He who believes in luck should study the career of Robert Lansing. Mr. Lansing probably thinks that the goddess of chance played him a scurvy trick, after having admitted him to the Olympian heights, to break him as suddenly as she made him.
Robert Lansing's real misfortune was not knowing how to play his luck. It is curious the fear men have of death. The former Secretary of State's only hope of immortality was to commit political suicide, and he lacked the courage or the vision to fall upon his sword.
When Woodrow Wilson was elected President for the first time he appointed Mr. Bryan Secretary of State. The opinion Mr. Wilson entertained of Mr. Bryan we all know. Mr. Wilson was not given to letting his thoughts run wild, but on one occasion, with pen in hand, he permitted himself the luxury of saying what he thought and expressed the pious hope that somebody would knock the distinguished Nebraskan into a cocked hat and thus dispose of the perpetual candidate who was the Old Man of the Sea to the Democratic Party.
Circumstances alter cases; Mr. Wilson as a private citizen could say and think what he pleased; as President he was compelled to make Mr. Bryan Secretary of State. As Mr. Bryan knew nothing of history and less of European politics and had a superb disdain of diplomacy—diplomacy according to the tenets of Bryanism being an unholy and immoral game in which the foreign players were always trying to outmaneuver the virtuous and innocent American—he was provided with a political nurse, mentor, and guardian in the person of John Bassett Moore, who had a long and brilliant career as an international lawyer and diplomatist. Mr. Bryan busied himself with finding soft jobs for deserving Democrats, preaching and inculcating the virtues of grape juice to the diplomatic corps, and concocting plans whereby the sword was to be beaten into a typewriter and war become a lost art. Meanwhile Mr. Moore was doing the serious work of the Department.
No two men were more unlike than Mr. Bryan and Mr. Moore; Mr. Bryan a bundle of loosely tied emotions to whom a catchy phrase or an unsound theory is more precious than a natural law or the wisdom of the philosopher; Mr. Moore an intellect who has subordinated his emotions, and to whom facts are as important as mathematics to an engineer. It was an incompatible union; it could not last. Mr. Moore became impatient of his chief's vagaries and, about a year later, returned to the dignified quiet of Columbia University.
This was early in 1914. Now for the random way in which chance weaves her skein. Mr. Moore went out of the Department and left the office of Counselor vacant, an office, up to that time, so little known that the public, if it gave the matter any thought, believed its occupant was the legal adviser of the Department, while, as a matter of fact, he is the Under Secretary, which is now the official designation.
At this stage of his career Mr. Lansing was connected with the Department as an adviser on international affairs and had represented the United States in many international arbitrations. He was known to a small and select circle of lawyers specializing in international law, but to the public his name meant nothing. He had always been a good Democrat, although he was married to the daughter of the late John W. Foster, who wound up a long and brilliant diplomatic life as Secretary of State in President Harrison's Cabinet after Mr. Blaine's resignation.
Mr. Lansing had made Washington his home for many years, and when the new Democratic Administration came into power he believed his services to the party entitled him to recognition, and he sought the appointment of Third Assistant Secretary of State. The Third Assistant Secretary is the official Social Secretary of the Government. When royalty or other distinguished persons come to this country as the guests of the nation the Third Assistant Secretary is the Master of Ceremonies. He has to see that all the forms are properly complied with and nothing happens to mar the visitors' enjoyment; he sends out invitations, in the name of the State Department, to the funerals of Ambassadors or the inauguration of the President. But for some reason Mr. Lansing's praiseworthy ambition was defeated.
Mr. Moore had knowledge, learning, and experience, but he was denied the gift of divination. Had he known that a few months later a half crazed youth in an unheard of place was to be the unconscious agent to set the whole world aflame, undoubtedly he would have put up with Mr. Bryan's curious ideas and peculiar methods and stuck to his desk at the State Department, and Mr. Lansing would never have been heard of. But at the turning point in Mr. Moore's career his luck deserted him and Mr. Lansing became the beneficiary. Mr. Lansing, who would have been satisfied with the appointment of Third Assistant Secretary of State, a minor place in the hierarchy, was appointed by Mr. Wilson Counselor of the Department of State.
The appointment created no excitement. In March, 1914, foreign affairs had little interest for the American people. There was Mexico, of course, and Japan; there were the usual routine questions to form the customary work of the department; but the skies were serene; murder, rape, and sudden death no one thought of; Lloyd's, which will gamble on anything from the weather to an ocean tragedy, would have written a policy at a ridiculously low premium on the maintenance of the peace of Europe; any statesman rash enough to have predicted war for the United States within three years would have aroused the concern of his friends and the professional solicitude of his physician. Apparently Mr. Lansing had tumbled into an easy and dignified post which would not unduly tax his physical or mental strength. He could congratulate himself upon his good fortune.
A few months later the situation changed. The State Department became not only the center about which the whole machinery of the Government revolved but on it was focused the attention of the country and the thoughts of Europe. The Counselor of the Department was lifted out of his obscurity; despatches to the belligerents signed "Lansing" were published in the newspapers, statements were issued by him, he was interviewed; he received Ambassadors, and when an Ambassador visited the State Department the nerve centers of the whole world were affected. Again, a few months later, in June, 1915, Mr. Bryan kindly accommodated Mr. Wilson by knocking himself into a cocked hat, and Mr. Lansing was appointed Secretary of State. Few men had risen so rapidly. He had no reason to complain of his luck.
Mr. Wilson made some extraordinary appointments—a close observer has said he could read motives but not men—and his appointment of Mr. Lansing at a time of crisis would have been inexplicable were it not logical as Mr. Wilson reasoned. Mr. Wilson did not invite as his associates his intellectual equals or those who dared to oppose him; it was necessary that the State Department should have a titular head, but Mr. Wilson was resolved to be his own Secretary of State and take into his own hands the control of foreign policy. No great man, no man great enough to be Secretary of State when the world was in upheaval, would have consented to that indignity; no man jealous of his own self-respect could have remained Mr. Wilson's Secretary of State for long. A Secretary of State or any other member of the Cabinet must of course subordinate his judgment to that of the President, for the President is the final court of appeal. But Mr. Wilson went further than that; he heaped almost unparalleled affront upon Mr. Lansing; he made the great office of Secretary of State ridiculous, and he invested its incumbent with no greater authority than that of a copyist.
Perhaps Mr. Wilson reads men better than his critics believed; perhaps Mr. Wilson had fully taken the measure of Mr. Lansing and knew how far he could go.
Nature never intended Mr. Lansing to be a leader of men, to fight for a great cause, or to engage in physical or intellectual combat. His life has been too soft for that, and he is naturally indolent. He is fond of, and has more than the amateur's appreciation for, music, painting, poetry, and the classics of literature. He has dabbled in verse, he sketches and he has written, but without brilliancy. Accident made him a lawyer, but he was really intended to be an artist; he would have produced no masterpiece, for genius is not in him, but he would have been happy in his work and perhaps have given inspiration to men of greater talent. Without being a fanatic or dogmatic, he is strongly religious; religion to him has a meaning and is not merely a convention; he has a code which he has always observed and ideals which he has preserved; he is charitable in his judgments and has never allowed his prejudices to influence his actions; he is, to use a word so often misapplied, a gentleman, and his motto is Noblesse oblige. Typical of the standard he sets for himself was the admirable restraint he showed after his abrupt dismissal from the Cabinet. He neither sought vindication through the newspapers, nor posed as a victim, nor soothed his feelings by denunciations of the President; he did not make a nuisance of himself by inflicting the recital of his grievances upon his friends or hinting darkly at revelations. He kept quiet and went about his affairs as a gentleman should.
Why, it may be asked, should a man with so many fine qualities have cut such a sorry figure? The answer perhaps is that he suffers from the defects of his qualities, fine as we must admit them to be; too fine, perhaps, for a coarser world.
When a weak and somewhat easy-going man, immensely pleased with his own exalted position, has to deal with a man of iron will, ruthless in his methods, he is necessarily at a disadvantage. Considering Mr. Lansing's temperamental defects and the effect of his training, his failure is no mystery.
Until Mr. Lansing became Secretary of State he had never known responsibility. Practically his entire life had been spent as a subordinate, carrying out with zeal and intelligence the tasks assigned to him, but always in obedience to a stronger mind. Nothing more weakens character or intellect than for a man habitually to turn to another for direction or inspiration; always to play the part of an inferior to a mental superior. For years Mr. Lansing had been connected with many international arbitrations which, theoretically, was a magnificent training for a future Secretary of State, and actually would have destroyed the creative and administrative usefulness of a much stronger man than Robert Lansing.
In the whole mummery of international relations there is nothing more farcical than an international arbitration. It is always preceded by great popular excitement. A ship is seized, a boundary is run a few degrees north or south of the conventional line, something else equally trivial fires the patriotic heart. The flag has been insulted, the offending nation is a land grabber, national honor must be vindicated. Secretaries of State write notes, ambassadors are instructed, the press becomes rabid, speeches are made; the public is advised to remain calm, but it is also assured there will be no surrender. After a few weeks the public forgets about the insult or the way in which it has been robbed; but the responsible officials who have never allowed themselves to become excited, continue the pleasing pastime of writing notes.
Months, sometimes years, drag on, then a new Secretary of State or a Foreign Minister, to clean the slate, proposes that the childish business be ended by an international arbitration. More weeks, more often months, are spent in agreeing upon the terms of reference, and finally the dispute goes before an "impartial arbitral tribunal." Both sides appoint agents and secretaries, an imposing array of counsel, technical experts; and as the counsel are always well paid they have a conscientious obligation to earn their fees.
More months are required to prepare the case, which frequently runs into many printed volumes; and the more volumes the better pleased everybody is, as size denotes importance. The arbitrators, although they are governed by principles of law, know what is expected of them, and they rarely disappoint. Almost invariably their decision is a compromise, so nicely shaded that while neither side can claim victory neither side suffers the humiliation of defeat. As by that time both nations have long forgotten the original cause of the quarrel their people are quite content when they are told the decision is in their favor. As junior counsel Mr. Lansing's name appears in many international arbitrations, and it was precisely the work for which he was fitted.
If Mr. Lansing had been a man of more robust fiber, he would have returned his portfolio to Mr. Wilson as early as 1916, for the President was writing notes to the belligerents and did not, even as a perfunctory courtesy, consult his Secretary of State; he made it only too patent he did not consider his advice worth asking. Mr. Lansing was too fond of his official prominence to surrender it easily, and that is another curious thing about the man. Somewhat vain, holding himself in much higher estimation than the world did, few men have so thoroughly enjoyed office as he. But he remained the quiet and unassuming gentleman he had always been; and he certainly could not have deluded himself into believing that there was a still higher office for him to occupy.
Mr. Lansing could not screw up his courage to resign in 1916. The following year the United States was at war and he naturally could not desert his post; but in 1919 Mr. Lansing was given another opportunity, and still he was obdurate. He has told us in his public confession that he tried to persuade the President not to go to Paris. Mr. Wilson, as usual, remained unpersuaded, and Mr. Lansing humbly followed in his train.
Then, of course, Mr. Lansing could not resign, but in Paris he was even more grossly humiliated; he was completely shut out from the President's confidence; he wrote letters to Mr. Wilson which the President did not deign to answer; so little did Mr. Lansing know what was being done that he sought information from the Chinese Delegates! It sounds incredible, it seems even more incredible that a Secretary of State should put himself in such an undignified position, and having done so should invite the world to share his ignominy. But he has set it down in his book as if he believed it was ample defense, instead of realizing that it is condemnation.
Curious contradictions! One might expect a sensitive man, a man who has never courted publicity, who has none of the genius of the self-advertiser, to crave forgetfulness for the Paris episode, to shrink from publicly exposing himself and his humiliations, but Mr. Lansing seemingly revels in his self-dissection. The President slaps his face; in his pride he summons all the world to look upon the marks left by the Executive palm. He feels the sting, and he enters upon an elaborate defense to show it is the stigmata of martyrdom. A treaty was framed of which he disapproved, yet he could sign it without wrench of conscience. Unreconciled to resignation in Paris, he returned to Washington as if nothing had happened, again to resume his subservient relations to the President.
Opportunity, we are told, knocks only once at a man's door, but while opportunity thundered at Mr. Lansing's portal "his ear was closed with the cotton of negligence."
Early in 1920 Mr. Wilson dismissed him, brutally, abruptly, with the petulance of an invalid too tired to be fair; for a reason so obviously disingenuous that Mr. Lansing had the sympathy of the country. He should either have told the truth then and there or forever have held his peace; and had he remained mute out of the mystery would have grown a myth. The fictitious Lansing would have become an historical character. But he must needs write a book. It does not make pleasant reading. It does not make its author a hero.
It does, however, answer the question the curious asked at the time of his appointment: "Why did the President make Mr. Lansing Secretary of State?"
The most striking victim of the American propensity for exaggeration is the senior Senator from Pennsylvania, Boies Penrose. He has a personality and contour that lend themselves to caricature. Only a few deft strokes are needed to make his ponderous figure and heavy jowl the counterpart of a typical boss, an institution for which the American people have a pardonable affection in these days of political quackery. For, when the worst is said of the imposing array of bosses from Tweed down to the present time, they could be forgiven much because they were what they were. That is why, perhaps, the altogether fanciful picture of Penrose, propped on his pillows with his telephone at his bedside directing the embattled delegates at Chicago, who in sheer desperation turned to Warren G. Harding, is dwelt upon fondly by a deluded public.
Penrose does not despise the appurtenances of bossism. If the truth were told he probably likes the idea of being represented as the hard-fisted master of party destinies. He knows that such a reputation inspires awe if not respect, on the part of the rank and file, from the humble precinct worker to the gentleman of large affairs who provides the necessary campaign funds. It has its value, sentimental as well as practical, for the American people likes to set up its own political idols. The politicians who for the moment guide the destinies of the nation are so misdrawn, so illuminated with virtues and endowed with vices quite foreign to them, that they frequently achieve a personality quite fictitious, but which, none the less, passes current in the popular mind as genuine.
Nothing could be more grotesque, for example, than the picture of Senator Smoot, who is merely a sublimated messenger boy, as one of the arbiters of the Republican policies; or of Senator Lodge, by sheer strength of leadership, restraining the discordant Republican elements in the Senate from kicking over the traces. This is journalist "copy" written for a popular imagination which finds the truth too tepid.
Boies Penrose serves the purpose of appeasing national appetite for what the magazine editors call "dynamic stuff."
But the real Boies Penrose is not all as he is pictured. At a cursory glance he might appear to be a physiological, psychological, and political anachronism. At least he is sufficiently different from his colleagues to be, if not actually mysterious, not easily understandable. There is something fundamental about him. He inspires a certain awe which may not be magnetic but has the same effect upon those who surround him; where he sits is the head of the table.
I doubt if Lodge or Knox or Hughes could ever fathom the secret of his power; they are not cast in the same mould. His colleagues smile at his idiosyncracies—behind his back—but they approach him with the respect due to a master. Many of them admire him, not a few hate him, but all of them fear him. It is rather a singular thing that Senator La Follette, himself at the pinnacle of his championship of the Wisconsin progressive idea, was probably on friendlier terms with the senior Senator from Pennsylvania than any of the other leaders of those reactionary forces with whom he was tilting. He knew where Penrose stood and it is not at all improbable that behind the Penrose reticence there was a modicum of admiration for the methods of the redoubtable little colleague, who in his way, was a more inexorable boss than Penrose himself ever dreamed of being. The mutual understanding was there, even if it never became articulate.
Penrose has peculiarities which put him in a niche quite his own. He eschews conversation as an idle affectation. He dislikes to shake hands, preferring the Chinese fashion of holding his on his own expansive paunch. When he finds it necessary to talk at all he speaks the precise truth as he sees it without consideration for the feelings of those he happens to be addressing. The results are frequently so ludicrous, particularly when he enters a colloquy on the Senate floor, that he is given credit for a much more pronounced sense of humor than he actually possesses. I doubt that he is always conscious of the element of humor and I suspect that if he realized that his observations were to evoke laughter he would deliberately choose a less satirical or flippant method of expression.
This temperamental characteristic was illustrated by an episode in the Senate chamber not long ago. Penrose, entering, found his chair occupied by a Democratic colleague who had overestimated his capacity for the doubtful stuff that is purveyed in these days of Volsteadism and whose condition was apparent to everyone on the floor and in the galleries. Penrose is, perhaps, the most widely known personage in the Senate. His towering figure makes him conspicuous. But the most of the myriads of trippers who visit the Capitol do not know one senator from another. They rely for identification upon little charts showing the arrangements of the seats on the floor each one of which is labeled with a senator's name.
Now Penrose, might or might not have suspected that these trippers following their charts, would pick out the snoring recumbent figure as his own. He decided to remove all possibility of error and addressing the chair with usual solemnity said, "Mr. President, I desire the chair to record the fact that the seat of the senior Senator from Pennsylvania has not been occupied by himself at the present session. It is occupied by another." The galleries roared; the somnolent Senator shambled over to his own side of the aisle and Senator Penrose was given credit, by the unwise, for humor quite unintended.
Life with Mr. Penrose is a much more serious business than most people imagine. And it became even more serious a little while ago when illness laid hold of him and his brother, a physician, prescribed dietary rules restricting the freedom that he had once exercised without restraint. There was something lion-like in the gaunt figure in the rolling chair which he occupied when he returned to the Senate from his sick bed. It was amazing that he recovered; it was even more amazing that he should have submitted to the rigorous rules laid down by his doctor, even if that doctor was his own brother. The bated breath with which Pennsylvania politicians awaited bulletins from his bedside was a striking acknowledgment of the power he wields.
The evolution of Boies Penrose is an amusing commentary upon American politics in more ways than one. Three years after he was graduated from Harvard College he was elected to the Pennsylvania State Legislature on a reform ticket. His election was made the occasion for great rejoicing on the part of the good people of Philadelphia. And well might they rejoice. They had at last driven a wedge into the sinister political machine that had brought the city of brotherly love into disrepute as a boss-ridden municipality.
Their young leader had wealth, which has its advantages, and social position, which to a Philadelphian is as dear as life itself. Moreover he had ability and all that makes for success. His fame as a reform leader spread throughout the land and across the seas. James Bryce, in his first edition of his American Commonwealth cited him as an example of the sterling type of young Americans who were arousing themselves at that time to rescue the municipal and state governments from the grip of the vicious boss system.
In the subsequent editions of the American Commonwealth you will find no reference to Mr. Penrose. Something had happened to him and to the reform movement. Whether he was struck by a bolt from the heavens or a bolt from Matthew Stanley Quay is immaterial. The fact is that after a few years' residence in Harrisburg, the seat of the government of the commonwealth of Pennsylvania, he counseled with himself and solemnly decided that Providence had never selected him to be the apostle of the political millenium.
Most men are born radicals and die conservatives. The development is gradual and represents the result of years of experience. But Penrose repented while there was time to make amends for his error. He sought a very short cut. He went directly from the legislature to the Republican organization of Philadelphia and stood as its candidate for mayor. But his late friends, the reformers, happened to be in the ascendency that year and he was defeated.
The story told of him at that time, whether true or not, that he announced his willingness to take as his bride any estimable young lady the organization might select, since the fact that he was a bachelor was given by his henchmen as the reason of his defeat, is typical of him. The "organization," the Republican Party, constitutes his political creed and philosophy. He has devoted his life to it. The "party" is his life, his religion, his family, his hobby. Down in his soul he believes that the destiny of the American people is so inextricably interwoven with its fortunes that its destruction would be nothing less than national hari kari.
He does not believe that the Republican Party is perfect, but he believes that it is as perfect as any political organization is ever likely to be. He has no illusions concerning the men it chooses for high places. He is never disturbed by stories of political corruption or graft unless they are serious enough to jeopardize forthcoming elections. Otherwise they are merely unpleasant incidents that arise in the life of every business organization.
If he were supreme he would not tolerate political corruption, any more than he would tolerate murder; but since he is not supreme and cannot dictate to all men, he accepts their efforts in the interest of the organization even though their hands may be slightly soiled. Like the wise general who raises a volunteer army he is not meticulous in the choice of his privates, providing they are capable of performing the tasks assigned to them. No seeker after souls ever believed the end justifies the means more sincerely than Boies Penrose believes his vote-seekers are justified in stretching the code a bit for the benefit of the organization—particularly if it is actually endangered.
Just as he believes in the Republican Party he believes in a high tariff—the higher the better. Prosperity without protection is inconceivable. During a Washington career of more than twenty years he has been constantly caricatured as the tool of the interests—the man upon whom they could rely to raise the tariff wall an inch or two for their personal benefit.
He has raised it whenever he has had the opportunity to do so, but not for the reason assigned. He is no man's tool. The suggestion that Boies Penrose personally has ever profited financially through politics is too absurd to be entertained for a moment. Of course, he expects the interests, whom the party serves with tariff protection, to save the party at the polls and they usually do so. But that in the opinion of the senior Senator from Pennsylvania is the essence of sound politics.
Unbelievable as it may sound in these days, Senator Penrose actually thinks that most men are dependent for their daily bread upon the success of a very small group of financiers, magnates, or whatever you care to call the great leaders of the world of business.
Years of experience has convinced him that the human race is composed, for the most part, of hopelessly improvident people and that a great part of the globe would be depopulated through starvation and disease if it were not for the foresight, ability, and thrift of the handful of leaders whom Divine Providence has provided. He looks upon himself as one of the instruments of Providence and he sincerely believes that the policies which he has supported since his early experience with the reformers are responsible for the happiness and prosperity of many a family. He would consider it the height of absurdity for any of these poor, worthy, but ignorant people to expect the comforts which they have enjoyed without the protection afforded their employers by the Republican Party.
By this somewhat unpopular method of reasoning, he believes that he of all the men in public life has made the most persistent and consistent fight for the masses. It is undoubtedly this calm faith and sincere belief in his own rectitude which has enabled him to hold the tremendous power he has exerted since Nelson Aldrich retired from the Senate.
I have presented his political philosophy in some detail because he is probably the most misjudged man in Washington. People are inclined to look upon him as a glorified boss who deals in politics as other men deal in commodities;—it is hardly a fair estimate of the man. He considers himself the chosen leader of the most intelligent people of a great commonwealth who is rendering tremendous service to the country. I do not agree with that estimate either. But taken all and all it seems to me that the country owes him a debt of gratitude for having been sincere when another course would have been more profitable. It is a relief to find one at least who has never been called a hypocrite.
Senator Penrose does not hate Democrats; he does not consider them important enough for that; he merely despises them. They are to his mind an inferior class of human beings who should not be intrusted with the affairs of the nation. Reformers irritate him. They are either self-seeking hypocrites or deluded. In neither case has he the time nor inclination to listen to their suggestions or heed their maledictions.
He had an abiding hatred for Theodore Roosevelt when he was in the White House, but he supported him loyally so long as he was the leader of the Party. When Colonel Roosevelt bolted the hatred ran the last gamut. He was classed as an arch criminal for having smashed the organization.
Penrose is an enigma to those who know him only casually, especially those who view life through the rose glasses of culture. They marvel at the extent to which he has been able to dictate to men who appear to be his superiors. I have heard him called a cave man by some, by others a boor; but he is neither. He observes the amenities of life so far as they are necessary, but only so far. He is impatient of mediocrity; he will not tolerate stupidity and he loathes hypocrisy. I would not say that he has bad manners; he has none at all.
Throughout the recent eclipse of the Republican Party, which began with the Roosevelt default, no member remained more steadfast than the Pennsylvania leader. He accepted the inevitable and bided his time like the politicians of the old school of which he is one of the few conspicuous surviving examples. Expediency does not enter into his make-up; he made no effort to keep himself in the limelight, for he is by the Party, of the Party, and for the Party.
Now that the Party is back again, in power, more than one of his colleagues suspect that Penrose, if his health permits, will emerge from the background as the real leader of the Senate majority. His political past is against him. But he knows men and his tutelage under Aldrich has not been forgotten.
Taken at its best, life, to William E. Borah, is little more than a troublesome pilgrimage to the grave.
This does not mean that he is a misanthrope or a seer of distorted vision. On the contrary his sympathies are broad and he has an elusive charm, more apparent in the early years of his political career than now. But, for some reason, probably temperamental, he is in the habit of dwelling upon the dangers that beset the republic—dangers which are sometimes very real. Nevertheless an hour in his presence is more often than not depressing; it leaves one with a sense of impending calamity. There are few bright spots on his horizon.
It is not altogether to his discredit that his more venerable colleagues look upon him as a young man—he is fifty-six; nor does it imply merely arrested political development. For all of his pessimism he maintains a certain freshness, if belligerency, of spirit which is puzzling not only to those who have long since accustomed themselves to the party yoke but to those whom experience has taught the art of compromise. For Borah hates the discipline that organization entails, in spite of his respect for organization, and he dislikes compromise however often he is driven to it.
This may be accounted for by the fact that he was not obliged to fight his way laboriously upward on the lower rungs of politics—he landed in the Senate from an Idaho law office in one pyrotechnical leap when he was only forty two—and by the fact that in his make-up he is singularly unpolitical. Disassociating him from his senatorial environment it is much easier to imagine him as a devotee of academic culture, a university professor, a moral crusader, even a poet, than as a politician.
There is in his make-up an underlying Celtic strain which may account for his moodiness, his emotionalism, and his impulsiveness. These characteristics are constantly cropping up. For many years he has buried himself in a somber suite of rooms in the Senate office building as far away from his colleagues as he could get. There he lives in an atmosphere of academic quiet. There he reads and studies incessantly, far from the maddening crowd of politics. This detachment has probably bred a suspicion that marks his actions. He has no intimates, no associates who call him "Bill." He is not a social being. He is rarely seen where men and women congregate. He is virtually unknown in that strange bedlam composed largely of social climbers and official poseurs called Washington society. He neither smokes, drinks, nor plays. What relaxation he gets is on the back of a western nag in Rock Creek Park where he may be seen any morning cantering along—alone. He does not ride for pleasure; his physician ordered it and it is a very businesslike matter. If he experiences any of the exhilaration that comes to men in the saddle he contrives to conceal it.
On the floor of the Senate he is quite a different person. There his unmistakable genius for oratory is given full sweep and when he speaks his colleagues usually listen, not because they agree with what he says but because they are charmed by the easy and melodious flow of his words. There is a hint of Ingersoll in his speeches which are full of alliteration and rhythmic phrases. He has a sense of form sadly lacking in his stammering and inarticulate colleagues, for oratory in the Senate is probably at its lowest ebb. But, strangely enough, it is only occasionally that he makes a lasting impression. His eloquence ripples like water and leaves scarcely more trace.
Mr. Borah's entire political career has been characterized by an impulsiveness which has given him a halo of popularity but has never enabled him to garner the fruits of plodding labor. At one time or another this has led him to break with nearly every faction with which he has been identified. The "regular" Republicans have felt that they never could rely upon him; the "progressive" element has found him inconstant and at intervals he has threatened to pull down the party house of the Republicans and to bring destruction to one or other of the leaders whom he dislikes.
This was illustrated by an observation he made to me one spring morning in 1919 when the Republican attitude toward the League of Nations was still in the formative process. Borah was "convinced" that Elihu Root and Will H. Hays were conspiring to induce the Republicans to accept the League and he said, quite seriously, that he had about come to the conclusion that it would be necessary to wreck the Republican Party to save the country. Root, he told me, was pro-British to the last degree and Hays, he said, was cajoled by the great international bankers who trembled at the delay of peace.
"If such men are to lead the Republican Party," he declared, "the sooner it is destroyed the better." Of course, he did not take the stump. He has failed so often to carry out his threats of rebellion that they no longer inspire the fear they once did. Although he has repeatedly turned against the organization he has managed to escape being an outlaw. This singular trait of political conservatism came conspicuously into play in 1912 when Roosevelt turned upon the machine. All through the stormy days of that stormy Chicago convention Senator Borah could be found at the side of that one leader for whom he had a consistent regard. He was with him up to the very last moment before the die was cast. He was almost successful at the eleventh hour in inducing Mr. Roosevelt to abandon his mad project. They were closeted together on the evening of the clamorous meeting of the progressives in a hotel across the street.
"We have come to the parting of the ways, Colonel," Borah said to his chief. "This far I have gone with you. I can go no further." He urged Roosevelt not to take the step which would mean the disruption of the party and defeat. Roosevelt wavered. But before he could reach the decision Borah sought a committee from the outlaw meeting, burst into the room, and enthusiastically announced that the stage was set for the demonstration that was to mark a new political era.
Roosevelt, hat in hand, turned to Borah and said, "You see, I can't desert my friends now." The ex-President went his way and Borah came back to the old Republican fold.
From that time to this he has followed his own way which, fortunately for the Republican Party, has been within organization limits, but his relations with his fellows are neither intimate nor serene. Some of the Republicans, who can be forgiven for not understanding a man who respects neither party decrees nor traditions, feel that Borah is so American that he possesses one of the characteristics of the aboriginal Indian—in other words, that he is cunning, that he will not play the game according to organization rules. He has a habit of making too many mental reservations. I am not quite sure that these allegations could be supported before an impartial tribunal. I am rather inclined to the belief that to maintain his position in the Senate Borah has had to become a shrewd trader.
Fortunately for himself he is too much of a personage to be ignored or suppressed, and manages to be a power in a party which has no love for him.
He is virtually a party to himself. He cannot be controlled by the ordinary political methods. His constituency is small and evidently devoted to him and his state is remote; he is not compelled to do the irksome political chores that cost Senators their political independence. However doubtful he might be as a positive asset his dexterity and power of expression are such that he would be very dangerous as a liability. A report that Borah is on the rampage affects Republican leaders very much as a run on a bank affects financial leaders. They are not quite sure when either is going to stop. Borah knows that most of the men with whom he is dealing are clay and estimates with uncanny accuracy the degree to which he can compel them to meet his demands.
This method has not always been successful. It was singularly unsuccessful in the case of Senator Penrose. Borah is the antithesis of Penrose, whom he dislikes intensely. Several years ago he interpreted a remark made by the Senator from Pennsylvania to another Senator as a thrust at his own political ethics, or lack of them. It was a petty affair at most and Penrose never admitted the accuracy of Borah's construction, but Borah has had nothing to do with him since. When the present Congress was in process of organization Borah announced that he would bolt the party caucus if Penrose were slated for the chairmanship of the Finance Committee to which he was entitled according to the rule of seniority. It was a ticklish situation. The Republicans had a bare majority in the Senate and if any of them deserted the organization it might mean Democratic control. The leaders were disturbed and tried to mollify the defiant Senator from Idaho with every means at hand even giving assurance that the Senator from Pennsylvania would vote against the Peace Treaty and the League of Nations which was supposed to represent his vital interest at that time. He refused to compromise and announced that Penrose must go. He was offered every committee assignment that he or his friends wanted, and accepted them, but as a matter of right.
Penrose was determined not to be displaced to satisfy what he regarded as a colleague's whim. He sat silent in his office receiving reports from hour to hour on Borah's state of mind. On the day before the caucus Borah whispered that he intended to make charges against the Pennsylvania leader that would provide a sensation regardless of any effect they might have upon the party or the country. The report was brought to Penrose. Instead of trembling he sent word to Borah that he might say what he pleased concerning his political career but that if he made any personal charges he would regret them to his dying day. Borah appeared to understand. He did not even attend the caucus and Penrose was duly elected. Whether he was trading for committee assignments or initiated the fight on political grounds is a question he alone can answer, if anyone should have the temerity to ask it.
The same violence of his likes and dislikes is shown in his attitude toward the British and his espousal of the Irish cause. At the time of the visit of the British mission to Washington, Vice-President Marshall designated Senator Borah a member of the committee appointed to escort the British visitors into the chamber. This Borah resented as a personal affront.
"Marshall has a distorted sense of humor," he said. "He knows I dislike the British and that I despise the hypocrite Balfour." This feeling was probably due in large measure to the Irish lineage which Borah can trace in his ancestry as well as a temperamental dislike of the British methods of maintaining control over subject peoples.
It is difficult to label Senator Borah from a political standpoint. His most striking characteristic is his inconsistency. For a long time in the early days of the progressive movement he displayed a marked inclination to be "irregular" and he is to be found voting for most measures for which the "progressives" claimed sponsorship, but when the more radical leaders began to advocate the recall of the judiciary, Borah rose up and delivered an invective the memory of which lingers in the Capitol. It was one of the few speeches he has made that had a permanent effect and, strangely enough, it was the kind of speech that might have well been delivered by Root or Knox.
There has always been reason to believe that Borah was never more enamored of La Follette in his prime, or of Hiram Johnson, than he has been of the "reactionary" leaders with whom he has been oftentimes in open conflict. When the latter deluded himself with the hope of securing the Republican nomination, Borah was supposed to be his chief supporter. When Johnson had eliminated Lowden and Wood, and seemed to have eliminated Harding, Borah showed more interest in the Knox candidacy. He wanted Knox at the head of the ticket mainly because he knew that Knox was an implacable foe of the League of Nations. On that fateful Friday night in Chicago when the signs of the trend toward Harding had begun to appear, the Senator from Idaho was anxious and prepared to place Knox's name in nomination and begged Johnson to swing his delegates in that direction.
Borah has succeeded very well in concealing his own ambitions, possibly because he is more cautious than some of his impetuous colleagues, or because the opportunity has never come for an avowal. But among those who have followed his career there is a very strong suspicion that his one great desire was to be the successor of Roosevelt. This might be one reason for his antagonism toward the politicians of the old regime, such as Penrose, who have barred his way in that direction, and his fitful devotion to progressivism championed by others. The failure to realize this ambition might account in some measure for his later reticence and his suspicion of politicians in general. He has shown a pronounced distrust of them. The only exception has been the audacious Ambassador to the Court of Saint James who in his REVIEW and in his WEEKLY flattered the Senator from Idaho with an absence of restraint that might have made a more trusting person skeptical.
The Senator from Idaho has too many years before him to justify predictions concerning his career. Whatever faults he might have they do not entirely obscure his virtues. It is possible that the occasion might arise for him to serve as the spokesman of a popular cause, which he would do with undoubted earnestness and eloquence, in which event he might still become a dominating figure in American politics.