-day,and I am going to take this matter up. I have been pushing onit for several weeks. As to the purchasing of supplies, I think weought to protect the Allies, especially Russia, but, of course, wecannot touch their present contracts. …

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, April 15, 1917

MY DEAR GEORGE,—I enclose a couple of confidential papers thatwill interest you. The situation is not as happy in Russia as itshould be. The people are so infatuated with their own internalreforms that there is danger of their making a separate peace,which would throw the entire strength of Germany on the westfront, and compel us to go in with millions of men where we hadthought that a few would suffice.

My work on the National Council of Defense lately has been dealingwith many things, chiefly mobilization of our railroads and thesecuring of new shipping. At my suggestion to Mr. Willard hecalled together the leading forty-five railroad presidents of theUnited States, and I addressed them upon the necessity of tyingtogether all of the railroads within one unit and making a singleoperating system of the 250,000 miles. They met the propositionsplendidly and appointed a committee to effect this. It willrequire some sacrifice on the part of the railroads, andconsiderable on the part of the shippers; for free time on carswill have to be cut down, some passenger trains taken off, andequipment allowed to flow freely from one system to the otherunder a single direction, no matter who owns the locomotives orthe cars. I put it up to them as a test of the efficiency ofprivate ownership.

On the shipping side we are not only going about the task ofbuilding a thousand wooden ships, under the direction of Denmanand Goethals, but we are going to take our coastwise shipping off,making the railroads carry this freight, and put all availableships into the trans-Atlantic business. We want, also, to getsome steel ships built. The great trouble with this is theshortage of plates and the shortage of shipyards. In order toeffect this, I expect we will have to postpone the building ofsome of our large dreadnaughts and battle cruisers, which couldnot be in service for three years anyhow. Whether we will succeedin getting the Secretary of the Navy to agree to this is aquestion, but I am going to try.

We, of course, are going to press into service at once the Germanand Austrian ships, such of them as can be repaired and will be ofuse in the freight business, but we will not confiscate them. Wewill deal with them exactly as we will deal with American ships,paying at the end of the war whatever their services were worth.This spirit of fairness is to animate us throughout the war. Ofcourse enemy warships were seized as prizes of war, but there arevery few of these, and of no considerable value. I do not believethey can be of any use.

England is sending over Mr. Balfour with a very high Commission.These gentlemen will arrive here this week, and I expect with themViviani and Joffre, from France. We will have intimate talks withthem and gain the benefit of their experience. I expect Mr.Balfour to make some speeches that will put England in a morefavorable light, and the presence of Joffre will stimulaterecruiting in our Army and Navy. He is the one real figure who hascome out of the war so far.

We are raising seven billions; three billions to go to the Allies,largely for purchases to be made here. Money contributions passunanimously, but there is to be trouble over our war measuresrespecting conscription and the raising of an adequate army. Somepacifists and other pro-Germans are cultivating the idea that nonebut volunteers should be sent to Europe. Some are also sayingGermany can have peace with us if she stops her submarine warfare.I doubt if that line of agitation will be successful beforeCongress. Certainly it will not be successful with the Presidentor the Cabinet. We are now very happily united upon followingevery course that will lead to the quickest and most completevictory.

The greatest impending danger is the drive on the east front intoRussia, possibly the taking of Petrograd, and the weakness on thepart of the Russians because of so large a socialistic element nowin control of Russian affairs. We offered Russia a commission ofrailroad men to look over their railroad systems and advise withthem as to the best means of operating them. At first Russiainclined to welcome such a commission, but later the offer wasdeclined because of local feeling. We intend to send a commissionourselves to Russia, possibly headed by McAdoo or Root, and onthis commission we will have a railroad man with expert knowledgewho can be of some service to them, I hope. The Russian and theFrench governments have ordered hundreds of locomotives and tensof thousands of cars in this country, a large part of which areready for shipment, but which cannot be shipped because of lack ofshipping facilities. Affectionately yours,

F.K.L.

Grosvenor Clarkson, who was first Secretary and then Director ofthe Council of National Defense, writes in February, 1922, thisaccount of the work of the Council:—

"As early as February 12, 1917, or nearly two months before wewent into the war, Secretary Lane presented resolutions at a jointmeeting of the Council of National Defense and its AdvisoryCommission, to the effect that the Council 'Call a series ofconferences with the leading men in each industry, fundamentallynecessary to the defense of the country in the event of war.' Theresolutions also proposed that the Council at once proceed toconfer with those familiar with the manner by which foreigngovernments in the war enlisted their industries and, further,that the Council should establish a committee to investigate andreport upon such regulations as to hours and safety of labor asshould apply to all war labor.

"Secretary Lane's resolution was referred to the AdvisoryCommission, and on February 13, at a joint meeting of the Counciland Commission, the matter was thoroughly discussed. Out of thisresolution grew the famous cooperative committees of the AdvisoryCommission. Here was the inception of the dollar-a-year man.

"This organization, set up by the Advisory Commission, furnishedfor the first eight or ten months of our participation in the war,almost the only thing in the way of a war machine under thegovernment on the civilian or industrial side.

"In the first week of May, 1917, the Council of National Defensecalled to Washington representatives of each state in the Union,to confer with the federal government as to the common prosecutionof the war. The state delegates, consisting of many Governors andin each case of leading citizens of the respective commonwealths,were received by the six Cabinet officers, forming the Council, inthe office of Secretary Baker in April.

"Secretary Lane thought that the most effective way to wake thecountry up out of its dream of security was to tell the truthabout the submarine losses, the country up to that time not havingreally appreciated what the losses amounted to. He said, 'ThePresident is going to address the State representatives at theWhite House, and I am going to urge him to cut loose on thesubmarine losses,' and he asked me to prepare a memorandum for himto give to the President. This I did. The President, however,apparently decided not to go into the subject, and Secretary Lane,with a courage that can only be appreciated by those who knew theatmosphere of official Washington at that time, decided to takethe bull by the horns himself, and at the next meeting with therepresentatives with the Council in Secretary Baker's office,Secretary Lane … cut loose and told the actual truth aboutsubmarine losses at that time. … The next morning it was thestory of the day in the newspapers and it did as much to arousethe country as a whole as to what we were up against as any onething that occurred during this period, save only the President'swar message itself.

"Secretary Lane became chairman of the field division of theCouncil of National Defense toward the end of the war. This wasthe body that guided and coordinated the work of the 184,000 unitsof the state, county, community, and municipal Councils ofDefense, and of those of the Woman's Committee of the Council—nodoubt the greatest organization of the kind that the world hasever known."

To George W. Lane

Washington, May 3, 1917

These are great days. Their significance will not be realized formany years. We are forming a close union with France and England.The most impressive sight I have ever seen was that atWashington's tomb last Sunday. We went down on the Mayflower—theFrench and the English commissions and the members of the Cabinet.Viviani and Balfour spoke. Joffre laid a bronze palm uponWashington's tomb, then stood up in his soldierly way and stood atsalute for a minute, Balfour laid a wreath of lilies upon thetomb, and leaned over as if in prayer. Above the tomb, for thefirst time, flew the flag of another country than our own, theStars and Stripes, and on either side, the British Jack and theFrench Tricolor. This is a combination of the Democracies of theworld against feudalism and autocracy.

I heard a story from one of Joffre's aides. Joffre, by the way, isthe quietest, sweetest, most naive, and babylike individual I evermet. All of the women, as well as the men, are in love with him.When he met Nancy, at a garden party, he kissed her on bothcheeks. Nancy, as you may imagine, was ecstatically delighted.This simple, grave, kindly soldier sat in his room while theGermans came marching upon Paris, saying nothing. Every fewminutes an aide would come in and move the French markers backupon the map, and the German markers forward, toward Paris. Dayafter day he saw this advance, but said nothing. At last when theycame to the valley of the Marne, an aide came in and marked themap, showing that the Germans were within thirty miles of Paris.Then Joffre quietly said, "This thing has gone far enough," andtaking up a pad of paper he called to his troops to stand fast anddie upon the Marne, if necessary, to save France. There is nothingfiner than this in history.

Joffre has a skin like a baby. He has the utmost frankness andsimplicity of speech. When McAdoo asked him at the White House ifthe present drive was satisfactory, he said in the most innocentway, "I am not there." Viviani, who is the head of the FrenchCommission, is as jealous as a prima donna, terribly jealous ofJoffre, (which makes Joffre feel most uncomfortable) because, ofcourse, Joffre is the hero of the Marne.

I spoke at the Belasco Theatre the other day for the benefit ofthe French war relief fund, introducing Ambassador Herrick and thelecturer, a young Frenchman. Joffre and Viviani were in a box.Every mention of the name of Joffre brought the people to theirfeet. Yesterday I spoke again at a meeting of the State Councilsof Defense and I enclose you what the New York Post had to say.

Last night I dined with Balfour. I have seen quite a little ofhim. He is sixty-nine years old and stands about six feet two. Heis a perfect type of the aristocratic Englishman, with a charmingsmile. His real heart is in the study of philosophy. Anne sat nextto him at dinner and he told her that he believed in a personalGod, personal identity after death, and answer to prayer, which isa remarkable statement of faith for one who has lived through ourscientific age. I think at bottom he is a mystic.

On all sides they are frank in telling of their distress. We didnot come in a minute too soon. England and France, I believe, weregone if we had not come in. It delights me to see how muchsympathy there is with England as well as with France. The Irishalone seem to be unreconciled with England as our ally.

Ned got your letter, and I suppose in time will answer it, I hadthe question put to me by Baker yesterday as to whether I wishedhim to go to the other side, and I had to say frankly that I did.It was to me the most momentous decision that I have made in thewar. He has passed his final test, and I hope that he will get hiscommission in a few days.

To-night we give a dinner to the Canadians, Sir George Foster, the
acting Premier, and Sir Joseph Polk, the Under Secretary of
External Affairs, who, by the way, was born in Charlottetown,
Prince Edward Island, and says he heard our father preach.

The country's crops are going to be short, I fear, and we have hadlittle rain. Ships and grain—these are the two things that wemust get. Ships, to carry our grain and our locomotives and rails,and grain to keep the fighters alive. The U-boats are destroyingtwice as much as the producing tonnage of the world. We need everybushel that California can produce. With much love, affectionatelyyours,

F.K.L.

To Frank I. Cobb New York World

Washington, May 5, 1917

MY DEAR COBB,—I had a long talk with Hoover yesterday. He tellsme that the U-boat situation is really worse than I stated it.There is no question but that the actual sinkings amounted to morethan 300,000 tons in a week, and if we add those put out ofbusiness by mines, they will exceed 400,000 tons. The French areabsolutely desperate. One of the French ministers told Hoover thatthey had fixed on the first of November as their last day, if theUnited States had not come in. Admiral Chocheprat told me, withtears in his eyes, three nights ago, that they felt themselveshelpless. They were absolutely at the mercy of the submarinesbecause of their lack of destroyers, and they had feared we werepreparing to defend our own shores rather than fight across thewater. I know that the latter has been the policy of the heads ofthe Navy Department.

Do not, I beg of you, minimize the immediate danger. This is thetime to defend the United States; and the United States iswoefully indifferent to its dangers and to the needs of thesituation. We have been carrying on a ship-building program withreference to conditions after the war. It is only within ten daysthat we have realized that the end of the war will be one ofdefeat unless we build twice as fast as we proposed to build. Youknow that I am not pessimistic. It is not my habit to look uponthe gloomy side of things. It is no kindness to the Americanpeople or to France or England to give them words of good cheernow. This war is right at this minute a challenge to everyparticle of brains and inventive skill that we have got.

Please treat this as entirely confidential. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

May 8

The only dissension in the Council is over the use that will bemade of Hoover. Houston, I think, is rather making a mistake,though it may work out all right. I hope it will.

Don't "bat" us; we are a nervous lot right now. …

"Lane was among the first to grasp the bigness of the danger tothe allied cause," James S. Harlan says, "in Germany's underwaterattack on the merchant marine of the world. He also realized themagnitude of the task of frustrating the new peril and the need ofprompt measures to save the situation. Lane had no anxieties orhesitations in his personal contact with big men; but he had agenuine fear of small men when big things were doing. And so inthis great emergency he naturally thought of Schwab. How well Irecall the fine force and vigor in his expression when, risingfrom his chair and standing with clenched fist pointed at me, hesaid in substance:—'The President ought to send for Schwab andhand him a treasury warrant for a billion dollars and set him towork building ships, with no government inspectors or supervisorsor accountants or auditors or other red tape to bother him. Letthe President just put it up to Schwab's patriotism and put Schwabon his honor. Nothing more is needed. Schwab will do the job.'

"This was a full year before Schwab was called down to Washingtonto talk over the question of building ships."

To Will Irwin Paris, France

Washington, July 21, 1917

MY DEAR WILL,—I have just received your letter. Thank you verymuch for what you say of my speech. I am doing my damndest to keepthings going here but it is awfully hard work, because the minutemy head raises above the water some neighboring ship plugs it.

I think you are dead right in staying with the Post. The feelinghere is that we are not getting real facts regarding thedesperateness of the U-boat situation. We need to be told facts inorder to have our minds challenged. We are not cowards, and I hopeyou will give us realistic pictures of just what is happening ifyou can. …

My boy is the youngest lieutenant in the Army—nine-teen. He goesnext week to Illinois as an instructor in aviation, and I supposein a little while when he gets the machines, he will be crossingover.

With warm affection, my dear Will. Always yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Robert Lansing Secretary of State

Beverly, Massachusetts. [August, 1917]

MY DEAR LANSING,—I had lunch yesterday with Colonel House whoasked me what I thought should be done as to the Pope's appeal forpeace. I told him I thought it should be taken seriously. Heagreed and asked what the President should say. I answered that,inasmuch as all the evidence pointed to the conclusion that theGerman Centerists and Austria were responsible for this appeal,that we could not afford to have them feel that we were for apolicy of annihilation,—for this would be playing the WarParty's game and would place the burden on us of continuing thewar. And this we could neither afford [to do] at home or abroad.This opportunity should be seized, I said, to make plain not somuch our terms of peace as the things in Germany that seemed tomake peace difficult,—Germany's attitude toward the world, thespirit against which we are fighting. That we wished peace; thatwe had been patient to the limit; that we had come in in the hopethat we could destroy the idea in the German mind that it couldimpose its authority and system, by force, upon an unwillingworld; that we were not opposed to talking peace, provided, at theoutset, and as a SINE QUA NON, the Central Powers would assumethat Government by the Soldier was not a possibility in the 20thcentury.

The Colonel said that he had written the President to this sameeffect. That he had written you, or not, he did not say. So I amtelling you the Colonel's view for your own benefit. He thoughtthat the Allies would strongly insist upon concerted action,putting aside the Pope's appeal, and that this had to be resisted,for we should play our own game. I find all I meet here strong forthe war, but of course I only meet the high-spirited. There ismuch feeling that we are going about it too mechanically, with toolittle emotion and passion. … As always,

LANE

Toward the middle of August, Lane started for Mount Desert toinspect the proposed National Park created there through thepublic-spirited devotion of George B. Dorr. This northern trip wastaken to decide whether he would accept, as Secretary of theInterior, this addition to the National Parks. Two years later inwriting to Senator Myers, Chairman of the Committee on PublicLands, of this National Park, the only one east of theMississippi, Lane said, "The name Lafayette is substituted forthat of Mount Desert, the name proposed by the former bill, and Iconsider it singularly appropriate that the name of Lafayetteshould be commemorated by these splendid mountains facing on thesea, on what was once a corner of Old France, and with it theearly friendship of the two nations which are so closely allied inthe present war."

[Illustration with caption: Franklin K. Lane and George B. Dorr in
Lafayette National Park, Mount Desert Island, Maine]

To Henry Lane Eno Bar Harbori, Maine

Washington, Saturday, [September 2, 1917]

There are not many weeks in a man's life of which he can say thatone was without a flaw, that it could not have been improved uponin company, comfort, or surroundings. And all these things, mydear Mr. Eno, I can affirm of the days spent with you. I have abetter opinion of my fellows and of my country because of them.Perhaps, after all, that is as complete a test as any other. As Ilook back I think of but one thing that gives occasion for regret—we had too few good, mind-stretching talks, you, Dorr, andmyself. But those we had were certainly not about affairs of smallconcern. We indulged ourselves as social philosophers,psychologists, war-makers, and international statesmen. The worldwas ours, and more—the worlds beyond. To do things worth while byday, and to dream things worth while by night, and to believe thatboth are worth while, that is the perfect life. If one can't getto Heaven by following that course, then are we lost.

I am sending a line to Dorr, noble, unselfish, high-spirited,broad-minded gentleman that he is. … Sincerely and heartilyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To George Dorr, Bar Harbor, Maine

Washington, [September 2,1917]

MY DEAR MR. DORR,—You do not know what good you did my tiredpolitics-soaked soul by showing me, under such happy conditions,the beauties and the possibilities of your island. And I came toknow two men at least, whose heads and hearts were working for aless pudgy and flat-footed world. … To have enthusiasm is tobeat the Devil. So I have you down in my Saints' book.

You know a man in politics is always looking about for some placeto which he can retire when the whirligig brings in another groupof more popular patriots. Now I can frankly say that if I couldhave an extended term of exile on your island with you and yourfriends, I would feel reconciled to banishment from politics forlife, provided however (I must say this for conscience' sake) thatwe had time and money to make the Park what it should be—ademonstration school for the American to show how much he can addto the beauty of Nature.

A wilderness, no matter how impressive and beautiful, does notsatisfy this soul of mine, (if I have that kind of thing). It is achallenge to man. It says, "Master me! Put me to use! Make mesomething more than I am." So what you have done in the Park—theSpring House and the Arts Building, the cliff trails and theopened woods, show how much may be added by the love and thoughtof man. May the Gods be good to you, the God of Mammonimmediately, that your dreams may come true, and that you may giveto others the pleasure you gave to yours sincerely,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HON. WOODROW WILSON THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, September 21, 1917

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—It will interest you to know that theCommission which I sent up this year to Alaska to look into theAlaskan Railroad matters has just returned. The engineer on thisCommission was Mr. Wendt, who was formerly Chief Engineer of thePittsburg and Lake Erie Railroad, and who is now in charge of theappraisal of eastern roads under the Interstate CommerceCommission. He tells me that our Alaskan road could not have beenbuilt for less money if handled by a private concern; that he hasnever seen any railroad camps where the men were provided with asgood food and where there was such care taken of their health.They have had no smallpox and but one case of typhoid fever. Noliquor is allowed on the line of the road. The road in hisjudgment has followed the best possible location. Our hospitalsare well run. The compensation plan adopted for injuries issatisfactory to the men.

I have directed that all possible speed be made in connecting theMatanuska coal fields with Seward. This involves the heaviestconstruction that we will have to undertake, which is alongTurnagain Ann, but by the middle of next year, no strikesintervening, and transportation for supplies being available, thispart of the work should be done. Faithfully and cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

In Lane's Annual REPORT OF THE SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR, datedNovember 20, 1919, he writes of the Alaskan railroad enterprise:—"One of the first recommendations made by me in my report of sevenyears ago was that the Government build a railroad from Seward toFairbanks in Alaska. Five years ago you intrusted to me thedirection of this work. The road is now more than two-thirds builtand Congress at this session after exhaustively examining into thework has authorized an additional appropriation sufficient for itscompletion. The showing made before Congress was that the road hadbeen built without graft; every dollar has gone into actual workor material. It has been built without giving profits to any largecontractors, for it has been constructed entirely by smallcontractors or by day's labor. It has been built without touch ofpolitics; every man on the road has been chosen exclusively forability and experience."

This memorandum touching the early history of Alaska was found in
Lane's files.

MANUSCRIPT NOTE

Washington, December 29, 1911

Last night I dined with Charles Henry Butler, reporter for theSupreme Court and a son of William Alien Butler, for so long aleader of the New York bar.

In the course of the evening Mr. Charles Glover, President of theRiggs National Bank, told me this bit of history. That when he wasa boy, in the bank one day Mr. Cochran came to him and handed himtwo warrants upon the United States Treasury, one for $1,400,000.and the other for $5,800,000. He said, "Put those in the safe."Mr. Glover did so, and they remained there for a week, when theywere sent to New York. Mr., Glover said "These warrants were thepayment of Russia for the Territory of Alaska. Why were there twowarrants? I never knew until some years later, when I learned thestory from Senator Dawes, who said that prior to the war, therehad been some negotiations between the United States and Russiafor the purchase of Alaska, and the price of $1,400,000. wasagreed upon. In fact this was the amount that Russia asked forthis great territory, which was regarded as nothing more than abarren field of ice.

"During the war the matter lay dormant. We had more territory thanwe could take care of. When England, however, began to manifesther friendly disposition toward the Confederacy, and we learnedfrom Europe that England and France were carrying on negotiationsfor the recognition of the Southern States, and possibly of somemanifestation by their fleets against the blockade which we hadinstituted, (and which they claimed was not effective and merely apaper blockade), we looked about for a friend, and Russia was theonly European country upon whose friendship we could rely.Thereupon Secretary Seward secured from Russia a demonstration, inAmerican ports, of Russian friendship. Her ships of war sailed toboth of our coasts, the Atlantic and Pacific, with theunderstanding that the expense of this demonstration should be metby the United States, out of the contingent fund. It was to be asecret matter. "The war came to a close, and immediatelythereafter Lincoln was assassinated and the administrationchanged. It was no longer possible to pay for this demonstration,secretly, under the excuse of war, but a way was found for payingRussia through the purchase of Alaska. The warrant for $1,400,000.was the warrant for the purchase of Alaska, the warrant for$5,800,000. was for Russia's expenses in her naval demonstrationin our behalf, but history only knows the fact that the UnitedStates paid $7,200,000. for this territory, which is nowdemonstrated to be one of the richest portions of the earth inmineral deposits."

TO HON. WOODROW WILSON

THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, November 3, 1917

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—On April 7, 1917, the Council of NationalDefense adopted a report, submitted by the Chairman of theExecutive Committee on Labor of the Advisory Commission of theCouncil, urging that no change in existing standards be madeduring the war, by either employers or employees, except with theapproval of the Council of National Defense. …

The next step for producing efficiency must be no strikes.

The annual convention of the American Federation of Labor,consisting of international unions, will be held at Buffalo onNovember 12th. I would urge that about thirty executives of theunions, which more directly control essential war production, beinvited to confer with you prior to that date, to determine on apolicy which will prevent the constant interruption of productionfor war purposes. The Commissioners of Conciliation of theDepartment of Labor and the President's Commission have awonderful record of accomplishments for settling strikes afterthey have occurred. Organized labor should give the Government theopportunity to adjust controversies before strikes occur.

At this conference it could safely be made plain that for the war,employers would agree not to object to the peaceable extension oftrade unionism; that they would make no efforts to "open" a"closed shop"; that they would submit all controversies concerningstandards, including wages and lockouts, to any official body onwhich they have equal representation with labor, and would abideby its decisions; that they would adhere strictly to health andsafety laws, and laws concerning woman and child labor; that theywould not lower prices now in force for piece work, except byGovernment direction; that if a union in a "closed" shop after duenotice was unable to furnish sufficient workers, any non-unionemployees taken on would be the first to be dismissed on thecontraction of business, and the shop restored to its previous"closed" status; that the only barrier in the way of steadyproduction is the unwillingness of the unions to uphold theproposition of settlement before a strike, instead of after astrike.

The imminence of this convention seems to me to make some stepnecessary at this time. I would take the matter up with SecretaryWilson were he here, and have sent a copy of this letter to him.You undoubtedly can put an end to this most serious situation bycalling on the international labor leaders to take a stand thatwill not be so radical as that taken in England, and yet willinsure to the men good wages and good conditions, and make surethat our industry will not be paralyzed. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO J. O'H. COSGRAVE NEW YORK WORLD

Washington, December 21, 1917

MY DEAR JACK,—My spirit does not permit me to give you aninterview on the moral benefits of the war. This would be sheercamouflage. Of course, we will get some good out of it, and wewill learn some efficiency—if that is a moral benefit—and apurer sense of nationalism. But the war will degrade us. That isthe plain fact, make sheer brutes out of us, because we will haveto descend to the methods that the Germans employ.

So you must go somewhere else for your uplift stuff. Cordiallyyours,

FRANKLIN E. LANE

CABINET NOTES IN WAR-TIME

1918

Notes on Cabinet Meetings—School Gardens—A Democracy Lacks
Foresight—Use of National Resources—Washington in War-time—The
Sacrifice of War—Farms for Soldiers

NOTES ON CABINET MEETINGS

FOUND IN LANE'S FILES

February 25, 1918

As I entered the building this morning Dr. Parsons [Footnote: Ofthe Department of the Interior, Bureau of Mines.] met me. I askedhow the cyanide plant was getting on. His reply was to ask if hemight request the War Department to allow us to make the contract—that he could have the whole thing done in two days. This iswhere we are at the end of more than six months of effort. It ishopeless! We find the process, everything!—but cannot get thecontract, through the intricate, infinite fault-findings andnegligence of the War Department.

Manning [Footnote: Of the Department of the Interior, Bureau ofMines.] came to see me to say that he expected, after the Overmanbill was passed, that the President would take over the gas work—order it into the War Department. He had been asked twice if hecould be tempted by a uniform into that Department, and had saidthat he was freer as a civilian,—had planned the work andgathered the force as a civilian, and would not leave theDepartment. He felt damned sore and indignant, that a work so welldone should be the subject of envy, and possibly be made lesseffective and useful. …

Everit Macy lunched with me and told me the sad story of themishandling of labor affairs by the Shipping Board. He had gone tothe Pacific Coast and with his colleagues, Coolidge and others,made an agreement with the shipbuilding trades. Five dollars andtwenty-five cents for machinists, etc. In Seattle, however,because of one firm's bidding for labor, he felt that there wouldhave to come a strike before this schedule would be accepted.Before he got back the threatened strike came, and then the demandof the men for a ten per cent bonus was acceded to, upsetting allother settlements in San Francisco, Portland, Los Angeles, etc.Result, ten per cent gain everywhere. And now the Eastern andSouthern men ask the Pacific scale, and he can't see how it can beavoided, nor can I. They will have to standardize all wages.

Poor chap, his advice was scorned, for he protested against thebonus being given to Seattle, and as he said, "If it had not beenwar-time I would have resigned." To increase the men in the South,to this unprecedented scale, will not get more ships, he fears,but less, for they will not work if they have wages in four days,equal to seven days' needs. I advised for standardization. He saidthe Navy wouldn't hear of it, as it would demoralize their yards.…

Politics, politics, curse of the country! It has gotten into thewhole war program. Hoover and McAdoo are at swords drawn. Hooverhad a cable signed by the three Premiers, George, Clemenceau, andOrlando, crying for wheat and charging us with not keeping ourword—and starvation threatening all three countries—in fact,almost sure, because we have not been able to get the wheat to theships; and with starvation will come revolution, if it gets badenough. … I asked Hoover about this on Sunday night, … and hesaid that a list of eight hundred cars had been on McAdoo's deskFOR A WEEK. …

(McChord said on the bench [Footnote: The Interstate CommerceCommission.] to-day that he thought Hoover seventy-five per centright.)

March 1, [1918]

Yesterday, at Cabinet meeting, we had the first real talk on the
war in weeks, yes, in months! Burleson brought up the matter of
Russia, … would we support Japan in taking Siberia, or even
Vladivostock? Should we join Japan actively—in force?

The President said "No," for the very practical reason that we hadno ships. We had difficulty in providing for our men in France andfor our Allies, (the President never uses this word, saying thatwe are not "allies"). How hopeless it would be to carry everythingseven or eight thousand miles—not only men and munitions, butfood!—for Japan has none to spare, and none we could eat. Her menfeed on rice and smoked fish, and she raises nothing we wouldwant. Nor could the country support us. So there was an end oftalking of an American force in Siberia! Yes, we were needed—perhaps as a guarantee of good faith on Japan's part that shewould not go too far, nor stay too long. But we would not do it.And besides, Russia would not like it, therefore we must keephands off and let Japan take the blame and the responsibility.

The question is not simple, for Russia will say that we threw herto Japan, and possibly she would rush into Germany's arms as thelesser of evils. My single word of caution was to so act thatRussia, when she "came back," should not hate us, for there wasour new land for development—Siberia—and we should have frontplace at that table, if we did not let our fears and our hatredand our contempt get away with us now.

Daniels whispered to-day that Russia had five fast cruisers in theBaltic, which could raid the Atlantic and put our ships off thesea. He had wired Sims to see if they couldn't be sunk. I hopeit is not too late; surely England must have done something on soimportant a matter, though she is slow in thinking. And how isanyone to get there with the Baltic full of submarines and mines!The thought is horrible, the possibilities! We certainly have madea bad fist of things Russian from the start. They have deserted usbecause they were trying to drive the cart ahead of the horse,economical revolution before political revolution, socialism aheadof liberty with law. And they know we are capitalistic, because wedo not approve of socialism by force.

March 12, (1918)

Nothing talked of at Cabinet that would interest a nation, afamily, or a child. No talk of the war. No talk of Russia orJapan. Talk by McAdoo about some bills in Congress, by thePresident about giving the veterans of the Spanish war leave, withpay, to attend their annual encampment. And he treated thisseriously as if it were a matter of first importance! No word fromBaker nor mention of his mission or his doings. …

TO FRANKLIN K. LANE, JR.

SOMEWHERE IN FRANCE

Washington, February 15, 1918

MY DEAR BOY,—… We are anxiously awaiting some word tellingwhere you are, what you are doing, and how you got on in yourtrip. I thought your cablegram was a model of condensation, quitelike that of Caesar, "Veni, vidi, vici." …

Sergeant Empey has just left the office with a letter to theSecretary of War, asking that he be given a commission. He hasbeen lecturing among the cantonments and wants to get back toFrance. … He says that the boys in the cantonments are anxious togo across, and that they are beginning to criticise us becausethey do not have their chance. But they will all get there soonenough for them. Our national problem is to get ships to carrythem, and to carry the food for the Allies. … We have undertakento supply a certain amount of food to the other side, and ourcontract, so far, has not been fulfilled. During December andJanuary, however, this was, of course, due to railroad conditions.

You are a long way off, but you must not visualize the distance.Nothing so breaks the spirit as to dwell upon unfortunate facts.Some one day or another you had to leave the nest, and this isyour day for flying. Wherever you are, with people whose languageyou understand only imperfectly, with a civilization that issomewhat strange, and under conditions that often-times will betrying, don't adopt the usual attitude of the American in aforeign country and wonder "why the damn fools don't speakEnglish." No doubt some of the French will pity you because ofyour delinquency in their language.

Another thing that differentiates us from other people is ourlavishness in expenditure, and in what appears to us to be their"nearness." … From these same thrifty French have come greatthings. They have always been great soldiers; they have led theworld in the arts, especially in poetry, painting and fiction—perhaps, too, I should add architecture. So that men who arecareful of their pennies are not necessarily small in their minds.…

I have less doubt, however, of your ability to get on with theFrenchman than I have with the Englishman. … You will havedifficulty—at least I should—in understanding the rather heavy,sober, non-humorous Englishman. … He is always a self-importantgentleman who regards England as having spoken pretty much thelast word in all things, and who will abuse his own country, hiscountrymen, and institutions, frankly and with abandon, but willallow no one else this liberty. He is not a "quitter" though, andhe has done his bit through the centuries for the making of theworld.

… See as many people as you can, present all your letters,accept invitations. Remember that while you are there and we missyou, we are not spending our time in moping. Every night we go todinner and we chatter with the rest of the magpies, as if theworld were free from suffering. Last night I talked withPaderewski for an hour on the sorrows of Poland, and it was onelong tale of horror. …

To-day the Russians are calling their people back to arms to stopthe oncoming Germans. Foolish, foolish idealists who believed thatthey could establish what they call an economic democracy, withoutbeing willing to support their ideal in modern fashion by force.The best of things can not live unless they are fought for, andwhile I do not think that their socialism was the best ofanything, it was their dream. … With much love, my dear boy,your DAD

To George W. Lane February 16, 1918

MY DEAR GEORGE,—… Things are going much better with the WarDepartment. My expectation is that this war will resolve itselfinto three things, in this order:—ships for food, aeroplanes, bigguns. We must, as you know, do all that we can to keep up themorale of our own people. There is a considerable percentage ofpacifists, and of the weak-hearted ones, who would like to have apeace now upon any terms, but the treatment that Russia isreceiving, after she had thrown down her arms, indicates what maybe expected by any nation that quits now.

… The prospects for democratization of Germany is not as good asit was a year ago, when we came in, because of their success inarms due to Russia's debacle. The people will not overthrow agovernment which is successful, nor will they be inclined todesert a system which adds to Germany's glory. It is a fight, along fight, a fight of tremendous sacrifice, that we are in for. Isaid a year ago that it would be two years. Then I thought thatRussia would put up some kind of front. Now I say two years fromthis time and possibly a great deal longer. Lord Northcliffethinks four or six or eight years.

Ned writes me that things are very gloomy and glum in England andin Ireland, where he has been. He was out in an air raid, inseveral of them, in London, not up in the air, but from the groundcould see no trace of the airships that were dropping bombs on thetown. The Germans seem to have discovered some way by which theycan tell where they are without being able to see the lights ofthe city, for now they have bombarded Paris when it was protected,on a dark night, by a blanket of fog, and London also under thesame conditions. The compass is not much good, the deviations areso great. It may be that the clever Huns have found some way ofpiloting themselves surely. We are starting two campaigns throughthe Bureau of Education which may interest you. One is for schoolgardens. To have the children organized, each one to plant agarden. The plan is to raise vegetables which will save thingsthat can be sent over to the armies, and also give the children asense of being in the war. Another thing we are trying to do iseducate the foreign born and the native born who cannot read orwrite English. If you are interested in either of these two thingswe will send you literature, and you can name your own district,and we will put you at work. …

Well, my dear fellow, I long very much for the sun and thesweetness of California these days, but I could not enjoy myselfif I were there, because I am at such tension that I must be doingevery day. Do write me often, even though I do not answer.Affectionately yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ALBERT SHAW

REVIEW OF REVIEWS

Washington, March 7, 1918

MY DEAR DR. SHAW,—I have your letter of March 4th. The thing thata democracy is short on is foresight. We do not have enough menlike the General Staff in Germany who can think ten and twentyyears ahead. We are too much embedded and incrusted in the thingsthat flow around us during the day, and think too little of thefuture.

For five, long, weary years, I have been agitating for the use ofthe water powers of the United States. We estimate the unusedpower in tens and tens of millions of horse-power. Right in NewYork you have in the Erie Canal 150,000 horse-power, and on theNiagara river you have probably a million unused. If you had agreat dam across the river below the rapids we should have waterpower in chains, like fire horses in their stalls, that could bebrought out at the time of need. But we are thinking in largefigures these days, and while we used to be afraid to ask for afew hundred thousand dollars we now talk in millions, and some daywe may realize that to put the cost of a week's war into powerplants in the United States would be money well invested. …

We have no law under which private capital feels justified ininvesting a dollar in a water power plant where public lands areinvolved, because the permit granted is revokable at the pleasureof the Secretary of the Interior, and capital does not enjoy theprospect of making its future returns dependent upon the gooddigestion of the Secretary. But if we get this bill, which Ienclose, through, we will be able to handle the powers on allstreams on the public lands and forests and on all navigablewaters, and give assurance to capital that it will be well takencare of if it makes the investment. …

I am greatly pleased at the kind things you say about me. Thelonger I am in office the more of an appetite I have for suchfood. Hoover [Footnote: Hoover at this time was FoodAdministrator.] can only commit one fatal mistake—to declare ataflfyless day. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Edward J. Wheeler on February 1, 1917, he had written:—

"It is an outrage that we should have a total of nearly sixmillion acres of land withdrawn for oil, three million forphosphates, and one million for water power sites, potash, etc.,and allow session after session of Congress to pass withoutproducing any legislation that will sensibly open these reservesto development. The extreme conservationists, who are really forholding the lands indefinitely in the Federal Government andunopened, and the extreme anti-conservationists, who are forturning all the public lands over to the States, have stood foryears against a rational system of national development."

Although a great part of the energy of the Department of theInterior was, of necessity, diverted to forward war enterprisesand to supply war necessities—chemical, metallurgical,statistical—Lane steadily pressed forward the conduct of thenormal activities of the department. In his report for the year1918, he briefly summarizes this work,—"The distribution, survey,and classification of our national lands; the care of the Indianwards of the Nation, their education, and the development of theirvast estate; the carrying forward of our reclamation projects; theawarding and issuance of patents to inventors; the construction ofthe Alaskan railroad and the supervision of the Territorialaffairs of Alaska and Hawaii; the payment of pensions to Army andNavy veterans and their dependents; the promotion of education;the custody and management of the national parks; the conservationof the lives of those who work in mines, and the study andguidance of the mining and metallurgical industries."

To Walter H. Page

Washington, March 16, 1918

My dear Mr. Ambassador,—I am the poorest of all livingcorrespondents, in fact, I am a dead correspondent. I do notfunction. If it had not been so I would long since have answeredyour notes, which have been in my basket, but I have had no timefor any personal correspondence, much as I delight in it, for Ihave a very old-fashioned love for writing from day to day whatpops into my mind, contradicting each day what I said the daybefore, and gathering from my friends their impressions and theirspirit the same way. For the first time in three months I haveleisure enough … to acknowledge a few of the accumulatedpersonal letters.

Let me give you a glimpse of my day, just to compare it with yourown and by way of contrasting life in two different spheres and ondifferent sides of the ocean. I get to my office at nine in themorning and my day is broken up into fifteen-minute periods,during which I see either my own people or others. I really writenone of my own letters, [Footnote: This referred to routineletters.] simply telling my secretaries whether the answer shouldbe "yes" or "no." I lunch at my own desk and generally with mywife, who has charge of our war work in the Department. We haveover thirteen hundred men who have gone out of this Departmentinto the Army. … My day is broken into by Cabinet meeting twicea week, meeting of the Council of National Defense twice a week,and latterly with long sessions every afternoon over the questionof what railroad wages should be.

My office is a sort of place of last resort for those who arediscouraged elsewhere, for Washington is no longer a city of setroutine and fixed habit. It is at last the center of the nation.New York is no longer even the financial center. The newspapersare edited from here. Society centers here. All the industrialchiefs of the nation spend most of their time here. It is easierto find a great cattle king or automobile manufacturer or arailroad president or a banker at the Shoreham or the WillardHotel than it is to find him in his own town. The surprising thingis that these great men who have made our country do not loom solarge when brought to Washington and put to work. … Every day Ifind some man of many millions who has been here for months andwhose movements used to be a matter of newspaper notoriety, but Idid not know, even, that he was here. I leave my office at seveno'clock, not having been out of it during the day except for aCabinet or Council meeting, take a wink of sleep, change myclothes and go to a dinner, for this, as you will remember, is theone form of entertainment that Washington has permitted itself inthe war. The dinners are Hooverized,—three courses, little or nowheat, little or no meat, little or no sugar, a few serve wine.And round the table will always be found men in foreign uniforms,or some missionary from some great power who comes begging forboats or food. These dinners used to be places of great gossip,and chiefly anti-administration gossip, but the spirit of thepeople is one of unequaled loyalty. The Republicans are as glad tohave Wilson as their President as are the Democrats, I thinksometimes a little more glad, because many of the Democrats aredisgruntled over patronage or something else. The women areferocious in their hunt for spies, and their criticism is againstwhat they think is indifference to this danger. Boys appear atthese dinners in the great houses, because of their uniforms, whowould never have been permitted even to come to the front door inother days, for all are potential heroes. Every woman carries herknitting, and it is seldom that you hear a croaker even among themost luxurious class. Well, the dinner is over by half past ten,and I go home to an hour and a half's work, which has been sentfrom the office, and fall at last into a more or less troubledsleep. This is the daily round.

I have not been to New York since the war began. I made one tripacross the continent speaking for the Liberty Loan, day and night.And this life is pretty much the life of all of us here. ThePresident keeps up his spirits by going to the theatre three orfour times a week. There are no official functions at the WhiteHouse, and everybody's teeth are set. The Allies need not doubtour resolution. England and France will break before we will, andI do not doubt their steadfast purpose. It is, as you said longago, their fault that this war has come, for they did not realizethe kind of an enemy they had, either in spirit, purpose, orstrength. But we will increasingly strengthen that western gate sothat the Huns will not break through.

We do things fast here, but I never realized before how slow weare in getting started. It takes a long time for us to get a newstride. I did not think that this was true industrially. I haveknown that it was true politically for a long time, because thiswas the most backward and most conservative of all thedemocracies. We take up new machinery of government so slowly. Butindustrially it is also true. When told to change step we shiftand stumble and halt and hesitate and go through all kinds ofawkward misses. This has been true as to ships and aeroplanes andguns, big and little, and uniforms. Whatever the government hasdone itself has been tied by endless red tape. It is hard for anarmy officer to get out of the desk habit, and caution,conservatism, sureness, seem even in time of crisis to be moreimportant than a bit of daring. In my Department, I figure that ittakes about seven years for the nerve of initiative and the nerveof imagination to atrophy, and so, perhaps, it is in otherdepartments. It took five months for one of our war bureaus to getout a contract for a building that we were to build for them.Fifteen men had to sign the contract. And of course we have beenimpatient. But things are bettering every day. The men in thecamps are very impatient to get away. But where are the ships todo all the work? The Republicans cannot chide us with all of theunpreparedness, for they stood in the way of our getting shipsthree years ago. The gods have been against us in the way ofweather so we have not brought down our supplies to the seaboard,but we have not had the ships to take away that which was there;or coal, sometimes, for the ships.

From now, however, you will see a steadier, surer movement of men,munitions, food, and ships. The whole country is solidly, stronglywith the President. There are men in Congress bitterly against himbut they do not dare to raise their voices, because he has thepeople so resolutely with him. The Russian overthrow has been agood thing for us in one way. It will cost us perhaps a millionlives, but it will prove to us the value of law and order. We areto have our troubles, and must change our system of life in thenext few years.

A great oil man was in the office the other day and told me in aplain, matter-of-fact way, what must be done to win—thesacrifices that must be made—and he ended by saying, "After all,what is property?" This is a very pregnant question. It is notbeing asked in Russia alone. Who has the right to anything? Myanswer is, not the man, necessarily, who has it, but the man whocan use it to good purpose. The way to find the latter man is thedifficulty.

We will have national woman suffrage, national prohibition,continuing inheritance tax, continuing income tax, national lifeinsurance, an increasing grip upon the railroads, their financesand their operation as well as their rates. Each primary resource,such as land and coal and iron and copper and oil, we will morecarefully conserve. There will be no longer the opportunity forthe individual along these lines that there has been. Industrymust find some way of profit-sharing or it will be nationalized.These things, however, must be regarded as incidents now; and thelabor people, those with vision and in authority, are very willingto postpone the day of accounting until we know what the new orderis to be like.

Well, I have rambled on, giving you a general look—in on my mind.Don't let any of those people doubt the President, or doubt theAmerican people. This is the very darkest day that we have seen.But we believe in ourselves and we believe in our own kind, andbelieve in a something, not ourselves, that makes forrighteousness,—slowly, stumblingly, but, as the centuries go,surely.

I have not yet seen the Archbishop of York. He has not been here.But he has made a most favorable impression where he has been, andso have the English labor people.

Poor Spring-Rice did good work here. Washington felt very sad overhis death, and is expecting that England will evidence herappreciation of the fact that he did nothing to estrange us by theway in which his widow is treated.

Reading has been received and fits in perfectly. With warmregards, as always, Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John Lyon Machine Gun Company Camp McClennen, Alabama

Washington, March 15,1918

MY DEAR JOHN,—I know how you must feel. Every particle of my ownnature rebels against the horror of this war, or of any war, andagainst the dragooning by military men. I had rather die now andtake my chances of Hell, than doom myself and Ned and those whoare to come after, to living under a government which is as thisgovernment is now and as all governments must be now,—autocratic,governed by orders and commands. But this is the game, and we havegot to play it, play it hard and play it through. Manifestly wecannot quit as Russia did without getting Russia's ill-fortune.There was a great empire of a hundred and eighty million people.They mobilized twenty-five million men. Six million of them aredead. The Czar was overthrown, a new government was set up, one ofconservative socialism, and that was swept aside and a group ofimpractical socialists put in its stead, and where is Russia now?Broken to bits, its population dying of hunger, its industriesunworked, its soil untilled, and Germany coming on with her greatfeet, stamping down the few who are brave enough to interposethemselves between Germany and her end. If we were to quit,Germany would do to us, or try to do to us, what she has done toRussia.

If there ever was a real defensive war it is the one that we areengaged in, and we must sacrifice, and sacrifice, and sacrifice,not merely for the world's sake but for our own sake. Ned is inFrance. He went through England. He tells me that everybody isserious, solemn, purposeful. They would rather all die than liveunder Germany's mastery of the world.

The President is being bitterly criticized because he has takenevery opportunity to talk of terms and of ways out, but I think heis right. He must make the people of the world feel that we arenot foolishly, and in a headstrong way, fighting to get anythingfor ourselves or for anybody else, except the chance to live ourown lives. And we will show these Germans something. Our capacityto produce aeroplanes is still altogether unrealized, and we willhave great guns a few feet apart along the entire front. We canbomb German harbors where submarines are, and are made—that'sthe work that Ned is going in for,—and we will hold that westernline until every resource is exhausted. And we will go through itone of these days, perhaps not this year. But we must go throughit or else American ships will live on the sea by consent ofGermany, and Canada will become German territory. This is nodream. Give Germany Paris and Calais and she can exact terms fromEngland. Why should she not ask for Canada? And give GermanyCanada and what becomes of the United States? An army of Germanson our border, 5,000,000 men in arms in the United States always,the army and navy budget taking thirty or forty per cent of everyman's income. Who wants to live in such a country? We are fightingthe greatest war that history has ever seen, not merely in numbersbut in principle. We are fighting to get rid of the most hatefulsurvivals from the past. The overlord, the brusque and arrogantsoldier, is the dominating factor in society and the government,the turning of men's thoughts away from the pursuit of the thingsof art and beauty and social beneficence into the one channel ofmaking everything serve the military arm of the nation.

This will be a better world for the poor man when all is over. Wemust forget our dreams, what our own individual lives would havebeen, and with dash, and cheer, and courage, and willingness tomake the ultimate sacrifice, set our jaws and go forward. Thedevil is in the saddle and we must pull him down, or else he willrule the world,—and you are to have a tug at his coat. And I envyyou. I'd take your place in a minute, if I could. Remember thatyou are an individualist, not a collectivist naturally, butindividuals are of no use now. The war can be made only by greatgroups who conform. The free spirit of man will have its way oncemore when this bloody war is done.

I am glad you wrote me, and I want you to feel that you always canwrite me, whatever is in your heart, and I will give you suchanswer as my busy days will permit. There is only one way to lookat life and get any satisfaction out of it, and that is to bow tothe inevitable. We all must be fatalists to that extent, and oncea course has been determined upon, accept it and make the best ofit. The life of the old gambler does not consist in holding a bighand but in playing a poor hand well. You and I are no longermasters of our own fortunes. All that we can do is to abide by theset rules of the game that is being played. I would change manythings, but I am powerless, and because I am powerless I must sayto myself each day, "All that God demands of me is that I shall domy best," and doing that, the responsibility is cast upon thatSpirit which is the Great Commander. I like to feel at these timesthat there is a personal God and a personal devil, and there hasbeen no better philosophy devised than that. God is not supreme,He is not omnipotent, He has His limitations, His struggles, Hisdefeats, but there is no life unless you believe that Heultimately must win, that this world is going upward, notdownward, that the devil is to be beaten,—the devil inside ofourselves, the devil of wilfulness, of waywardness, of cynicism,and the devil that is represented by the overbearing, cruelmilitarism and ruthless inhumanity of Germany. You are a soldierof the Lord, just as truly as Christ was.

I send you my affectionate regards, and with it goes theconfidence that you will, with good cheer and resolution, playyour part. Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

This boy died in France. Lane wrote to his father of him:—

To Frank Lyon

Washington, [November 16, 1918]

DEAR FRANK,—Have just heard. Dear, dear Boy! I was so fond ofhim. He had a brave adventurous spirit. Well, he has gone outgloriously. There could be no finer way to go and no better time.

I know your own strength will be equal to this test—and thewife, poor woman, she too is brave. My heart goes out to you bothvery really, wholly. With much affection.

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Miss Genevieve King

Washington, March 16, 1918

MY DEAR MISS KING,—These are times of terrible strain and stress,and we cannot easily fall back upon those sources of power whichseem so distant and unavailing. I like to think of you as in ourlast talk in the Millers' drawing room, where you had a muchbetter opportunity to express yourself than in the one that welater had out on the porch. You then seemed to live your thoughtand to have the capacity for its expression. I think of you, too,up on that beautiful mountainside, where things like war and gunsand bandages and hospitals and men without arms and the lack ofships, the need for saying goodbye, are so remote.

We still keep up a semblance of social life by going to dinnersevery night. It is the one relief I have, and yet each time I go Ifeel ashamed at what appears like a waste of time, and yet I knowis not, and the waste of good food which is needed by others somuch more than by us. Still the people have come down to a strictand modest diet with surprising firmness. There is little evidenceof what you would call luxury or extravagance, excepting in theway a few people live. The place is filled with soldiers of manycolors, breeds, and uniforms.

… Anne is busy every day at her work, and I see little of anyonewho does not come to me on business. The country seems stronglywith the President, and while his spirits are not gay, his purposeis high and his determination is strong. We will do better, andincreasingly better, as time goes on, I believe. With warmregards, as always sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Lane was a member of the Executive Council of the Red Cross, withwhom his wife was working during the war. He characterized itssymbol as,—"The one flag which binds all nations is that whichspeaks of suffering and healing, losses and hopes, a past ofcourage and a future of peace—the flag of the Red Cross."

To John McNaught

Washington, March 16, 1918

MY DEAR JOHN,—It is only now after a month's delay, that I havean opportunity even to acknowledge your letter of the 17th ofFebruary.

… The whole war situation seems to be so big that it overwhelmsthe minds of men. … But we are grinding on and going surely inthe right way. Not everything has been done that could be done,but we are getting our step. This thing will be longer than wethought. But as the President says, it is our job—our job is cutout for us, and we are going to see it through. Russia has taughtus what happens to a nation that is not self-respecting. We arehard at work, every one of us, big and little. The nation neverwas as united, and while we do not realize just what war is, yetwe will realize it more from day to day and harder will our fibregrow.

My boy is in France. He hopes to fly an aeroplane over a Germansubmarine base, and drop a ton of dynamite on it and put it out ofbusiness.

How the world has changed since we dreamed together in the CosmosClub! How Paris has changed since we wandered through itsboulevards together! The day of the common man is at hand. Ourdanger will be in going too fast, and by going too fast doinjustice to him. But your kind of socialism and mine is to haveits fling.

I was much pleased to meet your wife, very much indeed, and I hopewe may see you here one of these days. With my affectionateregards, sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

On May 31, 1918, Lane sent a long letter to President Wilson inrelation to his plan for providing farms, from the public domain,for the returning soldiers. The letter is given at some length,because this plan was so dear to Lane's heart, and was one uponwhich he had put much earnest study. In addition to the phases ofthe subject printed here, he gave, in his signed letter toPresident Wilson, detailed consideration to several other aspectsof the matter; such as, a comparison of his plan with land-tenurein Denmark, Ireland, New Zealand, and Australia; the need for anextension of the method whereby land can be "developed in largeareas, sub-divided into individual farms, then sold to actual bonafide farmers on long-time payment basis"; and also the part Alaskashould be made to play in affording agricultural opportunity toour returned soldiers.

To Hon. Woodrow Wilson The White House

Washington, May 31, 1918

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—I believe the time has come when we shouldgive thought to the preparations of plans for providingopportunity for our soldiers returning from the war. Because thisDepartment has handled similar problems I consider it my duty tobring this matter to the attention of yourself and Congress. …

To the great number of returning soldiers, land will offer thegreat and fundamental opportunity. The experience of wars pointsout the lesson that our service men, because of army life with itsopenness and activity, will largely seek out-of-doors vocationsand occupations. This fact is accepted by the allied Europeannations. That is why their programs and policies of re-locatingand readjustment emphasize the opportunities on the land for thereturning soldier. The question then is, "What land can be madeavailable for farm homes for our soldiers?"

We do not have the bountiful public domain of the sixties andseventies. In a literal sense, for the use of it on a generousscale for soldier farm homes as in the sixties, "the public domainis gone." The official figures at the end of the fiscal year, June30, 1917, show this: We have unappropriated land in thecontinental United States to the amount of 230,657,755 acres. Itis safe to say that not one-half of this land will ever prove tobe cultivable in any sense. So we have no lands in any waycomparable to that in the public domain when Appomattox came—andmen turned westward with army rifle and "roll blanket," to beginlife anew.

While we do not have that matchless public domain of '65, we dohave millions of acres of undeveloped lands that can be madeavailable for our home-coming soldiers. We have arid lands in theWest, cut-over lands in the Northwest, Lake States, and South, andalso swamp lands in the Middle West and South, which can be madeavailable through the proper development. Much of this land can bemade suitable for farm homes if properly handled. But it willrequire that each type of land be dealt with in its own particularfashion. The arid land will require water; the cut-over land willrequire clearing; and the swamp land must be drained. Without anyof these aids, they remain largely "No Man's Land." The solutionof these problems is no new thing. In the admirable achievement ofthe Reclamation Service in reclamation and drainage we haveabundant proof of what can be done.

Looking toward the construction of additional projects, I am gladto say that plans and investigations have been under way for sometime. A survey and study has been in the course of consummation bythe Reclamation Service on the Great Colorado Basin. That greatproject, I believe, will appeal to the new spirit of America. Itwould mean the conquest of an empire in the Southwest. It isbelieved that more than three millions of acres of arid land couldbe reclaimed by the completion of the Upper and Lower ColoradoBasin projects. …

What amount of land, in its natural state unfit for farm homes,can be made suitable for cultivation by drainage, only thoroughsurveys and studies can develop. We know that authentic figuresshow that more than fifteen million acres have been reclaimed forprofitable farming, most of which lies in the Mississippi RiverValley.

The amount of cut-over lands in the United States, of course, itis impossible even in approximation to estimate. … A roughestimate of their number is about two hundred million acres—thatis of land suitable for agricultural development. Substantiallyall this cut-over or logged-off land is in private ownership. Thefailure of this land to be developed is largely due to inadequatemethod of approach. Unless a new policy of development is workedout in cooperation between the Federal Government, the States, andthe individual owners, a greater part of it will remain unsettledand uncultivated. …

Any plan for the development of land for the returned soldier,will come face to face with the fact that a new policy will haveto meet the new conditions. The era of free or cheap land in theUnited States has passed. We must meet the new conditions ofdeveloping lands in advance—security must to a degree displacespeculation. …

This is an immediate duty. It will be too late to plan for thesethings when the war is over. Our thought now should be given tothe problem. And I therefore desire to bring to your mind thewisdom of immediately supplying the Interior Department with asufficient fund with which to make the necessary surveys andstudies. We should know by the time the war ends, not merely howmuch arid land can be irrigated, nor how much swamp landreclaimed, nor where the grazing land is and how many cattle itwill support, nor how much cut-over land can be cleared, but weshould know with definiteness where it is practicable to begin newirrigation projects, what the character of the land is, what thenature of the improvements needed will be, and what the cost willbe. We should know also, not in a general way, but withparticularity, what definite areas of swamp land may be reclaimed,how they can be drained, what the cost of the drainage will be,what crops they will raise. We should have in mind specific areasof grazing lands, with a knowledge of the cattle which are bestadapted to them, and the practicability of supporting a familyupon them. So, too, with our cut-over lands. We should know whatit would cost to pull or "blow-out" stumps and to put the landsinto condition for a farm home.

And all this should be done upon a definite planning basis. Weshould think as carefully of each one of these projects as GeorgeWashington thought of the planning of the City of Washington, Weshould know what it will cost to buy these lands if they are inprivate hands. In short, at the conclusion of the war the UnitedStates should be able to say to its returned soldiers, "If youwish to go upon a farm, here are a variety of farms of which youmay take your pick, which the Government has prepared against thetime of your returning." I do not mean by this to carry theimplication that we should do any other work now than the work ofplanning. A very small sum of money put into the hands of men ofthought, experience, and vision, will give us a program which willmake us feel entirely confident that we are not to be submerged,industrially or otherwise, by labor which we will not be able toabsorb, or that we would be in a condition where we would show alack of respect for those who return as heroes, but who will bewithout means of immediate self-support.

A million or two dollars, if appropriated now, will put this workwell under way.

This plan does not contemplate anything like charity to thesoldier. He is not to be given a bounty. He is not to be made tofeel that he is a dependent. On the contrary, he is to continue,in a sense, in the service of the Government. Instead ofdestroying our enemies he is to develop our resources.

The work that is to be done, other than the planning, should bedone by the soldier himself. The dam or the irrigation projectshould be built by him, the canals, the ditches, the breaking ofthe land, and the building of the houses, should, under properdirection, be his occupation. He should be allowed to make his ownhome, cared for while he is doing it, and given an interest in theland for which he can pay through a long period of years, perhapsthirty or forty years. This same policy can be carried out as tothe other classes of lands. So that the soldier on his returnwould have an opportunity to make a home for himself, to build ahome with money which we would advance and which he would repay,and for the repayment we would have an abundant security. Thefarms should not be turned over as the prairies were—unbroken,unfenced, without accommodations for men and animals. There shouldbe prepared homes, all of which can be constructed by the menthemselves, and paid for by them, under a system of simpledevising by which modern methods of finance will be applied totheir needs.

As I have indicated, this is not a mere Utopian vision. It is,with slight variations, a policy which other countries arepursuing successfully. The plan is simple. I will undertake topresent to the Congress definite projects for the development ofthis country through the use of the returned soldier, by which theUnited States, lending its credit, may increase its resources andits population and the happiness of its people, with a cost toitself of no more than the few hundred thousand dollars that itwill take to study this problem through competent men. This workshould not be postponed. Cordially and faithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

The bill, incorporating this plan, was rejected by a Congressunwilling to accept any solution of any part of the after-warproblem, if the plan came from the Wilson Administration.

In 1918, Colonel Mears, who had been Chief Engineer and later
Chairman of the Alaskan Commission, in charge of the construction
of the Alaskan railroad, went, with many others, to the front, and
Lane was obliged to find new men to carry on the Alaskan work.

To Allan Pollok

Washington, July 17, 1918

You certainly can have more time, because I want you, and it isnot on my own account altogether, because I feel sure you willdelight in the kind of creative job that it is. I found thatScotchmen had made Hawaii, and I would like to see some of thatsame stuff go into Alaska. You see we have a fine bunch of menthere, practical fellows of experience, but not one of them loomslarge as a business man or as a creator. I would personally liketo spend a few years of my life just dreaming dreams about whatcould be done in that huge territory, and if I only got by withone out of five hundred, I would leave a real dent in the historyof the territory.

That coal must be brought out of Alaska for the Navy, if the Navyis going to use any coal, and we ought to be able to send a greatmany thousands of Americans, as stock raisers and farmers, intoAlaska after this war. The climate is just as good as that ofMontana, and in some places much better. Of course it is not aswivel-chair job. It is a challenge to everything that a fellowhas in him of ambition, courage, imagination, enterprise, andtact, and if we can possibly get that road completed by the end ofthe war, and know that we have another national domain there forsettlement, it would help out mightily on the returning soldierproblem. You and I cannot fight and that is our bad luck. We wereborn about thirty years too early but I have a notion that we canmake Alaska do her bit through that railroad. … If you want agreat mining expert to go in with you I can get one. … Come oninto the game.

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To E. S. Pillsbury

Washington, July 30, 1918

MY DEAR MR. PILLSBURY,— … In these radical times when thingsare changing so quickly it does not do to be too conservative orthings will go altogether to the bad. …

Pragmatic tests must be applied strictly and the way to beat wild-eyed schemes is to show that they are impracticable, and toharness our people to the land. Every man in an industry ought tobe tied up in some way by profit-sharing or stock-owningarrangements, and we should get as large a proportion of ourpeople on small farms as possible. If this is not done we aregoing to have a reign of lawlessness.

When a sense of property goes, it becomes more and more apparentto me, that all other conserving and conservative tendencies go,and the man who has something is the man who will save thiscountry. So it is necessary that just as many have something aspossible. … The one thing which the Bolsheviki do not understandis that the economic world is not divided between capital andlabor, but that there is a great class unrepresented in these twodivisions—the managing class which furnishes brains anddirection, tact and vision, and no socialistic scheme provides forthe selection and reward of these men … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To William Marion Reedy Reedy's Mirror

Washington, September 13, 1918

MY DEAR MR. REEDY,—In the first place … as to the coalagreement, when coal was more than six dollars a ton and climbing,and it was nobody's business to reduce the price, I made an appealto the coal operators to fix voluntarily a maximum price of one-half of what they were then getting. This they did, with theunderstanding that it would stand only until the Government fixedthe price, if it chose to do so later. The price was three dollarsin the East, and two dollars and seventy-five cents in the West,and there is not a coal mine in the country to-day, underGovernment operation, that is producing coal for as little as thatprice, which the operators themselves upon my appeal, fixed …

Some day or another we will meet, … and I am inclined to believethat you will think me less of a reactionary than a radical. I amagainst a standardized world, an ordered, Prussianized world. I amfor a world in which personal initiative is kept alive and atwork. There are a lot of people here who believe that you can dothings by orders, which I know from my knowledge of the human andthe American spirit can much more effectively be done by appeal.

Everything goes happily here these days, because we are winningthe war, and the future of the world will soon be in the hands ofa man who not so long ago was a school teacher. A great worldthis, isn't it? And the greatest romance is not even the fact thatWoodrow Wilson is its master, but the advance of the Czecho-Slavsacross five thousand miles of Russian Asia,—an army on foreignterritory, without a government, holding not a foot of land, whoare recognized as a nation! This stirs my imagination as I thinknothing in the war has, since Albert of Belgium stood fast atLiege. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Notes on Cabinet Meetings Found in Lane's Files

October 23, 1918

Yesterday we had a Cabinet Meeting. All were present. ThePresident was manifestly disturbed. For some weeks we have spentour time at Cabinet meetings largely in telling stories. Even atthe meeting of a week ago, the day on which the President sent hisreply to Germany—his second Note of the Peace Series—we weregiven no view of the Note which was already in Lansing's hands andwas emitted at four o'clock; and had no talk upon it, other thansome outline given offhand by the President to one of the Cabinetwho referred to it before the meeting; and for three-quarters ofan hour told stories on the war, and took up small departmentalaffairs.

This was the Note which gave greatest joy to the people of any yetwritten, because it was virile and vibrant with determination toput militarism out of the world. As he sat down at the table thePresident said that Senator Ashurst had been to see him torepresent the bewildered state of mind existing in the Senate.They were afraid that he would take Germany's words at their facevalue.

"I said to the Senator," said the President, "do they think I am adamned fool?" … Yet Senator Kellogg says that Ashurst told theSenators that the President talked most pacifically, as ifinclined to peace, and that Ashurst was "afraid that he wouldcommit the country to peace," so afraid that he wanted all thepressure possible brought to bear on the President by otherSenators. At any rate, the Note when it came had no pacificism init, and the President gained the unanimous approval of the countryand the Allies.

But all this was a week ago. Germany came back with an acceptanceof the President's terms—a superficial acceptance at least—hencethe appeal to the Cabinet yesterday. This was his opening, "I donot know what to do. I must ask your advice. I may have made amistake in not properly safe-guarding what I said before. What doyou think should be done?"

This general query was followed by a long silence, which I brokeby saying that Germany would do anything he said.

"What should I say?" he asked.

"That we would not treat until Germany was across the Rhine."

This he thought impossible.

Then others took a hand. Wilson said the Allies should beconsulted. Houston thought there was no real reform insideGermany. McAdoo made a long talk favoring an armistice on termsfixed by the military authorities. Strangely enough, Burleson, whohad voted against all our stiff action over the Lusitania and haspleaded for the Germans steadily, was most belligerent in histalk. He was ferocious—so much so that I thought he was trying tomake the President react against any stiff Note—for he knows thePresident well, and knows that any kind of strong blood-thirstytalk drives him into the cellar of pacifism. …

One of the things McAdoo said was that we could not financiallysustain the war for two years. He was for an armistice that wouldcompel Germany to keep the peace, military superiority recognizedby Germany, with Foch, Haig, and Pershing right on top of them allthe time. Secretary Wilson came back with his suggestion that theAllies be consulted. Then Baker wrote a couple of pages outliningthe form of such a Note suggesting an armistice. I said that thisshould be sent to our "partners" in the war, without giving it tothe world, that we were in a confidential relation to France andEngland, that they were in danger of troubles at home, possiblerevolution, and if the President, with his prestige, were to askpublicly an armistice which they would not think wise to grant, orwhich couldn't be granted, the sending of such a message into theworld would be coercing them. The President said that they neededto be coerced, that they were getting to a point where they werereaching out for more than they should have in justice. I pointedout the position in which the President would be if he proposed anarmistice which they (the Allies) would not grant. He said thatthis would be left to their military men, and they wouldpractically decide the outcome of the war by the terms of thearmistice, which might include leaving all heavy guns behind, andputting, Metz, Strasburg, etc., in the hands of the Allies, untilpeace was declared.

I suggested that Germany might not know what the President's termswere as to Courland, etc., that this was not "invaded territory."He replied that they evidently did, as they now were consideringmethods of getting out of the Brest-Litovsk treaty. He said he wasafraid of Bolshevism in Europe, and the Kaiser was needed to keepit down—to keep some order. He really seemed alarmed that thetime would come soon when there would be no possibility of savingGermany from the Germans. This was a new note to me.

He asked Secretary Wilson if the press really represented thesentiment of the country as to unconditional surrender. Wilsonsaid it did. He said that the press was brutal in demanding allkinds of punishment for the Germans, including the hanging of theKaiser. At the end of the meeting, which lasted nearly two hours,he asked to be relieved of Departmental matters as he was unableto think longer. I wrote a summary of the position he took, andread it after Cabinet meeting to Houston and Wilson, who agreed.It follows:—

If they (the Allies) ask you (the President), "Are you satisfiedthat we can get terms that will be satisfactory to us withoutunconditional surrender?"

You will answer, "Yes—through the terms of the Armistice."

"By an armistice can you make sure that all the fourteenpropositions will be effectively sustained, so that militarism andimperialism will end?"

"Yes, because we will be masters of the situation and will remainin a position of supremacy until Germany puts into effect thefourteen propositions."

"Will that be a lasting peace?"

"It will do everything that can be done without crushing Germanyand wiping her out—everything except to gratify revenge."

November 1, 1918

At last week's Cabinet we talked of Austria—again we talked likea Cabinet. The President said that he did not know to whom toreply, as things were breaking up so completely. There was noAustria-Hungary. Secretary Wilson suggested that, of course, theirarmy was still under control of the Empire, and that the answerwould have to go to it.

Theoretically, the President said, German-Austria should go toGermany, as all were of one language and one race, but this wouldmean the establishment of a great central Roman-Catholic nationwhich would be under control of the Papacy, and would beparticularly objectionable to Italy. I said that such anarrangement would mean a Germany on two seas, and would leave theGermans victors after all. The President read despatches fromEurope on the situation in Germany—the first received in manymonths.

Nothing was said of politics—although things are at a white heatover the President's appeal to the country to elect a DemocraticCongress. He made a mistake. … My notion was, and I told him soat a meeting three or four weeks ago, that the country would givehim a vote of confidence because it wanted to strengthen his hand.But Burleson said that the party wanted a leader with GUTS—thiswas his word and it was a challenge to his (the President's)virility, that was at once manifest.

The country thinks that the President lowered himself by hisletter, calling for a partisan victory at this time. … But helikes the idea of personal party-leadership—Cabinetresponsibility is still in his mind. Colonel House's book, PhilipDru, favors it, and all that book has said should be, comes aboutslowly, even woman suffrage. The President comes to Philip Dru inthe end. And yet they say that House has no power. …

Election Day. November 5, [1918]

At Cabinet some one asked if Germany would accept armistice terms.
The President said he thought so. …

The President spoke of the Bolsheviki having decided upon arevolution in Germany, Hungary, and Switzerland, and that they hadten million dollars ready in Switzerland, besides more money inSwedish banks held by the Jews from Russia, ready for the campaignof propaganda. He read a despatch from the French minister inBerne, to Jusserand, telling of this conspiracy. Houston suggestedthe advisability of stopping it by seizing the money and interningthe agitators. After some discussion, the President directedLansing to ask the Governments in Switzerland and Sweden to getthe men and money, and hold them, and then to notify the Allies ofwhat we had done and suggest that they do likewise. Lansingsuggested a joint Note, but the President vetoed this idea,wanting us to take the initiative. He spoke of always having beensympathetic with Japan in her war with Russia, and thought thatthe latter would have to work out her own salvation. But he was infavor of sending food to France, Belgium, Italy, Serbia, Roumania,and Bulgaria just as soon as possible; and the need was great,also in Austria.

He said that the terms had been agreed upon, but he did not saywhat they were—further than to say that the Council at Versailleshad agreed to his fourteen points, with two reservations:—(1) asto the meaning of the freedom of the seas, (2) as to the meaningof the restoration of Belgium and France. This word he haddirected Lansing to give to the Swiss minister for Germany—and tonotify Germany also that Foch would talk the terms of armistice.… He is certainly in splendid humor and in good trim—notworried a bit. And why should he be, for the world is at his feet,eating out of his hand! No Caesar ever had such a triumph! …

November 6, 1918

Yesterday we had an election. I had expected we would win becausethe President had made a personal appeal for a vote of confidence,and all other members of the Cabinet had followed suit, exceptBaker who said he wanted to keep the Army out of politics. ThePresident thought it was necessary to make such an appeal. Heliked the idea of personal leadership, and he has received a slapin the face—for both Houses are in the balance. This is theculmination of the policy Burleson urged when he got the Presidentto sign a telegram which he (Burleson) had written opposingRepresentative Slayden, his personal enemy, from San Antonio, and,in effect, nominating Burleson's brother-in-law for Congress. Weheard of it by the President bringing it up at Cabinet. Burlesonworked it through Tumulty. The President said that he did not knowwhether to write other letters of a similar nature as to Vardaman,Hardwick, ET AL. I advised against it, saying that the voters hadsense enough to take care of these people. Burleson said, "Thepeople like a leader with guts." The word struck the President'sfancy and although Lansing, Houston, and Wilson also protested, inas strong a manner as any one ever does protest, the letters wereissued. … Even before the Slayden letter was one endorsingDavies, in Wisconsin, as against Lenroot. … Then came the letterto the people of the whole country, reflecting upon theRepublicans, saying that they were in great part pro-war but notpro-administration.

November 11, 1918

On Sunday I heard that Germany was flying the red flag, andpostponed my promised visit to the Governors of the South, to beheld at Savannah. At eleven yesterday word came that the Presidentwould speak to Congress at one, and that he would have noobjection if the Departments closed to give opportunity forrejoicings. I went to a meeting of the Council of National Defenceand spoke, welcoming the members. It was a meeting called byBaruch to plan reconstruction—but the President had notified himon Saturday that he could not talk or have talking on thatsubject. So all I could do was to give a word of greeting to menwho are bound to be disappointed at being called for nothing.

The President's speech was, as always, a splendidly done bit ofwork. He rose to the occasion fully and it was the greatestpossible occasion. … Lansing says that they (he and thePresident) had the terms of Armistice before election—terms quiteas drastic as unconditional surrender.

TO DANIEL WILLARD PRESIDENT, BALTIMORE AND OHIO RAILROAD

Washington, November 7, 1918

DEAR MR. WILLARD,—I am extremely sorry to receive word that youare leaving us, but of course you are going into a sphere ofaction much larger than the one you are in here, and we must yieldyou with every grace, no matter how unwillingly. You will be gonefrom us only a short time, I trust, and then I shall have theopportunity of seeing more of you and continuing a friendshipwhich has been of very real value to me.

All that you say about the Advisory Commission is true, and more.If the history of the Council of National Defence and of theAdvisory Commission is ever written it will be seen that yougentlemen, who gave your time and experience freely, gave thefirst real impulse to war preparation, and we missed out onlybecause we did not have more authority to vest in you. I am veryproud of the first six months of the Council's work and of theCommission's work.

I received your letter telling me of the death of your son anddaughter-in-law, and I did not have the heart to write you anotherline. The mystery and the ordering of this world grow altogetherinexplicable when the affections are wrenched. It requires farmore religion or philosophy than I have, to say a real word thatmight console one who has lost those who are dear to him. Tenyears ago my mother died, and I have never become reconciled toher loss. This is a wrong state of mind, and I hope that you aresustained by that unfaltering trust of which Bryant spoke.Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To James H. Hawley

Washington, November 9, 1918

MY DEAR GOVERNOR,—… To my great surprise we have lost bothHouses. We felt sure that we would carry both, and did notappreciate the extent to which the Republicans would beconsolidated by the President's letter, which, from what I hearwas one of the inducing causes of the result; although not by anymeans the only one, for the feeling in the North and West wasstrong that the South in some way was being preferred. I am freshfrom a talk with Senator Phelan who, to my surprise, tells me thatthese were the factors in the New England States from which he hasjust come. …

The Wilson administration may be judged by the great things thatit has done—the unparallelled things—and the election of lastTuesday will get but a line in the history of this period, whilethe Versailles conference and the Fourteen Points of Wilson'smessage will have books written about them for a century to come.Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Samuel G. Blythe London, England

Washington, November 13, 1918

MY DEAR SAM,—I had not seen the review of my little book ofspeeches [Footnote: The American Spirit.] made by the Daily Mailuntil you sent it to me. I guess we are a nation of idealists andit won't do any harm to have a little of this leaven thrown intothe European lump. I am amused when I read the reviews on thisbook to see myself regarded as the rather imaginative interpreterof the national attitude, after these twenty years of quiet, stifflegal opinions on municipal law and rail-road problems.

Glad to hear of the boy! He is a poor correspondent, as most two-fisted young chaps are apt to be. I envy you your opportunity nowto see the revolution in Germany, and it? possible spreadingelsewhere. I think you might write an I article on how revolutioncomes to a country; a picture of just how the thing happens; whatthe first step was; what kind of organization there was and howthey went about their business and got hold of the Government.There is I a whole book in this, but immediately there is a chancefor a couple of mighty interesting articles.

Here we have gone wild over the victory and peace, and the factthat the election went against us means nothing, so far asinternational questions are concerned. We had not fixed the priceon cotton while we had fixed the price on wheat, and that made theNorth feel that this is a Southern Administration. The Republicanswere united for the first time in ten years. These are the bigreasons for the shift. You see we have no idea here of Cabinetresponsibility or votes of confidence or lack of confidence. Iexpect there will be some fun in Congress for the next two years.As always, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, December 16, 1918

MY DEAR GEORGE,—I have your long letter, telling me of all yoursad experiences with red tape and how you have settled down atlast to do your bit at home. You have gone through the bitternessthat most fellows have experienced in trying to do anything withthe Government. I really am very sorry that you had to make such afinancial sacrifice and break up your home and then be fooled, butprobably it is all for the best. The war is over, the boys arecoming home soon and this brings me to the main point.

Ned got home this morning. Nancy, Anne, and I went to Norfolk tomeet him. He had no expectation of seeing us there and at eighto'clock on a very rainy foggy morning, we came up along side ofhis transport and he was taken by surprise. He had a fine lot ofboys with him, but since May he had been at the Naval AviationHeadquarters as one of the General Staff.

He had many narrow escapes; had men killed standing beside him,torn to pieces by shrapnel; was knocked over by the concussion ofshells; was over the lines in the battle of Chateau-Thierry in anaeroplane, flew across the Austrian-Italian lines and chased theGerman on his retreat through Belgium.

He seems to be in good health, though rather nervous. He very muchadmires the men who were his comrades and his superiors, but isglad to be out of it all. I think he would like to get on a bigfarm. My plan for getting farms for the soldier is making slowprogress. I have got to put in all my effort now to get somedecisive answer out of Congress—either yes or no. …

[Ned] has seen France very thoroughly, all the north of Italy fromRome up, England, and Ireland. In the latter spot, he was shot atthree times, notwithstanding a general order that no Irishman isallowed to have a gun. He was challenged to a duel by a Frenchmanwho tried to get away with his seat in a car. He gave theFrenchman a good licking and then discovered that he was liable tocourt martial, but he got the seat and then told the Frenchlieutenant he would throw him out of the car window if he talkedany more about dueling. The following morning he offered theFrenchman a cigarette which was taken, and they shook hands andparted.

He went up in an aeroplane in Italy at one place and had a hunch,he said, that something was wrong with the machine and so hebrought it down and landed. Another fellow took it up, an Italian.He got up about one thousand feet in the air and the gas tankexploded. The poor fellow came down burnt to a cinder, all withinfive minutes. He shot a German from the Belgian trenches and hasbeen recommended four times for promotion, but hasn't got it yet.With much love to Frances and yourself, I am, affectionatelyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO EDGAR C. BRADLEY ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF THE INTERIOR

Washington, [December 18, 1918]

MY DEAR BRADLEY,—You wouldn't let me close my sentence yesterdayand I don't propose to close it to-day. Yet I am not going to letyou drive westward toward the land and people we both love somuch, without letting you carry a word of affection and greetingfrom me, which you can just throw to the winds when you get there,throw it out of the window to Tamalpais, it will sweep over thoseeucalyptus trees on the right, throw it up to the Berkeley hills,which now are turning green, I suppose, throw it up the longstretch of Market Street till it reaches Twin Peaks, and let itflow down over "south of the slot" that was, and up over Nob Hill,even to the sacred brownstone of the Pacific-Union.

Go with a heart that is full of rejoicing that peace has come,through our sacrifice as well as that of other of the noblerpeoples of earth, and with a heart that is proud that you wereable to help with your strength and sane judgment and greatgentleness of speech and manner, in carrying on this nation'saffairs in the day of its greatest adventure. We shall all missyou greatly, whether you are gone two weeks or two years! Do justwhat you think is right, just what she who is so much to youthinks you should do. There is no better test of a man's duty.

If you can't return we shall stagger on. I shan't stop climbingthis ladder because a rung is gone—tho' many a rung is gone—anda damn hard old ladder this is sometimes. …

F.K.L.

AFTER-WAR PROBLEMS—LEAVING WASHINGTON

1919

After-war Problems—Roosevelt Memorials—Americanization—Religion
—Responsibility of Press—Resignation

TO E. C. BRADLEY

Washington, January, 1919

MY DEAR BRADLEY,— … I am terribly broken up over Roosevelt'sdeath. He was a great and a good man, a man's man, always playinghis game in the open. …

I loved old Roosevelt because he was a hearty, two-fisted fellow.… The only fault I ever had to find with him was that he tookdefeat too hard. He had a sort of "divine right" idea, but he wasa bully fighter. I went to his funeral and have joined in massmeetings in his memory, which I suppose is all I can do. … Ofcourse … he said a lot of things that were unjust andunjustifiable, but if a fellow doesn't make a damned fool ofhimself once in a while he wouldn't be human. The Republicanswould have nominated him next time undoubtedly. They are without aleader now, and we are just as much up in the air as ever. … Iam standing by the President for all I am worth. I talked to theMerchants' Association the other day and gave him a great send-off, but they didn't rise to their feet at all, which is the firsttime this has happened in two years. … Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, January 30, 1919

MY DEAR GEORGE,— … The one thing that bothers us here is theproblem of unemployment. We have not, of course, had time to turnaround and develop any plan for reconstruction. Our whole warmachine went to pieces in a night. Everybody who was doing warwork dropped his job with the thought of Paris in his mind, withthe result that everything has come down with a crash, in the wayof production, but nothing in the way of wages or living costs.Wages cannot go down until the cost of living does, and productionwon't increase while people believe prices will be lower later on.I to-day proposed to Secretary Glass that he enter upon a campaignto promote production, (1) by seeing what the Government couldbuy, (2) by seeing what the industries would take as a bottomprice, (3) by getting the Food Administration at work to reduceprices. Perhaps it may do some good. …

I have always thought the President was right in going across, andI believe that he will pull through a League of Nations. When Iget a copy of it I will send you my speech on this subject, whichis rather loose but is a plea for dreams.

Ned is going West to. work for Doheny in some oil field, startingat the bottom. I rather think this is right, but of course hewon't stay as a laborer very long. The boy is fine and gay, anddid splendid work, and is anxious to get into the game and makemoney. Just where he gets this desire for making money I don'tknow. Certainly I never had it. But he was telling me the otherday of his hope that by forty he would have made enough money toretire. I told him you were the only fellow I ever knew who hadactually retired, and you had only done it half way. He willreport at Los Angeles, but I expect he will get up to see you assoon as he can. He has a remarkable affection for California,considering he has seen so little of it, and so has Nancy. Theyboth regard it as the golden land where all things smile, andpeople have hearts. I have not attempted to cure them of theirillusion.

Do write me a good, long letter, for I am always eager to hearfrom you.

F. K. L.

To George W. Lane

Washington, May 1, [1919]

MY DEAR GEORGE,—Well, what do you think of the Italian situation?I think the President right, that Fiume should not go to Italy.Certainly she has no moral claim, for by the Pact of London, Fiumewas to go to Croatia. Orlando says that he is answering the callof the Italians in exile. Let them stay in exile, I say. They wentinto a foreign land to make money and now they wish to annex theland they are visiting, to the home country. How would we like itif the Chinese swamped San Francisco and then asked to be annexedto China? This is carrying the Fiume idea to its ultimate, aridiculous ultimate, of course, as most ultimates are.

Whether he [President Wilson] gave out the statement as to thebreak too early, and without the consent of England and France, ofcourse I don't know. Quite like him to do it if he thought thething had hung long enough, and that Italy was too damn predatory.And she does seem to be. The New Idea seems to have less real holdin Italy—at least among the governing class—than in any otherEuropean country. Her present position will postpone peace. Thiswill cause us trouble over the extra session of Congress for ourappropriations will run out. And perhaps in England it may give achance for labor troubles to rise. It will postpone the return ofgood times to this country. But ultimately Italy will have to comethrough. If economic pressure were put upon her she would becompelled to yield at once, for she depends on England andourselves for all the coal she uses, and on us chiefly for herwheat. Of course this form of coercion will not be resorted to.She might think more kindly if she were given an extended credit,say of two hundred million dollars. But the people being arousednow over what they think is a matter of principle—loyalty totheir compatriots in Fiume—they may not be able to compromise.Lord Reading rather fears that this is the situation and that itmight have been avoided if the President had not issued hisstatement when he did. However, I have no doubt that the Presidentwill have his way. He nearly always does. Surely the God that oncewas the Kaiser's is now his.

To be the First President of the League of Nations is to be thecrowning glory of his life. I believe in the League—as aneffort. It will not cure, but it is a serious effort to get at thedisease. It is a hopeful effort, too, for it makes moralstandards, standards of conduct between nations which will bringconventional pressure to bear on the side of peace, to offset theold convention of rushing into war to satisfy hurt feelings.Sooner or later there will come disarmament—the pistol will betaken away and the streets will be safer.

The boy is having a tough time in his oil work. It is so dirty!But I hope he sticks out until he proves himself. I hear that theDutch Shell people have bought out Cowdray in Mexico, and now aretrying to get Doheny's lands. They bestride the earth, and as soonas their activities are known generally, this country will lookupon the Standard Oil as the American champion in a biginternational fight.

… Well, dear old chap, I know that I could add nothing to yourcure if I were there but I am not content to be so far away fromyou. … F. K. L.

TO WILLIAM BOYCE THOMPSON ROOSEVELT PERMANENT MEMORIAL NATIONALCOMMITTEE

Washington, May 20, 1919

MY DEAR MR. THOMPSON,—I told Mr. Loeb that I would feel greatlyhonored to be a member of a Memorial Committee, to do honor to Ex-President Roosevelt. To-day, I receive an agreement which I amasked to sign in which the members of the Committee are to pledgethemselves to a memorial for the furtherance of Mr. Roosevelt'spolicies. I do not know what such a phrase means. With some of hispolicies I know I was in hearty accord but as to others, such asthe tariff, I have my doubts. This might be turned or construedinto a great machine for propaganda of a partisan character, andit seems to me that the Colonel's memory is altogether tooprecious a national possession to have that construction possiblygiven to any memorial to him.

There are hundreds of thousands of Democrats, like myself, whoadmired him and who would contribute toward a memorial, who shouldnot be asked to do this if it was any more than a straight-outmemorial to the man, the soldier, the naturalist, the historian,the President, the intense, vital American.

And all of your officers, so far as I am acquainted with them, areRepublicans. This does not seem to convey quite the rightsuggestion.

I have already planned for a lasting Roosevelt memorial in thecreation of a park in California, to bear Colonel Roosevelt'sname. I expect this will have Congressional approval at thepresent session of Congress.

Last night I talked with Senator Frank Kellogg about this matter,and he agrees with my view. He says that he understood thememorial was to be something in Washington of a permanent andartistic character, and perhaps the home at Oyster Bay, and thatthe personnel of all committees was to be popular, including ifpossible as many Democrats as Republicans.

Under these circ*mstances I beg leave to withhold my signature tothe agreement sent me. I would have no objection to askingCongress to provide for a memorial, though I think this should bedeferred as a matter of policy until the public had subscribedgenerously. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER PRESIDENT EMERITUS, UNIVERSITY OFCALIFORNIA

Washington, June 16, 1919

MY DEAR WHEELER,—I have seen your goodbye address at Berkeley,and I am very glad I did not hear it, for it must have been a sadday for Berkeley and for you. The address itself was a noble word.I hear that you have bought Lucy Sprague's home and are to remainin Berkeley. This is as it should be. You can ripen into the Sageof Berkeley, and be a center of influence, stimulating the best inothers. A long, long life to you! Always sincerely and devotedlyyours,

FRANKLIN K, LANE

TO E. S. MARTIN LIFE

Washington, August 23, 1919

MY DEAR MR. MARTIN,— … It does not seem to me that this countrywill rise to a class war. We have too many farmers and smallhouseholders and women—put the accent on the women. They are theconservatives. Until a woman is starving, she does not grow Red,unless she is without a husband or babies and has a lot of moneythat she did not earn. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, September 11, 1919

DEAR GEORGE,—You do not know how much of sympathy I send out toyou and how many words of prayer I send up for you. You need themall, I expect. … What a long siege you have had!

I suppose you will not be able to hear the President speak when heis there. You will miss much. He is not impassioned nor a greatorator, such as Chatham or Fox, or Webster or Dolliver, or evenBryan—but he has a keen, quick, cutting mind, the mind of areally great critic, and his manner is that of the gentlemanscholar. He is first among all men to-day, which is much forAmerica.

My Nancy has been having a splendid time, even if she only sawyour ranch for a week—but she is the gayest thing alive—Godgrant she may continue so always. …

For the first time in twenty-five years we are living in anapartment, large and in a nice place, but somehow my sense of thefitness of things will not let me call the place "home"—altho' itis the most comfortable habitation I have ever lived in, elevator,whole floor to ourselves. … and they let me keep my dog. Iwouldn't have come if they hadn't. We turned down a fine placewith a more expansive view because Jack was not wanted. But surelyin these days of doubt and disloyalty one must have some rock tocling to, why not a trusting-eyed dog? … But all this does notrecompense me for the absence of a "home"—which is a house,anywhere. Yet we may have to do our own work. … The cooks areall too proud to work—I wish you would tell me just how thiseconomic problem should be settled. How much do you believe insocialism or socialization? … Do you think there can be apartnership in business? I am inclined to think this can be workedout, along lines of cooperative ownership, but not until anenterprise is well standardized.

I expect bad times soon with labor. We are only postponing theevil day. The President seems less radical than he was. He issobered by conditions, I suspect. The negro is a danger that youdo not have. Turn him loose and he is a wild man. Every Southernerfears him.

… I am trying hard to believe something that might be called theshadow of a religion—a God that has a good purpose, and anotherlife in which there is a chance for further growth, if not forglory. But when I bump up against a series of afflictions such asyou have been subjected to, I fall back upon Fred's philosophy ofa purposeless or else a cruel God. … I simply have a sinking ofthe heart, a goneness, a hopelessness—not even the pleasure of aresignation. Old Sid's cold mind has worked itself through to adecision that there is no purpose and no future, and finds solacein the ultimate; having reached the cellar he finds thesatisfaction of rest. I can't get there for my buoyancy, the hold-over of early teachings or perhaps my naturally sanguine naturewill not permit me to hit bottom, but forever I must be floating,floating—nowhere. Happy the man who strikes the certainty of arock-bottom hell, rather than one who is kept floating midway—that is a purgatory worse than hell. I don't seem to have anycapacity for anger, as against God or man, for anything thatbefalls me, but I get morbid over the injustices done to others.Now I shall stop philosophizing on this matter for it is three inthe morning, and too hot to sleep, and such a time is made forwickedness and not for righteousness.

I am sorry you will not see the President. He is worth hearing,better than reading, and he always talks well. He can not pass histreaty without some kind of reservations and he should have seenthis a month ago. The Republicans will not struggle to pass it inhis absence and think that they have done a smart thing, but inthe end Wilson and not Lodge would win by such a trick. The onegreatest of vices is smart-aleckism. Sometime I shall write anessay on that subject. The burglar and the confidence operator andthe profiteer and the profligate and the defaulting bank cashierare all victims of that disease—smart-aleckism. They will do atrick, to prove how clever they are. I believe that is the wayninety per cent of the boys and girls go wrong, and instead ofteaching them the Bible, why not try reducing the size of theirconceit and their disposition to boast. I just wonder how farwrong I am on this?

… Don't let the family worry you. Call for the police if theydon't let you have your own way. … What a plague of women! Buthow did monks manage to live anyhow? Maybe they chose a harddeath—perhaps that was the secret of the whole monkery game!Women let us down into the grave with much unction to our ego, Imean sweet oil of adoration … poured out upon the way down toAvernus. … Don't feel discouraged because you lie there. I feelmuch more discontented than you do, right here at the heart of theworld. … Love to Maude and Frances, and mention me with properrespect and dignity to Miss Nancy Lane.

F. K.

TO VAN H. MANNING DIRECTOR, BUREAU OF MINES

Washington, September 24, 1919

MY DEAR MR. MANNING,—I have been intending for several days towrite you a letter regarding the Petroleum Institute, but theopportunity has been denied me. Perhaps you will be good enough tosay to the gentlemen, whom I understand you are to meet tomorrow,that I regard their work, if taken hold of whole-heartedly, as ofthe greatest national importance. It is quite manifest now thatprivate enterprise must stand in the forefront in the developmentof this industry, and that what the government can do will besupplemental and suggestive. It is not an exaggeration to say thatmillions of dollars must be spent in experiment before we know themany services to which a barrel of oil can be put. There is almostan indefinite opportunity for research work along this line.

Petroleum is a challenge to the chemists of the world. And now theworld is dependent upon it, as it is upon nothing else exceptingcoal and iron, and the foodstuffs and textiles. It has jumped tothis place of eminence within twenty years, and the world isconcerned in knowing how large a supply there is and how everydrop of it can best be used. Practically, I think you should urgethat there be cooperative effort to protect against waste. The oilmen themselves should see the value of this and spend their moneyfreely to keep their wells from being flooded, to keep their pipelines from leaking, and to save their gas.

We are behind the rest of the world in the use of our oil for fuelpurposes. We are spendthrifts in this as in other of our nationalresources. We can get three times as much energy as we do out ofour oil through the use of the Diesel engine, yet we are doinglittle to promote development of a satisfactory type of stationaryDiesel, or marine design. Instead of seeing how many hundredmillions of barrels of oil we can produce and use, our effortshould be to see how few millions of barrels will satisfy ourneeds. I say this although I am not a pessimist as to theavailable supply, which I believe has been underestimated ratherthan overestimated. I am satisfied that the man who has a barrelof oil has something which, if he can save, is better than agovernment bond. Throughout the Nation we must make a drive toincrease production—that is the slogan of this time—but thatdoes not mean that we should make a drive to exhaust resourceswhich God alone can duplicate.

Then too, I think that Congress can be largely helped by the sanepresentation of wise policies touching this industry. I have thebelief that whatever the body of oil men would agree upon would besomething that would make for the best use of petroleum, and forthe protection over a long period of this fundamental resource inour industry. Congress has difficulty often in getting the largeview of practical men who speak without personal interest, andsuch an Institute could speak not for the individual but for theindustry and show how it may best be developed in the interest ofthe country.

To do these things, and to do them adequately, will require themen in the industry to take the attitude of statesmen and not ofselfish exploiters. It means they must tax themselves liberally,generously. It means that they must think of themselves astrustees for a Public as wide as the world.

Please give my regards to the members of the Institute. Cordiallyyours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO E. C. BRADLEY

Washington, October 2, 1919

MY DEAR BRADLEY,— … I have all along said that the treaty couldnot be ratified without some interpretive reservations. I thinkthat the President will see that, although he sees clearly, as Ido, that these interpretations are already in the treaty itself,but on a question of construction two men may honestly differ. Thewhole damn thing has gotten into the maelstrom of politics, of thenastiest partisanship, when it ought to have been lifted up intothe clearer air of good sense and national dignity. …

Hoover can be elected. He came home modestly and made a splendidspeech. We need a man of great administrative ability and ofsupreme sanity who can lead us into quiet waters, if there areany.

… We have imported, with our labor, their discontent, and thetheories which are founded upon it to obtain the price. But theAmerican workingman is a sensible fellow, when he can have thechance to think without being overwhelmed by fear, and he willrealize that his betterment in a material way must come throughhis own individual growth and the growth of the conscience of thepeople who believe in a square deal. The serious thing in thewhole situation, to my mind, is the fact that so many workingmenseem to accept the idea that they are of a fixed class; that theycan not move out of their present conditions; that they wantalways to remain as employees and have no hope of becomingsuperintendents, employers, managers, or capitalists; andtherefore think that their only prospect is in bettering theircondition as a part of a class. Great propaganda should be carriedon to show how false this is and how much demand there is for menof ability.

With warm regards, old man, I am cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO MRS. LOUISE HERRICK WALL

Washington, Friday, [October 10, 1919]

MY DEAR MRS. WALL,—We heard through Ned of the Commodore's death,and you can realize how shocked and terribly grieved we were, andstill are.

Poor dear girl, there is nothing anyone can say that will helpeven a little bit. Every word of appreciation makes the loss moreserious. And you need no one to tell you that he was loved by us,and every single person who really knew him. He was to meChristlike, beautiful, gentle, wise and noble. Since that firstday, nearly thirty years ago on Grays Harbor, I have known him asone of the rare spirits of the world, and Anne and I have lovedhim deeply. Surely he must live on, and we must all see him again!

May strength come to you out of the Infinite resources of theUniverse to bear this blow. The world was made better by him! Indeep sympathy,

FRANK LANE

TO—

Wednesday, November, [1919]

MY DEAR OLD MAN,—I am sitting alone in my den having come downstairs to write a line on my report, but instead have been luredinto an evening of delight with Robert Louis Stevenson, whoseletters, in four volumes, I advise you to read for the spirit ofthe man. Much like your own, my brave fine fellow! He went throughtortures with a smile and a merry imagination which made himgreat, and makes all of us, and many more to come, his debtor. Iknow how little you read. The birds have been yours and the treesand the dogs and fishes, but there are men in the world, or havebeen, whom one can know through their writings. Did you ever readTrevelyan's three volumes on GARIBALDI? No,—well get it beforeyou are a week older and you will thank me for ever and a day.

All of this, however, I had not intended to write, rather to tellyou … how emotional I have been all day with the old soldierspassing by on parade—the last that many of them will ever have.

Fifty years ago, Andrew Johnson received Grant's returned forceson the same spot. There were 180,000, or so, then—and 20,000 now—crippled, lame, one-legged, bent, halting most of them, butdetermined to make the long journey from the Capitol to the WhiteHouse, and prove that they had lived this long time and were stillgood for a longer journey. There was little of gaiety among them,tho' some were swinging flags, torn, tattered, be-shot … andraised their hats to the President as they passed, tho' most ofthem, doubtless, were sorry that he was not a Republican. It was atime to remember.

… Nancy is back after her tour of glory—larger than ever butnot less tender or playful. She is the brightest spirit I haveever met—and all her vanities are so dear and human and lie sofrankly exposed. I thank you for your kindness to her, she lovesyou very much; yes, really recognizes those qualities which somecannot see, poor blind things! But I can, and she can, and Francescan, and many more when you give them a look in. May your grassgrow and soul keep warm and your spirit lift itself in song atmorning and at night. Affectionately always,

F.L.

TO M. A. MATHEW

Washington, November 3, 1919

MY DEAR MR. MATHEW,—I have your letter of October 27th, and Iappreciate very much its kind words. The Industrial Conference wasnot a success because we got into the steel strike at first, andpeople talked about their rights instead of talking of theirduties. We will have another conference, however, which I thinkwill do some real work and lay a foundation for the future. Thecoal strike is a bad one, but the people are not in sympathy withit, and sooner or later, in my judgment, it will come to anadjustment situation in which the President will be perfectlywilling to participate. He, by the way, is getting along verywell, but I expect it will be many weeks before he is himselfa*gain. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K LANE

TO HERBERT C. PELL, JR. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Washington, November 8, 1919

MY DEAR MR. PELL,—I wish you success with your ConstitutionalLeague. I have no objection whatever to my name being used inconnection with it, providing the League is not an institution fordenouncing people or denouncing theories of government or economicpanaceas; but is a positive, aggressive institution for thepresentation to our people of the fact that we have in thisDemocracy a method of doing whatever we wish done, which avoidsthe necessity for anything like revolutionary action. Theobjection to Bolshevism is that it is absolutism—as Lenine hassaid himself, the absolutism of the proletariat. It is an economicgovernment by force, while our Democracy is a government bypersuasion.

I find that no good comes from calling names. The men who are tobe reached are the men who are not committed against us, but aredisposed to be with American institutions. We must show them thatwe have a system that it is worth while betting on, and that ifthey have another way of doing things economical, machinery bywhich it can be instituted is in the people's hands. Our policy isto look before we leap, and to submit our methods to the judicialjudgment of the people. This permits any doctrine to be preachedthat does not subvert our institutions. Where do our institutionscome from? What have they been effective in bringing about? Whatis the condition of the United States as a whole compared withother countries? Can we hope to work out our salvation withoutcivil war? These are legitimate questions, the answer to which isfound in this other question—is not political Democracy the onepractical way to eventual industrial Democracy? Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HENRY P. DAVISON

Washington, November 23, 1919

MY DEAR MR. DAVISON,—I wired you yesterday my conclusion, as toyour very generous and patriotic offer, which was the same that Ihad come to before seeing you in New York. Your appeal was sostrong and went so much to my impulse for public service that youmade me feel that, perhaps, I was giving undue weight to theconsiderations I had presented to you. So I sought the judgment ofothers—all of them men of large distinction whom you know, or atleast have confidence in, and without dissent I found them saying,voluntarily and unbidden, what I had said to you—that for me toundertake this work of arousing the best patriotic feeling ofAmerica, on a salary, would make seriously against the success ofthe work and against my own value in it, or in anything else Imight undertake. If I were rich I would go into it with my wholeheart. But a poor man can not be charged with making money out ofthe exploitation of the good opinion others have of his love ofcountry. This is not squeamishness, it is a rough standard,arrived at by instinct rather than by any refined process ofreasoning.

I say this to you because of my deep confidence in you and my veryreal confidence that you are my friend, and sought to do me akindness and give me an opportunity. Now let me see if I can be ofany help in this work. …

[Here followed a full detailed plan of an Americanization program,that concluded with the paragraph.]

These outline some methods of reaching the public with the ideathat this is a land that is lovable, prosperous, good-humored,great, and noble-spirited. To carry it out will cost a great dealof money, I should say that not less than five million a yearshould be available. With warm regard, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO GEORGE W. LANE

Washington, November 28, [1919]

MY DEAR GEORGE,—Do not be surprised if you hear that I am out ofthe Cabinet soon, for I have been offered two fifty thousand ayear places, and another even more. I don't want to leave if itwill embarrass the President, but I do want something with alittle money in it for awhile. … But I must see the Presidentbefore I decide … and I don't know when that will be, now thathe is sick.

This life has a great fascination for everyone and I dread toleave it; for anything else will bore me I am sure. I deal hereonly with big questions and not with details—with policies thataffect many, and yet I have but a year and a half more, and thenwhat? Perhaps it is as well to take time by the forelock, tho' Ido not want to decide selfishly nor for money only. I must gowhere I can feel that I am in public work of some kind. …

… I have served him [the President] long and faithfully undervery adverse circ*mstances. It is hard for him to get on withanyone who has any will or independent judgment. Yet I am notgiven to forsaking those to whom I have any duty. However we shallsee, I write you this, that you may not be misled by the thoughtthat there has been or is any friction. Of course you won't speakof it to anyone.

I am so glad you are able to be out a little bit. "Ain't it aglorious feelin'?" The farm must look mighty good. Well, old man,goodnight, and God give you your eyes back! With my warmest love,

FRANK

TO C. S. JACKSON OREGON JOURNAL

Washington, December 29, 1919 MY DEAR SAM,—I hear from Joe Tealthat your boy has been lost at sea, and I write this word, not inthe hope that I can say anything that will minimize your loss, forall the kindly words of all men in all the world could not do asmuch as one faint smile from that boy's lips could do to bring abit of joy into your heart.

But you are an old, old friend of mine. It is more than thirtyyears since we dreamed a dream together which you were able torealize. We both have had our fortune in good and bad, and on thewhole I think our lives have not added to the misery of men, buthave done something toward making life a bit more kind for manypeople. And why should that boy be taken from you? There is themystery—if you can solve it you can solve all the othermysteries. I hope you have some good staunch faith, which I havenever been able to get, that would enable me to look upon thesethings in humility, in the confidence that this thing we call abody is only a temporary envelope for a permanent thing—alasting, growing thing called a spirit, the only thing thatcounts. If we can get that sense we can have a new world. I do notbelieve we will change this world much for the good out of anymaterialistic philosophy or by any shifting of economic affairs.We need a revival—a belief in something bigger than ourselves,and more lasting than the world.

With my warmest sympathy, I am, yours as always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO JOHN CRAWFORD BURNS

Washington, December 29, [1919]

MY DEAR JOHN,—The manner in which you write assures me that youare very happy, notwithstanding your marriage and your newreligion, for which I am glad. An even better assurance is thepicture of the bride. By what wizardry have you been able to lureand capture so young, good, and intelligent-looking a girl? Ipresume she was fascinated by the indirectness of your speech, thetouches of humor and your very stern manner. John, you are ahumbug, you have made that aloofness and high indifference awinning asset. I shan't give you away. Only you fill me with amortifying envy.

As for your religion, various of your friends think it odd. Ithink that you are a subject for real congratulation. A man whocan believe anything is miles ahead of the rest of us. I wouldgladly take Christian Science, Mohammedanism, the Holy Rollers oranything else that promised some answer to the perplexingproblems. But you have been able to go into the Holy of Holies andsit down on the same bench of belief with most of the saints—thisis miraculous good fortune. I mean it. I am not scoffing orjeering. I never was more serious.

This whole damned world is damned because it is standing in a bog,there is no sure ground under anyone's feet. We are the grossestmaterialists because we only know our bellies and our backs. Weworship the great god Comfort. We don't think; we get sensations.The thrill is the thing. All the newspapers, theatres, prove it.We resign ourselves to a life that knows no part of man but hisnerves. We study "reactions," in human beings and in chemistry—recognizing no difference between the two—and to my greatamazement, the war has made the whole thing worse than ever. John,if you have a religion that can get hold of people, grip them andlift them—for God's sake come over and help us. I know you canunderstand how people become Bolsheviks just out of a desire fordefiniteness and leadership. The world will not move forward byfloating on a sea of experimentation. It gets there by believingin precise things, even when they are only one-tenth true. I wishI had your faith—as a living, moving spirit. Some day I pray thatI may get with you where you can tell me more of it and how yougot it.

I am leaving the Cabinet, tho' the precise date no one knows, forthe President is not yet well enough to talk about it. He seems tobe too done up to stand any strain or worry. But I must have somemoney, for my years are not many, Anne is far from well, and Nancyis a young lady, and a very beautiful one. She has just come outand is quite the belle of the season, tho' like her father, tooanxious for popularity.

Great good luck of all kinds to you in 1920, old man—and do giveme a line now and then.

F. K. L.

TO FRANK I. COBB NEW YORK WORLD

Washington, [1919]

MY DEAR FRANK,—I have read your speech on Prussianizing theAmericans, and I concur. Of course repression … promotes thegrowth of error. We are not going to destroy socialism, or preventit from coming strong by refusing to answer it.

But I have a notion that you have not expressed as directly as Ishould like:—That the newspaper is not influential enough to stopit and perhaps does not care to, sometimes. Where are the papersthat are respected for their character? They are few. The most ofthem are believed to be the allies of every kind of Satan. "Theyare rich; their ads. run them; they pander to circulation, nomatter of what kind, to get ads.", that is the answer of the plainpeople. If the papers were things of thought and not of passion,prejudice and sensation and interest, they could do the work thatpolice and courts are called upon to do. They could effectivelyanswer the agitator. But the people do not believe them when theycry aloud. Maybe I am wrong, but isn't there a grain, or a gram,of truth in this?

For a year and a half I have been bombarding Congress with ademand for a bill that would make a campaign, through the schools,against illiteracy. I have made dozens of speeches for it, writtena lot, lobbied much, until Congress passed a law stopping myworking up sentiment for it, by a joint resolution. How muchsentiment has the press created? You had one or two editorials.The Times one. No one else in New York gave a damn. TheCongressmen were not made to feel that those ignorant foreignerswho were fifty-five per cent of the steel workers, must learn toread papers that were written in American, not in Russian orYiddish or Polish or Italian.

I tell you seriously we are not a serious people except when weare scared. "Rights of free speech, O yes! they must be preserved.Democracy has its balancing of forces." All this is forgotten whenthe government is at stake—our institutions. These mottoes andlegends and traditions presuppose someone who will enlighten thepeople and a people that can be enlightened. Otherwise you willget the strong arm at work. It is inevitable. Has there been anymeeting of editors to map a course that will truthfully revealwhat Bolshevism is? or how absurd the talk of wage-slavery is? orwhy the miners strike? or why this is the best of all lands?

Tell me why workmen don't believe what you print, unless it issome slander on a rich man, or some story that falls in withprejudices and hatreds?

Answer me that and you will know why the people sit indifferentwhile papers are suppressed, speakers harried, and espionage isking.

Mind you, I am not saying that you are alone to blame. Congressis. The States are. The cities are. The people are. They have leteverything drift. What is our passion? What do we love? Do wethink, or do we go to the movies? The socialist takes hisphilosophy seriously. The rest of us have no philosophy that is apassion with us.

But there, I have scolded enough. You are right, but you are notfundamental or basic or something or other, which means that youcan't put out a fire unless you have a fire department that is onthe job. Tenderly yours,

F. K L.

Lane never outgrew his passionate belief in the moralresponsibility of the press. To Fremont Older, when he took chargeof the SAN FRANCISCO CALL, Lane telegraphed:—

"There is no other agency that can serve our national purpose thatis one-half as powerful as a free press, and no other that hasone-half the responsibility. We need a press that will stand forthe right, no matter whether its circulating or advertising isincreased or not by such a position, and that means a press thatincludes in its understandings and sympathies the whole of societyand serves no purpose other than the promotion of a happier andnobler people. Journalism is the greatest of all professions in afree country, if it is bent upon being right rather than beingsuccessful. I hope that you may be both."

TO MRS. LOUISE HERRICK WATT

Watkins Glen, New York, [December, 1919]

MY DEAR MRS. WALL,—I am reminded by your letter to Anne that Ihave said no word to you since that first word of attempt atsupport, which I threw out on the first day. I meant it all andmore. Wall was always in my mind, as at heart, the truest DemocratI knew. He really lived up to the standard of the New Testament.He did love his neighbor as himself. He never did good or kindnessout of policy, but always from principle, from nature—which canbe said of very few in this world. He was without cowardice of anykind, and without hypocrisy. I believe he had no vanity. He hadthe pride of a noble man and lived as generously toward the worldas I have ever known man to live. This might be said of one whowas austere, but the dear, old Commodore was to me, and to us all,the very symbol of warmth. The one thing I criticised in him washis unwillingness that people should discover him for thefanciful, humorous, wise, and exquisitely tender man that he was.He did not leave an enemy, I know, unless that man was ascoundrel. And with all his reticence he impressed himselfprofoundly on hundreds. I know if there is another world that Walland I will find each other, and he will be with the gladdest,gayest of the spirits. I hope you can look forward to such ameeting with the confidence that Anne has, which always astonishesme and makes me envious. He has gone to the one place, if any suchplace there is, where the greatest longing of his soul can begratified—his love for justice.

If you have a picture of him, no matter how poor, won't you let mehave it, that I may hang it beside my work desk, and looking at itfind inspiration and be reminded of the sane, loving, lovable,high-hearted chap whom I held as a brother?

Dear lonely woman, I wish I could speak one word that wouldlighten your sense of loss, in him and in your mother. I know thatyou are not lacking in courage, but stoutness of heart does notbring comfort, I know. How exceptional your loss because howexceptional your fortune—such a man and such a mother. Verysincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANK

TO MRS. M. A. ANDERSEN

Sunday, [December, 1919]

… The whole of mankind is searching for affection, tenderness,—not physical love but sweet companionship. We could get along withfewer pianos and victrolas if we had a more harmonious society. Wereally don't like each other much better than Alaskan dogs. Nowwhat is the reason for that? Are we afraid of them stealing fromus—our houses, sweethearts, or dollars? Or are we so stupid thatwe don't know each other, never get under the skin to find outwhat kind of a fellow this neighbor is? Certainly we are self-centered and we wonder that people don't like us when we don't tryto find what is likable about them—and keep stressing theirunlikable qualities.

All of which homily leads up to the Holidays. I hope that you willenjoy them. Nancy is having no end of a gay time, and knows howreally good a time she is having, I do believe. She is the rarestcombination of old woman and baby I have ever known, cynicallywise, almost, and soft innocence. She has a dozen beaux and isextravagant about, and to, each. …

The President is getting better slowly, but we communicate withhim almost entirely through his doctor (Grayson). I shall bemighty sorry to leave here, where we have so many friends, but myhope is to get enough to buy a place in California, one of thesedays, and settle down to the normal life of digging a bit in thesoil and then digging a bit in the brain.

Give my warmest regards to the Captain. You have ripened into afine beauty and a great usefulness, and I hope that you will findserenity of mind and soul, which is all that the great have eversearched for. With much love,

FRANK

TO GEORGE W. LANE

[December, 1919]

MY DEAR GEORGE,—Things are going well notwithstanding thePresident's illness. No one is satisfied that we know the truth,and every dinner table is filled with speculation. Some sayparalysis, and some say insanity. Grayson tells me it is nervousbreakdown, whatever that means. He is however getting better, andmeantime the Cabinet is running things. …

Ned is here and having a good time with all his old girls, some ofwhom have married and are already divorced, so he feels an oldman. Nancy is lovely and merry and quite a belle. She took withthe Prince of Belgium, and was quite as happy as you would be withhaving caught a six-pound trout—just the same feeling, I guess.

Politically things do not look interesting. There are no big menin the line except Hoover. The country wants some manly, two-fisted administrator and it doesn't care where he comes from.

I hope your eye is better, dear old man. My love to Frances.

F. K. L.

The Dan O'Neill to whom the next letter was written, was a friendof early days. Lane always liked to recall this episode. O'Neill,a big elderly Irishman, was in the City employ, while Lane wasCity and County Attorney, and had formed for his "Chief"—as helustily called him—a most disinterested affection. After Lane'sdefeat for Mayor of San Francisco, O'Neill came one day and askedfor an interview. When greetings were over he stood hesitating andtwirling his hat, until Lane said, "Well, Dan, what can I do foryou?"

"You see, Chief," he answered, "The wife and I were talking itover last night. We know how these damned campaigns of yours havebeen taking the money. You see, we have two lots of land—outthere," with a jerk of the hat toward the great outside, "and alittle house—and we're well and strong, and all the childrendoing fine at school—and we can, easy as not, put a mortgage onthe house, for two or three thousand. We'd like it fine if you'dtake it, until you get going again."

Lane did not have to mortgage his friend's house, but it was these"sweet uses of adversity," more than anything else, that tempered,for him, the pain of defeat. This friendship lasted to the end ofhis life. In 1915, when going back from California on a hurriedtrip, Lane wrote to O'Neill, "I did not see much of you and I amsorry I didn't. It was my fault, I know. Your dear old Irish faceis a joy to me every time I see it, and whenever I go out you mustnot fail to turn up, else I shall be brokenhearted."

When Lane was very ill in 1921, O'Neill came to pay his respectsto the wife of his Chief. As she went out into the hallway of herfriend's house, in San Francisco, the whole place seemed filled byO'Neills, for he stood there and all his three great sons—one afire captain, and stalwart men all. It was a sad meeting andparting.

TO DAN J. O'NEILL

Washington, December 24, 1919

MY DEAR DAN,—I am delighted to get your nice letter. It is ascharming a letter as I ever received, because you tell me of allthe family and that they are doing well, and that you are in goodhealth, and that you want me back with you—all of which makes melove you more and more. Give to the whole family my good holidaygreetings. Make them earnest and hearty.

I haven't got money enough, Dan, to pay my fare back after livinghere so long, and I shall have to make some before coming backthere, but I hope to do it some one of these days. …

Dan, I know you have been a bad man, and I know you have been agood man; and there will be a place in Heaven for you, old fellow.You have been an honest citizen, a credit to your country, and sohave your children, and you will never know anyone who is fonderof you than I. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO EAMLIN GARLAND

December 3l, 1919

MY DEAR GARLAND,—I am going up to New York on the eleventh totalk to the moving picture people at the Waldorf-Astoria. I hadthem down here and had a resolution put through the Committees onEducation of both House and Senate, asking the Moving PictureIndustry to interest itself in Americanization, and I have beenappointed at the head of a committee to take charge of this work.I have some schemes myself that I want very much to talk to youabout regarding Americanization.

I do not know how much time I will be able to give to this workbecause I have got to make some money, but I am going to use myspare time that way. Suppose when I get to New York I telephoneyou and see if we can not get together. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To one of the Moving Picture Weeklies, Lane contributed thisparagraph on Americanizing the foreign born:—"The one sure way tobring the foreign born to love this land of ours is to show ourpride in its present, faith in its future, and interpret Americato all in terms of fair play and square dealing. America gives mennothing—except a chance,"

TO HUGO K. ASHER

Rochester, Minnesota, January 3, 1920

MY DEAR HUGO,—I have not written you because my own plans must bedetermined by circ*mstances. I think, however, that I shall leavevery soon. I hate to go because the work is so satisfactory. …

Bryan has come back. What strength he will develop, no one cantell. He evidently has determined that he will not be pushed asideor disregarded. He has been, and will continue to be as long as helives, a great force in our politics. People believe that he ishonest and know he is sympathetic with the moral aspirations ofthe plain people. They distrust his administrative ability, but onthe moral question, they recognize no one as having greaterauthority.

… I hear there is talk among the business people of setting up athird party and nominating Hoover. Two things the next Presidentmust know—Europe and America, European conditions and Americanconditions. The President of the United States must be his ownSecretary of State. We need administration of our internal affairsand wise guidance economically. Hoover can give these. He has theknowledge and he has the faculty. He has the confidence of Europeand the confidence of America. He is not a Democrat, nor is he aRepublican. He voted for Wilson, for Roosevelt, and McKinley. Buthe is sane, progressive, competent. The women are strong for himand there are fifteen million of them who will vote this year. Itwould not surprise me to see him nominated on either ticket, and Ibelieve I will vote for him now as against anybody else.

But I must quit talking politics because I am going out of itentirely, completely, and I really have been out of politics eversince I left California. I have tried to take a broad non-partisanview of things which is one of the reasons I have had hardsledding. But I am going without a grouch, without a complaint ora criticism—with a great admiration for Wilson and with athorough knowledge of his defects; and with a more sympatheticattitude toward my colleagues than any can have who do not knowthe circ*mstances as well as I do. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ADMIRAL CARY GRAYSON

Washington, January 5, 1920

MY DEAR ADMIRAL,—As you know, I am contemplating resigning. Ithas been my purpose to wait until such time as the President waswell enough to see me and talk the matter over with him. Iunderstand from Mr. Tumulty that the President is prepared to namemy successor, and that it would not in any way add to hisembarrassment to fill my place in the immediate future. I wouldlike to know if this is the fact, for my course will be shapedaccordingly. Two years ago I had an offer of fifty thousand a yearwhich I put aside because I thought it my duty to stay while thewar was on. When Mr. McAdoo resigned, this offer was renewed but Ithen thought that I should await the conclusion of formal peace,which all expected would come soon. While the President was West,I promised that I would take the matter up with him on his return,and since then I have been waiting for his return to strength. Ineed not tell you that I am delighted to know that he is in suchcondition now as to turn to matters that in the best of health arevexatious, if this is the fact.

My sole reason for resigning is that I feel that I am entitled tohave assurance as to the future of my family and myself. I havebeen in public life twenty-one years and have less than nothing inthe way of private means. … And having given the better part ofmy life to the public, I feel that I must now regard the interestof those dependent upon me. I wish you would be perfectly frankwith me, for I would do nothing that with your knowledge you wouldthink would make against the welfare of our Chief. Cordially,

FRANKLIN K LANE

TO HERBERT C. PELL, JR. HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES

Washington, January 31, 1920

MY DEAR CONGRESSMAN,— … It is our boast and our glory that wehave a form of government under which men can make theirconception of society into law, if they can persuade theirneighbors that their dream is one that will benefit all. There isnothing more absurd than to contend that the last word has beenspoken as to any of our institutions, that all experimenting hasended and that we have come to a standstill. … We are growing.But this does not mean that all change must be growth and that wecan not test by history, especially by our own experiences andknowledge, the value of whatever is proposed as a substitute forwhat is. The dog that dropped the meat to get the shadow of abigger piece is the classical warning. We are for what is, notbecause it is the absolute best but because it has worked well. Itis sacred only because it has been useful. Until a system ofgovernment, or of economics, or of home life, can be demonstratedto be an improvement on what we have, we shall not hystericallyand fancifully forsake those which have served us thus far.

Our Government is not our master but our tool, adaptable to theuses for which it was designed; our servant, responsive to ourcall. This makes revolution an absurdity. But it also makes asense of responsibility a necessity. And while we may not havebroken down in this regard we certainly have weakened. We haveproceeded in the belief that automatically all men would come tosee things as we do, have a sense of the value of our traditionsand a consciousness of the deep meanings of our nationalexperiences. The things we believed in we have not taught. Hencethe need for such institutions as the Constitutional League which,however, can not do for each of us the duty that is ours of livingthe spirit of our Constitution. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO HON. WOODROW WILSON THE WHITE HOUSE

Washington, February 5, 1920

MY DEAR MR. PRESIDENT,—It is with deep regret that I feelcompelled to resign the commission with which you saw fit to honorme, by appointing me to a place in your Cabinet, now almost sevenyears ago. If it will meet your convenience I would suggest that Ibe permitted to retire on the first of March.

With the conditions which make this step necessary you arefamiliar. I have served the public for twenty-one years, and thatservice appeals to me as none other can, but I must now think ofother duties.

The program of administration and legislation looking to thedevelopment of our resources, which I have suggested from time totime, is now in large part in effect, or soon will come intoeffect through the action of Congress.

I return this Department into your hands with very real gratitudethat you have given me the opportunity to know well a workingforce holding so many men and women of singular ability and rarespirit.

I trust that you may soon be so completely restored to health thatthe country and the world may have the benefit of the full measureof your strength in the leadership of their affairs. Thediscouragements of the present are, I believe, only temporary. Thecountry knows that for America to stand outside the League ofNations will bring neither pride to us nor confidence to theworld.

Believe me, my dear Mr. President, always, cordially andfaithfully yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO FRANK W. MONDELL

Washington, February 13, 1920

MY DEAR MR. MONDELL,—I wish to acknowledge, with the warmestappreciation, your letter of yesterday, and to say that I amliterally forced out of public life by my lack of resources. Thelittle property that I have been able to save is all gone in aneffort to make both ends meet, and I find myself at fifty-fivewithout a dollar, in debt, and with no assurance as to the future.I assure you that it is with the deepest regret that I leavepublic life for I like it, and the public have treated mehandsomely, especially the men in Congress with whom I have had todeal, and not the least of these, yourself.

I should like to stay, especially so, that we could put intoeffect some of the legislation for which we have been fighting,such as the oil bill, the power bill, and the farms-for-soldiersbill. I shall leave a set of regulations as to the oil leasesready for operation. The power bill will come into effect soon, Ihope. I am responsible for the three-headed commission, but it wasthe only chance I saw of getting any unity as between thedifferent branches of the government.

Letters are still coming in from the boys who want to go on farms,and I hope that we will be able to lead Congress to see that thisis a farsighted measure.

I thank you very much for your many courtesies to me. I trust thatyour career may be one of still greater usefulness and expandingopportunity. With the warmest regards, cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Late in the year 1919, Lane wrote to James E. Gregg:—"… Thesoldier-farms bill has been reported favorably by the Committee onPublic Lands to the House, but has not yet been taken up forconsideration on the floor. … Of course, some of the oppositionhas been by those who say the plan does not do something for allof the soldiers, but this is hardly a good objection, as no otherconstructive suggestion seems to have been made by any one thatwould do anything for any of the soldiers, except the cash bonus,which I believe is altogether impossible, improvident, and not inthe interest either of the country or the soldier."

TO ROBERT W. DE FOREST

Washington, February, 1920

MY DEAR MR. DE FOREST,—I do not know that I have received anotherletter which has made me feel as conscious of the gravity of thestep I have taken as has yours. I have accumulated much in twentyyears of public life that ought to be forever at the service ofthe public, and if I were alone in the world I would not think ofgoing out. But I must think now for a time in a narrower field.Your own career shows that without holding office a man may do agreat good and give wide public service. Perhaps this opportunitymay be mine.

I shall be in New York soon and I hope very much to see you andsee you often. Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

POLITICAL COUNSEL-LINCOLN'S EYES 1920

Suggestions to Democratic Nominee for President—On Election of
Senators—Lost Leaders—Lincoln's Eyes—William James's Letters

TO WILLIAM PHELPS ENO

Saugatuck, July 5, [1920]

Here I am at your desk looking out of your window into your trees,up the gentle rise of your formal garden into the brilliant crownof rambler roses above the stone gateway.

This is a very delightful picture. The sun is just beginning topour into the garden. He is looking through the apple trees andhaving hard work to make even a splash of golden green upon thelawn, but the silver spruce and the tiara of roses get the fullmeasure of his morning smile and are doing their best to show thatthey understand, appreciate, and are glad. Oh, it is a greatmorning!

And on the water side it has been even more stimulating, I havewalked along the stone wall, the water is down, very low, the boatis stranded, like some sleeping animal, with its tether lyingloose along the pebbly strand. The gulls are crying to each otherthat there is promise of a gulletfull. Nearer shore the fish areleaping—only one or two I think but they make just enough noiseto make one realize that there is life in the smooth water, thatit is more than a splendid silver mirror for the sun which streamsacross it. I disturbed a solitary king-fisher as I went out to thewharf. He rose from his perch upon the rope, circled about for aminute and then settled back, on his watch for breakfast.

It is altogether lovely, a quiet, gentle, kindly morning, such asyou have often seen, no doubt, when Judah Rock is making its giantfight to rise triumphant from the sea.

But this is not a bit of geologic prophecy nor a Chapter I. to alove story, that I am writing. This is a bread-and-butter letter.I have been your guest and I am telling you that I have enjoyedmyself. But you, of course, wish something more than the baldstatement that I like your place and that your bread was good andyour butter sweet. Yes, you deserve more, for this place is anexpression of yourself. No one can be here and not see you atevery turn, even though you may be right now in Paris "making theway straight." You have put your love of beauty, your restrainedlove for color, and your exceptional sense of balance into thewhole establishment. It is a man's house—things are made foruse; the chairs will stand weight; the couches are not fluff; onecan lean with safety on the tables. But everywhere the eye issatisfied. My bed is beautiful, French I fancy, yet it is comfortit*elf. The lamp beside my bed is a dull bit of bronze which doesnot poke itself into your sleepy eye, yet you know that it fitsthe need, not only for light but for satisfaction to the eyesafter the light comes. And the bath tub—may I speak of a bath tubin a bread-and-butter letter?—the bath tub is not too long—doyou ever suffer from the long, long stretch into the cold water atyour back and the imperfect support to the head which imperilsyour entire submergence?—your bath tub is not too long, and Igrab it on both sides to get out. And as I dry myself I look downinto that garden of precise, trimmed and varied green upon whichthe rambler roses smile.

It is well to have had money. No Bolshevism comes out of such aplace as this. It makes no challenge to the envy of the submergedtenth. It has not ostentation. It gives off no glare, and it isall used. For men who can put money to such use, who do not over-indulge their own love for things of beauty, nor build forluxurious living, but mould a bit of seashore, some trees and arambling house into an expression of their own dignified andbalanced natures, for such men I am quite sure there is or willbe, no social peril from the Red.

And may I close with a word, an inadequate and most feeble word,as to the Lady of the House who so perfectly complements thebeauty and the refinement of her setting. She would make livableand lovable a shack, and she would draw to it those who think highthoughts. She has an aura of sympathy and companionability whichmakes her one with the healing earth and the warming, encompassingsunshine; May you and she give many more sojourners as much of theright stimulus as you have given yours affectionately,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO ROLAND COTTON SMITH

New York, July 9, [1920]

MY DEAR PADRE,—Oh, that I could reply to you in kind, but alasand alack! the gift divine has been denied me. My Nancy comes tome tomorrow—Praise be to Allah! and I shall duly, and inappropriate and prideful language, I trust, present her with yourmellifluous lines.

When the spirits Good and Bad will permit me to visit Ipswich Icannot say. Are Doctors of the carnal or the spiritual? They holdme. So soon as I was given a few ducats these banditti rose to robme. Polite, they are, these modern sons of Dick Turpin, and cleverindeed, for they contrive that you shall be helpless, that you maynot in good form resist their calculated, schemed, coordinatedblood-drawing. And I had as lief have a Sioux Medicine man dancea one-step round my camp fire, and chant his silly incantation formy curing, as any of these blood pressure, electro-chemical, pill,powder specialists. Give me an Ipswich witch instead. Let her layhands on me. Soft hands that turn away wrath. Have you such or didyour ancestors, out of fear of their wives, burn them all?

Well, this is no way for a sober, sick, sedate citizen to betalking to a Man of the Cloth, even tho' he be on vacation. Haveyou read any of Leonard Merrick's novels? CONRAD IN QUEST OF HISYOUTH, for instance? If not, do so now. They are what you literatiwould designate as G. S.—great stuff.

Give me another cheering line, do! For I live in a world that isnot altogether lovely.

F. K. L.

TO JAMES M. COX DEMOCRATIC NOMINEE FOR PRESIDENT

New York City, July 25, 1920

MY DEAR GOVERNOR,—I shall presume upon your flattering invitationto speak frankly, not in the hope that I may in any way enlightena man of such experience and success, but that I may possiblyaccentuate some point that you may recognize as important, whichin the rush of things, might be overlooked. If I should appear inthe least didactic, I beg that you charge it to my desire fordefiniteness, and my inability to give the atmosphere of apersonal conversation.

A WORD AS TO GENEROSITY

The unforgivable sin in our politics is a lack of generosity.Smallness, meanness, extreme partisanship, littleness of any kind—these are not in accord with the American conception of anAmerican leader. A clever thing may gratify a man's own immediatepartisan following, but the impression on the country at large isnot good. We want a FULL, adequate appreciation of the fact thatthere is hardly more than a film that divides Republican fromDemocrat; indeed, in that fact lies our hope of success. We mustwin FIRST VOTERS and Independents.

Let me be concrete;—The war was won by Republicans as well asDemocrats. … Therefore, I would say, give generously ofappreciation to the Republicans, who raised Liberty Loans, whoadministered food affairs, who put their plants at the Nation'sservice, who directed the various activities, such as aeroplanemaking, and transporting and financing during the war. …

A day has come when partisanship with its personalities andbitterness does not satisfy the public. We have seen things on toolarge a scale now to believe in the importance of trifles, or inthe adequacy of trifling men. We must have men who are largeenough to be international and national at the same time, to bepoliticians and yet American statesmen, to subordinate always theindividual ambition and the party advantage to the national good.

THE LEAGUE OF NATIONS

I feel that we have not tried to interpret the League of Nationsto our people in terms of America's advantage. We Democrats arelooked upon as International visionaries because we have not beenwilling to deal practically with a practical situation.

The League is not anti-national, it is anti-war; its aim is todefer war and reduce the chances of war between nations. This isto be effected, not by creating a super-nation, or by binding usto abide by the decisions of a super-national tribunal, but byestablishing the method and machinery by which the opinion of theworld may become effective as against those inclined toward war.

By adopting the League, we do not pledge ourselves to any warunder any circ*mstances, without the consent of Congress. Andbecause we have not been willing to say this, we are now in dangerof losing the one chance the world has had to get the nationstogether.

Loyalty to the President's principles does not mean loyalty to hismethods. They have been wrong as to the League, in my opinion. Youcould deal with Congress, even a Republican Congress, on thismatter, I believe, and come out with the essentials. …

Don't let Bryan get away from you, if you can help it, because hereally represents a great body of moral force and opinion. Butdon't pay the price to Bryan or Wilson or Hearst or Murphy or anyone else, of being untrue to your own belief as to the wise andpracticable national policy, that you may gain their support.

There couldn't be a better year in which to lose, for somethingreal. You can not win as a Wilson man, nor as a Murphy man, nor asa Hearst man. The nation is crying out for leadership, not puss*-footing nor pandering. Be wrong strongly if you must be wrong,rather than be right weakly. You can only win as a Cox man, onewho owns himself, has his own policies, is willing to go along,not with a bunch of bosses, but with any reasonable man, asks forcounsel from all classes of men and women, does not fear defeat,and expects a victory that will be more a party victory than apersonal one, and more a people's victory than a partisan one.

YOUR ENEMIES

Pick a few enemies and pick them with discretion. Chiefly be FORthings. But be against things and persons, too, so that the nationcan visualize you as leading in a contest between the constructiveforces and the destructive critical forces.

And the thing to be against is the man who is looking backward,who talks of the "good old days," meaning (a) money in politics,buying votes in blocks of five; (b) human beings as commodities,Homestead strikes, and instructions how to vote in the payenvelop; (c) privately controlled national finances as against theFederal Reserve System; (d) taxation of the poor through indirecttaxes on pretext of protecting industry; (e) seventy-five centwheat; (f) dollar a day labor; (g) the saloon-bossed city; (h) noAmerican Merchant Marine; all goods carried abroad under foreignflags—those were the "good old days," for which the StandpatRepublican is sighing.

But the world has moved in the past twenty-five years, and Americanot only has moved it, but has kept in the lead. …

WHAT WE WANT

A greater America—that is our objective.

We want our unused lands put to use.

We want the farm made more attractive through better ruralschools, better roads everywhere, more frequent connection betweentown and farm, better means of distribution of products.

We want more men with garden homes instead of tenement houses.

We want our waters, that flow idly to the sea, put to use; morestored water for irrigation, more hydroelectric plants to supplyindustries, railroads and home and farming activities. Thereshould be electric lights upon the farm, and power for the sewingmachine and the churn. It can be done because it is being done onthe best farms of the far West.

We want our streams controlled so that they do not wash away ourcities, farms, and railroads, and so as to redeem the submergedbottom lands for the next generation. …

We want fewer boys and girls, men and women, who can not read orwrite the language of our laws, newspapers, and literature, …that those who live with us may really be of us. …

We should dignify the profession of teaching as the foundationprofession of modern democratic life. …

We want definite and continuing studies made of our greatindustrial fiscal and social problems. The framing of our policiesshould not be left to emotional caprice, or the opportunism of anygroup of men, but should be the result of sympathetic and deepstudy by the wisest men we have, irrespective of their politics.There should be industrial conferences, such as those recentlyinaugurated, to arrive at the ways by which those who furnish thefinancial arm of industry and those who furnish the working arm ofindustry may most profitably and productively be brought intocooperation. … Through the study of what has been done we cangive direction to our national thought and work with a will towarda condition in which labor will have recognition and be morecertainly insured against the perils of non-occupation and oldage, and capital become entitled to a sure return, because moreconstantly and productively USED.

Then, too, we need a study made of the health conditions of ourchildren,—of the reason for the large percentage of undevelopedand subnormal children who are brought to our schools, and thelarger number who do not reach maturity. … Underfed boys andignorant boys are the ones who turn to Bolshevism. We can notstand pat and let things drift without their drifting not to the"good old days" but to bad new days.

Why should not our system of taxation be subject for theprofoundest study? … We must find ways by which the individualmay have tools for production which his skill and foresight andthrift have created and yet take for society in taxes what societyitself gives. … There must come to society an increasingly largeportion of the wealth created by each generation throughinheritance taxes. Thus all our boys and girls will start the raceof life more nearly at the scratch. This will be for the making ofthe race and for the enriching of the whole of society. Yet theremust be saved, surely, the call upon the man of talent for everyounce of energy that he has and every spark of imagination.

We want our soldiers and sailors to be more certain of ourgratitude and to have an opportunity to realize their own ambitionfor themselves. We must not be driven into any foolish orimpossible course by the pressure of a desire to win their votes.On the contrary, the pressure should come from us who had not theopportunity to risk our lives, that those who did take such riskshall be highly honored. For those who will identify themselveswith the tilling of the soil, there should be farms, small yetcomplete, for which they can gradually pay on long time. Forothers there should be such education for professional orindustrial life as they desire. For others, a home, not aspeculation in real estate, but a piece of that American soil forwhich they fought. For these things we can pay without extrafinancial strain, if we dedicate to this purpose merely theinterest upon the monies which other nations owe us. The extent ofour willingness to help these men is not to be measured by theirrequest but rather by our ability and their lasting welfare. …

We are to extend our activities into all parts of the world. Ourtrade is to grow as never before. Our people are to resume theirold place as traders on the seven seas. We are to know otherpeoples better and make them all more and more our friends,working with them as mutually dependent factors in the growth ofthe world's life. For this day a definite foreign policy must bemade, one that is fair; to which none can take exception. Ourpeople shall go abroad for their good and the good of other lands,with their skilled hands and their resourceful minds, and theirenergetic capital, and they must be assured of support abroad, asat home, in every honest venture.

TRUE AMERICANISM

AMERICA's ambition is to lead the world in showing what Democracycan effect. This would be my conception of the large idea of thecampaign. It involves much more than the League of Nations. Thisis our hour of test. We must not be little in our conception ofourselves, nor yet have a conceit that is self-destructive.

America must prove herself a living thing, with policies that areadequate to new conditions. … We wish an internationalsettlement that will enable us to be more supremely great asnationalists. This is the significance of the League of Nations.It is a plan of hope. It is the only plan which the mind of manhas evolved which any number of nations has ever been willing toaccept as a buffer against devil-made war. … It is a monumentalexperiment which this century and other centuries will talk of andthink of and write of because it involves the lives of men andwomen under it, and there is the possibility of giving our fullthought and energy and wealth to making life more enjoyable andfiner instead of more horrible and cruel. While other nations arein the mood, we should agree with them, that we may spend ourlives and money in a rivalry of progress rather than in acompetition in the art of scientific boy-murder. There are timeswhen war is the ultimate and necessary appeal, but those timesshould be made fewer by American genius and sacrifice.

And our prestige and power should not be wasted at this criticaltime, because out of some fecund mind may come an abstract andlegalistic plan for some other kind of League. Let us bepractical. Let us go to the fullest limit with other nations whoare now willing to join hands with us, yet never yielding theConstitutional Congressional control over our war making. … Letus take thought to-day of our opportunities else these may notexist tomorrow. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO TIMOTHY SPELLACY

August 2, 1920

MY DEAR TIM,—Here you are, when you are sick yourself, worryingabout me. Now, don't give any concern to any matter exceptinggetting thoroughly well, just as soon as possible. You are doingtoo much. You are not resting enough, and you are worrying. Youhave got enough to take care of yourself and your family for therest of your lives, you have the respect of every one who knowsyou, and the affection of every one who knows you well; in fact,you have nothing to work for, and every reason to be contented. SoI suggest that you learn, in your later years, how to bum. I haveno doubt that Mike will come across something very good inColombia, if he doesn't get the fever, or break his blooming neck.I have never seen so aggressive a group of old men as you fellowsare. You will not admit that you are more than twenty-one. …

With my warmest regards, as always cordially yours, FRANKLIN K.
LANK

With the presentation of an Irish flag, August 10, 1920.

To Edward L. Doheny, with the cordial esteem of Franklin K. Lane.

This flag is a symbol. It stands for the finest thing in a humanbeing—aspiration—the seed of the Divine. It represents thenoblest hope of a thwarted and untiring people. It makes a call tothe heart of every generous-minded man, and gives vivifyingimpulse to the home-loving of all faces. It is a symbol of apeople to whom most of the arts were known when England andAmerica were forest wastes, whose women have made the worldbeautiful by their virtue, and whose men have made the world freeby their courage.

To Franklin D. Roosevelt New York, August, [1920]

DEAR OLD MAN,—This is hard work—to say that I can't be with youon this great day in your life. [Footnote: Notification ceremoniesfollowing Franklin D. Roosevelt's nomination as Vice-president bythe Democratic party.] You know that only the mandate of themedical autocrats would keep me away, not that I could do you anygood by being there, but that you might know that many men likemyself take pride in you, rejoice in your opportunity, and keepour faith in Democracy because out of it can come men of idealslike yourself. I know/that you will not allow yourself to becomecheap, undignified, or demagogical. Remember, that East and Westalike, we want gentlemen to represent us, and we ask no man to bea panderer or a hypocrite to get our votes. Frankness, andlargeness, and simplicity, and a fine fervor for the right, arevirtues that some must preserve, and where can we look for them ifnot from the Roosevelts and the Delanos?

It is a great day for you and for all of us. Be wise! Don't bebrilliant. Get plenty of sleep. Do not give yourself to thehandshakers. For now your word carries far, and it must be a wordworthy of all you stand for. I honestly, earnestly ask God'sblessing on you. As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Our love to your dear Mother,—proud happy Mother,—and to
Eleanor.

To Mrs. George Ehle

Katonah, September, 1920

TO THE EHLE,—Now this is a pleasure to have a minute's talk withyou in the cool under an apple tree. You are gay, with Grouitches,and other festive creatures, while I am glum, gloomy andlugubrious. You know this is a novel experience for me to be incare of two nurses and a doctor, not to speak of a wife; but I amobedient, docile, humble, tractable, and otherwise dehumanized.The plan here is to follow my boy's statement of the modernprescription for women, "Catch 'em young; treat 'em rough; tell'em nothing." Well, they don't catch me young, but otherwise theprescription is filled. They reduced me to weakness, dependence,and a sort of sour-mash, and now they say that on this foundationthey will build me up. Tho' I am still to lose some weight, beingonly twenty-four pounds under my average for twenty years. I willemerge from this spot, if I emerge at all, a regular Apollo, andwill do Russian dances for you on that lovely lawn under themulberry tree. And what happy memories of that spot I do have, andthey cluster about you, with your soft hand and your understandingeye and your sympathetic mouth. You don't mind my making love toyou in this distant fashion do you? Well, this is a charming jail,but jail it is after all, for I can't flee, though all the leisurein the world were mine—and it irks an American eagle or eaglet.

Dear Anne has been improving here. She now is jolly, tho' it hasbeen hot. Responsibility kills her, and I thrive on it.

I believe I will take that place we went to see on the Shepaug.Ryan, my friend, is to manage it. Well, we have a place of refuge,eh? where the wicked and the boring and the ununderstanding cannotpursue.

But oh! my dreams do not come true these days, the magic touch islost, the Fairies have been hurt in their feelings, my Daemon hasdeserted, and instead of beauty and joy and power, sweet contentand warm friendship, I am struggling merely to live—and to whatend?

Please go into my room some morning early and look out to thegate, the cobwebs must be diamond-sprinkled on the circle at thedoorway, the catalpa trees must stand like stiff, prim, proper,knickerbockered footmen, on either side of the hedge, the groundmust rise in a very gradual swell and culminate in the rose-covered gate. Throw it a kiss for me—(I wonder if there could beany roses left?). All of it is a lovely bit of man's handiwork,and Mr. Eno should have been born poor so that his planning mind,conceiving things of beauty in regular and balanced form, couldhave been used by many.

Tell him I got his nice letter and will drop him a line one day.
With much love,

FRANK LANE

TO ISADORE B. DOCKWEILER

Washington, September 25, 1920

MY DEAR DOCKWEILER,—It is a great disappointment that I am notable to speak in California this year, I wished so much to say aword that might be helpful to Senator Phelan. I helped in hiselection six years ago, and I wanted to be able to say to thosewhom I then addressed, that Phelan had thoroughly made good inWashington. He has been strong, honest, courageous, loyal toCalifornia and the country, and at every minute he has been at theservice of his constituents. That is much to say, isn't it? Well,every word is true. …

These things I know, for I have watched him through the past sixyears and for many years before. Indeed, it is more than thirtyyears now since we first joined with boyish enthusiasm in theactivities of the Young Men's Democratic League, and always I havewondered at his willingness to make himself the target of so muchcriticism because of his loyalty to convictions that have notpleased those in political or social power. He thinks; he does nottake orders. And you can rely on his being superior to thepartisan phase of any real issue. This self-respecting, or self-owned individual is the sort of man we need to promote in ourpolitical life, or else we will soon find ourselves back in thepre-Roosevelt days of political invertebrates. I found inWashington the secret of the exceeding great authority which theolder states carry in Congress, they return their Senators andCongressmen, term after term, and give them opportunity to rise topositions of eminence in the national legislature. The usefulnessof a Senator is not to be measured by the roundness of hisperiods, nor even by the soundness of his ideas. He must passthrough a period of impatient waiting before his status is suchthat he can really have the opportunity to have his ideasconsidered seriously. By returning men who have been faithful, theState strengthens itself in Washington and eventually gainsgreatly in prestige, as in the case of Julius Kahn. Senator Phelanhas now passed through this initial period of gaining status, andhis future will be one of an assured and much strengthenedposition among his colleagues. Not to return Phelan will mean aloss at Washington that California can ill afford at this criticaltime, for in the national mind he is identified with her primeconcerns.

… These are to be most momentous times … Just where we aregoing no one knows, but clearly the people here, as elsewhere, arebent upon testing the value of Democracy as a cooperativeorganization of men and women, and are determined to make of it afuller expression of human capacities and hopes. We must feel ourway carefully at such a time, but we must act constructively, elsethere will surely come a dangerous radical reaction. Sympathy mustbe checked by wisdom, a wise knowledge of man's limitations andtendencies, that we do not take on burdens we cannot safely carry.Yet we must dare, and dare purposefully. What can this Democracydo for men and women—that is the super-question which rises likeShasta and follows one throughout the day, dominating everyprospect. And the answer must be wrought out of the sober thoughtand the proved experience of our statesmen. … Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

In September, 1920, he wrote,—"Things look dark to mepolitically. The little Wilson (as distinguished from the GreatWilson) is now having his day. Cox is making a manly fight onbehalf of the President's League, but the administration issullen, is doing nothing. Cox will be defeated not by those whodislike him but by those who dislike Wilson and his group. Thisseems mighty unjust."

To Hall McAllister

Katonah, September 25 [?], 1920

MY DEAR HALL,—This paper is a concession to my love for color, itis not yellow, but golden, and to make the touch truly CalifornianI should write with a blue pencil.

I cannot write as gaily or as bravely as you did, for I have beenpretty well beaten down to my knees. My nights are so unforgivablybad—wakened up two or three times, always with this Monstersqueezing my heart in his Mammoth hand—By God, it is somethingDante overlooked …

Take my advice, dear Hall, and avoid doing any of the things whichthe 3793 Doctors I have paid tell me cause this thing—among themare;—smoking, eating, drinking, swearing, working.

You can recover partially—not wholly under any circ*mstances—ifyou arrive at a state of Nirvana before death. … Gay life this,my boy! I've been so wicked and fast and devilish and hoggish andgluttonous and always rotten and riotous that I needs must spend afew months in this agony by way of preliminary atonement before Imay get even a chance at purgatory.

You know that sometimes in the most terrific crushing pain, Ilaugh, at the thought that my steady years of drive and struggleto help a lot of people to get justice, or a chance, should begloriously crowned by an ironical God with an end that would makea sainted Christian, in Nero's time, regret his premature taking-off. …

Tell that most charming of all women, who is your sister, that hernoble man was in great good fortune; and I envy him because theGods showed their love for him even up to the last. The wicked,torturing devils respected his gay spirit as he passed along andforgot to fill him full of arrows, poisoned arrows, as he ran thegauntlet down to the River. Her letters are beauteous reflectionsof her thoroughbred soul, and they give delight to Anne andmyself. … Yours as always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

TO MRS. GEORGE EHLE

Bethel, October [3], 1920

That is so charming and gracious a letter that it must be answeredwithin the day, not that any word in kind can be returned, but thespirit may be echoed. We may be short in words but not in feeling.Let me tell you, Lady Ehle, about this place. It is Nirvana-in-the-Wilderness, the Sacred, Serene Spot. Beautiful, for it is aridge surrounded by mountains—or "mountings"—of gold and green,russet and silver. Noiseless, no dogs bark or cats mew or autoshonk. Peaceful—no business. Nothing offends. Isn't that Nirvana?No poverty. People independent but polite. Children smile backwhen you talk to them, and you do. And the sky has clouds thatcolor and that cast shadows on purpling mountains and stretches ofmeadow. Yes, this is one lovely spot over which a man namedGehring presides, unofficially, modestly, gently; he has given itpurpose for being, for here he does good by healing, and some ofhis wealthy patients have put up a handsome inn in his honor—andthey have said so in a bronze tablet over the mantel.

How much good he can do me I cannot say, but he is trying, Oh,ever so hard to touch my trouble-centre, and I shall give him afull chance yet awhile.

Wouldn't it be splendid if Shepaug were assured, or any otherplace of simple beauty to which we could retire to commune withthe things that, alas, one only discovers to be the really greatthings, the worth while things, late in life. Daily would weforegather beside that stream to build some kind of altar to theGod of Things as we Hope they may sometime Be. …

Give my regards to the Duke of Saugatuck and tell him that hispicture on horseback is good enough to enlarge—and then I wantone.

And to you, The Ehle, may the peace that gay souls need and seldomget, and the joy that good souls long for, be with you always. Anddo write some more!

F. K. L.

TO BENJAMIN IDE WHEELER

Bethel, [October 28, 1920]

MY DEAR B. I.,—It has been along time since your letter came, butuntil now I have not felt that I could write. Most of the time Ihave been in pain and I have also been much discouraged over thecondition of my health. No one wants to hear a man talk of hisaches and I haven't much else on my mind. I am beginning to crawla bit health-wards, I think; at any rate I am moving on thatassumption.

[Illustration with caption: FRANKLIN K. LANE IN 1917. TAKEN IN
LAFAYETTE NATIONAL PARK]

What a hell of a condition the land is in politically. Cowardiceand hypocrisy are slated to win, and makeshift and the cheapestpolitics are to take possession of national affairs. Better evenobstinacy and ego-mania! Cox, I think, has made a gallant fight.He is to be beaten because Wilson is as unpopular as he once waspopular. Oh! if he had been frank as to his illness, the peoplewould have forgotten everything, his going to Paris, his refusalto deal with the mild Reservationists—everything would have beenswept away in a great wave of sympathy. But he could not be frank,he who talked so high of faith in the people distrusted them; andthey will not be mastered by mystery. So he is so much less than ahero that he bears down his party to defeat.

And after election will come revolt in the Republican party, forit is too many-sided for a long popularity.

I am sorry to be out of it all, but the Gods so willed. I did wantto help Phelan. The country will think that what he has stood for,as to California matters, especially oil and Japan, has beenrepudiated if he is not returned. He was California incarnate inWashington.

Remember me to the Lady and the Soldier. Always your friend,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John W. Hallowell

Bethel, November 3, 1920

MY DEAR JACK,—You have so much idle time hanging, dragging,festooning on round and about your hands that I want to give you ajob, something to do. Eh, what!

I have taken it into my head, caput, cranium, that I will readGibbon's Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, and as the onlycopy here is too poorly printed to read, and furthermore as I wishto own said work myself, I would that you make purchase of sameand send it to me. Now, I do not wish an expensive copy, nor alarge copy, nor a heavy copy. Therefore I think it would be bestto buy a good second-hand set, say in half-leather—perhaps youcan get it in six or eight volumes—and it must not be heavy,because I read in bed. About the size of an ordinary novel wouldbe very good, and pretty good sized type—leaded not solid. Yes,the more I think of a second-hand set, the better I like the idea—old binding but strong, old paper but light, old type but clear.Twelve dollars I enclose for a second-hand set. By devoting twentydollars worth of time to the search I know you can get a secondhand set for twelve dollars. That is uneconomical, but think ofthe fun you will have. I suggest to you that this was the verything you needed to do to bring perfect contentment into yourlife. Search for Gibbon, pretty backs, good type, light in weightfor twelve dollars. Oh what joy you will have! Really I should beselfish enough to do it myself but now that I have said so muchabout it I can't withdraw this boon. …

Well, get Gibbon and "with all thy getting get understanding."

F. K. L.

TO JOHN W. HALLOWETT

Bethel, November 12, [1920]

MY DEAR JACK,—I said nothing of the kind to myself. This is whatI said, "Now I want a Gibbon. Not a show-off set but a usefulone—light and small and well bound. How can I get it? Cotter inNew York? What does Cotter know of learning and books of learning?What interest does New York take in such things anyway? There aresecond-hand stores there but they must be filled with novels andsuch trumpery. No one in New York ever read Gibbon—ninety-ninepercent never heard of him. So why should I send to New York? No,Boston is the place. There is the city of the Erudite, the Home ofLodge, and incidentally of Parkman, Bancroft, Thayer, Morse,Fiske, and all others who have minds to throw back into the otherdays, and make pictures of what has been. Every house there hasits Gibbon, of course, and some must, in the course of nature,fall into the hands of the dealers. So to Boston,—and who elsebut Jack Hallowell who knows what a book is, how in respectabilityit should be bound, and what size book is a pleasure and what aburden. A man of learning, identified with scholarship, throughhis athletic course in Harvard, and withal a man of business whowill not pay more than a thing is worth. Ideal! Hence the letterand consequent trouble to good Jack Hallowell, who as per usual"done his damnedest for a friend," as Bret Harte says, in writinga perfect epitaph. …

The reason I sent twelve dollars needs explanation. I put thatlimit because a very handsome edition of eleven volumes sold forthat price to a friend of mine. It was red morocco, tooled, etc.,and I thought surely twelve dollars would buy something as good asI needed.

Now you have the whole mysterious story. Make the most of it as
Patrick Henry suggested to George III.

I have your dear Mother's book and will write her when I have readit. I also have a letter saying that Hoover has named me astreasurer of his twenty-three million or billion fund. …

Thank you for your kindness and write me as often as you can. …

F. K. L.

TO ROBERT LANSING

Bethel, Maine, November 10, [1920]

MY DEAR LANSING,—It is good to see that letter-head, but aren'tyou afraid to enter into competition with Mr. Tumulty, who hasnow, I see, bought the old Shepard mansion and will settle inWashington. How do they do it with the high cost of living what itis? … The transmutation of brass into gold is becoming acommonplace.

To-night's paper speaks of Knox as probable Secretary of State.… Tell me where the opposition is to come from—who are to leadus? … All possible leaders have been submerged, squelched,drowned out, in the past eight years. I wish the whole country hadgone unanimously for Harding. Then we might have started on afresh, clean footing to create two parties that represent liberaland conservative thought. As it is, I think you will see Hearstand Johnson and La Follette try to capture the radicals of bothparties and make a new party of their own. Then I shall be withall the rascals I have been fighting since boyhood—the WallStreet rascals—as against the other group. But maybe the Lordcares a bit for us after all.

I mend very slowly, but I delight in your recovery and wonder atit. … I do beg you will give me all the gossip of Washingtonthat you can, for I am here in a wilderness, beautiful but notexciting. As always,

F. K. L.

To Carl Snyder

Bethel, November 13, [1920]

Dear Carl,—This is extremely disagreeable business, this ofrepairs and restoration. I suppose I am doing fairly wellconsidering that I have been more than half a century getting mygearings askew and awry. But I am taking orders now and say "Thankyou," when I get them. Just when I shall be well enough to takehold again is not yet discoverable.

Strange how little news there is when you are above the clouds.One must be local to be interested in ninety percent of what thepapers print. Make me a hermit for a year and I could see thingsin the large I believe, and ignore the trifles which obscure realvision. But a monk must be checked by a butcher. The ideal must betranslated into the possible. "Man cannot live on bread alone"—nor on manna.

Outside it is snowing beautifully, across an insistent sun, thefire is crackling and I do not know that I am ill but for thestaring bottles before me.

Give me a line when you have a free minute—and take to your
Beautiful Lady my warm regards.

F. K. L.

To William R. Wheeler

Bethel, 17 [November], 1920

My dear Bill,—…I am mighty sorry to hear about the Lady AliceIsabel. Funny that these women are like some damn fools, likemyself, and do things too strenuously, and then go bang. Damn thatIrish temperament, anyway! O God, that I had been made a stolid,phlegmatic, non-nervous, self-satisfied Britisher, instead of awild cross between a crazy Irishman, with dreams, desires,fancies, and a dour Scot, with his conscience and his logicalbitterness against himself,—and his eternal drive!

I can't tell you anything new about myself. I hope it is not adelusion that I am growing slowly better. I cultivate that ideaanyway. …

It was a slaughter, the election, and properly did it come to us.Now be wise and you can have this land for many years. But foolishconceit will put you out in four. …I wish you Republicans hadcarried all the South. I am glad for Lenroot—very! … ButPhelan's defeat has about broken my heart and for Henderson andChamberlain and Thomas I am especially grieved. Well, it will be achanged world in Washington, and I'm sorry I can't be in it and ofit.

Anne has gone to Washington to see Nancy who has not been well, soI am alone but not for long. I get on all right. God bless you, mydear old chap, and do rest awhile beneath your own fig tree. Mylove to Alice. Affectionately as always,

F. K. L.

To George Otis Smith

Bethel, [November] 18, [1920]

Dear George Otis,—I love this Maine of yours. It is beautiful,and its people are good stuff—strong, wholesome, intelligentyoung men. I like them greatly. I'd be content to sit right downhere and wait for whatever is to come. It is a place of serenity.There is no rush, yet people live and the necessary things getdone. It doesn't have any Ford factories, but I rather fancy itmakes the men who go West and make the factories.

The autumn has been one long procession of gay banners on thehillsides, and now that the snow has come the pines are blue andthe mountains purple; and mountains five thousand feet high arejust as good, more companionable, than mountains fifteen thousandfeet high. What is more lovely, stately and of finer color than aline of these receding hills which walk away from you, as if theycontinued clear across the continent?

I must get out against my wish, to have a lot more testing done—for this doctor differs with the others—and I rather think he isright. But I hope to get back here and enjoy this air. No wonderthis stock was for prohibition, the air itself is an intoxicant,especially when the snow is on the ground and it comes to yougently; it is as bracing as a co*cktail, not a sensuous wine likethe Santa Barbara air—tell Vogelsang this—but I presume morelike the High Sierras, where the fishing is good.

I shall read your speeches with the deepest interest. Keep up thepublicity. It affects Congress and it justifies the good doctrinewe have preached. Cordially,

F. K. Lane

Have read the speeches and they are everything they should be.Right theory, clear statement, conclusive facts. A few too manyfigures perhaps, you should keep your prime figures in the airlonger so they can be visualized. This may be called jugglingfigures in the right sense.

Lane

To George W. Wickersham

Bethel, Maine, 18 [November, 1920]

My dear G. W.,—I have your good letter. By 'good' I mean manythings—well done as a bit of sketchy composition, a welcomeletter, kindly also in spirit, cheering, timely, telling of thingsthat interest the receiver, one, too, having the flavor of thehousehold whence it comes, altogether a good letter. I had onealso from Her; which I brutally answered with a preachment—inpencil, too, for I can't write with comfort at a desk and, afterall, what have white paper and ink in common with these woods? Iam for harmony—a reconciler, like Harding. …

Root, as you say, would give a good smack to the meal. The countrywould at once say Harding knows how to set a good table. But tellme—will he be a Taft? a McKinley? a Hayes? or a Grant? Pshaw! whyshould I ask such a question? Who knows what a man will turn outto be! Events may make him greater than any, or less. A war, abullet, a timely word of warning to a foreign power, a fiercefight with some unliked home group, the right sort of a deal onpostal rates with newspapers and magazines—any one of these mightlift him into a national hero; while a sneaking act revealed, alittle too much caution, a period of business depression, wouldsend him tumbling out of the skies.

These be indeed no days for prophesying—Wilson gone, Clemenceaugone, Venizelos gone,—Lloyd George alone left! The wise boy hadhis election at the right moment, didn't he? Surely statesmanshipis four-fifths politics. Harding's danger, as I see it, will liein his timidity. He fears; and fear is the poison gas which comesfrom the Devil's factory. Courage is oxygen, and Fear is carbonmonoxide. One comes from Heaven—so you find Wells says,—and theother would turn the universe back into primeval chaos. Wilson, beit said to his eternal glory, did not fear. They send word to mefrom the inside that he believed in Cox's election up to the lastminute, although the whole Cabinet told him defeat was sure. He"was right, and right would prevail"—surely such faith, even inoneself, is almost genius!

I am glad you put Lincoln first in your list of great Americans. Idecided that question for myself when I came to hang some picturesin my library. Washington or Lincoln on top? And Lincoln got it. Ihave recently read all his speeches and papers, and the man istrue from the first day to the last. The same philosophy and thesame reasoning were good in 1861 as in 1841. He was large enoughfor a great day—could any more be said of any one?

Lincoln made Seward and Chase and Stanton and Blair his mates. Hedid not fear them. He wished to walk with the greatest, not withtrucklers and fawners, court satellites and panderers. His greatsoul was not warm enough to fuse them—they were rebellious ore—but his simplicities were not to be mastered by their elaboratecogencies.

McKinley was simple in his nature, at bottom a dear boy of kindheart, who put his hand into the big fist of Mark Hanna and wasled to glory.

Is Harding great and masterful in his simplicity, or trustful andyielding? and if the latter where is the Hanna? Well, I don't wantto die in these next few months, anyway, till some questions areanswered. This would be a part of my Cabinet if I were Harding:—Root, State; Hoover, Treasury; Warren of Michigan, Attorney-General; Wood, War; Willard (of Baltimore)

You enviously write of my opportunity to read and contemplate. Ihave done some of both. But that's a monk's life, and even a monkhas a cell of his own, and a bit of garden to play with; and hecan think upon a God that is his very own, an IsraelitishProvidence; and, in his egotism, be content. Yes, with a cell anda book and a garden and an intimate God, one should be satisfiedto forego even health. But I hold with old Cicero that the "wholeglory of virtue is in activity," and therefore I call mydiscontent divine.

You speak of great Americans, and have named all four frompolitical life. I concur in your selection. Now what writers wouldyou say were most distinctly American in thought and mostinfluential upon our thought, men who a hundred years hence willbe regarded not great as literary men but as American social,spiritual, and economic philosophers? It occurs to me that thissingular trio might be selected—Emerson, Henry George, andWilliam James. What say you?

Say "Hello" to the young Colonel for me.

F. K. L.

Lincoln haunted Lane's imagination, the humor, friendliness,loneliness, and greatness of the man. This—written for no formaloccasion but to express part of his feeling—has found its way toothers who, too, reverence the great American.

Lincoln's Eyes

I never pass through Chicago without visiting the statue ofLincoln by St. Gaudens and standing before it for a momentuncovered. It is to me all that America is, physically andspiritually. I look at those long arms and long legs, large handsand feet, and I think that they represent the physical strength ofthis country, its power and its youthful awkwardness. Then I lookup at the head and see qualities which have made the American—thestrong chin, the noble brow, those sober and steadfast eyes. Theywere the eyes of one who saw with sympathy and interpreted withcommon sense. They were the eyes of earnest idealism limited andchecked by the possible and the practicable. They were the eyes ofa truly humble spirit, whose ambition was not a love for power buta desire to be supremely useful. They were eyes of compassion andmercy and a deep understanding. They saw far more than they lookedat. They believed in far more than they saw. They loved men notfor what they were but for what they might become. They werepatient eyes, eyes that could wait and wait and live on in thefaith that right would win. They were eyes which challenged thenobler things in men and brought out the hidden largeness. Theywere humorous eyes that saw things in their true proportions andin their real relationships. They looked through cant and pretenseand the great and little vanities of great and little men. Theywere the eyes of an unflinching courage and an unfaltering faithrising out of a sincere dependence upon the Master of theUniverse. To believe in Lincoln is to learn to look throughLincoln's eyes.

To Benjamin Ide Wheeler

Bethel, 18 [November, 1920]

MY DEAR B. I.,—From both ends of this continent we talk to eachother. We have both retired from active things and can with somedegree of removal, and from some altitude, look upon the affairsof men. Frankly, it challenges all my transcendental philosophy toconvince me that "deep love lieth under these pictures of time."And yet I must so believe or die. It is a disheartening time—Wilson, a wreck and beaten. Clemenceau, beaten and out. And nowVenizelos gone. Only Lloyd George, the crafty, quick-turning,sometimes-lying, never-wholly-frank politician left, because hecalled his election when spirits had not fallen.

And little men take their places, while Bolshevism drives Wrangelinto the sea, possesses all Russia and Siberia, and is a successpolitically and militarily, tho' a failure economically andsocially. We have passed the danger of red anarchy in America, Ithink, tho' no one should prophesy as to any event of to-morrow.Communism, and socialism with it, have been made to pause. Yetnothing constructive is opened by the world for men to think upon,as a means of bettering their lot and answering the questionsflung to them by Russia, Germany, England, and our own homeconditions.

I can see no evidence of constructive statesmanship on this sidethe water, excepting in Hoover. The best man in Congress isLenroot, and he writes me that unless the Republicans do somethingmore than fail to make mistakes that the Democrats will take thepower from them in another four years. But I am nothing forparties. I cannot wait for an opposition to come in. I would liketo see the Republicans now address themselves to the problems ofthe world at large and of this land. If Knox is to be Secretary ofState, as the rumor is, we will have Steel Trust Diplomacy,—whichwill give us safety abroad, which is more than we have had forsome years—but it will be without vision, without love formankind. Root would give the Republicans great assurance andconfidence. He would make them smack their lips and feel thatHarding was not afraid of the best near him. Hoover may or may nothave a Cabinet place, but his brain is the best thing working inAmerica to-day, on our questions. If Penrose and Co. beat him theywill regret it,

If I were Harding I'd put Root, Lowden, Wood, Hoover, and Johnsonif he wanted it, into my Cabinet and I'd gather all the men ofmind in the country and put them at work on specific questions asadvisors to me, under Cabinet officers. One group on Taxes andFinance, one on Labor and Capital, one on Internal Improvements,one on Education and Health. And have a program agreeable toCongress, which is sterile because it is a messenger-boy force forconstituents.

The Democrats could do this if they had the men,—but look overthe nation and see how short we are of talent of any kind. It maybe an opposition party but it has no force, no will, no self-confidence. It hopes for a miracle, vainly hopes. It cannot gathertwenty first-rate minds in the nation to make a program for theparty. I tried it the other day—men interested in politicalaffairs, outside Congress—try it yourself. Get twenty big enoughto draft a national program of legislation for the party. I sentthe suggestion to George White, chairman of the NationalCommittee, and gave him a list, and at the head I put you andPresident Eliot, classing you both as Democrats, which probablyneither of you call yourselves now, tho' both voted for Cox. …

If I get to California I must see you. But I shall play my stringout here before trying the Western land. My best regards to theLady. Yours always, LANE

To Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt

Bethel, Maine, [November, 1920]

To THE DEAR ROOSEVELTS,—… You realized what was coming, but Ifear Cox did not; could not believe that his star would not pullthrough. I wish Georgia and Alabama had gone, too. The Americanborn did not like Wilson because he was not frank, was too selfishand opinionated. The foreign born did not like his foreignsettlements. So they voted "no confidence" in his party. What wewill do in this land of mixed peoples is a problem. Our policiesnow are to be determined by Fiume and Ireland—not by real homeconcerns. This is dangerous in the extreme. Demagogues can win topower by playing to the prejudices of those not yet fullyAmerican. … As always,

F. K. L.

To Lathrop Brown

Bethel, [November] 20, [1920]

MY DEAR LATHROP,—You are wrong, dead wrong, viciously, wilfullywrong. I do like this exact science business. I worked at it andin it on the railroad problems for seven years. There is only onething that beats it, puts it on the blink, and that is inexacthuman nature which does wicked things to figures and facts andtheories and plans and hopes. Prove, if you will, that there is nomargin at all over wages, and a nominal return on capital, and youdo not kill the desire of someone to run the shop. … Talking ofbusiness men, what about the Shipping Board? O, my boy, they havesomething to explain—these Hurleys and Schwabs! … How does thissound to you? They let their own tanks lie idle, commandeeredthose of Doheny and rented them to the Standard Oil—so that theycould bid when Doheny couldn't—eh, what? …

F. K. L.

To Timothy Spellacy

Bethel, [November] 22, [1920]

MY DEAR TIM,—I hear from Mike that you are not in New York, andso I am writing you out of "love and affection," as I hope to seeMike but won't see you when I go to New York for Thanksgiving. Itwas my hope that we three could have a good talk over Mike'sColombia plans, but do not trouble yourself with these businessconcerns. Get well—that's the job for both you and me. We havebeen too extravagant of ourselves, and especially you, you big-hearted, energetic, unselfish son of Erin! Eighteen years I haveknown you and never a word or an act have I heard of or seen thatdid not make me feel that the campaign for Governor was worthwhile, because it gave me your acquaintance, friendship,affection. And Ned and George love you as I do. When I get mad, asI do sometimes, over something that the Irish do, I always amtempted to a hard generalization that I am compelled to modify,because of you and Mike and Dan O'Neill, in San Francisco—and afew more of the Great Irish—. …

Well, my dear fellow, drop me a line when you feel like it and besustained in your weakness by the unfaltering affection ofthousands who know you, among them—

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Frank I, Cobb New York World

New York, December 6, [1920]

DEAR FRANK,—You are right, but too far ahead. We must come toCabinet responsibility, and I am with you as an agitator. Twentyyears may see it.

This morning you chide the Republicans for not having a program.Good God, man, why so partisan? What program have we? Will we justoppose; vote "Nay," to all they propose? That way insures twentyyears as "outs"—and we won't deserve to be in. What we lack isjust plain brains. We have a slushy, sentimental Democracy, butdon't have men who can concrete-ize feeling into policy, if youknow what that means. A program—a practicable, constructiveprogram—quietly drawn, agreeable to the leaders in both Houses,pushed for, advocated loudly! That's our one hope—Agree? Yourscordially,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To John G. Gehring

New York, December 9, [1920]

Well, my dear Doctor, here I am at another cross-roads. … Ileave … in a day or two with a new dietary and some good advice.The latter in tabloid form being:—"Drop business for a time, gointo it again slowly, and gradually creep into your job." All ofwhich is wise, and commends itself greatly to my erstwhile mind,but is much like saying, "Jump off the Brooklyn bridge, "slowly."… I am not resigned, of course. Because I cannot see the end.Definiteness is so imperative to some natures. However, I thinkthat I have done all that an exacting Deity would demand, andcannot be accused of suicide, if things go badly.

Our plan is to go to Washington to see some old friends thencesouth and so to California, for a couple of months. Delightfulprogram if one had health, but in exchange I would gladly take asentence to three months in a chain-gang on the roads.

One of my friends has suggestively sent me Burton's Anatomy ofMelancholy. To offset it I went out at once and bought a new suitof bright homespun clothes and a red overcoat—pretty red. Inaddition I have a New Thought doctor giving me absent treatment. Iam experimenting with Hindu deep breathing, rhythmical breathing,in which the lady who runs this hospital is an adept. And whatwith an osteopath and a regular and a nurse and predigested food,I am not shirking. If melancholy gets the better of me now—Kismet!

Tell your dear Lady that it was infinitely good of her to write,(and she has, I may say, quite as brilliant a pen-style asspeech.) And one day I shall write her when the world looksbetter. My best reading has been William James' Letters; and thatwhich amused me most a new novel, entitled Potterism, by RoseMacauley, which cuts into the cant and humbug of the world rightcruelly. I see your beautiful serene landscape and envy you. And Ienvy those who hear your hearty chuckle each morning in the Inn.As always,

F. K. L.

To John W. Hallowell

New York, December 9, [1920]

DEAR JACK,—I have tried out New York again and find it lacking asbefore. No help! They do not know. … So I am going toCaliforni…A. I wish I were to be near you—you really have aspecial old corner in all that is left of my heart. And one ofthese days well indulge ourselves in a good time—a long pulltogether again.

I have been reading William James' Letters—and real literaturethey are—far better than all your novels. What a great Man—amind, plus a man. Not to have known James in the last generationis to have missed its greatest intellect; Roosevelt and James andHenry George were the three greatest forces of the last thirtyyears. Sometime when you come across a good photo or engraving orwood-cut, or something, of James, will you buy it and send it tome? I want a human one—not a professional one. I guess hecouldn't be the pedantic kind anyway.

Billy Phillips has a new baby-boy born Monday.

My plan is to leave here in a week, go to Washington and seeNancy, and get a glimpse of some of my old people in theDepartment, thence to South Carolina and then probably Californiafor two or three months. Ah me—most people would think thisluxury—I think it hell! But it may be for my great spiritualgood. Certainly if I could have you to walk with for these months,and more of William James to read, I could take a step or twoforward.

Have also been reading a bit of Buddhism lately. It is toonegative—that is almost its chief if not its only defect, as anattitude toward life. It won't make things move but it will makesouls content. And I can't get away from the thought that we arehere as conquerors, not as pacifists. I can't be the latter, savein the desire.

Peabody dropped in yesterday from Chicago. (I have forgottenwhether you knew him well or not.) Able chap, fond of me, as I ofhim. My boy works for him. He sent me a gorgeous edition ofBurton's Anatomy of Melancholy which I have always wanted, largelybecause it is one of the curiosities of the world. …

Write me as often as your Quaker spirit moves you to utterance.Your dinner got quite a send-off in these papers, which issomething, for New York to recognize Boston! Terribly tough jobthough. Poor babies! Hard to believe in a good God and a kind God,isn't it?

I hear talk of shoving Hoover outside the breastworks. Fools!Fools! Best for him but worse for the country. Whole question ofRepublican success turns on the largeness of Harding. I don't aska Lincoln—much less will do. If he is only a smooth-footedpolitician he will fail. So far he has been the gentleman. …

My love to your whole circle, from Grandmother down.
Affectionately,

F. K. L.

To John G. Gehring

Rochester, Minnesota, December 31, [1920]

MY DEAR PADRE,—It is the last night of an unhappy year. Never doI wish for such another. No joy—defeat, dreary waiting. Thesewords describe not merely my personal history and attitude butfairly picture those of the world. It took guts to live throughsuch an unillumined, non-productive, soul-depressing year. Didany good come out of it? Yes, to me just one thing good—I came toknow you, your Lady and the beauteousness of Bethel. And after alla man does not do any better in any year than make a friend. Noman makes seventy friends in a life-time, does he? So I must notrepine nor let the year go out in bitterness. On the credit sideof my account book I have something that can be carried over into1921, whereas most people can only carry over Hope.

I hope there is something significant and more than suggestive inmy turning up here on the last day of the year for examination—"Getting a ready on" for a New Year—that's what you wouldoptimistically shout if you were here, I know. And that is myGoodbye word to 1920—"You haven't beaten me, and I have lived totake your brush."

I am being ground and wound and twisted and fed into and out ofthe Mayo mill, and a great mill it is. Of course they are givingme a private view, so to speak. Distinguished consideration is amodest word for the way in which I am treated—not because of myworth but because of my friends—. Those men are greater asorganizers, I believe, than as workmen, which is saying muchindeed, for they are the surgeons supreme. … Two to threehundred people, new people, a day pass through [their shop]. Sixtyto seventy thousand a year received, examined, diagnosed, treatedperhaps, operated on (fifty per cent), and cared for. Themachinery for this is colossal and superbly arranged.

Dr. Mayo told me to come over at two o'clock and register. … Istood in line and was duly registered, telling name, and othersuch facts, non-medical. Then a special guide took me to Dr. Mayo,who had already heard my story at the hotel but who, wished it inwriting. Accordingly, I was presented to a group of the staff andone man assigned as my escort. I answered him a thousandquestions, touching my physical life for fifty-six years. Then tothe tonsil man, who saw a distinct "focus," now there, a focus inthe tonsils! Nose and ears without focus or focii or focuses. Downan elevator, through a labyrinth of halls, down an inclined plane,up a flight of steps, two turns to the left and then a group ofthe grumpiest girls I ever saw or heard or felt. They were goodlooking, too, but they didn't care to win favor with mere males.They had a higher purpose, no doubt. They openly sneered at mydoctor escort. They lifted their eyebrows at my good-looking youngson, and they told me precisely where to sit down. I was notspoken to further. My ear was punched and blood was taken in tubesand on slides by young ladies who did not care how much of myblood they spilled or extracted. They were so business-like, somechanical, so dehumanized, these young ladies with microscopes!One said cryptically "57," another said "53." I was full ofcuriosity but I did not ask a question. They tapped me as if Iwere a spring—a fountain filled with blood—and gave me neitherinformation, gaiety or entertainment in exchange. Each one I amconvinced has by this life of near-crime, which she pursues for aliving, become capable of actual murder.

Thus has my first day gone. It is cold here—slushy underfoot,snow dirty, sky dark. How different from a place we know!

There are one hundred and fifty physicians and surgeons in theclinic, and Heaven knows how many hundred employees. No hospitalsare owned and run by the Mayos; all these are private, outsideaffairs. The side tracks are filled with private cars of thewealthy. Scores of residences, large, small, fine, and shabby arelittle hospitals. The town has grown 5,000 in five years, all onaccount of the Mayos, these two sons of a great country doctor whowithout a college education have gathered the world's talent tothem.

I am tomorrow to be medically examined further, to the revealingof my terrible past, my perturbed present, and pacific future. Theresult of which necromancy I shall duly report. I am afraid thatthey will not find that an operation will do good, if so I shalltruly despair. And if they decide for the knife, I shall go to theguillotine like the gayest Marquis of the ancient regime. Yes, Ishould do better for I have my chance, and he, poor chap, hadnone.

I received your Christmas present in the spirit that sent it. Ican't say "No! No!"—for I preach mixing pleasure with business.Things are all wrong when we don't. I will never repay you. If Icould, or did, you would receive none of the blessings that comefrom giving gifts. The truth is, we knew each other years ago,perhaps centuries ago, and you have done a good turn to an oldfriend for which the old friend is glad, because it makes the tiemore binding.

I told you I would send Wells' history to you, and to it I haveadded one of the greatest of human documents, William James'Letters. I hope you love the largeness of the man, to be large andplayful and useful, I say, man, can you beat that combination? Ibelieve I know another beside James who meets the specifications.And strangely enough he, too, evolved from physician topsychologist, to philosopher.

Well, here's hoping that he and his High-Souled Partner meet withmany joys and few sorrows in 1921.

F. K. L.

LETTERS TO ELIZABETH 1919-1920

To Mrs. Ralph Ellis

[Camden, North Carolina, March, 1919]

MY DEAR ELIZABETH,—And so they call you a Bolshevik! a parlorBolshevik! Well, I am not surprised for your talk givesjustification for calling you almost anything, except a dullperson. When one is adventurous in mind and in speech—perfectlywilling to pioneer into all sorts of mountains and morasses—thestay-at-homes always furnish them with purposes that they neverhad and throw them into all kinds of loose company. I haveforgotten whether or no there was a Mrs. Columbus, but if the OldMan on his return spoke an admiring word of the Indian girls hesaw on Santo Domingo you may be sure that he was at once regardedas having outdone that Biblical hero who exclaimed, "Vanity ofVanities, all is Vanity!," after having run his personal attacheesup into the thousand.

Yes, the very solemn truth is that adventuring is dangerousbusiness, and mental adventuring most dangerous of all. We forgivethose who do things that are strange, really more readily thanthose who talk of doing them. People are really afraid of talk,and rightly so, I believe. The mind that goes reaching out and upand around and through is a disturber, it bumps into every kind offixed notion and takes off a chip here and there, it probes intoall sorts of mysteries and opens them to find that they are hollowwind-bag affairs, tho' always held as holy of holies heretofore.To think, to speculate, to wonder, to query—these implyimagination, and the Devil has just one function in this Universe—to destroy, to kill, or suppress or to divert or prevent theimagination. Imagination is the Divine Spark, and old Beelzebubhas had his hands full ever since that spark was born. "As youwere," is his one military command. His diabolical energy ischallenged to its utmost when he hears the words "Forward March!"There is not much—ANYTHING—of beauty or nobility or achievementin the world that he has not fought, and all of it has been thefruit of imagination, the working of the creative mind. You see Icome very near to believing in that old personal Devil which myPresbyterian father saw so vividly, and which our friend Wells hasrecently discovered, Satan is smart, and that is a very dreadfulthing to be, I never like to hear the Yankee called smart, it is aterm of reproach. I don't like to think of a Smart Set. And myrefuge is in the knowledge that there is just one thing thatdestroys smartness and that is, to put it in a very high-soundingword, Nobility. There is the test we can all put to ourselves—andit really is conscience and ethics and religion all in one—is theidea smart or is it noble? I'd take my chances of going to Heavenon the conformity of conduct to that criterion.

But all this seems a far way from Parlor Bolshevism—yet it isnot so far. For it all comes down to this. The Lord he prompts usto think and to advance, and the Devil he urges us to be smart, toswitch our thinkings, our very right thinkings, our progressiveimpulses, to side tracks that will serve his ends.

And that is just what is happening to a lot of the finest minds.Men and women who see clearly that things are wrong, who haveenough insight and knowledge to get a glimpse into the unnecessarysuffering of the world and who mentally come down with a slap-bangdeclaration that this must stop, are allowing themselves to becalled by a name that history will execrate, and to smooth overand palliate and defend things that are bad, out of which goodwill not come.

You have no love for Czarism any more than you have for Kaiserism.You do not care to make the world righteous by dictatorship,because you know that it is not growth or the basis of growth, butthe foundation of hate. Now the very cornerstone of Bolshevism issmartness—the get-even spirit. Because the Czars and the Dukeshave oppressed the poor, because when this land was divided amongthe serfs the division was not what it pretended to be, andbecause the German business managers of Russian industry madewages and conditions that were brutal and brutalizing, thepeasants and workmen have said, "Let us have done with the wholecrew, and take all land and industry into our own hands, killingthose who were our masters under the old economic system. Let usturn the whole world topsy-turvy in a night, and bring all down towhere we are. In our aspiration for Beauty, let us kill what hasbeen created. In our hunt for Justice, let us disregard fairdealing. In our purpose to level down, let us do it with the kniferuthlessly and logically," Thus disregarding the teachings oftime, that men are not the creatures of logic, of passionless orpassionate theses, but are the expression of an unfalteringSpirit. Whenever men have been the victims of logicalness theyhave been wrong. For instance, read the story of the Inquisition.They saw what they wanted clearly, those old Fathers of theChurch. They knew their objective, which was to save men's souls.And they thought they knew the way. Logic told them that those whopreached heresies were bringing men's eternal souls to everlastinghell fire. And they set about to stop the preaching. Had Ibelieved as they did, I doubtless would have done as they did. Butto be infallibly right is to be hopelessly smart. Thus it is withall who take a paper system and apply it to that strange thingcalled Life.

This is the defect of the Intellectuals, the "parlor" Bolsheviks.(Better by far be an outdoor Bolshevik, a Red Guard, if youplease, one who is in and of the fighting, who acts, who lives thetheory!) They do not think in terms of human nature, of naturalprogress, of real facts. They say, "all men are born free andequal," and at once conclude that the stable boy can step from thestable door to the management of a factory or into thelegislature. Now experience teaches that this is a most dangerousexperiment, both for stable boy and society. The true philosophyof Democracy teaches that the stable boy shall have, throughschool and the step-ladder of free institutions, the chance torise to the management of industry or the leadership of theSenate. That is why the foundation of Democracy is political. Forout of political freedom will come social and economic freedom.That is why I favor woman suffrage, it gives women a chance togrow, to think along new lines and grow into new capacities.

To feel acutely that things are badly ordered, and to feel thatyou know what opportunities men and women and boys and girlsshould have, is not a program of salvation, it is only the impulsetoward finding one. Why then, because we do feel so, should weharness ourselves to a word that implies methods that we would notcountenance, and give character to a movement that is at absolutedefiance with America's spirit and purpose? There is danger, gravedanger, in doing this. For we can upset our own apple-cart veryeasily these days. I have no more of this world's goods than thehumblest workingman. No man is poorer than I am, measured by bankaccount standards. The education that I have, I fought for.Therefore I do not speak for a class. To defend the methods bywhich some men have made their money is not at all to my fancy. Isee as clearly, I think, as one can, the necessity for the strongarm of society asserting itself, thrusting itself in where it hasnot been supposed to have any business. Yet I know that aBolshevik movement, a capturing of what others have gained underthe system which has obtained, and the brutal satisfaction of"getting even with the wage-masters" and making them feel to thedepths of their souls and in the pain of their flesh everyhumiliation and torture, will permanently set nothing right.America is fair play. Is it a failure? Have you tried it longenough to know that it will not serve the world, as you think theworld should be served? Is there any experiment that we cannotmake? Are our hands tied? True, our feet may lag, our eyes may notsee far ahead, but who should say that for this reason man shouldthrow aside all the firmness and strength and solidity of order,forget all that he has passed through, and start afresh from thebottom rung of the ladder—from the muck of the primitive brute?

There are things that we would not hold, that we think unworthy ofour philosophy, that must be changed or else our sympathies andabiding hopes will be forever offended. And this would be to liveright on under the pointing finger of shame. So we know it cannotlast, this thing that offends, the badness and brutality ofinjustice, of unfairness to the weak, their inability to get asquarer chance.

Yet this does not compel us to forsake the hopeful thing we have,for which all men have striven, these centuries through. Must weconfess that revolution is still necessary? Are we no furtherahead for all that Pym and Hampden and Sam Adams and Washingtonand all the rest of the glorified ones have done? This land istruly a land of promise because it may be a land of fulfilment. Itshows the way by which without murder and robbery and class hatredand the burning up of what has been, men may go right on makingexperiments, and failing, making others and failing, and learningsomething all the time.

So, I'm for America, because, if nationalization of land andindustry are wise experiments to make, no one can stop us frommaking them, if partial nationalization of either, or both,appeals to us as something that will right manifest wrongs, we cantry that solution. And to cry quits on the best that civilizationhas done, because all that is wished for may not be realized orrealizable today, is to lose perspective and balance, and jump outthe window because the stairs go round and round.

There is really no use, and therefore no sanity, in being too gayor too grave over this old world of ours. That smart Devil, who isfor the static life, is just now particularly active in hisfavorite old line of propaganda. He knows that the fruit of thetree will bring the millennium. Eat it and you will be happy. Heknows the short cuts to freedom and justice. He knows that thecurses that are promised for the breaking of the laws of the huntwill be turned into songs. So he is urging and urging, tellingyou, with your imagination and sensitiveness, that all is so badthat it is best to take the great risk, telling the poor sightlessones that their very primitive feelings and powers are the onlysafe guides, their last ultimate reliance and hope. And out ofdespair comes the bitter fruit we find in Russia, where they havewrought what they call an economic revolution, but have in factproduced nothing, for chaos is nothing. The wise Tinker who wroteof the Pilgrim's Progress was too true a Christian Scientist, aChristian and a Scientist, if you please, to picture his heroreaching the gate of gold by adopting Despair as his guide.

Progress means the discovery of the capable. They are our naturalmasters. They lead because they have the right. And everythingdone to keep them from rising is a blow to what we callcivilization. Bolshevism is the supremacy of the least capable whohave the most power, most physical power. The thing Democracy willdo is to breed capacity, give capacity its "show." The premiums,the distinctions, must go to capacity to promote it, to bring itforth, to make it grow, to be its sunshine. A chance at thesunshine, that's the motto. Sincerely yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Washington, 20 [March, 1919]

You said, you will remember, that you did not mind suchunconventional things as penciled letters—so here goes, Mrs.Radium.

This is to be a conventional letter, too, one of the bread andbutter variety, the quail and dove, pigeon pie, creamed macaronivariety, for all of which much thanks, likewise for muchstimulating talk, your help in planting my garden, many motorflights through brown woods, and some most charming company,including a man named Ellis and his celebrated son, the pigeonshooter.

We left you in the best possible hands, a lion and lioness[Footnote: Mr. and Mrs. John Galsworthy.] who through long yearsof civilized captivity came tamely to your bars to be tickled andpatted, and, no doubt, when properly fed, purred back. If I wereyou, I would loot their typewriter. Therein are the secrets of theBritish government, copies of all unknown treaties, plans for theextermination of Bolsheviki generally and the female kind inparticular; likewise, therein you will find, narrated withparticularity, the details of all loose conversations had withhotel clerks, commercial travelers, teachers, chauffeurs, andothers of the illuminati, in which "impressions" are given toforeign authors hunting for "copy." Mr. George Creel has theseaforesaid gents of the illuminati staked out, so to speak, forthis very purpose. Your dear friend Vera, the political Vamp, isno doubt conducting these sweet Innocents abroad, tho' not inperson of course, being much too crafty and cunning for that. Shehas directed them by the wireless magic of her mind to Horsebranchon the Hill, there to discover a radiating and luminous Lady,hidden in the pine woods, who will reveal among other things thefollowing: (1) The nature of Woodrow Wilson's personal character;(2) The full reasons for his conduct; (3) His occult internationaldesigns; (4) How he purposes to free Ireland; (5) The value ofbeing House-broken; (6) The real name of the Man in the Iron Mask.

And much, much more—for she is a well, a fountain, a geyser, aNiagara, reversed, of information, misinformation, knowledge,ignorance, modesty, audacity, in captivating breeches or in modestdemure caps or in flowing evening robe. Wise Vera, wise Creel—they know their business! The English snooper, with typewriter inhand, will have a generous swig of the Scotch whiskey of thevintage of '56, and his tied tongue will loosen, a confiding andtender and sympathetic hand will softly clasp his, and the DarkFlower will open to the world—rather mixed that figure! eh, what?

Now, of course, this is not what I took my pen in hand to write,not at all. I had intended after the formalities had been dulyobserved to tell you a few words about my wife. Excellent woman,that! But very jealous! very! No sense of her own place! Unwillingto subordinate herself. Since she "came into my life" she haswalked around in it and otherwise behaved familiarly and at home.Never, never I beg of you, permit anyone to come into your life.It decidedly makes for clutter and disturbance. However, as I wassaying, she is an excellent woman and has been to the Doctor whosays that she has suffered much. (Charge for same $10.) As hewishes to make the same charge for many days the excellent wifewill not go to Charleston but remain here, that the charge maylawfully be imposed. (This is where the Christian Scientists aremore Scientific for they could make the charge in absentia.)

However and notwithstanding, the Peace Conference still lives. Bywireless I have the news that Lloyd George is still doingpolitics, that Orlando is Fiuming (give that one to theEnglisher), that Colonel House has not told all he knows toLansing, and that Henry White dined last night with a duch*ess whoheld his hand four minutes while telling him terrible things.

But this is too frivolous altogether for a statesman to be writingto one whose mind is interested only in serious things! I can seeher steady, cold, stern eye of reproach. "And this to me," shesays, "And 'twere not for thy hoary beard, etc., etc."

I tell you frankly, tho' you may not believe it, that I am notentirely in a sober mood. Yesterday I planted bulbs with a ladywho was not bulbous. The day before I shot pigeons for a lark. AndI am boastful! fair boastful, my Lady! My secretary and myconfidential clerk and my many dark-hued messengers are solemnlyimpressed with my prowess with gun and spade. The truth shall notbe heard in the land. I am my own talebearer and my own censor. Iknow more about agriculture than the Secretary of Agriculture, andI know more of Labor than the Secretary of the same. And for this,this glorious bursting into fruitfulness at so advanced an age—you and your good man are responsible and to be credited in theGolden Book in which is written, What the Plain People Do for EachOther.

Thanking you for the Bread and Butter, believe me yours for Life,
Liberty and the Pursuit of Happiness.

F. K L.

Washington, Saturday, [January 19, 1980]

I am clothed in sackcloth and sitting in ashes. My head is bowedin humility and I am beating my breast in contrition. There is nojoy in my face and my eyes look downward. Truly I am full ofregret. Did she not write long, joyous, inquiring, curious,inviting pages to me? and I have not answered! And now will sheever make her face to shine upon me and give me peace?

I would fly to her—yes, fly to her in monoplane, biplane, ortriplane—but many things deter me. A wife, who is busy with theGods of the Elder Days; a daughter, who is busy with the God ofthe present day—to wit, a young man named Philip, surnamedKauffmann, son of "The Star" six feet two in stockings orotherwise, late of His Majesty's Navy, Princeton, Football, etc.,etc. The marriage is to be tied in April, God willing, Nancyordering, Philip consenting, Father paying.

As if this were not enough to hinder, the desk must be cleared forexit—the office desk; for the place that knew me through sevenlong years of trouble, anxiety, insult, joy, humiliation,satisfaction, achievement, companionship, hope, shall soon know meno more, forever.

Verily, I say unto you, that if ever mortal man or mortal mindneeded rest, recreation, recuperation, and other alliterativethings, that same man is now writing to the Lady Elizabeth Ellis,of Terraced Garden, in Camden, by the Wateree. And he is writingwithout hope that he will see the Lady and her Lord and thePrinceling, for moons and moons. This is a sad, sad word for himto write. But the whole world is skew-jee, awry, distorted andaltogether perverse. The President is broken in body, andobstinate in spirit. Clemenceau is beaten for an office he did notwant. Einstein has declared the law of gravitation outgrown anddecadent. Drink, consoling friend of a Perturbed World, is shutoff; and all goes merry as a dance in hell!

Oh God, I pray, give me peace and a quiet chop. I do not ask forpower, nor for fame, nor yet for wealth. Lift me on the magiccarpet of the Infinite Wish and lay me down on a grassy slope,looking out on a quiet sunny sea, and make me to dream that menare gentle and women reasonable. And forgive us our trespasses,Amen!

And again I pray—Give me patience. Let me not ask for today whatmay not come until tomorrow. Let mine eyes not be filled withvisions of things as they would be in a world wherein men wereGods. Let mine ears be closed to Siren calls which lure to therocks. Stiffen my soul to make the climb. Keep from my heartcynical despair. Make my mouth to speak slow words, and curb mytongue that it may not outrun the Wisdom taught by the years. Givesurety to my steps, O Lord, and lead me by the hand for I know notthe way.

Your telegram lures as your letter did. But such pleasures are notfor us, because of our sins. "And those that are GOOD shall behappy!"

Work. Work. Work. It is the order of the One Supreme. It keeps usfrom being foolish, and doing as fools do. It is needed for themastery of a world that has its Destiny written, as surely aswe have ours. It is a chain and a pair of wings; it binds and itreleases. It is the master of the creature and the tool of theCreator. It is hell, and it lifts us out of hell into heaven. Itwas not known in Paradise, but there could be no Paradise withoutit. A curse and a Savior! Our life-term sentence and the one planof salvation! Work for the weary, the wasted, and the worn. Work—for the joyous, the hopeful, the serene. Work—for the benevolentand the malevolent, the just and the cruel, the thoughtful and theunheeding. Work—for things that life needs, for things that areillusions, for dead-sea fruit, for ashes; and work for a look atthe stars, for the sense of things made happier for many men, forthe lifting of loads from tired backs, for the smile of a tendergirl, for the soft touch of a grateful mother, for the promise itbrings to the boy of one's hopes.

Work! Why work? It is the order of the One Supreme.

So saying, at one o'clock of Sunday morning, he lifted up his handand waved three times to the Southward—once for the Lady of theTroubled Heart, who flirts with the Angel of Destruction, thinkinghe may turn out to be a God, and once for the Lord of the Lady,serenely fatalistic, and the third, and this a very big one, forthe Princeling who is making a manly battle, cheerfully,confidently. The Friend of the Three.

F. K L.

Washington, [February 5, 1920]

And so, again the Boy has been attacked by a strange enemy, andyou are fighting. That is what you have been doing for years,fighting for that bit of life you love more than your own self.You did not think you could do it when you were a girl, did you?You have wondered at yourself many, many times. And wondered atthe Fate which brought this long challenge to you. But it has beena splendid fight, hasn't it? A glorious fight against odds. Therehas been no justice in it. No justice, and our souls do so wantjustice, an even chance, something in front of us that we can seeand know and fight. God knows why such tortures come to some,while others sail on such smooth seas. Can it be that there is nosoul excepting the one we make for ourselves by fighting? Arethose really blest who have such challenges given to theirspirits? Or is this all by way of excusing God, or Nature, for theunexplainable?

There is no way to make the fight excepting to believe that thefight is the thing—the one, only, greatest thing. (To deny thisis to leave all in a welter, and drift into purposeless cynicism,—blackness.) To determine that this is the way, the truth, and thelife, is to get serenity. Then the winds may howl and the seasroll, but there can be no wreck.

I know you don't like to be coddled. You are not of the cotton-batting school. You can take and give. But "may I not" say a wordof appreciation and perhaps of stimulation—give you a goodmasculine thump on the shoulder by way of saying that for one wholives in a mist you have lots of gimp. To love something betterthan oneself is the first step, I guess, toward making that soul.

Please read the note, in special envelop, to Ralphie, when he willbe interested. By Jove, how fortunate that we could not leave. Allmy force is sick. Three of my assistants are laid up. Six hundredand eighty people in my Department are in bed. And I am strugglingto get out and leave my job up to date. Good fortune!

F. K. L.

[Katonah, August, 1920]

… You know that I love you—yes, just as much as Ralph Ellis,who is a tough sailor man, and Anne Lane, who is a citizen of twoworlds, will let me. But I would love you more, much more, if youdid not have to be induced by my wife to write to me. Your loveletter was all right, but it was procured. Do you get that word—procured—and my wife was the procuress. This may be de rigueurand comme il faut and umslopogass on Long Island, but it does notgo in Katonah—peaceful, pure Katonah!

Here, in this sweet centre, if a lady wishes "for to make eyes" ata man, by way of a letter, she does it without being told to do itby the said man's wife. And then to open, "Dear Mr. Lane,"—GoshLizzie! isn't that pretty warm!

My anger is so great that I am now sitting up in bed at the wearyhour of two to relieve myself—for otherwise I cannot sleep.

Your remarks upon the distraught condition of the public mind, theunfortunate fix into which the Polacks have fixed themselves, theheart-breaking cry that you send out for men to get together andbe sensible, before they are sadder,—these things have nolodgement in my soul-center. For I am loved by a lady who speaksmuch of free speech and courage and candor and other virtues ofprehistoric existence, but who talks of herself all through herletter and never of me at all. How can the fire be kept burningwith a cold back-log like that? Talk about me! That's the firstprinciple of all conversation—even not amorous. Well, you are agood woman, Mrs. Ellis, and I hope Mr. Ellis is well, and that youare not having trouble with the help. Goodbye, Mrs. Ellis!

Come, sweet Elizabeth, let us join hands and go for a gay climbover the piney hills—you can sing your minor note of saddistress—your miserere, if you can, in the face of the puffyclouds, and I will laugh at you for having too much of worldconcern in your heart. The blessings do not come to those who are"troubled about many things." The soul is an individual, you know.We are saved by units not en masse. Every individual is a species—isn't that what splendid Bergson says? So come away fromresponsibilities and let your poor heart, which is so unselfishthat it cannot rest, indulge itself in the luxury of a peacefulforgetting, for a few days.

Practically, this seems like a good place—the process is toreduce you to a pulp and then gradually restore you to form. I amjust emerging from the mash.

Do give my greetings—graduated calorically as your judgmentsuggests—to the many friends in your neighborhood who haveforgotten me.

Devotedly, yet very sore,

F. K. L.

[September]

This is a sentimental letter from a sentimentalist to a sent—,for a sent—. It is by way of atonement, chiefly. I want to beforgiven for all the hard things I have said to you. I feel that Iowe you much, at least a good word, for all the bad ones I havegiven you.

You are a health-giver. That's not such a bad name, is it? In factI don't know a better. It doesn't sound sentimental, no husbandwould be alarmed by it, and yet it carries in it implications ofgaiety and tenderness and rompishness with a touch of mysteriousadoration. Altogether it is a very real large word that does notsignify virtues but rather attractivenesses. Mind, I don't saythat you have not the virtues—all of them, offensive anddefensive, but the attractivenesses make life, don't they? And tobe a health-giver is not merely to have charm. That is the spell-casting power, to be filled with witchery, to be a witch. Yes, Ibelieve it is something like that—very much in fact, but thewitchery must be balsamic, it must be radiant, it must go out inrays or circles or waves, because it can't help going out, notpurposefully and selfishly, like the casting of a net—it must bebalsamic and radiant, the outbreathing of pines.

Now this is a very nice name I have called you—you can put itinto Latin or Greek or French and make it sound much better to theunimaginative. But you deserve it, and I hope my little girl willbecome one.

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Katonah, Sunday, [September 25, 1920]

… We leave here on Wednesday (D. V.) for Bethel because you saidto. Now how soon will you follow—a day—a week? Not more!

You made up your mind that you would go there, and there is now tobe proof given whether your mind is weak or riding strong.

Anne is to have H. Beale there, and they move in circles barred tome. So I shall sorely need someone who knows my language. And I amnot frivolous when I say that you and I need nothing more than areligious faith of some kind. Mohammedan, Christian Science, orwhat you will. We are both religious—deeply. We pray—we dothings for the good of men and women,—but we do not relateourselves properly to the Great Enveloping, Permeating Spirit. Ihave sought to, vainly, for many years, and yet I have not beenpersistent. "Seek and ye shall find!" I want to believe that theGod of Things as They Are is not wilfully cruel. Is Heindifferent?

Are we mastering something? Tell me! Do you know? What philosophyhave you come to?

Well, all this we can talk over when we reach Bethel. Say, do youever answer letters or is it your Queenly prerogative to drop yoursweethearts down the public oubliette?

F. K. L.

Washington, 27 [December, 1920]

My wife won't let me call on you, "not now, anyhow," she says. Oh,you have so many enemies! Adolph and Mary, Senator and Mrs.Kellogg, Chief Justice and Mrs. White, Dr. and Mrs. Gehring. Allare against you, and against me—all plotting, planning, andconspiring with my wife to keep us apart. They know the hold youhave on me, that I had rather have you as my doctor than any oneelse in the whole vasty Universe—but why sigh? I am to be tornaway on Wednesday and rushed to Rochester, where the Mayos willtake me in hand, and do their worst. I have great hope that theymay cut me into happiness, and carve me into health, and slice meinto strength.

So, as Anne wired, we shall not see you in Camden, nor Ralph northe Junior nor anything that is Ellis—not for some moons anyway.

… The reason for going to Mayos? To see if it is true that mystomach and my gall bladder have become too intimate. Rochester isthe Reno where such divorces are granted.

I'd like to say I love you and the whole kit and caboodle, but mywife won't let me.

F. K. L.

FRIENDS AND THE GREAT HOPE

1921

Need for Democratic Program—Religious Faith—Men who have Influenced
Thought—A Sounder Industrial Life —A Super-University for Ideas
—"I Accept"—Fragment

To Mrs. Philip C. Kaujfmann

Rochester, Minnesota, January 1,1921

To that little Fairy with whom a young fellow named Frank Laneused to wander in the woods, hunting the homes of the Fairies,—Greetings on her birthday! Has she found where they live? Ibelieve she has. They live where eyes are bright with love, andhands are gentle and kind, where feelings are not hurt and thereis song hummed, and Play, a very real God, still lives,

… I think that we have got to see each other some how,somewhere, because life is passing awfully fast and there is onebest thing in it—supremely, overwhelmingly best—and that isaffection. I've chased around after fame and work for others, butI just wish I had spent pretty much all my time loving you andMother and Ned, and let everything else come way down on the list.The people who really love us are so few, aren't they? Lots ofthem like us, lots of them are glad to be with us, but few can becounted on "world without end, Amen."

… This is surely a very uncertain and unsatisfactory world forme right now. How much we all do like definiteness and how few arewilling to trust the future to the Great Spirit. We fuss and fumeas if it would do good rather than ill. Happiness is the thing weall desire and it is to be had easily through a most simplephilosophy; do your best and then have faith that things will comeright. Happy people are those who live with happy thoughts; thosewho see good in people and by brave and cheerful thinking aresuperior to depression and bitterness.

The longer I live the more I am convinced that it is our duty tobe gay; not reckless, never that; not boisterous, but light-hearted. It saves doctor's bills, brings success, and is the onemethod, the natural method, by which we become really big, and bythat I mean superior to the evil forces that try to break us down.… To be gay one must see how very little some things are, andhow very big other things are. And the big things are things likelove and goodness and unselfishness; and the little things are theselfish mean things, self-indulgent things, things generally thatcome out of one's vanity, one's love of one's self. Get rid ofthat and life becomes a pretty good place. Envy, vanity, self-indulgence—these are devils.

… I wish you would really sink yourself into some religion. Tostart right is so important. You will miss much joy in life, I amconvinced, by not having a faith; something to live by, somethingthat explains the questions that rise each hour. Buddhism does notclaim to be supernatural, is not founded on miracles, and yetBuddha taught the philosophy of Christ five hundred years beforeHe came. The central note is getting above self—real self-mastery. Possessing, mastering your body and mind so that you donot allow envy or hatred to possess you, and do not hanker after"things," possessions, or fame or popularity, and keep strong holdon wilfulness and anger and your passions. Its fundamental maximis that unhappiness and sorrow come from ignorance of Truth—andTruth is found by submerging self. The body is not bad, the lustsof the body and the mind are not bad, but the body is no more thanan envelop for the soul, its master.

Good-night to you both, you are fast asleep by now. … In my longdays and nights I think so much about you, wondering what the Godshave in store for her who has been so much to me. Much, much lovelittle one.

DAD

To Benjamin Ide Wheeler

Rochester, Minnesota, January I, 19L1

To the Wheelers with the warmest greetings of the Lanes! A bonnyyear be this to you—a year of sunny faces—may you livesurrounded by those whom you love and damned indifferent to allthe rest!

I, Franklin K. Lane, am trying to find out if the last doctor inNew York was right. He said my trouble came from an improperalliance between my gall-bladder and my pyloric orifice, and thathere in Rochester they could be summarily divorced. (If you don'tknow where the pylorus is you may locate it as the N. W. 1/4 ofthe N. W. 1/4 of the stomach. Until you reach fame you never havea pylorus—and then it is most costly.) So here I am in a realReno, hoping that a knife will be able to "put me to work anew,"… and writing this as a proof of "love and affection," whateverthe legally great may mean by the distinction. …

And talking of language, have you read what Wells has to say inhis Outline of History on this subject? I found it veryinteresting; probably all old stuff to you, however. Can there bea science of language, or of anything that a human creates? I amrather Bergsonian in my idea of the individual man—each is aspecies.

Miller is very unhappy because [Governor] Harding may leave theBoard. He [Miller] will go if the new man is not satisfactory. ButI think he will be. For Harding will be conservative and a greatrespecter of wealth. And Miller while a radical in many things isa classicist as to Finance.

If Harding leaves out Hoover he will do himself and the countryharm, and Hoover good. At last the sun shines!

F. K. L.

To Lathrop Brown

Rochester, Minnesota, January 3, [1921]

Well, my dear young Spirit of the Renaissance, I am not yet dead,not even dying. Slowly I am doing the stations of the Cross inthis most thorough institution. I am delighted with my experience.Here is concentrated every form of torture and annoyance to whichone can be legally subjected. Cruel and unusual punishments areforbidden by the Constitution, but I take it that one may yet taketorture and punishment, if he pays for it. All that I have everdone, been or thought has been revealed—probed for, and foundout. …

Truly, this is the most scientifically organized organization ofscientists that ever was. Henry Ford could not improve upon it.Combine him with M. Pasteur, add a touch of one Edison, and a doseof your friend, Charlie Schwab, and you have the Mayo Clinic, big,systematized, modernized, machinized, doctorial plant, run by acouple of master workmen. I am seeing it all, and am prepared forany fate. Thus far I am no more than twenty-one years of age. Myorgans seem to be working union hours and to react with properpromptitude, self-respect and authority. Tomorrow I am to bephotographed and fluoroscoped—and then will come the verdict. Ifit is the guillotine I shall go gaily, like one of your ancestorsin those tumbril days of France. What I fear is an order to"rest," on a new diet. But I guess whatever is said will be thelast word—the Supreme Court decision. Fine reputation, that, fortwo young chaps who never went to Harvard, eh, what?

Well, tell me the news. You have been silent too long. I long toknow of your further adventures in politics with one G. White. …

And now, my dear Lathrop, may I extend to you the greetings of theNew Year. May you have a continuous and abiding and keen sensethat you are doing good, likewise doing well.

F. K. L.

To Mrs. George Ehle

Rochester, Minnesota, January, [1921]

It is only a little below freezing. The sky is grey. Snow, hardand frozen over, covers the ground, sleighs go through thestreets, jingling their merry way. Boys throw each other down uponthe encrusted snow. Girls in red woolen caps pick their waycautiously. Farm horses drawing sleds make their heavy way. And inthese sleds, families sitting on the heaped straw in the bed ofthe wooden box, smiling mothers and happy babies, lined uptogether, warm, protected from the wind. Trees outlined againstthe sky, looking like dark coral rising out of a sea of snow intothe dull light. An old man, gaunt, bewhiskered, trudges alongconfidently although he looks over eighty. A younger man,evidently a stranger, feels his cautious way over the slipperywalk, covered with furs, hands, head, and body. After him a stillyounger man, without an overcoat—a postman.

Can you see it all? Do you recognize the picture? Was it once partof your life? This world is not so very bad when nature challengesevery one to fight for life. Nothing doing for me now! That's theword. Too much risk. …

Bless you, Lady Dear of the Understanding Eye. May we yet meetupon the gentle banks of the Shepaug and there make medicine forour poetic souls.

Anne has been a trump through these ten days of anxiety. Yoursaffectionately,

F. K. L.

To Mrs. William Phillips

Rochester, Minnesota, January 11, [1921]

The black cat, yellow-eyes, came, dear Lady Caroline—came to mehere in a hospital and I put him on my table alongside my tinybust of Lincoln, which is the sacred place. I wish indeed thoseeyes could see within this shell of mine and tell what it is thattwists my heart, physically turns it on its axis, so that itspolarity is changed. From mystery to mystery we have traveled thepast year, Anne, with her unfaltering trust, and I, a doubtingThomas. We came here for an operation, but the doctors somewhatdoubt its wisdom at all, certainly not now, when pneumonia mightbefall. So after ten hard days of closest examination I go forthfrom this, the Supreme Court of Surgery in the Land, with nodecision. "Wait and see what good it has done to live withouttonsils, and in the California sunshine until spring." … Butthey live in the Land of Guess!

And so another baby has come to bless you and William! Truly youare a confident couple! Age would hesitate to bring into a world,so filled with shadow, an increasing number of our species. What asupreme act of faith the continuance of the race is. … Oh, thecunning of Nature—how empty the heart of man or woman who hasnot felt the clutch of a baby's hand, or drunk deep of the heaven-made perfume of a baby's breath. And the impulse that babies giveto life, the challenge that they make to the father is always anoble one. It is not so as to women; less, as to ourselves. We areurged to courses that are petty, unworthy, selfish, debasing,supine, and brutal by our own natures or those of our mates. Butfor the child we act nobly, its call to us is always to our finerside, and so gradually we are lifted higher. Did any man inhistory ever do a cruel or wicked thing because of the appeal madeto him by the smile of his child? He may have accredited hisaction to the prompting of love for his baby, but I believe itwould be found that there was another motive, generally anoverwhelming personal vanity; so great a lust for power, perhaps,that it would carry across the gulf of death.

I hardly believe that you need fear immediate expulsion from yournew-found Eden. My expectation is that you will be treated withkindness by the new Administration, which will act most cautiouslyon all things. I shall know how to get a word, any word you wish,to the new President, I think, and my services as you know are atyour order at any time. But if you are sent into the Limbo ofprivate life you will be welcomed by a host who have preceded youand who will selfishly rejoice.

My gayest greetings to Sir William and, in cloudy Holland, may thesun shine in your hearts always.

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To James H. Barry

San Francisco Star

Rochester, Minnesota, January 12, [1921]

DEAR JIM,—The Star has set—it goes the way of Nature—thecircle must be completed. The only question one may ask is, "Wasit useful?" I think it was, Jim, it held many to the true course,it was an honest guide in a bewildering world.

Do let us meet when I am West, and talk of Henry George and JohnMarble and Arthur McEwen, who have gone on, and left not theirlike. …

F. K. L.

To Michael A. Spellacy

Rochester, Minnesota, January 12, [1921]

MY DEAR MIKE,— … I shall await your re-coming with greatinterest. Truly you should write up what you see. Get goodpictures and I will get it all in the National GeographicMagazine, and then we'll see what the Cosmos Club will say! I amin earnest about this—keep a diary in which you write, in yourown gay style, what you see, and you will soon have fame as wellas fortune.

The news from Mexico is not very encouraging. Obregon is sick somuch, and without policy, without dependable friends. CardinalGibbons came near dying, but, thank God, pulled through! A verywonderful man. I am very fond of him and he likes me I know, for Ihandled the Indians for seven years and had no trouble, because heand I had a flat understanding that I should take my churchtroubles, if any arose, to him.

The old Chief Justice called on us in Washington. He is seventy-five and almost totally blind. And the greatest Chief since JohnMarshall.

De Valera has landed and I expect things to be doing pretty soon.The British are greatly mystified as to how he got over and back.You see you are not the only adventurer on the face of the globe.We used to think that these were prosey, stoggy, flat-footed days,but there is any amount of adventure—from the fields of Flandersto the mountains of Colombia—even the Spanish main has had itsrebirth.

Mrs. Lane wants me to thank you for your thought of her. As youknow no one holds a deeper, surer place in her heart than you andTim.

Well, old chap, I am sitting in bed—four in the morning—with adevilish sore throat and without anything to eat or much sleep forthirty-six hours, so if this screed is not one of greatillumination or information you will know that it was only amessage of cheer and good-will from one who is fond of you, butwho warns you to be careful for all of our sakes. As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To William R. Wheeler

Rochester, Minnesota, January 13, [1921]

DEAR BILL,—Off to see you eventually, I trust, tomorrow. Had mytonsils out, won't do anything else till Spring. Meantime I wantto see no doctors. Having tried twenty, and come "out by that samedoor wherein I went." An osteopath, yes. Faith cure—IndianMedicine men—anything else, but no doctors! I turn fromEsculapius to Zoroaster, from medicine to the sun. I want to "liedown for an aeon or two." (Alice knows where that comes from.)With much love to you both.

FRANK

To V. C. Scott O'Connor

[Rochester, Minnesota], January 13, [1921]

MY DEAR SCOTT O'CONNOR,—It is a joy to get your letter and toknow of your new book which I have not seen, for the very goodreason that for five months I have been in hospitals. Anginapectoris they call it, but where it comes from they don't say,they don't know. Am off to California for a couple of months, thenprobably back to New York.

I have read Wells' History, which seems to me the most remarkablething of the historical essay kind ever hit off; and therein Idiscovered your friend Asoka, but I have been able to learn littleelse about him.

Buddhism attracts me greatly, as perhaps the most perfect attitudeon the negative side that has ever been developed and largelylived. It is not complete for a temperate zone people, who are andmust be aggressive. Nor does it reveal, so far as I know, thespiritual possibilities that Christianity does. The constructiveseems to be lacking. But it is so far ahead of the purelyopportunist attitude that Christianity takes that I should like tobe a Buddhist, I verily believe.

I see that Lord Reading goes to India. He is the greatest ofdiplomats, an oriental by nature, and will do good, if good can bedone in that unhappy situation. I admire the cheerful way LloydGeorge keeps. He is a great man. Each six months I have looked tosee him fall, but he keeps up, even with Ireland, India, Egypt,South Africa on his back.

Tell me what you are doing now, anything beside writing, andwriting what next? I wish that I had the literary endowment—ideas, plus style, plus energy. Good fortune to you always.Cordially yours,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

Letter sent to several friends

Rochester, Minnesota, January 10, 1921

"And when they came upon the Snark, they found it was a Boojum—orwords to that effect—and so, my dear Jack, they couldn't operatenow.

There is the whole story. Details there are, of course. ButMeissonier's style never did appeal to me. After peering into, andprobing, all known and unknown parts of the Mortal Man, they foundthat the heart in one part changed its polarity,—turned over, byGeorge, or tried to,—hence the Devil's clutch. But why did it dothis vaudevillian act? Bugs, bugs, of course. But where? So theychased them to their lair in that wicked, nasty-named and mostvulgar organ known as the gall-bladder. Damn the gall-bladder! Outit must come! On with the knifing! But soft, not so swift. Supposethe heart should try to play its funny stunt in the midst of theoperation? Or suppose again in this icy weather, pneumonia shouldensue and the naughty heart should take to turning? Eh, what then,my brave Bucko? "No," they said, "We are experts in eliminatingthis same appropriately named organ from the system—eightthousand times have we done it. It is a twenty-five minute job, Amere turn of the wrist and out the viper comes. And it never comesback! This is positively its last appearance, save as a mementofor the morbid-minded in a bottle of alcohol. But hearts that dosomersaults and lungs that choke up, fill us with fear. So outwith the tonsils where bugs accumulate and men decay, and then offwith you to California where bugs degenerate and men rejuvenate.Then come back when the sun shines and the trees begin to burgeonand the trick will be done. Hold yourself where you are, growbetter if you can, and we'll have to take the risk of the tumblingheart, but the pneumonia risk will be gone."

Thus saith the Prophets! And this day, therefore, will be spentwith the Master of the mysterious fluoroscope, who reverses EdwardEverett Hale and looks "in and not out," and with the dentist whomust fill a pesky tooth, and then with the surgeon who tears outtonsils. Rather a full day, eh? And after two days in hospital, orthree, over the hills to 8 Chester Place, Los Angeles,—by nomeans a poor-house,—but alas! carrying the malevolent bugs andtheir nesting place with me. Then I shall rest, "and faith I shallneed it, lie down for an aeon or two, till the Master of all goodworkmen shall put me to work anew."

I am disappointed. I would take the risk if it were left to me.But I shall go West—why did those soldier boys ever use thatphrase with such sinister meaning, or did it signify a better landto them? I shall go West in good hope that I shall return, andmeantime will try to develop a strong propaganda in favor of racesuicide in the land of the bothering bacteria, Adios.

F. K. L.

To John G. Gehring

Rochester, Minnesota, January 13, [1921]

MY DEAR PADRE,—I wrote you an impressionistic sketch of what thepoliticians call the "local situation," a couple of days since.… It is subject to attack on every possible ground as todetails, for no man can know from it what these doctors found. Butit is a perfect picture from the artist's standpoint, because itproduces the result on the viewer or reader that is truth, andthat result is a large, purple befuddlement. I am whole, but Ihave a pain. …

After I had practically been declared one hundred per centpluperfect I gave the electric cardiograph man a picture orexhibition performance under an attack. This revealed to him achange in polarity in the current passing through, which signifiedsomething, but what that something was, other than that I washaving a spasm, I don't know. …

The smug, mysterious gentleman who made this picture was muchpleased, apparently at nothing more than that he had proved that Ihad a clutch of the heart, which I had announced, by wire, beforearriving here.

Am I impatient or am I a damn fool?

Well, with my tonsils out I am in Royal Baking Powder conditionand tomorrow we start for California. I cannot hope to be outthere till May or June, when you would come. But Heaven knows I'dlike to introduce you to the Yosemite! …

Do you know I am beginning to admire myself. Now many have thoughtthat that was my favorite sport. But I can assure you that no oneever felt more humble than I have, any appearance to the contrarybeing a bluff for success—effect. But now that I have been wiselyand scrupulously and unscrupulously examined by the most exaltedrulers of the Inner Temple, and they pronounce me all that manshould be, why shouldn't I strut some? But, damn it, struttingbrings that Devil's clutch—and a man cannot be anything morestrutty than a dish-rag then. In William James you will find aquestionnaire, "Why do I believe in immortality? 'Because I thinkI'm just about ready to begin to live.'" There speaks self-justifying age—I'm there, too.

I'd love to look on Bethel this morning, and see what your poet-partner calls the hills in their wine bath. Good luck.

LANE

To Lathrop Brown

Los Angeles, [January] 15, [1921]

MY DEAR LATHROP,—I have yours of the eleventh. First question, asto men and women for the Executive Committee,

Answer: Get men who can make a program, something that the partycan push, outside Congress, if too cowardly in. People who don'twant anything, if possible.

Think of these! (I don't say they will do, but they stand forsomething.)

Charles W. Eliot. Benjamin Ide Wheeler. (Ex-President of the
University of California. Ex-Chairman, Democratic Committee,
Elmira, New York.) E. M. House. Frank L Cobb. John W. Davis.
Robert Lansing. R. Walton Moore. (Congressman from Virginia, big
fellow.) Gavin McNab. Governor Parker, of Louisiana. James D.
Phelan. Van-Lear Black.

For solid thought I'd choose out of that bunch—Eliot and Moore.
For cleverness—Black and McNab. For diplomacy—House and Davis.
For progressiveness—House and Parker. For Conservative Democracy
—Wheeler and Lansing. For writing ability—Cobb and Eliot.

I know no women who think, particularly. …

The kind of publicity we need is the advocacy by the NationalCommittee, and by Democrats in Congress of first class measures,known to be Democratic measures, part of a program.

I'll tell you how to get all the publicity you want when I seeyou—or White—a new kind, cheap, but requiring brains. …

F. K L.

To Lathrop Brown

Los Angeles, January, [1921]

DEAR LATHROP,—(1) You are right as to standardization. The Devildevised it as a highway to socialism. It is the Bible of the greatTribe of Flatfoot, not for artists like you and myself. Andspeaking of programs, please read what Wells says in his firstvolume of Outline of History, on David, Solomon, Moses. It willdelight your anti-semitic soul. …

Yes, standardization is like all else, good—for a distance. Thewhole bally outfit of life is a matter of balance, maintained bywar among the unintelligent bacilli and other primitives, and bywill among men (goat feed for men, eh?) But do you get my point?Something to it!

(2) George White will be eaten up first thing he knows, unless hemoves. Your friend McAdoo is here declining the next nominationdaily, speaking much, and, I understand, well. … Why doesn't G.W. get Frank Cobb and Hooker, of the Springfield Republican, andVan-Lear Black, and Senator Walsh, and Phelan, and CongressmanWalton Moore together, or any other group, and put up his plan andask them what they think of it tentatively,—just a quiet chat,but start.

He doesn't need to resign, if he can get someone as a quietorganizer "who will give all his time" to take up that job underhim, with sub-organizers. Who is this genius who can organizeinorganic matter, and give it life? Thought He was dead sometime!

"Wanted—A Miracle Man who can overcome a majority of sevenmillion votes with a hearty handshake and a warm brown eye. Needhave no program, no money. Must be a hypnotist who can make thepeople forget a few things and believe a few things that are nottrue. Must be able by reciting poetry to make the cunningcapitalist see that he is safer in the hands of the Democrats thanelsewhere, and at the same time educate the worker by a pass ofthe hand to know that it is decent to stay bought. Must havereceived the Gift of Tongues on the Day of Pentecost, so as totalk Yiddish, in New York; Portuguese and Gaelic, inMassachusetts; Russian and German, in Chicago; Scandinavian, inthe Northwest; Cotton and Calhoun, in the South; John Brown andwheat, in Kansas; gold and Murphy, on 14th Street; and translateJesus Christ into Bolshevism, Individualism, Capitalism, Lodgeism,Wilsonism! Must be as honest as old Cleveland and as clear ofpurpose as Abraham Lincoln."

Put this want ad. in the papers and send me, by freight car, thereplies. With my warmest,

F. K. L.

To Adolph C. Miller

Los Angeles, January 26, [1921]

DEAR ADOLPH,—I see that Harding [Footnote: Governor Harding ofthe Federal Reserve Board—a rumor of resignation.] is to leaveyou, and this is a note of sympathy. What will you do? Poor chap!I know the satisfaction you have had out of working with him andnow he follows Warburg, Delano, and Strauss. By Jove, that's whywe can't make things go as other countries do—because we can'tgive our people enough to live on. This is at once the meanest andmost generous of Republics. Mean collectively, generousindividually.

He will wait until after March 4th. "Right oh!" I expect you tohave some say as to his successor, especially as to the newGovernor. And if you can't work with the new man you can lift yourskirts and skip! Freedom of movement, assured as to all by AdamSmith, is exclusively the prerogative of the fortunate few. Don'tbe downhearted! You can't be as badly off as you were for severalyears. Just think how unlucky I am as compared with you, and patyourself on the back and take one of the old time struts. Goodbelly! Good brains! Good pocket-book! Good friends near you! Gooddog to walk with in the woods—and woods in which you can walk!Good house, with your own books to look at you friendly-like. Ohboy, rejoice and be glad!

February 17, [1921]

We are most terribly disappointed. Your promised visit was abright spot,—a sunshiny place—to which we have looked forward asto nothing else since we came here. Well, life is a series of suchjars, and child-like I submit, but am not reconciled.

… Are you coming later? How is Mary? We really seem far awayfrom our friends. The land is beautiful, but friends convert ashack into a palace, a desert into a heaven.

F. K. L.

To John G. Gehring

Pasadena, near Paradise, February 18

Before breakfast this morning, indeed before dressing, I sent youa message which was a combined confession, apologia, report, andappeal. I said, "I have done wrong, I apologize, I am slightlybetter, and I hope and pray you will not become downhearted." Ialso promised to write and here I am at it. But you would have hadthis letter just as early anyway, for this morning was to be yoursand mine. All other mornings for two weeks and more have belongedto someone else. I have been pretending to work, by going to theoffice each day. And last night I said good-bye to the Napoleon ofour institution, who took his private car and rolled away toMexico, to Galyeston first, thence by private yacht to Tampico,there to see his properties and spend two or three weeks.

… They desired us to go greatly, and ours would have been everypossible comfort that one can have while traveling, … but thetyrant Anne thought that as I was picking up a bit it was wrong tochange conditions, and I yielded, hardly against my judgment, butstrongly against my desire.

So here I am, the first hour after release, sitting on the porchof a villa, looking across a valley at amethyst mountains, crownedwith a sprinkling of blue and white snow. The noises that come tome are not raucous;—the twitter of birds, a rooster crowing, awell-pump throbbing its heart out, the shouts of some children atplay, a distant school bell, with no silver in its alloy, however,the swish of a wood-sawing machine in some back-yard. So my earsare not lonesome. Immediately before me is the gray-lavender boleof a tall eucalyptus, not a leaf or branch for fifty feet, andthen a drooping cascade of blue-green feathers. Beyond it a fewfeet a red-blue eucalyptus, sturdy, branching almost at the groundand in blossom. These stand near the border of a drive which ismarked by a cypress hedge, trimmed and proper, and beyond thedrive, on the front of the terrace are magnolia and iron-wood andavocado and palm and spruce, rising up out of beds of carnationsand geraniums, jasmine and pansies (all violet), and cherokeeroses, five-petaled, white with golden centers, and rose colored—(the wild rose with a university education, a year or two inItaly, and the care of a good maid). While beyond this terrace areorange, and tangerine, and lemon, and grapefruit with their green,yellow, and deep red-golden fruit pendant; and still further on, afringe of blossoming pear trees tell you that this is not thetropics after all. The breeze is a gentle woman's hand, a softtouch, kindly, tender, emotional, but not disturbing. It is notlotus-eating time. I don't know that that time ever comes here.Autos whisk through the woods, buildings are going up, the air isdry and has tang; it has challenge in it, but it does not give offthe heady champagne of the air that the snow breathes out on yourMillbrook hillside.

I remember as I looked from my window at the sunset at Bethelsaying to myself, "Can there be any fairer spot than this?" Andthis morning as I saw the sun rise into the pink and blue of thesky, empurpling the shadowed hills and splashing rose leaves onthe snowy mountains, I again said "Is there anything lovelier,anywhere?" Great blessing, these catholic eyes! Should the heartbe equally catholic? There is a real problem in philosophy andsociology for you!

And now that you know how happily circ*mstanced I am as toenvironment your doctorial demand is for something as to thebehavior of the organs and nerves which we call the physical man.Well, I can't tell you much. I do not rise and walk half a blockwithout that trigger being pulled, but the explosion is notdynamite, rather poor black powder, I should say. If I walk half adozen blocks I stop a half a dozen times, and once or twice nibbleat a precious pellet of nitro. At night I am wakened as of yore,but the agonizing, crushing pains do not come every night. … Ieat prunes and bran biscuit and coffee for breakfast; a bit ofcooked fruit (and that in this land of oranges and alligator pearsand ripe raspberries!), chicken and green peas, and bran biscuitand tea for lunch; a couple of green vegetables and bran biscuitand a small black, for dinner. And all this I write with a supremesense of virtue, which Simon Stylites or St. Benedict could notmore than parallel. As to smoking—a pipe, generous in size but ofthe mildest possible tobacco, after breakfast. A mild, large cigarafter lunch, and pause here and worship—no cigar after dinner.(But this latter is a Lenten innovation. I would not have youthink I am preparing for immediate ascension.)

As to treatment, an osteopath and a Christian Scientist are mypresent complement. Each morning the former, and each evening thelatter. The former to gratify myself, the latter to gratify a dearfriend who "believed and was saved." The osteo is rational, the C.S., with limitations and reservations. …

The C. S. is a woman, the sister of an artist I used to know. Ifshe did not ask or expect that I believe certain things, we wouldget on better. I can believe in God as the Principle of Life, thatseems scientific. I am willing to call Him Spirit, that isChristian. That He is Supreme in the Universe, I admit. That sinand sickness may with further light be overmastered I do not deny;physical death, of course, seems to me a thing not worth botheringabout. But that God is all good, I cannot asseverate in the livingpresence of a few Devils whom I know, unless I deny that He isomnipresent and omnipotent, or unless I say that Bad is Good. Godcannot be good and all powerful without being also responsible forBad, and therefore be both Good and Bad. This I can believe, andit brings me to Emerson's transcendentalism, which is set forth inthe Sphinx—"Deep Love lieth under these pictures of Time, whichfade in the light of their meaning sublime." In a word we aregrowing into the Good. The Bad is not the ultimate, but is nonethe less real. This is better than Manicheism, the Miltoniancontest between the Good Spirit and the Bad, which Wells also inhis Invisible King presents; a simple theory, understandable butnot to my mind subject to careful scrutiny. There is but one God,one Force, one Principle, one Spirit, and it is working its waythrough, expressing itself as best it can. And Evil is a partialview, one phase of undevelopment, the muck through which, by God'sown law, we must come; and indeed He could not have sent us anyother way. This means that He is bound, too. Is this supposable?Omnipresent? Yes! All pervading! In all! But Omnipotent? No, notin the sense that He could change the Order of Things, for He isthe Order of Things Himself. Is there even in Him complete Freedomof Will, freedom to make a world other than this? One wishes, in asense, to say so, but the horror of it! for then He is responsiblefor the cruelty of the ant-heap, the feeding of the carnivorousupon the vegetable eaters, the preying and persecution of themalevolent upon the kindly—and He could have made it allotherwise! With a Free Will He could have brought growth withoutpain, being omnipotent. Here we see God as a monster,—responsiblefor sweat shops and the Marne, in the sense that His will couldhave averted these things. So I say God is not Good, save in thesense that He is that sunrise this morning. But night cometh, whenthieves break through and steal. More sunlight—that is themeaning of the phrase "God is Good"—a belief in a tendency, inthe temporality of darkness, of night, a sureness that the daywill come and "There will be no night there."

This is a long disquisition, but I just had to get it out of mysystem; yet I can't, it bothers, and confuses, and perplexes, andhinders, I believe. Better brush it away for practical purposesand have the Will to Believe, for thence cometh strength.Pragmatically C. S. works out with certain people; and to them itis Truth. I wish it were so with my doubting mind, that I couldbelieve. I am willing to be cured tho' I do not understand andcannot believe, and this they say they can do. But it has not beendone with me.

Lunch broke into this discourse, and then a walk. This time on theother side of the house, the other side of the hill. There I founda new world. Palms, huge ones, thirty feet across, with their deadbranches strewing the ground, making a coarse woven carpet; andpines, large ones, yet not so gigantic as yours on the road beyondthe creek; and acacia in full golden bloom, glorious, yet modesttree, a very rare, non-self-assertive tree, a truly Christiantree, beautiful but not prideful. Bamboo in great clumps, erect,yielding but not to be broken—wise, tenacious orientals! And Iwalked on the off-cast seed of the pepper, and beside cacti higherthan my head with spears of crimson, and across a sweep of lawnover which oranges had been dropped, by the generosity of an up-hill row of trees that were saying, "We must make room for thenext generation." The flowers (oxalis) and leaves I enclose made amat, close clinging to the earth, a mat of white, red, andlavender resting on these clover-like leaves that rested in turndirectly on the ground. And all about, a hundred plants I did notknow, into which my footsteps sent quail and rabbit, that did notfear me really but could not quite say that Man is Love.

I have written you a long line, may it serve for a time as a wordalso to your dear Lady, whose letter and rare bit of verse I havealso received. I do hope that you soon master whatever ails you.Don't lose faith in yourself, above all things. Believe that youare all that your friends believe you to be—a Civilized MedicineMan. Be as deluded as we are. Affectionately,

LANE

To John W. Hallowell

Los Angeles, February 21, 1921 MY DEAR JACK,—It is Sundaymorning, very early; the sun is trying to get out of bed, amocking bird is hailing its effort with great gurgling. I amsitting near an open window looking down into orange trees, whichare a very dark shadow, and I am just as happy in my heart as Ican be with a bum heart, and no home, and a scattered family. But—! Bad word that "but."

Roots we all have and we must not be torn up from them and flungabout as if we were young things that could take hold in any soil.I have been, all America has been, too indifferent to roots—homeroots, school roots, work roots. … We should love stability andtradition as well as love adventure and advancement.

Your new job interests me, but I wonder if you will go with theSecretary of Commerce [Hoover], … I guess he did right. Butunless he gets to be the leading adviser he'll have to get out.For I'm afraid we are to see too much politics—RepublicanBurlesonism in the saddle. Government by unanimous consent is notpracticable, and it looked as if this were Harding's motto untilHoover's appointment. Hoover will be the man to whom the countrywill look for some guidance along progressive lines, and thecountry will expect too much, more than any man can deliver.

Please tell your dear Mother that I have her book, and last nightread two chapters. I know Bok and did not think him capable ofsuch a literary work, or that he had such character as his bookreveals. … My love to the Troop, and write just as often as youcan.

F. K. L.

To Curt G. Pfeiffer

Pasadena, 22 [February, 1921]

MY DEAR OLD PFEIFFER,—I have treated you shamefully. Yes, I have,don't protest! But I have been pretending to be busy. Mr. Dohenywanted me to go to Mexico, and Anne did not want me to go, and Ihave had a hard time. They have gone and we have come out herewith Mrs. Severance, in the loveliest hillside spot you ever saw.Flowers and trees all about and mountains in the distance.Wonderful land!

To-day I celebrated G. W.'s birthday by taking on a new doctor.
… Thought I had escaped from doctors but it is not so to be. …

This is all my news. I do wish I were there to talk politics withyou. Poor Harding! He will suffer the politicians, I fear, tillthey undo him. …

The Germans seem to have recovered their audacity. They shouldhave been driven into their own land and then some. I am not forrevenge nor for their paralyzing, but just reparation they shouldpay. Perhaps things have been botched, I do not trust Briand. I'dtrust Hoover to get all they could pay, and he's the only one Iknow who could be just and at the same time sensible in method,but he can't be used where he should be used. …

March 31

… You are a delight and joy to a thirsty man, a true watercarrier, you give of the water of life. For you know that menshall not live by bread alone. Not only words of wisdom, sagecounsel, come from you, but there is a heart behind which does notwane with the years, but on the contrary grows stronger and moregenerous. I look forward to returning to New York to be able onceagain to feel with you the pleasure of an intellectualcompanionship, wherein the mind is so refined as to be emotionallysympathetic. You would take the greatest joy out of the beauty inwhich I am living. … The night is fragrant (Do you remembertelling me of that Japanese criterion?) with orange, wisteria, andjasmine. Oh, this is exquisite country, if I only had health! Butthere is little beauty where pain is, and my pain holds on evenwhen I was with my brother on his farm, eighty acres, south of SanJose, tucked in the foothills—raises nothing but kindliness anda few vegetables and some hay. It is the sweetest place in itsspirit I have ever felt, and lovely physically, too. I wish Icould get you to go out there with me. Put up a comfortable adobeon the knob of a hill with a wide prospect and then make thingsgrow, including our own souls. …

I'm going back there in a week or two, then East, I hope, to Ned'swedding. … The girl is all a girl should be, I believe. Smallerthan he is, a tiny thing in fact, very gentle in voice and manner,sweet natured, musical, wholesome.

… I still dream of that place on the Shepaug river, in
Connecticut, where you think I would be lonesome. A winter here
with George and a summer there with you, would quite suit me. …
Well, write me, for books are not old friends after all, are they?
Forever and ever yours,

F. K. L.

Writing of the days of their youth Pfeiffer said later,"Friendships are inexplicable, they defy analysis, but whatever itwas that we might be doing, we were usually in harmony about it. Ican only explain it by saying that we liked each other. We likedeach other just as we were, and we knew each other with intimacythat deepened with the years, and never disappointed us. The magiccircle came later to include others, and they were accepted andappreciated with the same affection and trust. … It is asingular and beautiful thing that such a multiple and intimaterelationship should have survived throughout all of our lives.Perhaps it was because we were friends without capitulation. …

"Some of us did not meet again, after that first period, foryears, but whenever we did meet, it was always in the spirit ofthe early days. A few words would tell us what we knew of thelatest doings of the rest, and we would then 'carry on' just as ifthere had never been a break in our intercourse. The strength ofour joint memories, based on our youthful experiences in commonand added to from time to time, grew with the years."

To John G. Gehring

Pasadena, February 24, [1921]

MY DEAR DOCTOR-AND-MORE,—This is a note of cheer written by asomewhat dolorous duffer who spent last night in pain, but thismorning is rather comfortable. …

Am reading William James' Varieties of Religious Experience, andit is really the most helpful religious or philosophical work Ihave ever read. Nothing else anywhere near as good for the gropingmind that wants to be led cautiously, reasonably, suggestively tothe "Water of Life," but shown that there is water there. (Prettypoor figure, but perhaps understandable.) I must re-read hisanswer to the questionnaire in his Letters, and compare it withhis conclusions in this book. You remember my thought thatprobably Emerson, William James, and Henry George had been thegreatest writing minds we had produced. Probably you can improveon this.

Have been interested myself in thinking of a list of books thathave made great movements in the world, Darwin's Descent of Man,for illustration. Books that have provoked the minds of men intoaction of one kind or another:—The Bible, Koran, in religions, ofcourse! What started modern medicine? I mean in the way of a book?

What are, or have been, the great movements in history, anyway?
Wars, of course, don't count, when merely predatory.

Man's relation to God.
Man's relation to the World.
Man's relation to Man.
Man's relation to the Good.
Man's relation to the True.
Man's relation to the Beautiful.

These ought to cover Art, Science, Philosophy, Religion, Progress.Civilization of every kind. And this progress has come in waves,hasn't it? Did any book start, or give evidence of the starting ofthese waves? That's the question. Outside religion and philosophybooks were the results not the causes of movements. How true isthat? As always and always,

F. K. L.

To D. M. Reynolds

Pasadena, [February, 1921]

I'm writing this late at night and will mail it in the morning,for I'm going to Santa Barbara for a couple of days. Do with itwhat you will. Judge for me what it is wise to say. And be ascondensed as possible.

What I've written is to be dropped in at the right places, it isnot conservative. Will see you next week, I hope, perhapsSaturday.

F. K. LANE

Cooperation is the word of this century and we don't know what itmeans yet. We work together most imperfectly in things political,and we are just beginning to feel our way into the worlds ofsocial and industrial life. I'm not afraid of socialism. I reallydon't know anyone who is. We're all afraid of blundering attemptsat getting a thing called by that name, which is a mechanicalmethod of bringing the Kingdom of Heaven on earth, withoutchanging the human spirit.

The call for socialism or communism is generally a call for moreof justice and of honesty and of fair dealing between men, ratherthan a demand for any particular and organized method of carryingon industrial life. If business is squarely conducted we won't tryexperiments in mechanicalizing and sterilizing business. But a fewmore years of profiteering, and Conservatives would have becomeReds.

Now we should be studying and planning for a safer industriallife, one in which there will be fewer waves, a safer and moreeven sea. That we can have, if we are willing to be less greedynow, less venturesome and predatory.

The only people who have done much in the way of substantialthinking as to cooperative action, collective action, are thosewho think in terms of immediate and large fortunes for themselves,through plans of capitalizing combined brains and money. Theirexample is a good one to follow in lesser things, where the objectis not great wealth but a more even measure of good living.Insurance is the right word for it, business life insurancethrough honest cooperation. You mark my word, that is the next bigmove in business affairs. Nationalization of things is not theirsocialization. Not at all. It may mean their deserialization,their withdrawal from the use of society altogether, or their moreimperfect use. Calling things by nice names, popular alluringnames, does not solve problems. Nevertheless such names evidenceour social dreams. We all feel that there must be more of justicein the economic world. But we don't want it at the expense ofsociety, that is at our own expense, for that means Bolshevism andBolshevism is paralysis. …

Oil is one of the fine forms of Power that we know, for manypurposes the handiest. Industrially it is as indispensable andstaple as the soil itself. To lose faith in the future of oil—why, that's as unthinkable as to lose faith in your hands. Oil,coal, electricity, what are these but multiplied and moreadaptable, super-serviceable hands? They may temporarily beunemployed but the world can't go round without them.

A slack time is always one of fear, never of confidence. And nopolicies should be adopted in such an atmosphere. For the man whocan afford to take the long view these are great days. He can takeup what others cannot carry. Better still he can prepare for thedemand of to-morrow, or the day after to-morrow—find more oil, ifyou please, plan for its fuller use, as we are talking of oil, butthe principle applies to everything. Take the railroads. Their carshortage is mounting and their out-of-order equipment is way up.This has always been so in hard times. But this is the very timewhen they should have plenty of money, to get road bed andequipment in perfect shape for to-morrow's rush. No, the nationwould do no better if it had the roads. Congress doesn't thinkahead two years. It is a reflector, not a generator. The fault isours.

Right now the call in national affairs of every kind is for thelong view; we have use for the men who can see this nation in itsrelation to other nations, next year and next generation, and formen in business who can think in terms of 1922, and 1925, and1945. That's what really big business can do—hold its breathunder water and watch the waves.

To Mrs. Cordenio Severance

[Pasadena, March, 1921]

DEAR MAIDIE,—It is six in the morning. The sun is a long streakof salmon pink in a gray skirt of fog. Chanticleer is very loudand conquering. The little birds are twittering all about, inwisteria, in oranges; and over on the hillside, by the cherokeeroses, there was a mocking bird that hailed the dawn, or itspromise, an hour ago.

And for all this beauty, this gay cheer, this soul-lifting day-breaking I have you to thank. It is the one most exquisite spot inwhich I have ever laid my head. And pity is that I have been sodown-cast that I could not feel fully what was here, nor show whatI did feel.

Forgive me for my many ungraciousnesses and credit yourself, Ibeg, with having done all and everything that human hands andheart could do to make me "come back."

You have spent a lifetime doing good, giving out of your heart,and the only reward you can get is the evidence of understandingin paltry words like these.

F. K. L.

To Alexander Vogelsang Assistant Secretary of the Interior

Los Angeles, March 4, [1921]

DEAR ALECK,—The end has come. We were identified with an historicperiod, one of the great days of the world. And none can say thatour part, of relatively slight importance maybe, was not wellplayed. We did not strut and call the world to witness how well wedid. We did not voice indignation at injustice, and make heroes ofourselves at the price of unity. And some things we did, and morewe tried to do, and all were good. So I look back over the eightyears with some personal satisfaction, for not a thing was done orattempted … that was unworthy, ignoble, unpatriotic or little.

I am glad to get news of the force, and sorry that I cannot havethem all round about me for the rest of my days. Had I been well Iwould have been with you this morning, to bid you all good cheer.It was my hope when I saw you in December that this might be.

I like your plans for the future and, by the starry belt of Orion,I'd like to join you. … I am stronger and look very well, but mydamn pains are about as frequent and crunching as ever. … No onecan say that I have not fought a good fight and stood a lot ofpunishment. Good luck, dear Aleck.

F. K. L.

To James S. Harlan

Pasadena, March 5, [1921]

MY DEAR JIM,—That was a fine long letter in your old-time style,and I am doing the unprecedented thing of answering it promptly.To this I am prompted by the near-by presence of a very handsomeyoung woman formerly named Wyncoop, now Mays, who knows Mrs.Harlan well, having been much at the Crater Club. … Who wouldhave thought such a thing possible—that here as I lie on a couchin a doctor's office with a rubber tube in my mouth, I shouldattract the curiosity of a baby who came to see the "funny tube,"and that she should be followed by a nice-looking, blue-eyed,bright-cheeked girl who says, "I believe I saw you once at LakeChamplain. You know Mrs. Harlan."

Well now, as George Harvey might say—"One day After!" I want tohelp in any way I can to make this administration a success. …If Hoover can work with Harding, or the latter with him, all willbe well. But I fear the politicians—especially … [those]ambitious for a great political machine. The country will begenerous for a time to Harding. … But it will turn against himwith anger unbounded if he turns the country over to the men whowant office and the men who want privilege and favor. Thepoliticians and the profiteers may be his undoing. I hope not!

… I cannot close without a special word to that most gracious,tender, and charming Lady who is your "sweet-heart." As I wanderand see many, I find no limitation, no reservation, ormodification to put to that declaration of admiration anddevotion, which I made to Her now some fifteen years ago, nearly.Tell her that this old, sick troubled man thinks nice things abouther often. My affectionate regards to you, dear Jim.

LANE

To Adolph C. Miller

Morgan Hill, March 9, [1921]

When my eyes opened this morning they looked out upon a hillsideof vivid green, like the tops of Monterey cypress, flecked withbits of darker green embroiderings, and behind this was green,too, but very dark, and it had great splashes of a green so darkthat they looked black—and my heart was glad. It was a commonscene, nothing rarely beautiful about it. Fog enclosed the earth.There was no sky. But I had known it as a boy, this same kind of apicture, and it went to this poor tired heart of mine and was likebalsam to a wound. By Jove, it is balsam! These hills are for thehealing of men. I have been here three days and have taken moreexercise than in three months—walking and climbing; beside thecreek lined with great sycamores—alluvial soil, crumbles in yourhand, and with our friend the gopher in it; and climbed up througha bit of manzanita—big fellows, twenty feet high some of them—and such a rich brown, near-burgundy red! I barked a bit of thebole to get that green beneath, spring green, great contrast!

And above the grove of manzanita was a flat top to the hill, fromwhich I could see three ways, and all ending in cloud-wrappedmountains, that had shape and were blue of some kind, as far asyou could see. Ah man, this is a glorious land—even the people!Along the road I talked to Lundgren, who used to be a ship-carpenter, but he had a prune orchard here "since the fire." Imust "see his horses," great snuzzling monsters that he had raisedhimself (sold one of them once, and sneaked off and bought itback) and his calves, twins out of a three-year-old—and she hadhad one before. Oh shades of Teddy Roosevelt, there's your ideal!(Do you remember Kipling's line in the Mary Gloster, "And shecarried her freight each trip"?)

And next to Lungren was the Frenchman—far up on the hillcultivating his grapes, for which he got $110 per ton last year—and this year he puts out five acres more. The Frenchman hasindigestion and lives alone … that hillside of vines gives himsomething to love.

When we come to the turn in the road, where you cross the creek toclimb the hill, there the "Portugee" lives. He always has livedthere. He was found just there when the Padres came. And his namewas Silva. John Silva, of Stevenson's Treasure Island—born in theAzores, of course—there are no other Portuguese in America.

And John has—how many children? Give you three guesses. All byone wife, too, and she is in evidence, and a native daughter. Isaw her with my own eyes, black hair, dark skin, slight figure,voluble, smiling, large-knuckled hands and a flashy eye, oh! along way from being uninteresting to John yet, or a merely "goodwoman." Well, how many children did they have, right there by theroad?—eleven. Eight boys and three girls—and four dead, too.Fine boys and girls, one I saw plowing or cultivating straight upand down the vineyard, a sixty degree hill, I should say. I wasstruggling with a cane to get one foot before another on thesloping road and he was outdoing a horse, that he drove with hisneck and shoulders, while with his hands he guided the little plowstraight up toward the sky. I am not envious of such youth. Inever had it. I was always lazy. But it is a real joy for me to benear such youth—just to know that such things can be done—byangels from the Azores. You remember Anne's story, "In future itis prohibited to refer to our beloved Allies as 'the God-damnedPortuguese'"? Well, I feel the same way.

Yes, this land of yours is good. (All land is good, I believe.)And the stillness, and the birds, and the flowers! The simplicityof these two dear hearts—George and his wife—the little theyneed! A paper once a day for five minutes, a song to break daywith, and a round of songs and piano pieces to end the day, everyact one of consideration, and each word spoken with a tender look,a gay lilt to the voice, even in asking to pass the salt. "Bettera dinner of herbs where love is," etc. Well, they have it, herbsand all,—beet tops and mustard leaves. … Good luck to you.

F. K. L.

P. S. You don't deserve this—you stingy, skimpy mollusk!

To Lathrop Brown

Morgan Hill, [March] 16, [1921]

MY DEAR LATHROP,—I wish I could be with you just to laugh awaythat cynical mood. I know that I do not see the world undressed,naked, in the raw, as you youngsters do. Illusions and delusions,let them be! I shall cherish them. For whatever it is inside of methat I call soul seems to grow on these things that seem socontrary to the results of experience. "If a lie works, it's thetruth," says Dooley. So say I, in my pragmatism. I have "become"in the eyes of men and I want to "become" in the eyes of my betterself, that ego must be gratified at least by an effort. And to"become" requires that there shall be some faith. We don'taccomplish by disbelieving. That is your Mother's religion. It ismy philosophy. She has capacity for faith which I have not,because she climbs, while I stand still.

Of course the inauguration business was commonplace. That is Ohiostatesmanship, somehow. But good may come of it, and you and Iwant to help it, so far as it wants national food, to bear fruit.Damn all your politics and partisanship! Humbug—twaddle—fiddle-dee-dee, made for lazy louts who want jobs and bosses who wantpower. Well, we are out now for a long time, and we might as wellforget bitterness, or rather submerge it in the bigger call of thenation. All of which you characterize as sentimentalism—so saysBurleson, too.

I am beginning to despair of doctors and to say to myself, "Betterget back to work, and go it as long as you can, then quit and liveon rolled oats and buttermilk until the light goes out." … Well,goodnight, dear chap.

F. K. L.

To John G. Gekring

[March] 21, [1921]

And how are you, Padre? Do you find that there are those who canprobe into the secrets within you and tell more than you aspatient can tell yourself? Has a physician who follows thebiblical advice, "Heal thyself," a Fool for a Doctor? What hasbeen taught you in the ill-smelling center of darkness, drearinessand torture, where there is more need for beauty than in any otherplace, and less of it, more need for gaiety, and less of it, moreneed for wholesome suggestion and less of it? … All hospitalsshould have bright paper on the walls, or bright pictures. To hellwith the microbe theory! There are worse things than microbes. Allnurses should be good-looking. They should paint and pad, ifnecessary, to give an imitation of good looks. Now, honestly, doyou not agree? And they should not have doors open, nor askperfunctory silly questions, such as "Well, how are we today?"

On examination nurses should be rated largely for things thatdon't count—looks, cheerfulness, silliness, sympathy, softness ofhand, willingness to listen to the victim-patient! …

I am going to Rochester, … my brother is going with me. Blesshim! He'd be glad to take you back, and he can give you wood tochop, and a black-headed grosbeak to sing for you. Ever hear one?Better than Caruso.

May the Lord make his light to shine upon you and give you peace.

F. K. L.

To John H. Wigmore

Los Angeles, March 25, 1921

MY DEAR JOHN,—Hail to you brave leader of the Moral Forces! Isn'tthat an offensive title? You see I have been asked to join you in"Potentia." Isn't that word out of the Middle Ages?

I would like to join against crooks, thieves, and liars. But theAmerican people don't like anyone to assume that he represents theMoral Forces. And "Potentia" sounds too mystic for any land thisside of Egypt. Am I not right? Answer in one of your sane moments.You cannot go against ridicule in America. Bishops here are notthe same as Lords in England. They cannot save from ridiculepretentious good things. Now Ross and you are wise things. How doyou stand for "Moral Forces" and "Potentia"? No, no, dear John!—less hifalutism!

I write for information. Tell me—do you think good will come ofit? My immediate judgment is against it, strongly. In purpose—good, in method, name,—impossible. It is as if one were to say,"Come let us gather together the Good and the Wise, and say whoshall be called honest men." Cicero, I believe, formed governmentby the "boni." No one likes the good who advertise. I don't. Am Iall wrong? …

LANE

To Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt

[Pasadena], March 25, [1921]

Your letters, my dear Mrs. Franklin, are refreshing breezes. Theyare quite what breezes should be—warm, kindly, stimulating; nothard, stiff, compelling things, off a granite Northern shore. Annerejoices in them, without words.

I have been lately with my one brother on his ranch—a large nameimplying vast herds quietly grazing over infinite valleys andmountains. But all farms here are ranches, as you doubtless know,as all weather is fine. My brother's ranchita is eighty acres ofbeauty; a stream below, running up to manzanita crowns on good-sized hills, and oaks and sycamores and bays, and many other treesbetween. He has a house, all of which he planned in fullest detailhimself, with as lovely a site as anywhere, and a pretty andartistic wife; a good saddle horse, a noble dog, a loyal and mostexcellent cook, many books—and what more could he have in heaven?Outside his dining-room window he has built a dining-table for thebirds, and so as we dined within, they dined without. Each morningI saw the sun rise, and I whistled as I dressed. One morning Iclimbed the hills and found the cow and drove it in for the man tomilk. But my only morning duty was to pick a golden poppy or acherokee rose or a handful of wild forget-me-nots for my button-hole. All day I sat in the sun, or drove a bit or walked a little—talking, talking, talking; of law, and Plato, and Epictetus, andHarry Lauder, (whom we imitated, at a distance; for my brothersings Scotch songs); and we talked too of our old girls and theearly days of good hunting in this semi-civilized land, and ofWoodrow Wilson and H. G. Wells and Emerson and Henry George, andof Billy Emerson, the negro minstrel, and William Keith our greatartist. And we planned houses, adobe houses, that should be builtup above, over the manzanita bushes, and the swimming-pool thatshould just naturally lie between the two live-oaks hidden behindthe natural screen of mountain laurel, but open clear up to thesun. Each night we closed with a round of songs, and maybe a hymn.And bed was early. Now wasn't that a good place to be?

Not so very different in atmosphere from Hyde Park! But what wouldBroadway say of such a life! Oh, the serenity of it all, thedignity, the independence, the superiority over so much that wethink important. There one could get a sense of proportion, andsee things more nearly in their natural color and size. Truly, Icould have been religious if I lived in the country—and not beentoo hard driven for a living! (For one can't be anything good orgreat when pressed and bullied by necessity of any kind.)

So I grew in strength on the little ranch and unwillingly cameback for treatment here, which was not half so good for soul orbody as to sit in the sun and see the birds daintily pick theircrumbs and know that the dog at my knee understood what I did nottell him.

Give to the Ducal lady at Hyde Park my spring greetings, and tothe "young lord lover" who bears your name my respectful regards.I expect to go to Rochester, or elsewhere, in May, and in themeantime think me not silly because I like you and have written ofwhat I like.

F. K L.

To John W. Hallowell

Los Angeles, March 31, 1921

DEAR JACK,—I went to your Church on Sunday. Now there! RealFriends. I wondered, "Why the two doors?" as I went up the steps,but I said, "I'll take the nearest." Someone was talking, so Iplumped down in the backmost seat. Then I looked about and foundthat I was faced by three rows of sisters, in poke bonnets on araised platform, at the end of the room. Around me were women,women, women, and children. Not a man!

My wits at last came to me. I discovered there were two roomsreally, divided by pillars. And there were the men, the blessed,homely men. So up I lifted hat and coat and piled over on theman's side and breathed again.

The speaker looked like the late Senator Hoar and was intoning orchanting his speech or address or sermon. I had never heard itdone and the cadence was charming. It adds to the emotionalism ofwhat is said. When he sat down, there was a long pause, and then asister, on the opposite side now, quoted, modestly, a psalm. Twomore, a man and woman, spoke. Then a prayer and at twelve, withone accord, we all rose and went out.

It is the essence of Democracy and I fear the forward there, andnot the most worthy of being heard, come to the front. Please tellyour mother how good I was! And write me, you scoundrel!

F. K. L.

Postcard to John G. Gehring

April 20, [1921]

On the eastbound train, traveling toward a little man who carriesa little knife in his hand and beckons me toward the north. I donot go gladly, because I am feeling so much better. Have had wholedays and nights without pain, by the exercise of all kinds ofcare. Still that is living "on condition." Is there never again tobe freedom? You see I am a natural Protestant. Good luck to you,dear man.

LANE

To Hall McAllister

R.R. Train, Minnesota, April 22

DEAR HALL,—I am now on the St. Paul road going to Lake City,where, it is said my son is to be married to a charming, littleIrish girl, one generation away from Ireland.

Right now, I am sitting opposite Mrs. Franklin K. Lane who is, inturn, sitting beside my brother who has come East with me assecretary, nurse, doctor, mentor, spiritual advisor, valet, andcompanion. On my right is the Mississippi river, of which you mayhave heard. On Sunday I hope to go to Rochester again and then becut in two, tho' I am not sure they will do it.

I left California last Tuesday. It was quite pleased with itselfand full of pity for all the rest of the world. It surely has muchto say for itself, and says it with frequency and normalcy. Theonly disappointment in dying will be the unfortunate contrast—eh,you Californian? But then you and I are not like thosetransplanted Iowans who fill Southern California, most of whomhave never seen Mt. Tamalpais nor the Golden Gate and yet thinkthey know California!

I look at the paper and see "Harding" at the top of every column.Then I think of W. W. looking at the paper and seeing the sameheadlines. Oh, what unhappiness! Not all the devices of Tumultyfor keeping alive illusions of grandeur could offset thoseheadlines. Ungrateful world! Un-understanding world!

I hope you like your new boss. He will be a good westernSecretary, and is quite likely to get into a row with our easternconservation friends. I am glad he is from the Senate, they carefor their own.

I don't like Harrison jumping on Harvey after confirmation. Lookslittle, weakens his influence as "our" man, and is notsportsmanlike. We must take our medicine and let Harding have hisown way, and it won't be such a bad way, but surely verydifferent.

… I should like to get back to Washington and loaf for a timearound Sheridan Circle. I know a woman there who intrigued me (asyou writers say) long, long ago with various fascinations ofspirit and mind and eye and voice. But I fear she would not knowme any more.

Now do not be discouraged because you have a bit of sickness. Youare youth, you can beat old whiskered Time. Life has many a laughin it yet for you. Why you look forty years younger than JoeRedding—but don't tell him I told you.

LANE

To Mrs. Frederic Peterson

Rochester, Minnesota, April 26, [1921]

MY DEAR MRS. PETERSON,—… Once more I am going through thegrinding of the Mayo mill, and this time I hope to some concretepurpose, and have an end to this coming out "by that same doorwherein I went" The dear old meditative, contemplative Orientalsthrew up their hands in despair long years ago and found thefigure of the unending wheel to symbolize all processes andprocedures: a world, a universe, without termini. Sometimes Ithink them right, but then again my western mind will not have itthat the riddle of the Sphinx may not be solved. Our assurancemeets every challenge; mystery may make us humble; we may bebaffled; but we do not despair because we know we are Gods to whomall doors must open eventually. That seems to be the realunderlying strength of our position. Why men go on with researchexcepting out of some such philosophy I cannot see—nor why theygo on with life.

Tell your good man that I long to look once more into the sweetface of the Shepaug, and that while I have been wandering in thedelicious and rare places, I have not forgotten the freshwholesomeness of the Hoosatonic. My first visit shall be to themeeting place of the Three Rivers. Why might not fortune lead usto have a summer in Connecticut and a winter in California? "Iknow a place where the wild thyme grows," many such places indeed,and high hillsides of wild lilac and a wee mountain crowned withthe flowering manzanita. Oh, this world is a place to make soulsgrow if one can get an apple tree, a pine and an oak, a fewlilies, a circle of crimson phlox, a stretch of moving water and asweep of sky, that can be called one's own.

We saw Cordy Severance's place on Sunday—went there from thewedding of my boy to Catherine McCahill—and found a volume of theChinese Lyrics [Footnote: By Dr. Frederic Peterson.] in the bigroom. Great chap Cordy, and a great room he has to play the organin, and more people love him than anyone else I know, for he lovesthem with an aggressiveness that few men dare to show, that giveshim distinction and is a glory.

How far away the war seems—way back yonder with the fight for
Independence and the French Revolution, almost back to Caesar.
Well, I must quit mental meanderings. With all good will,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Roland Cotton Smith

Rochester, Minnesota, [April] 30

And you know that I cannot even write Spoon River! Vain man!
Strutting co*ck o' the walk! Knight of the Knickerbocker Club!
Gazer upon Fifth Avenue and the Foibles and Frivolities! Reveller
in things of life and Enjoyer of Gaiety!

Look thou upon me. To Minnesota driven. In a hospital-hotel.Punched and tapped by every stray Knight of the Golden Fleecers.Awaiting a verdict from puzzled doctors. … Bless you, I havebeen through years of watchful waiting but not of this kind, and afew weeks of this is enough. But I am a patient, long-suffering,Christian martyr upon whom the Pagans work their will.

And you, poor man. Tied to a woman's foot! Now that is what I callhumiliating. Worse than being tied to her apron strings or to herchariot, (in the latter, they say, there is often much joy.) Whyshould people have feet anyway in these days of autos? A meretransportation convenience! Well, all our transportationfacilities seem to be out of order these days. Fallen arches, insooth! Reminds one of Rome. Very much more aristocratic thaninfected gall-bladder after all. And I do hope they can berestored, those arches, and the world once more put on itsperipatetic way.

But you do not tell me of yourself. Can you chop wood or saw woodor play golf or do aught else that doth become a man of muscle,energy, life, vim, go, pep? Take a trip to the South Seas, aknock-about trip, casting off clerical garb and living in theopen, mixing with the primitive peoples, seeing beauteous nature,climbing mountains, swimming in soft waters, not seeing newspaperor book. They tell me that in Burmah live a happy people who lovebeauty, are always smiling and follow the Golden Rule far nearerthan those who live by trade and are blest by civilization. Ah,that I might see such a people! The nearest I ever came was atHonolulu, and there was the taint of the Christian, alack-a-day!The White Man's Burden is the weight of the load of sin, disease,death, and misfortune he has dropped on the happy ones who neverknew a Christian creed. We have given them bath tubs in exchangefor cheerful living!

I am as much in the air as to the future as I was in the russetdays of Bethel. But one of these days, let us hope we may gatherover a bottle of something sound and mellow, and laugh togetherover our adventure into the land of the woebegone. I do not taketo it, tho' they say some people live in it by choice, for theyfind something to talk of there, and feel saintly because theysuffer. Well, we will have more knowledge in that happy future andmore of sympathy. What a lot one must endure to gain a wee bit ofwisdom. And then to have it die with us. Maybe it does not, eh?Maybe it somehow, somewhere finds a corner into which it drops andcarries someone over a hard place. I don't know what kind oftheology this is that I am dripping from my pen, but I cannot yetbe beaten to the point where I say it is all purposeless. And thatis the faith that may not save a soul but does save souls, Iguess.

I wish you the joy and elevation of spirit that you have manytimes given to my sick soul and to others. Did I tell you my boyis married—to a Catholic girl too, of much charm? They weremarried on the ancestral farm with the ancestor of ninety yearspresent and in high spirits. A Dios, Padre mio,

F. K. L.

To John G. Gehring

Rochester, Minnesota, [April] 30, [1921]

Tomorrow will be May day—once, before the world becameindustrial, a day of gladness, now a day of dread, another resultof mal-adjustment.

What ever would these doctors do if they had no cheeks in which tohold their tongues while telling sick folk what ails them, and thecure? You are learning, Sir, how much of wisdom some men lack whohave certain knowledge. And wisdom is what we are after, weKnights of the Mystic Sign. Wisdom—the essence of lives lived;knocks, blows, pains, tortures reduced to fears, and theseincorporated into a string or queue of people who have eyes,nerves, and powers of inference, and the initiative to experimentand the impulse to try, and try again. Result—a nugget no largerthan a mustard seed of intellectual or spiritual radium, y-cleptwisdom. It does not grow on ancestral trees or on collegecampuses, nor does it come out of laboratories or hospitals, tho'it is sometimes found in all these places. A Carpenter is known tohave possessed more of it than any other man; tho' most of usdon't possess enough wisdom to know that He did possess so much ofit. An Indian Prince is also celebrated for the richness of hissupply. These men have been followed by others who sometimescarried mirrors, but some had tiny grains of the real thing also.And those are called Optimists and Transcendentalists andIdealists and Fools who think that more and more of these grainswill come into the hearts and minds of men; while those are calledsensible, and shrewd, and sane, who assert that the supply isuniform, stationary in quantity but moved about from time to time,producing nothing but the illusion that something is worth while.

But you and I say, "Suffer the Illusion to come into me, for ofsuch is the Kingdom of Heaven." Emerson says each man is an"inlet" of the Divine Spirit—just a bit on the side, out of theinfinite ocean. Thus all of us are connected up, and thus there ishope that some day doctors will be wiser than today. …

I should like to hold your hand for a time. It's the best serviceone man can give another. We are great hand-holders, we men,natural dependents, transfusers of sympathy and understanding andheartening stuff. They tell me here that your blood for purposesof transfusion is 1, 2, 3 or 4. The last is common denominatorblood and will go into anyone safely, but is uncommon. All theother three will kill if not put into those of correspondingquality of blood. Well, you and I like each other because we havethe same wave-length to our nerve current, perhaps, and we couldhold hands without danger to the other fellow, and possibly withsome benefit to the world,—for human sympathy makes goodmedicine.

Good fortune betide you! My brother, who is sitting by, wishes hisaffectionate regards to go with mine, and he hopes you will someday see him in that vale of Paradise where he lives.

F. K. L.

To Adolph C. Miller Federal Reserve Board

Rochester, Minnesota, May 1, [1921]

May Day, Glad Day, Day of Festival and Frolic,—once. Now Day ofPortent, of Threats and the Evil Eye. Such is the miracle workedby Steam Engine, Mechanics, Quick Exchanges, Industry!

With this happy opening let me to your letter in which you love mea little, which I very much like, calling me baby,—child,anyway. And so I am. I laugh at myself. I cannot think of myselfas Grandad or possible Grandad. In fact, I should not be Grandador Dad, notwithstanding the beauty and noblemindedness andcapacity of my dear kids. But I have always been a priest, marriedto things undomestic, and without the time which every fathershould have to train and educe the mind of his offspring;especially to give sound and substantial bread and meat to theirsubconscious mind when they are young. Then, too, a father shouldhave a religion, a sense of relation between himself and theMaster, and be able to instill this by gentle and non-didactivemethod into his bairns, so that they may steer by the North Starand not by shiftier, flashier stars.

Yes, altho' I am now tottering, bruised, battered, down on thefloor like a prostrate prize-fighter "taking the count" and hopingfor strength enough to rise, altho' an "aged man" as I was oncedescribed in my hearing, I am the youngest thing inside that Iknow; in my curiosity and my trustfulness and my imagination, andmy desire to help and my belief in goodness and justice. I want tostrike right out now and see the world, and having found the goodbring it back and distribute it. And I see every day things thatshould be done which make me long to live, even tho' I only tellothers that they should be done. And one thing that bothers meright now is our money scheme. I know I am far off from yourstandpoint, but there is something wrong when there is so great avariation in the purchasing power of things produced. Why is notIrving Fisher on the right road? I should like to lay a quietinghand upon the feverish desire for things which so possesses ourpeople. So few things will do, rich, beautiful, solid things, butnot many; and then to live with them, proud of them, revelling inthem, and making them to shine like well-handled bronze—notglossily but deeply. The great luxury we will not allow ourselvesis repose; that is because we are not essentially dignified. Thesoul is not respected sufficiently; it is not given that food onwhich it grows. Curious, the turn of my mind now, too. Having beenthinking, and while I still am thinking, in large terms,—thecity, the state, the nation, all peoples (I have grown throughthem all, never really thinking of the family unit)—I am nowthinking of a nest, a roof of my own, a bit of garden, a tree ofmy planting—little things, indeed, on which the mind can rest,after casting an eye over the world and talking in terms ofcontinents. (And I wonder if the gardens of the British—theirweek-ends at home with flowers and birds, may not bring them downto those little things which make for good sense, sanity, wisdom!)But I fear me I may never so indulge myself, and that is wrong—that a man should live for fifty-seven years and never thrust hishand into his own bit of his country's soil—such condition makesagainst loyalties that are essential.

Now I have talked with you for a long time, but not long enough.How I should like to sit in the big re-upholstered chair besidethe lamp, beyond the fire, and throw a match into your brain stuffthat would start it blazing. Yes, and I would like to gatheraround that fire a few whom I love. You and Aleck and Sid. andPfeiffer and Jack Hallo well and John Burns and Brydon Lamb andLathrop Brown and Cotton Smith and John Finley and Dr. Gehring andJohn Wigmore—the real world is very small, isn't it?

It just may be that the verdict here will be one of exile toCalifornia, to my brother George's farm; ah, yes he should be withthe few great, and I say 'exile' for I wonder if I should ever seeany of you then? My doctor in Pasadena said that I should live asa country gentleman, and I answered, "But that takes money." Yet Iwould not know where the farm should be, for climate is not all.So long, old man.

F.K.

Many months later, writing to Mrs. Lane this friend of many yearssays, "I want also to recall the remark Frank made when you andMary, and he and I, were rain-bound in the little chalet at St.Mary's in Glacier Park, nine years ago. That was an outstandingexperience in my long friendship with Frank. We had many hours todiscuss things, and no matter on what road we started, we alwayscame back to a discussion of life; what it was all for, and whatit was about, and what principle a chivalrous man should take inadjusting himself usefully to the going world. I remember late onenight we sat in the dimly lighted room after a long discussion, hearose, and turning to me said: 'Doesn't it, after all, just cometo this,—To spend and to be spent—isn't that what life is?'Every subsequent experience with Frank confirmed me in the beliefthat that was his personal philosophy. That is why he livedgreatly while he lived, and died nobly when his life was spent."

To Robert Lansing

Rochester, Minnesota, May 2, [1921]

MY DEAR LANSING,—I am to be operated on on Friday and so send youthis line that you may know that I have yours of April sixteenth,and have rejoiced very much at its good news, that you werebetter, and that you were not bitter because of the come-backcampaign.

Really, I think Harding is doing well, or rather that the wholeadministration is being supported well by the country. Oh, theseRepublicans have the art of governing, and we do so much better attalking! No one knows just what his foreign policy is, butsomething will work through that will satisfy a very tired people.There seem to be comparatively few out of work now. We are not outof the woods yet. But the Lord will take care of them. He may evenkeep Johnson from bolting Harding. They will temporize through;that's my guess.

Good English the people don't know. Ideality they have had enoughof for a time. They just want to get down to brass tacks and makesome money, so that the Mrs. can have more new dresses. I doearnestly wish them luck. God gave us the great day, and you andI, anyway, are not ashamed of the parts we played. In fact, theparty loomed pretty large those days—the whole country breathedlung-fuls and felt heroic. We shall not look upon such anothertime nor act for a people so nobly inspired.

Please give to Mrs. Lansing my very best regards—fine spirit,that she is—and to you, as always, dear Lansing, my affection andesteem.

LANE

To James D. Pkelan

Rochester, Minnesota, May 2, 1921

MY DEAR JIM,—Glad to hear from you and to get so cheerful a word,for surely you are justified in looking upon the world as verymuch of a friend of yours. You have a rare home, in which togather your many friends, and you have had honors in abundance,and now may rest and write and speak and adjust yourself tothings—terrestrial and celestial—and other service will callyou. There must be some Democrats appointed to adjust European orother difficulties, even by a Republican, and you will be theprominent one. So I can look across the mountains to Montalvo andfind you ripening into a fine old mellow age, conscious ofusefulness, in health and in happiness. May it be so!

Just as soon as my boy gets here, I shall be operated on. … Nedis now on his honeymoon with his darling little bride, a CatholicIrish girl named Catherine McCahill, whose grey-whiskeredgrandfather of ninety quite took the shine off the bride at thewedding. He is a Democrat (State Senator for thirty years) a SinnFeiner of the most robust sort, and a fanner of many acres.

Poor Anne, she is in for a bad time, with Nancy sick, but she hasa good stout heart and a most adequate and comfortable religiousfaith, which throws things that are personal into a very minorplace. The theory of relativity has more than one expressionindeed, and things are small when looked at from a height. And itis good to find one who can be both religious and large.

The country seems to be liking Harding and his cabinet more andmore. They do have a faculty for getting things done, thoseRepublicans, and they are subjected to so little criticism. It isreally good to see them do their work and get away with things soneatly. … As always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Mr. and Mrs. Louis Hertle Gunston Hall on the Potomac

Rochester, Minnesota, May 2

DEAR PEOPLE,—What good angel ever put it into your heart to wireus—and such a warm electric message!

I tell you this is not Gunston Hall—so few birds, flowers, trees—but I like the great sweep of the sky out here. There is nothingmean about this land of ours. It gives you something, and gives itto you generously, something lovable wherever you are.

The Doctors have not decided what to do with me. … But we'll beout of suspense this week, I expect.

I can see your garden now—fountain, hedge, roses, bird-boxes,pergola, box and all—with the dignified, stately Potomac way outyonder, beyond the cleared fields and the timber. Lucky people,and you deserve it all. No one, not even the Bolsheviks, wouldtake it from you. Cordially yours always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To Alexander Vogelsang

Rochester, Minnesota, May 4, 1921

DEAR ALECK,—I must pass under the knife, that is the verdict. OnFriday morning the act takes place. And out will come gall-bladder, adhesions, appendix and all things appertaining thereto,including hereditaments, reversions, lives in posse, andsinecures. So that's that!

They say that my heart has grown much worse in the last threemonths, but that I probably have four chances out of five ofpulling through, which is more chance than I ever had in politicsin California. I believe I am to be operated on while conscious,as they fear to give ether. I trust my curiosity will notinterfere with the surgeon's facility.

Ah well, this old shell is not myself, and I have never felt thatthe world's axis was located with reference to my habitat. Butthis is so interesting an old world that I don't want to leave itprematurely, because one does run the risk of not coming upon oneequally interesting. So I shall think of you and try to see youlater, in the new offices in the Mills Building. May clients comethick as dogwood in Rock Creek Park; and trout streams in hiddenplaces be revealed unto you, within an hour's flight by aero.Affectionately,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

P. S. Give my regards to the boys with you and in the office, whenyou see them—and to Wade Ellis and Ira Bennett and others who maybe interested. Love to your dear Lady!

To John Finley New York Times

Rochester, Minnesota, May 4, [1921]

MY DEAR FINLEY,—I have your postal from London and it cheerethme—Yea, thou hast done a kindly act to one who is sore beset. …

When you and I can talk together I want to urge a new field uponyour great paper. Perhaps you can take it up with Mr. Ochs andperhaps he can see how he can add to his usefulness and to theglory of his paper's name.

My thought is that there should be somewhere—and why not in NewYork?—a Place of Exchange for the New Ideas that the worldevolves each year, a central spot where all that is new inscience, philosophy, practical political machinery, and all elseof the world's mind-products shall be placed on exhibition wherethose interested may see. Why should not the Times do this?

It would cost very little. All the plant needs would be a buildingwhich would contain one or two fine halls for public speaking, anda few properly appointed apartments. No faculty—but a super-university with all the searchers and researchers, inventors,experimenters, thinkers of the world for faculty. No students—butevery man the world round interested in the theme underconsideration, welcome, as student without pay. The only executiveofficer a Director, whose business would be to see that the greatminds were tapped,—a high class impresario, who would know whohad thought thoughts, developed a theory, found a new problem, ora new method of solving an old one, and [would] bring the thinkeron the stage and present him to those who knew of what he talked;and could intelligently, quickly, distribute it to the ends of theearth.

Money? The lecturer would get his expenses from his home and backagain, and be cared for appropriately in one of the apartments.Otherwise the incidental expenses of administration. Aside fromthe single and simple building the whole thing should not costmore than $100,000 a year.

To illustrate—it took years for the world to know what Rutherfordwas doing with radium. Why should he not have been brought to somecentral place and there, before all the students who might chooseto come, tell his story? Pasteur, Einstein, Bergson, WrightBrothers, Wells (theory of Education). These names are suggestive.The great of the world could walk, as it were, in the groves withtheir pupils and critics, and we could have a new Athens. Whateverprogress the world had made, in whatever line, would be reportedat that time. And the world would know in advance that this was tobe so. Germany has been the world thought center for forty years.England is now planning to take Germany's place. Why not America?But the government has not the imagination, and this must be donequickly.

Why not the Times? And why shouldn't you start it for the Times—be the first Director?

Then I want someone to take over another of my ideas—a sort ofFederal Reserve Board on the good of the nation, an unofficialgroup of men with foresight, who would be a spur to government andsuggest direction. Somebody whose business it would be to attendto that which is nobody's business and so waits, and waits, untilsometimes too late. Why should we have had no plans for caring forour soldiers as to employment and giving them the right bent ontheir return?

There was no one to concentrate attention—the attention ofCongress and the public—on any definite plan. I tried it with myscheme for making farms for soldiers, but Congress, as soon as itfound that I was really agitating, passed laws making itimpossible for me to use a sheet of paper or the frank for thepurpose. I do not say my plan was the best possible. Then someoneshould have come forward with another, and pushed it against aCongress made up of Republicans who feared that Democrats wouldget the credit, and Democrats who feared Republicans would. Hence,deadlock, and a great opportunity lost! …

Seers, or see-ers, that's what these men should be. Elder
Statesmen, if you please, independent, away above politics.

Doesn't it seem to you that we are coming to be altogether toodependent on the President? That office will be ruined. Every onewith a sore thumb has come into the habit of running to thePresident. This is all wrong, all wrong. He cannot do his job wellnow. And he is only nominally doing it, and only nominally hasbeen doing it for years. But each month seems to add to his dutiesas arbiter of everything from clothes to strikes, from baseball todisarmament.

I see a tremendous field for a body of a few ripe minds who wouldtalk so little, and so wisely, and so collectively, that theycould get and hold the ear of the country, governmental andotherwise.

I outlined for Mezes, in your old job, a series of lectures byAmericans who have done things on Why America is Worth While—andhe has expanded it into a whole course on America, so that Ibelieve he will have something new and great—teaching history,geology, art, everything, by the history of that thing in America,and how it came to come here, or be here, or what it means here.

Well, I have written you a book and must stop—I don't know whereto address you but will send this to the Times. Please remember meto Mr. Ochs—who can see things, and here's hoping it won't belong before we meet. Yours always,

FRANKLIN K. LANE

To James H. Barry San Francisco Star

Rochester, Minnesota, May 5, [1921]

MY DEAR JIM,—I have nothing of importance to say, except that Iam to be operated on tomorrow and hope for the best, for Dr. WillMayo is to do the operating, and I am not in a very run-downcondition.

I find myself quite serene, for I can look forward even to thevery worst result with the feeling that there is no one to meet meover there to whom I've done any wrong. And while I haven't donemy best, my score hasn't been blank. I honestly believe I've addeda farthing or two to the talent that was given me.

My brother George is here, with his splendid philosophy and hisScotch songs; and Ned, my boy, and his bride have just come back,so that Anne and I are very well content that things are just asthey should be. I go to St. Mary's Hospital where they have nunsfor nurses, and when time comes for recuperation I shall go to thenear-by estate of my old friend, Severance, the big St. Paullawyer, whom I have known these thirty years.

I hope, my dear old man, that you will find new occupation soonthat will give you use for your pen, and sterling love of justice.My regards, sincere and hearty to your family, and my otherfriends.

F. K. LANE

To Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt

Rochester, Minnesota, May 5, [1921]

Just because I like you very much, and being a very old man dareto say so, I am sending this line, which has no excuse in itsnews, philosophy or advice; has no excuse, in fact, except whatmight be called affection, but of course this being way past theVictorian era, no one admits to affections! I will not belittle myown feeling by saying that I have a wife who thinks you the bestEastern product—and probably she'd move to strike out the word"Eastern." At any rate, I think I should tell you myself that I amto be operated on tomorrow, by Dr. Will Mayo, and am glad of it.We shall see what we shall see.

I find myself quite serene about the matter, altho' I believe myheart is so bad that they fear giving ether and will keep meconscious if they can, applying only a local anesthetic.

I'd like to have Anne's perfect sureness as to the future, butlacking it, I do not look forward with fear, even if the worstshould happen. I've never done a wrong to any man or woman orchild that I can now recall—but maybe my memory is failing.

My boy and his bride came back this morning—happy! Oh, so happy!And my "best beloved" brother who sings Scotch songs is here—agreat philosopher whom you would deeply admire—and our friendsthe Severances of St. Paul, thirty year-old friends, they comeover tonight. So we will be a merry, merry company. I'd love tosee you and the gay Cavalier, but let us hope it won't be longtill we meet! Au revoir!

F. K. L.

To friends who had telegraphed and written urgently for news

May 11, 1921

It is Wednesday afternoon and I am now sitting up in bed talkingto my good friend, Cotter. Until yesterday I did not clearlyvisualize any one thing in this room and did not know that it hada window, except that there was a place that noise came through,but I did know that it had a yellow oak door that stared at mewith its great, big, square eye, all day and all night.

Last Friday, you see, about ten in the morning, I took the stepthat I should have taken months, yes, years ago. I was stretchedon a stiff, hard table, my arms were clamped down and in three-quarters of an hour I had my appendix and my gall bladder removed,which latter was a stone quarry and the former a cesspool. Today,most tentatively, I crawled on to a chair and ate my firstmouthful of solid food. But four days ago I managed to shavemyself, and I am regarded as pretty spry.

I have seen death come to men in various ways, some rather noveland western. I once saw a man hanged. And I have seen several menshot, and came very near going out that way myself two or threetimes, but always the other fellow aimed poorly. I was being shotat because I was a newspaper man, and I should have been shot at.There must be public concern in what is printed, as well as itstruth, to justify it. That is something that newspapers should getto know in this country. After the earthquake in San Francisco, Isaw walls topple out upon a man. And I have had more intimateglimpses still of the picturesque and of the prosaic ways by whichmen come to their taking off.

But never before have I been called upon deliberately to walk intothe Valley of the Shadow and, say what you will, it is a greatact. I have said, during the past months of endless examination,that a man with little curiosity and little humor and a littlemoney who was not in too great pain could enjoy himself studyingthe ways of doctors and nurses, as he journeyed the invalid'spath. It was indeed made a flowery path for me, as much as anypath could be in which a man suffered more humiliation anddistress and thwarting and frustration, on the whole, than he didpain.

But here was a path, the end of which I could not see. I was notcompelled to take it. My very latest doctor advised me againsttaking it. I could live some time without taking it. It was a beton the high card with a chance to win, and I took it.

I undressed myself with my boy's help, in one of the hospitalrooms, and then arraying myself in my best suit of pajamas and anantique samurai robe which I use as a dressing gown, submittedmyself to being given a dose of dazing opiate, which was to do itswork in about fifteen minutes. I then mounted a chair and waswheeled along the corridor to the elevator, stopping meantime tosay "adieu" to my dear ones, who would somehow or other insistupon saying "good-bye," which is a different word. I was not to begiven the usual anesthetic, because my heart had been cutting upsome didos, so I must take a local anesthetic which Was to beadministered by a very celebrated Frenchman. I need not tell youthat this whole performance was managed with considerable eclat,and Doctor Will Mayo, probably the first surgeon of the world, wasto use the knife; and in the gallery looking on were DoctorFinney, of Johns Hopkins, Doctor Billings, of Chicago, DoctorVaughan of the Michigan University, and others. On the whole, itwas what the society reporter would call a recherche affair. Thelocal anesthetic consists of morphine and scopolamin. It isadministered directly by needle to the nerves that lead to thoseparticular parts which are to be affected by the operation. This Iwatched myself with the profoundest interest. It was painful,somewhat, but it was done with the niceness and precision thatmake this new method of anesthesia a real work of art. I shouldthink that the Japanese, with their very rare power at embroidery,might come to be past masters in this work. There were someinsertions very superficial and some extremely deep. Over theoperator's head, there were a half dozen heads peering intently ateach move he made, while the patient himself was free to lift hishead and look down and see just what was being done. I did nottest myself, as I should have, to see whether I was paralyzed inany part.

Just when this performance came to a head, Doctor Mayo came in andsaid, "Well, I am going in for something." I said, "That's right,and I hope you will get it."

His statement did not conclusively prove confidence that he wouldfind the cause of my trouble by going in. … I knew there couldbe no such definiteness, but I said to myself, "He will get it, ifit's there."

For two days I had had knowledge that this operation was to takeplace at this time, and my nerves had not been just as good asthey should have been. Those men who sleep twelve hours perfectlybefore being electrocuted have evidently led more tranquil livesthan I have, or have less concern as to the future. Ah, now I wasto know the great secret! For forty years I had been wondering,wondering. Often I had said to myself that I should summon to mymind when this moment came, some words that would be somewhat asynthesis of my philosophy. Socrates said to those who stood by,after he had drunk the hemlock, "No evil can befall a good man,whether he be alive or dead." I don't know how far from that wehave gone in these twenty-four hundred years. The apothegm,however, was not apposite to me, because it involved a declarationthat I was a good man, and I don't know anyone who has the rightso to appreciate himself. And I had come to the conclusion thatperhaps the best statement of my creed could be fitted into thewords, "I accept," which to me meant that if in the law of naturemy individual spirit was to go back into the great Ocean ofSpirits, my one duty was to conform. "Lead Kindly Light" was allthe gospel I had. I accepted. I made pretense to put out my handin submission and lay there.

"All through, doctor?"

"Yes, doctor."

"Very well, we will proceed."

And I was gradually pushed through the hall into the operatingroom. The process there was lightning-like. I was in torture.

"Lift me up, lift me up."

"What for?"

"I have one of those angina pains and I must ease it by getting upand taking some nitro."

That had been my practice, but I did not reason that never beforehad the pain come on my right side.

"Give him a whiff of ether." The tenderest arms stole around myhead and the softest possible voice—Ulysses must have heard itlong ago—"Now do take a deep breath." I resisted. I had been toldthat I would see the performance.

"Please do, breathe very deeply—just one good deep breath." Thatpain was burning the side out of me. I tried to get my hand up tomy side. Of course it was tied down. I swore.

"Oh Christ! This is terrible."

"It will stop if you will reach for a big breath,"—and I resignedmyself. Men who are given the third degree have no stronger willthan mine. I knew I was helpless. I must go through. I mustsurrender to that Circean voice.

I heard the doctor in a commonplace monotone say, "This is anunusual case—"—the rest of this sentence I never heard.

There was a long ray of gray light leading from my bed to my door.
I had opened my eyes. "I had not died." I had come through the
Valley.

"I wonder what he got."

In the broad part of the ray was my wife smiling, and stretchingout to that unreachable door were others whom I recognized, allsmiling. Things were dim, but my mind seemed definite.

"What did he get?" I had expected eternal mysteries to beunraveled. Either I would know, or not know, and I would not knowthat I would not know.

"He got a gall-bladder filled with stones and a bad appendix, andnow you are to lie still."

Then to this the drama had come, the drama beyond all dramas—ahandful of brownish secretions and a couple of pieces of morbidflesh!! Ah me!

I am doing well, cared for well, as happy as can be; have had noneof my angina pains since the operation. And as I lie here, Icontemplate [making] a frieze—a procession of doctors and nursesand internes, of diagnosticians and technicians and experts andmechanics and servitors and cooks—all, the great and the small,in profile. They are to look like those who have made theirpretenses before me during the past year;—the solemn and thestupid; the kindly, the reckless; the offhand; the erudite, thepractical; the many men with tubes and the many men withelectrical machines. Old Esculapius must begin the procession butthe Man with the Knife, regnant, heroic size, must end it.

What a great thing, what a pride, to have the two men of greatestconstructive imagination and courage in surgery in the world asAmericans, Dr. Charles and Dr. Will Mayo.

To Alexander Vogelsang

Rochester, Minnesota, May 14, [1921]

This is a line by my own hand, dear Aleck, just to show you that Iam still this much master of myself. …

I am going through much pain. Inside I am a great boil. But Natureis doing all she can, and I am helping. They think me a rightmodel sort of patient, for I made a showing of exceptionalrecovery. When T.R. shaved the day after, I said, "Hip Hip!" Well,I done it too! I guess as how I haven't been so very bad a boy allthese fifty-seven years or I couldn't play as good as "par" atthis game, and they say they have no better record than mine onthe books.

The National Geographic Society did a nice thing. Today I got aresolution of the most sympathetic kind from them. Some gentlemenstill alive, eh?

I dictated a bit of a thing about my experience the other day toCotter—something to send off to the chaps who wrote or wired—andsent you one. I hope it wasn't soft or slobby. Did you think itwas all right to come from a sick bed?

It will be three weeks or more yet of hospital, and then much ofrecuperation. But I have no complaint. I feel a faith growing inme, and I may yet draw my sword in some good fight.Affectionately,

FRANK

To John W. Hallowell

Rochester, Minnesota, May 14, 1921

DEAR JACK,—I've been down into the Valley since I heard from you,but I'm up once more and with new light in my eye, new faith in myheart, more sense of the things that count and those that don't.And affection, love for the good thing of any kind; loyalty, evenmistaken loyalty, these are the things that the Gods treasure.They live longest. So I turn to give you my hand, dear boy,

[Illustration with caption: LANE PEAK IN RAINIER NATIONAL PARK]

I was most badly infected, but I really never felt better thanwhen I stepped out of the auto on to the hospital steps. And ittook some nerve for me to say, "Go to it," under suchcirc*mstances. (I am patting myself on the back a bit now.)

Well, Glory be!—that step is taken and now I must fight to getfit. They say I am making as good a record as a boy, as torecovery, so all my Scotch whiskies, and big cigars and latenights with you politicians have not ruined me.

Say dear things to your Mother for me, Jack, and give greetings toall your family.

F. K. L.

To Robert Lansing

Rochester, 14 [May, 1921]

MY DEAR LANSING,—I am disturbed because you may be disturbed. AsI lie in bed I read and am read to, and some of the papers do nottreat you decently. The very ones that were loudest in theirdeclarations against W. W. at every stage, now suggest that youmight have quit his service if you didn't like it. I hope it willnot get under your skin …

What comfort you would have given the enemy if you had resigned!Have they thought of that? I came to the brink when the Presidentblew up my coal agreement to save three or four hundred milliondollars for the people, But I was stopped by the thought, "Give nocomfort to Berlin." … Good night and good luck.

F.K.L.

Manuscript fragment written May 17, 1921, and found in his room.
Franklin K. Lane died May 18, 1921.

And if I had passed into that other land, whom would I havesought—and what should I have done?

No doubt, first of all I would have sought the few loved oneswhose common life with me had given us matter for talk, and whom Ihad known so well that I had loved dearly. Then perhaps theremight have [been] some gratifying of a cheap curiosity, somesearching and craning after the names that had been sierras alongmy skyline. But I know now there would have been little of that.It would not have been in me to have gone about asking Alexanderand Cromwell little questions. For what would signify the triflewhich made a personal fortune, that put a new name up upon somepilaster men bowed to as they passed? Were Aristotle there,holding in his hand the strings and cables that tied together allthe swinging and surging and lagging movements of the wholeearth's life—an informed, pregnant Aristotle,—Ah! there would bethe man to talk with! What satisfaction to see him take, likereins from between his fingers the long ribbons of man's life andtrace it through the mystifying maze of all the wonderfuladventure of his coming up. The crooked made straight. The'Daedalian plan' simplified by a look from above—smeared out asit were by the splotch of some master thumb that made the wholeinvoluted, boggling thing one beautiful, straight line. And onecould see, as on a map of ocean currents, the swing and movementsof a thousand million years. I think that I would not expect thathe could tell the reason why the way began, nor where it wouldend. That's divine business, yet for the free-going of the mind itwould lend such impulse, to see clearly. Thus much for curiosity!The way up which we've stumbled.

But for my heart's content in that new land, I think I'd ratherloaf with Lincoln along a river bank. I know I could understandhim. I would not have to learn who were his friends and who hisenemies, what theories he was committed to, and what against. Wecould just talk and open out our minds, and tell our doubts andswap the longings of our hearts that others never heard of. Hewouldn't try to master me nor to make me feel how small I was. I'ddare to ask him things and know that he felt awkward about them,too. And I would find, I know I would, that he had hit his shinjust on those very stumps that had hit me. We'd talk of men a lot,the kind they call the great. I would not find him scornful. Yetboys that he knew in New Salem would somehow appear larger intheir souls, than some of these that I had called the great. Hiswise eyes saw qualities that weighed more than smartness. Yes, wewould sit down where the bank sloped gently to the quiet streamand glance at the picture of our people, the negroes beinglynched, the miners' civil war, labor's hold ups, employers'ruthlessness, the subordination of humanity to industry,—

THE END