The Letters of Franklin K. Lane, Personal and Political
definiteness of program and cooperation between both ends of
Pennsylvania Avenue. There is generally one end of the Avenue that
does not know its own mind, and sometimes it is one, and sometimes
the other.
Your friends have been made happy through the campaign by the
manner in which you have conducted yourself. You spoiled so many
bad prophecies.
With heartiest of personal congratulations, believe me, faithfully
yours,
FRANKLIN K. LANE
To William Jennings Bryan Washington, November 6, 1912
MY DEAR MR. BRYAN,--The unprecedented heroism of your fight at
Baltimore has borne fruit, and every man who has fought with you
for the last sixteen years rejoices that this victory is yours.
Now comes the time when it is to be proved whether we are worthy
of 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 done
nobly. The victory in California came late, but it was none the
less surprising and gratifying. We can dance like Miriam, as we
see the enemies of Israel go down in the flood.
I shall expect to see you here before long. With warmest
congratulations 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 been
moved to amend its equity rules. The whole agitation for judicial
recall will do good because it will not lead to judicial recall
but to the securing of a superior order of men on the bench and to
simplified procedure. I find that it is better to decide matters
promptly and sometimes wrongly than to have long delays. The
people have very little confidence in our courts, and this is
because of one reason: Our judges are not self-owned; either they
are dominated by a political machine or by associations of an even
worse character. Few men on the bench are corrupt; many of them
are lazy, and others are chosen from the class who feel with
property interests exclusively. I am heartily in sympathy with a
movement such as that you are promoting. It is in my opinion a
very practical way--perhaps the only practical way--of heading off
universal judicial recall. This is a Democracy and the people are
going to have men and methods adopted that will give them the kind
of judicial procedure that they want. They are not going to be
unfair unless driven to be radical by intolerable conditions. ...
Sincerely yours,
FRANKLIN K. LANE
Immediately after Woodrow Wilson's election in November, telegrams
and letters from different parts of the country, and especially
from his many friends in California, began to reach Lane asking
that he should consider himself available for a Cabinet position,
offering support and requesting his permission for them to make a
strong effort in his behalf. This he emphatically refused, saying
that 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 a
copy of the paper containing the cartoon on "Unfinished Business,"
the original of which, by the way, I should like to have for my
library. ...
I know absolutely nothing about the suggestion made by the Call as
to my being appointed to the Cabinet. I rather think that it was
Ernest Simpson's friendly act, though I have not heard from him at
all. Three men have been to me from the Coast who wanted to be in
the Cabinet, and I have told each one the same thing:--That I was
not a candidate; that no one would speak to the President for me
with my consent; but that I would not say that I would not accept
an appointment, because I would do almost anything to make
Wilson's administration a success, for I believe that he has faced
the right way and the only difficulty that he will have will be in
securing strong enough support to carry out his own policies. I
think he lacks somewhat in adroitness and that his campaign was
much less radical than he would voluntarily have made it. I do not
know him and shall not go near him unless he sends for me. If he
does send for me I shall tell him the truth regarding anybody of
whom he speaks to me. I shall advocate nobody. I am not going to
be a job peddler or solicitor. My present position makes all the
demand upon my imagination, initiative, and capacity that my
abilities justify. I could not work any harder or do any better
work for the people in any position that the Government has to
give. 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 were
sitting just across the table from me. Of course what I am saying
to you is absolutely private and personal. ...
We will just let this matter rest "on the knees of the gods," and
I shall try to serve with as little personal ambition moving me as
is 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 so
splendid 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 wish
to remove me from my present sphere of troublesomeness; but my own
guess is that your own good heart and our long-time friendship was
the sole cause of this most kindly act.
Some of the California papers, I notice, have had editorials
saying I should stay where I am (which is not a disagreeable fate
to be condemned to, barring a slight surplus of work), but of
course Wilson is not going to appoint anyone to his Cabinet
because of pull. He has a more difficult job than any President
has ever had since Lincoln, because he has to reconcile a
progressive Northern Democracy with a conservative Southern
Democracy, and satisfy one with policies and another with offices.
My guess is that he will have to turn over the whole question of
patronage practically to his Cabinet and that he will become the
actual leader of his party and attempt to formulate the
legislative policies of the party. He has a distinct ideal of what
the Presidency may be made. Whether he can make good under
conditions so apparently irreconcilable is a question that time
only can answer. His political family he will choose for himself.
They ought to be the very largest men that our country can
produce, and I am not fool enough to think that I am entitled to
be 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 and
philosophical presentation of your reason for adherence to the
Progressive Party. I understand your point of view and I
sympathize with it thoroughly. I had the hope that Colonel
Roosevelt would carry several of the Southern states. The
Democratic party of the North is distinct from the Democratic
party of the South, at least I fear that it is. The next four
years will demonstrate the possibility of these two elements
living together in effective cooperation. If Governor Wilson is a
mere doctrinaire the present victory will be of no value to the
Democratic party, but may be of great value to the country, for
the 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 Wilson
attempts to do anything which satisfies the reasonable demand of
the progressive North he will run counter to the traditional
policy of the South; that is to say, effective regulation of child
labor, of interstate corporations--railroad and industrial--flood
waters, irrigation projects. [These,] and a multitude of other
matters make necessary the wiping out of state lines to the extent
that a national policy shall be supreme over a state policy. As
our good Spanish friend said some centuries ago, "Where two men
ride of a horse one must needs ride behind."
This fact is stronger than any written word, and facts are the
things which statesmen deal with. If the South is large enough to
see this--if it has grown to have national vision--the hope of the
Northern Democrat can be realized. Otherwise the traditionalists
of both North and South will make a party by themselves, and the
rest of the country will follow in your lead into THE new party or
A 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 taken
the position that you have, because you can demonstrate whether
there is anything excepting a sawed-off shot-gun that will compel
some editors to tell the truth. ...
I shall not read your pamphlet because I have too much other
reading that I am compelled to do. My own guess, being totally
ignorant on the subject, is that you have violated the Sherman
Law, but everybody knows that the Sherman Law should be amended
and the conditions stated upon which there may be combination. Do
get out of your head, however, the idea that a railroad
corporation and an industrial corporation are subject to the same
philosophy, as to competition. One is necessarily a monopoly and
therefore must be regulated; the other is not necessarily a
monopoly, and the least regulation that it can be subjected to the
better. We have let things go free for so long that we have
created a big problem that sane men must deal with sensibly; not
admitting all there is to be right, but recognizing every natural
and 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 Netherlands
to the United States, left last night for San Francisco and will
be there about the ninth of the month. I have told him somewhat of
you and I want you to call on him. He is one of the most charming
men in Washington, really a poet in nature. He loves the beautiful
and good things of the world and is totally unspoiled by success
and position. ...
It is very good to know that you and President Wheeler have a sort
of mutual agreement on me for a Cabinet position, but I don't
think of it for myself. ... I find that I do not have the ambition
that I once had, excepting to do the work in hand just as well as
possible, and I am altogether impatient with the way I do it. I
should like to see you Secretary of the Treasury. There is to be
some change made in our currency laws during the next four years,
and a man of perfectly sane, level mind is tremendously needed to
guide Wilson in this matter, for I guess he is very ignorant upon
the subject. Especially is this true if Bryan goes into the
Cabinet. E. M. House, who is Sid Mezes' brother-in-law, is as
close to Wilson as any other man, and I will drop him a note,
telling him something about you, for I know that he is interested
in selecting Cabinet officers as he has been talking to me about
possible Attorney Generals. I have told him that I wanted nothing.
...
Mezes is the same adroit diplomat that he has always been, since
receiving the Presidency at Texas. He is doing big things for his
University and says that in two or three years he will be in a