Volume I Part 21 (1/2)

P.S. The serious part of the speech--made to convince the financial people, who are restive about Mexico, that we do not mean to forbid legitimate investments in Central America--has had a good effect here. I have received the thanks of many important men.

W.H.P.

_From the President_

The White House, Was.h.i.+ngton, March 25, 1914.

MY DEAR PAGE:

Thank you for your little note of March thirteenth[52]. You may be sure that none of us who knew you or read the speech felt anything but admiration for it. It is very astonis.h.i.+ng to me how some Democrats in the Senate themselves bring these artificial difficulties on the Administration, and it distresses me not a little. Mr. Bryan read your speech yesterday to the Cabinet, who greatly enjoyed it. It was at once sent to the Senate and I hope will there be given out for publication in full.

I want you to feel constantly how I value the intelligent and effective work you are doing in London. I do not know what I should do without you.

The fight is on now about the tolls, but I feel perfectly confident of winning in the matter, though there is not a little opposition in Congress--more in the House, it strangely turns out, where a majority of the Democrats originally voted against the exemption, than in the Senate, where a majority of the Democrats voted for it.

The vicissitudes of politics are certainly incalculable.

With the warmest regard, in necessary haste,

Cordially and faithfully yours, WOODROW WILSON.

HON. WALTER H. PAGE, American Emba.s.sy, London, England.

_To the President_

American Emba.s.sy, London, March 2, 1914.

DEAR MR. PRESIDENT:

I have read in the newspapers here that, after you had read my poor, unfortunate speech, you remarked to callers that you regarded it as proper. I cannot withhold this word of affectionate thanks.

I do not agree with you, heartily as I thank you. The speech itself, in the surroundings and the atmosphere, was harmless and was perfectly understood. But I ought not to have been betrayed into forgetting that the subject was about to come up for fierce discussion in Congress. . . .

Of course, I know that the whole infernal thing is cooked up to beat you, if possible. But that is the greater reason why you must win. I am willing to be sacrificed, if that will help--for forgetting the impending row or for any reason you will.

I suppose we've got to go through such a struggle to pull our Government and our people up to an understanding of our own place in the world--a place so high and big and so powerful that all the future belongs to us. From an economic point of view, we _are_ the world; and from a political point of view also. How any man who sees this can have any feeling but pity for the Old World, pa.s.ses understanding. Our role is to treat it most courteously and to make it respect our character--nothing more. Time will do the rest.

I congratulate you most heartily on the character of most of your opposition--the wild Irish (they must be sat upon some time, why not now?), the Clark[53] crowd (characteristically making a stand on a position of dishonour), the Hearst press, and demagogues generally. I have confidence in the people.

This stand is necessary to set us right before the world, to enable us to build up an influential foreign policy, to make us respected and feared, and to make the Democratic Party the party of honour, and to give it the best reason to live and to win.

May I make a suggestion?

The curiously tenacious hold that Anglophobia has on a certain cla.s.s of our people--might it not be worth your while to make, at some convenient time and in some natural way, a direct attack on it--in a letter to someone, which could be published, or in some address, or possibly in a statement to a Senate committee, which could be given to the press? Say how big and strong and sure-of-the-future we are; so big that we envy n.o.body, and that those who have Anglophobia or any Europe-phobia are the only persons who ”truckle” to any foreign folk or power; that in this tolls-fight all the Continental governments are a unit; that we respect them all, fear none, have no favours, except proper favours among friendly nations, to ask of anybody; and that the idea of a ”trade” with England for holding off in Mexico is (if you will excuse my French) a common gutter lie.

This may or may not be wise; but you will forgive me for venturing to suggest it. It is _we_ who are the proud and erect and patriotic Americans, fearing n.o.body; but the other fellows are fooling some of the people in making them think that _they_ are.

Yours most gratefully,

WALTER H. PAGE.