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COVERING WASHINGTON
PRESIDENT COOLIDGE ADDRESSING CONGRESS, DECEMBER 6, 1 923
COVERING WASHINGTON
government "Reflected to the 'Public in the "Press
I82.2.-ICJ2.6
BY
J. FREDERICK ESSARY
Washington Correspondent of the 'Baltimore Sun '
Author of 'Maryland in National Politics, 1 'Life of Isidor Rayner*
'Your War Taxes,' ' Ships ^ etc.
WITH ILLUSTRATIONS
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
fRjt XUberafibe 9re*# Cambridge
1927
COPYRIGHT, 1927, BY J. FREDERICK ESSARY
ATT RIGHTS RKSERVKD
'30
CAMBRIDGE MASSACUUSBTT8
PRINTKD IN THK U.S. A-
PREFACE
WASHINGTON is the nerve-center of America. Practically
every interest in our national life responds in a degree to
the activities and vibrations of some agency of the Fed-
eral Government. This inevitably follows that concen-
tration of power in the Capital which received its first
great impulse during the Civil War period. This power
has grown as the country itself has grown until at the
present time it is rarely resisted except by an occasional
States-rights voice echoing in the wilderness. The
chances are, moreover, that it will continue to expand
and that eventually the last dissenter will fall into silence.
Even now there is scarcely a basic industry in the land
that does not consciously or unconsciously listen for its
master's voice in Washington. The great banking and
credit system, for example, looks to the Federal Reserve
Board for its inspiration. Wall Street, sometimes re-
garded as a sort of super-government, is reacting more
and more to federal orders, decrees, or mere gestures.
The railroads bend to the will of the Interstate Com-
merce Commission ; the mercantile marine to that of the
Shipping Board. Agriculture seeks its panaceas at the
hands of Congress. Organized labor lives side by side
with that body. Education is yielding to federal super-
vision, as is highway construction, water-power develop-
ment, scientific research, foreign trade, commercial prac-
tices, and a score of other interests, great or small.
There was a time when Washington concerned itself
primarily with the national defense, delivery of the mails,
maintenance of navigable rivers and harbors, the en-
VI
PREFACE
forcement of federal statutes, guardianship of the In-
dians, federal currency, payment of war pensions, con-
trol of public lands, and a few minor matters. But that
time has passed; indeed, it is almost forgotten. Whether
or not it is in the public interest, the fact remains that
governmental bureaucracy is now practically all-absorb-
ing in its scope. It may touch lightly in one direction or
weigh heavily in another, but the contact with American
business is there. Only the blind or the hopelessly ignor-
ant deny it.
As a result of this sweeping centralization of political
and economic affairs in the National Capital, hundreds of
American newspapers and trade journals find it impor-
tant to maintain bureaus in Washington, just as hun-
dreds of national industrial or social organizations have
removed their headquarters to that city. Through these
press bureaus the more vital news of the nation is circu-
lated to the country. And because of the very vital na-
ture of the business with which they deal, the special
training and high character of the men who compose the
Corps of Washington Correspondents, together with the
official recognition which they have achieved, their phase
of journalism has become institutionalized.
It should be stated frankly that this book, which con-
cerns itself with the men who make news in Washington
as well as with those who write it, with the processes of
gathering and disseminating public information, is not a
memoir, an autobiography, or the record of the experi-
ence of any individual. Nor is it essentially historical,
although in a sense it begins with the beginning of that
intensive news reporting which for almost a century has
illumined the strategy of politics and the functioning of
the governmental organism.
PREFACE vii
The writer of these chapters, it might be added, has no
1 message/ He seeks to point no moral and to inculcate no
great truths. He champions no appealing reforms and
indulges in no deliberate muck-raking. He has no parti-
san ends to serve. There is no purpose in his mind to de-
fend the acts or policies of any Administration or to go
out of his way to find grievous fault with any. There is,
perhaps, plenty to be done along these engaging lines
and some day he may undertake the job but not now.
It has been his privilege for many years to sit at the
feet of the great and the would-be great, to observe them
in action and to reflect in the daily and periodical press
his estimate of their personalities and their policies
when they have had either. In that he has been only one
of a group of journalists devoting their whole time and
talent to theJfaithful recording of current history as they
have seen it made by the powers that govern us from
Washington. And his one hope here is to throw a meas-
ure of light upon the relationship existing between men
who serve as the eyes and ears of the public at the seat of
government, and those who man the governmental
machine itself.
The author is indebted to so many people for assistance
in assembling the material dealt with in the following
pages that it is difficult to acknowledge his obligation to
them all individually. He cannot fail to mention, how-
ever, the friendly criticism of Chief Justice William H.
Taft of the chapter on the United States Supreme Court,
or the helpful advice of the late Edwin M. Hood, diplo-
matic correspondent of the Associated Press; that of the
late Francis A. Richardson, his predecessor for more than
thirty years as Washington Correspondent of the Balti-
more Sun, also that of Richard V. Oulahan, long the
viii PREFACE
correspondent of the New York Times, and that of the
late Arthur Wallace Dunn, whose contributions to the
literature of official life in Washington are of enduring
value. Then, too, the author is grateful to Dr. Samuel
E. Forman for the inspiration of his American histories
as well as that of his personal encouragement.
J. FREDERICK ESSARY
WASHINGTON, 1927
CONTENTS
I. 4 OURT(>WN f I
II. LOOKING BACKWARD 9
III. SCORING THE 'Scoop' 37
IV. THE COURT OF LAST RESORT 58
V. PRESIDENTS AT HOME 83
VI. TRAVELING WITH THE PRESIDENT 105
VII. A PRESIDENT ABROAD 128
VIII. DIPLOMATS AND DIPLOMACY 152
IX. EVOLUTION OF THE LOBBY 172
X. IN CONGRESS ASSEMBLED 197
XI. WHEN PRESS AND CONGRESS CLASH 217
XII. ROASTING ON THE GRIDIRON 234
INDEX 267
ILLUSTRATIONS
PRESIDENT COOLIDGE ADDRESSING CONGRESS Frontispiece
Photograph by Tenschert & Flack, Washington
CROWD APPROACHING THE WHITE HOUSE FOR THE NEW
YEAR'S RECEPTION, JANUARY i, 1926 10
Photograph by Underwood & Underwood
SIR A. MAURICE Low 42
Photograph by Harris & Ewing
PRESIDENT HARDING DEPOSITING HIS BALLOT AT THE
PRESS CLUB 90
Photograph by Harris & Ewing
PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT SPEAKING EN ROUTE IN TEXAS 120
Photograph by Underwood & Underwood
PRESIDENT WILSON DRIVING IN THE CHAMPS ELYS&ES
WITH PRESIDENT POINCAR&, DECEMBER, 1918 146
Photograph by the United States Army Signal Corps
THE END OF THE SIXTY-NINTH CONGRESS: CLOSING THE
DOORS OF THE HOUSE 214
Photograph by Underwood & Underwood
PRESIDENT COOLIDGE AND THE WHITE HOUSE CORRE-
SPONDENTS ON THE LAWN 234
Photograph by Harris & Ewing
COVERING WASHINGTON
CHAPTER I
' OUR TOWN f
JUST as Washington is unlike any other of our cities, as a
municipality, so is the character of Washington people
just a trifle different, somehow, from that of other people.
There is no apparent reason for this difference, since
the bulk of the Capital's population has been recruited
from the States, yet the difference is there. Anybody can
see it who goes to Washington to live. Some change
comes over the people, once they cross the District line
and go to abide among the mighty in the land. Old ties
are abandoned ; new interests engage their energies.
The town itself is unique, as a town. To begin with, it
is a hand-made product. It started out in life under the
auspices of the Government. It has grown strong and
beautiful by the same liberal patronage. It has a Congress
for a city council. It has no mayor at all, and no substi-
tute for a mayor. Its people have no local politics and no
direct voice in the power that rules them. They, there-
fore, feel no responsibility to each other for their mutual
welfare. A federal treasury supplies nearly half the
money to run the town. The people supply the balance
without even half a say as to how one dollar of the
municipal income is to be expended.
As is natural under these circumstances, Washingto-
nians have no consuming pride in the bigness or goodness
2 COVERING WASHINGTON
of their city. Not one in a hundred of them has anything
to do with that bigness except perhaps to add himself to
the sum total of the city's population. They feel no joy
in the coming of a new factory, for no factory ever comes.
They boast not of their commercial importance, for there
is little commerce to boast of except that confined to the
city's limits. The increase in their postal receipts, their
railway tonnage, and their bank clearings inspires no
boomer spirit in them.
These are some of the oddities that place the nation's
Capital in a class of its own among our cities. And its
people, bereft of that local patriotism that has gone far to
make scores of weak American communities grow strong,
and the strong grow great, have centered all their inter-
ests in themselves. Their commanding aim in life is to
reach a little higher station in politics or society, or both.
They have made theirs essentially a city of climbers.
There is none on the continent like it for climbing, and
there is none to compare with it for opportunities to
climb. There are sets upon sets, circles within circles, and
planes above planes.
First of all, it is generally a climb to get to Washington.
The clerk in the store back home no doubt labored hard
and long to get his job in the civil service. The budding
politician from the same neighborhood experienced his
first thrill of glory, perhaps, when he became secretary to
a Congressman. The Congressman himself worked day
and night, suffered many defeats and survived many
vicissitudes to achieve his election to the House of Repre-
sentatives. The Governor of the State spent many years
in organizing the campaign that finally put him in the
Senate.
Therefore the climb began before Washington was
OUR TOWN 3
reached. Having arrived in the Capital and having ab-
sorbed a little of its spirit, the ambition to go higher be-
comes an obsession. The clerk wishes to be a chief clerk,
then a division head, then an assistant secretary, and
after that, who knows? a Cabinet portfolio might lie
beyond. The Congressman wants to come back and keep
coming back until he can take the usual route to the
Senate, via the governorship. Once a Senator, he wants
seniority. Seniority means powerful committee chair-
manship, big legislation, statecraft and fame.
And along with political preferment goes social pres-
tige. They are concomitant in Washington. To edge up a
notch on the political ladder guarantees a little more
social favor, all else being equal. Once seized with social
aspirations, the Washingtonian knows no restraints. To
figure with the more 61ite becomes a passion with him.
The department clerk learns to covet his neighbor's
automobile, to envy his neighbor his two servants, and to
long for a five-room flat instead of his of two and the
kitchenette.
The victorious Congressman, when he lands in town,
may harbor sincere scorn for the foibles and follies of
society. He may scoff honestly at the dress suit and the
high hat, but he inevitably becomes reconciled to these
frills the first time he finds himself the only dinner guest
who has failed to attire himself appropriately. Even our
Senator becomes possessed with a desire to associate him-
self with the charmed circle of the Capital's 'exclusives.'
He justifies this with the reasoning to himself that his
influence with the Administration is bound to increase
in the same ratio as do his intimacies with the ' powers
that be/
The politicians and civil office-holders are not alone in
4 , COVERING WASHINGTON
this class, however. The army and navy officers and the
diplomatic agents of the Government yearn for that order
which assigns them to the Department. The luxurious
service clubs, the official recognition, the marriageable
heiresses, and the entertaining allure the soldier and the
sailor alike. Once in the revolving office chair, the saddle
and the battleship bridge are forgotten. The rolling
plains and the rolling waves fade gently from view. The
fighting man becomes a mere clerk and his happiness is
complete.
The city's geography figures prominently in establish-
ing the social strata of the capital. Even the guide is im-
pressed with this when he pilots the wide-eyed and won-
dering visitor around Washington and delivers his stereo-
typed lecture from the quarter-deck of a sight-seeing car.
He first tells his fascinating story of the glory that was
and the grandeur that is, pointing with eloquent gesture
to 'yon glittering domes, the sky-piercing monument,
and the vast piles of granite that house the governmental
machinery/ In subdued tones he directs attention to the
ancient hotel where Henry Clay died and to the old
theater where Lincoln was shot. He comments with
reverential feeling upon the statuary scattered about,
memorializing the human greatness that has flourished
and gone.
Then, as the big car swings heavily into Sheridan or
DuPont Circle, the lecturer says: 'Ah, my friends, here
are the homes of the bon-tons, the rich and the high-fliers.
You are now in the Northwest section. Here live the
foreign diplomats, the Cabinet officers, the generals and
the admirals. Some Senators live in this part of the town,
too, but not many Congressmen or people like that. 1
The fact must be chronicled, though, that there is a
OUR TOWN 5
vast, an abysmal difference between the view of Washing-
ton from a canopied seat in a big automobile, and Wash-
ington at the white-of-the-eye range. The glamour that
amounts to enchantment from afar somehow seems to
tarnish when it comes to rubbing elbows with the people
who are making history and with those who are the daily
witnesses to the proceeding.
This contact with the country's famous men is dis-
illusioning. This living next door to the White House and
the Capitol tends inevitably to dissolve the shadow-of-
the-great-dome atmosphere. This awe of the sacred
portal somehow vanishes. It shows how anything may
become commonplace.
Then, too, there is a wide difference between the dream
of holding a soft federal job with big pay and no work,
and the reality of having one that begins with a thousand
a year, and ends twenty years later at eighteen hundred.
Again, there is a shocking difference between one's mental
picture of the commanding Congressional leader, sur-
rounded by applauding colleagues, and the unheard-of
and disappointed Congressman whose usefulness to the
nation is measured only by the seeds he sends back home.
And there is a sad difference between the tempting vision
of the social queen, the conquering country belle, intro-
duced to Washington society, yet passing along unseen,
unsought, and unpursued.
A few seasoned and cynical Washingtonians like to
prate about these differences. By these seasoned persons
is meant those old-timers who associate all events with
the Forty-Ninth or the Fifty-Second Congress, or perhaps
with the first Grant or the second McKinley Administra-
tion, instead of associating them, like other folks, with
some calendar year. They are the people who have no
6 COVERING WASHINGTON
reverence for anything in town. They care nothing about
the 'magnificent distances/ the silver-tongued orators,
the imposing marble structures. They barely turn their
heads when the President motors past, and they refuse to
be inspired even by an inaugural parade. They know for
a certainty that all current statesmen are demagogues;
they know that the gold is peeling off the tower of the
Library and that the famed marble pillars of the Treas-
ury are hollow.
They are not the typical Washingtonians, however.
They have long passed the typical stage, and cease to
count except in the census enumeration. The typical
townsmen are the patriots from the ' Provinces' who have,
by some sort of strategy, become attached to the govern-
ment payroll, and who have come to the Capital filled
with swelling hope and expanding aspirations. There are
thousands of them, too yea, tens of thousands. They
make up the climber class. They want fame. They want
to get into politics, big politics; or if not that, to start
with, they want high society. They want to be invited
out, and want the newspapers to print their names among
those present. Marked copies of these papers are useful
for mailing purposes.
If these newcomers develop enough resource and keep
at it, they may some day begin to figure. They can al-
ways establish a speaking acquaintance with a few ce-
lebrities, and can impress an out-of-town friend, if one
happens to drop in from down home, with a fine line of
conversation, breathing familiarity with the great and the
near-great. They soon learn to talk with affected indiffer-
ence but with unaffected persistence, of Secretary this or
Senator that or Congressman the other. They acquire
cock-sure opinions of the personages whom they talk
OUR TOWN 7
about, and never fail to criticize with an air of first-hand
knowledge.
When all is said, though, there is not much else in
Washington but official life. There are a few thousand
people accurately described by the apartment house signs
as i tradesmen/ but they are not in it. Leaving them out,
and leaving out a scattering thousand or so of retired
rich, professional practitioners, and newspaper corre-
spondents, the remainder is official. Beginning with the
President and ranging down to the modest department
clerk, all of them are federal job-holders.
The gradations of official life create corresponding
degrees in the social life of the city. There are sets with-
out end here. There is the Cabinet set, the diplomatic
set, the Senatorial set, the Congressional set, the army
and navy set, the department clerk set. There is a special
set of the retired rich, and there is another for the aristo-
cratic persons who may or may not have visible means of
support.
To climb from one set to another is the dream of the
Washingtonian. All of them do not climb, but all of them
try to; and there is no psychological difference between
those who do climb and those who fail. Some of them
may not graduate from the euchre parties of the depart-
ment clerk set, yet all of them abide in the hope of some
day receiving an invitation to a Congressional ball, or a
Senatorial dinner, or even to a Secretary's at-home.
Official importance, of course, adds to the social oppor-
tunities. To have become a chief clerk in a government
bureau opens the doors higher up to the aspirant, and to
receive a Presidential appointment places one's name
upon the official White House invitation list.
Recognition from the White House is, of course, the
8 COVERING WASHINGTON
zenith of social importance to many of the citizens. The
President and his family may not have any particular
interest in the guests whom they invite, but that does not
make any difference to the guests. The main thing is to
get the invitation, and the scheming that goes on for bids
to White House functions is so common that it is wholly
shameless. Nobody hesitates at a little or much wire-
pulling if wire-pulling seems necessary in this connec-
tion.
By placing much of the responsibility for the White
House invitation lists upon the White House aides, the
President and his wife have given these estimable young
gentlemen an importance which their rank in the army or
navy could never afford them. These officers, chosen not
for their heroism in battle, but for their social blandish-
ments, generally graduate into a fine lot of snobs. Inci-
dentally, this executive staff of fascinating knights is
called upon to act as social arbiters in emergencies, and
to determine grave questions of precedence.
During the Roosevelt Administration, for instance, a
bitter social feud developed, involving the precedence at
official functions of the members of the United States
Supreme Court and the foreign diplomats of ambassado-
rial rank. The judges, or justices, as they are always
called in Washington, regarded their position as superior
to that of any foreigner who might be on American soil,
and they delivered, or 'handed down,' many opinions to
that effect. On the other hand, the ambassadors, being
the personal representatives of their august sovereigns,
couldn't see it that way and they said so in many tongues.
Mr. Roosevelt, being essentially a politician, quite as
much after elections as before, unloaded the responsi-
bility of settling this dispute upon his aide, Colonel Me-
OUR TOWN 9
Cawley. The latter, playing safe, ruled that wisdom
should follow diplomacy, and so it has ever since.
Speaking of that Administration it may have been
strenuous up to a certain point, but it stood for peace and
good will when it came to harmonizing the endless differ-
ences among the Cabinet members and their wives. The
Cabinet is picked from many social stations. Therefore,
when this group of men come together and their wives
begin to commingle, natural conflicts in tastes and tem-
perament arise. Some of the Secretaries have lots of
money; others haven't much. Some of them entertain
lavishly; others do it modestly; and these conditions fail
to promote that sweetness of disposition that should pre-
vail in an official family. But the President and Mrs.
Roosevelt were especially successful in ironing out all
these differences, and promoting harmony.
President Taft, a large man and having a famous smile,
enjoyed, or acted as if he enjoyed, everything. He
smashed a good many sacred precedents while in the
White House. For instance, from time to time he went
visiting to the homes of old friends who had no official
standing at all. No previous and proper President ever
did that.
On one occasion he slipped away from his bodyguard,
the inevitable secret service men, and walked a mile in a
pouring rain to pass the time of day with an obscure
friend. When the discovery was made that the President
was Most,' a riot call was sent in by the Washington
police, and every reserve on the force was called out to
help find the First Citizen. One day he slipped into the
Capitol unheralded and had a look at Congress at work.
More unceremonious than any of these adventures,
however, was the spectacle of a three-hundred-pound
io COVERING WASHINGTON
President dancing at a charity ball with a very slender
young lady who had challenged him. Washington was
shocked, for as long a period as Washington can remain
shocked at any one thing, over this democratic, not to say
plebeian, performance. But Mr. Taft had a fine time, and
the unknown young lady was the envy of every belle of
all the sets in the Capital's varied society.
President Wilson was more circumspect and reserved
in his personal relations than any executive since Benja-
min Harrison. Except in the days of his second courtship,
he rarely visited a private house or allowed himself to be
entertained outside his immediate official family. Even
when he golfed, he played, for the most part, with his
physician, Dr. Grayson, or his brother-in-law, Dr. Axton.
When President Harding came along, however, the whole
atmosphere of the Executive Mansion changed. The
gates were thrown wide open once more as were the doors
of the Executive Offices and the East Room. People
never seemed to bore him.
In the old days when Presidents entertained, the White
House receptions amounted to little more than a large
perspiring crowd of people eager to shake the executive
hand.
In these happier days there is more, infinitely more, to
these functions. There is real food, served by a regiment
of White House servants. There is punch a little mild,
it is true, but punch. And there is plenty of everything.
The refreshments have never been known to run out. A
good many guests suppose, of course, that all these salads
and sandwiches and ices are prepared in the White House
kitchen and are therefore things to be treasured in one's
memory. The truth is that the food is purchased from
caterers and has never been within a hundred feet of the
White House stove.
make himself at home, saying that if O'Laughlin
46 COVERING WASHINGTON
found anything among the Senator's papers that inter-
ested him, to make use of it, but nothing should be re-
moved from the office. With that the Senator withdrew.
The hint which the Senator conveyed could not be mis-
understood. O'Laughlin took the treaty, made a verba-
tim copy of it on the Senator's own typewriter, carefully
returned it to its place, and hurried away to put over one
of the best beats of that reporter's long list of exclusive
stories. The Senator, on his part, faithfully denied to the
end that he had given O'Laughlin the story and exhibited
to all hands the copy of the treaty that had been confided
to him. And while he repeated gravely in the Senate
cloakroom all that he had said to O'Laughlin on the sub-
ject of his sacred duty, there is no doubt that in his gen-
erous old heart he was glad that his newspaper friend had
scored so heavily on the story.
O'Laughlin starred in another scoop many years ago,
this time through his intimate relationship with mem-
bers of the Diplomatic Corps. Russia and Japan were at
war. The fleets of both countries were in hostile array and
for weeks the world had been expecting daily a titanic
and perhaps a decisive engagement between the two naval
forces. The censorship laid upon the news of this war was
rigid, more rigid, in fact, than in any war which had pre-
ceded it. There were the official communiques and some
little comment by war correspondents on the scene, but
practically nothing was given to the public which either
Government wanted suppressed.
Remembering their experience in the Spanish-Ameri-
can War, when a Secretary of the Navy, without design-
ing it had allowed one newspaper man to beat his com-
petitors on the story of the naval battle off Santiago,
editors in the United States were in a state of acute anx-
SCORING THE SCOOP 47
iety lest the performance be repeated. O'Laughlin care-
fully reasoned it out that friends of his in the diplomatic
colony of Washington might conceivably receive news
through official sources of a naval conflict between the
Japanese and the Russians before an announcement
should be forthcoming. Acting upon that idea, he im-
portuned every diplomatic friend he had to work with
him.
Early one day, O'Laughlin was called on the telephone
by a member of the staff of one of the leading embassies
who told the correspondent in guarded language to meet
him at a certain hotel within an hour and to be alone.
O'Laughlin was there on the minute, as was his friend.
They retired to a quiet corner and the diplomat whis-
pered to the correspondent that word had just reached
his embassy that a smashing engagement had taken
place between the opposing fleets in the Sea of Japan
with the result that the Russian naval power had been
shattered beyond repair. No details were given, for none
were known. Nor were any needed, at that moment.
O'Laughlin had the big fact and rushed away to flash the
news to the Tribune hours before the formal communiques
were issued in Tokio and St. Petersburg.
There were three memorable news beats during the
course of the Wilson Administration. So impartial and
impersonal was Mr. Wilson and his Secretary, Joseph P.
Tumulty, in their relations with the press and so prompt
were they to make public a policy or an appointment,
once decided upon, that it was a rare experience for a
Washington reporter to receive exclusive information re-
garding an official act. Mr. Wilson had no intimates
among the Corps of Correspondents as had Colonel Roose-
velt and, to a lesser extent, Mr. Taft. There were a few
48 COVERING WASHINGTON
writers who sedulously advertised their inside knowledge
of the Wilson mind, but the record of their writings shows
that they had little if any actual news, first to last, that
was not available to all of us.
By far the most difficult story which Washington cor-
respondents have had to cover in recent times was the
original illness of President Wilson. Because of the re-
luctance of White House officials to discuss any phase of
Mr. Wilson's condition except through the formal and
somewhat cryptic bulletins, and because of the wild ru-
mors which were abroad, the men stationed at the Ex-
ecutive Offices were driven almost to madness by editors
who doubted if the real truth were being told. All the
earlier announcements, it might be recalled, referred to
the ' nervous breakdown ' of the sick man and were con-
fined to the most general terms.
Many of us were informed in strict confidence of every
detail of the President's sickness. We knew that he had
suffered a mild ' stroke' while on the train approaching
Wichita, Kansas. We knew that he had suffered a still
more alarming stroke a few days after he returned, and
we knew that his physicians and his family feared that
any moment he might be stricken a third time and that
such a development in all probability would be fatal.
This information, given to us in the most confidential
manner, only increased our uneasiness.
It fell to the lot of my own paper, the Baltimore Sun, to
carry the first authentic story of the President's illness.
This was a detailed statement by Dr. Hugh H. Young,
of Baltimore, one of the consulting specialists engaged,
giving both a diagnosis and a prognosis of the whole case.
It might be added that this public statement of Dr.
Young was made with the entire approval of the Wilson
SCORING THE SCOOP 49
family and that the criticisms visited upon Dr. Young at
that time, alleging unprofessional conduct, were unmer-
ited. The family had realized, after some weeks had
passed, the importance of giving to the public an au-
thoritative account of the President's disability, but did
not wish to broadcast it, so to speak. That is why one
paper was selected to carry the statement, all others be-
ing at liberty to follow it if they chose.
Another interesting circumstance might now be re-
vealed in this general connection. When President Wilson
became physically disabled, an extremely delicate sit-
uation arose within the Government itself. It was gravely
doubted in both the Cabinet and in Congress if Mr. Wil-
son was in any condition to perform his official duties.
Moreover, it was known to the official household itself
that the President was so desperately ill that he might
die at any time. And in view of that fact, it was felt by
some of thosf at the White House that Vice-President
Thomas R. Marshall should be confidentially advised of
the true state of affairs.
Because of the increasing pressure in congressional
circles for the practical abdication of the President, pres-
sure that was deeply resented by the intimate members of
the executive household, it was not deemed advisable for
any administration official to communicate direct with
Mr. Marshall. A Washington correspondent who was
known to have friendly relations both with the President
and the Vice-President, however, was pressed into service,
delegated to call upon Mr. Marshall privately, to give
the latter a detailed story of the whole case and to inform
the Vice-President that at any hour he might be called
upon to assume the Presidency.
The Sun's scoop on the Wilson sickness had its parallel
5 o COVERING WASHINGTON
about a year later when the New York World printed ex-
clusively an extended interview with the President im-
mediately after the nomination of Warren G. Harding
for the Presidency in 1920, and immediately before the
nomination of James M. Cox at San Francisco. Louis
Seibold, one of the ablest news writers in America, was
the author of that interview and because of the brilliant
fashion in which he executed it, he was awarded the Pu-
litzer Prize for that year's best piece of reporting.
The idea of the interview, however, did not originate
with the interviewer. It originated with Joseph P. Tu-
multy, Secretary to the President. That consummate
politician saw the value of some expression from the then
President on the politics of the day and persuaded his
chief, with some difficulty, to consent to an interview.
There was some debate between Mr. Wilson and his
secretary as to whether the views of Mr. Wilson should
go out generally or be confined to the columns of a single
paper. The latter suggestion prevailed. The World was
selected, its editors notified of the situation, and Seibold
was assigned to the job.
To Robert J. Bender, of the United Press, goes the
credit for having been the first reporter to print the fact
that President Wilson would attend the Paris Peace Con-
ference in person, a notable beat in its day. It is not true,
however, that Bender based that story on any advance or
exact information he had regarding the President's pur-
poses. This he has modestly testified to. He insists that
his story came out of his own head. He knew Mr. Wilson's
mental attitudes so thoroughly after years of contact with
him that he reasoned it out that the President would go
to Paris, no matter what might be the opposition at home.
And he did. The Bender story * stood up' exactly as if he
SCORING THE SCOOP 51
had been privately tipped by Mr. Wilson what to write.
It is not always the metropolitan newspaper or big
Washington bureau that lands the exclusive story. Not
by any means. There are many correspondents in the
Capital representing smaller dailies who, through their
intimate relationship with the members of their own
state delegations or perhaps through their own industry,
are the first to receive and print highly important informa-
tion. A Tennesseean sitting on the Ways and Means Com-
mittee of the House, for example, or an Oregonian serv-
ing as chairman of a major committee often passes to a
newspaper friend from his own State a story of national
or international bearing.
It was a small paper in a small Northwestern city
which back in 1909 scooped every journal in the country,
large and small, upon the fact that the late Philander C.
Knox, who had just been appointed Secretary of State by
President Taft, could not receive the $12,000 a year
salary paid to Cabinet officers. It so happened that Mr.
Knox was a member of the United States Senate at the
time legislation was enacted increasing the salary of cab-
inet officials from $10,000 to $12,000 a year. It also hap-
pens that there is an old law which bars a Senator or
Congressman from profiting by any increase in salary
authorized by the body of which he is a member.
It remained for a newspaper man to recall this old law
and to apply it to the case of Secretary Knox. The great
and near-great lawyers of both the Senate and the new
Administration had overlooked the statute. Mr. Knox,
himself one of the country's foremost lawyers, knew
nothing of it. The President, now the Chief Justice of
the United States Supreme Court, knew nothing of it.
But the law was there and it was applicable to Mr. Knox.
52 COVERING WASHINGTON
After the newspaper cited it and the jurisconsults had
verified it, a great pother was made about the matter.
It was decided finally that Mr. Knox need not resign as
premier of the Cabinet, but that he would have to worry
along on $10,000 instead of $12,000 a year.
It has happened at least once that a newspaper editor
was responsible for his own Washington correspondent
being beaten upon a very important piece of news. L.
White Busbey was Washington correspondent of the Chi-
cago Inter-Ocean during the McKinley regime. He en-
countered the late Senator Spooner of Wisconsin late one
afternoon and was informed by the Senator that the
Senate Finance Committee on the following Monday
would report the pending Porto Rican Tariff bill levying
an impost duty upon products from Porto Rico, the
amount of the duty to be impounded for the benefit of
the islanders.
President McKinley himself had stood firmly for free
trade between the United States and Porto Rico and the
House had accepted his views. To find the Senate not
only reversing the House, but going squarely against the
Administration on the important question, was a piece of
newspaper information of great value at the time. Busbey
realized this and wrote the story at length. Two of his
neighbors Louis A. Coolidge, of the Boston Journal,
and Robert J. Wynne, of the New York Press were
given carbon copies. They too saw its importance, but
upon checking the story for confirmation were informed
by another Senate leader that there was not a word of
truth in it. The whole idea was preposterous, this Sen-
ator insisted.
M. G. Seckendorff, of the New York Tribune, another
of Busbey's friends, was allowed to have the story and dis-
SCORING THE SCOOP 53
patched it as originally written. The Tribune played it
heavily on the first page. Busbey himself sent it, of course,
to the Inter-Ocean, but George W. Hinman, then the
editor-in-chief, realizing the political possibilities in-
volved in the refusal of the Senate to follow the President,
took the story home to read before turning it out for
publication. Mr. Hinman then promptly forgot all about
the manuscript in his pocket. The Inter-Ocean appeared
with not one line of Busbey 's story. Seckendorff was
credited with a great beat, although he contributed no
more to it than to strike Busbey's name off of the carbon
copy and insert his own. The story was borne out in de-
tail when the committee report was made the following
Monday.
The practice of making carbon copies of stories, the
copies to be used by the writer's colleagues, is a part of
the general system of cooperation between Washington
correspondents. By this means the individual reporter
is enabled to cover much more ground than otherwise.
But there are some hazards involved in the practice. An
illustration of this occurred during the Chicago Conven-
tion of 1912 which renominated President Taft and
brought about the bolt of Theodore Roosevelt.
Those of us covering that convention went out weeks
ahead of time and it was not always easy to find live news
each day. One Saturday afternoon George E. Miller,
correspondeat of the Detroit News, went to his room and
started to write a story. N. O. Messenger, of the Wash-
ington Star, happened to pass his door and without cere-
mony shouted to Miller to run a 'black sheet* for him.
As Miller was resetting his machine, Judson C. Welliver,
of the Washington Times, passed and asked for a copy
of the story and departed. A moment later, Welliver's
54 COVERING WASHINGTON
associate, John Snure, of the Times, came along and also
asked for a copy.
Miller was obliging and made copies for all three of his
friends. Messenger took the story and filed it to the Sun-
day Morning Washington Star, without change. Welliver
came along in time, took his copy and filed it, also without
change, to the Sunday afternoon Washington Times.
Finally Snure drifted in, took a copy and filed it, again
without change, to the Sunday afternoon Times. Im-
agine the amazement of the news editor of the Times
when early Sunday morning he received identical stories
from his two staff men at Chicago, the only difference be-
ing the signature! Then imagine the editor's further
amazement when he glanced at the Sunday Star to find
the same piece in that paper under the signature of Mes-
senger !
More often than not the news beat is an anticipation
of a development to come rather than the story of some-
thing already consummated. After a thing has come to
pass in Washington, it is generally possible for all hands
to seize upon it at the same time. Occasionally it happens
that the editor must wait longer than he expects for con-
firmation of one of his reporter's scoops.
For example, Charles Michelson, of the New York
World, startled all of us early in 1922 with the flat and
unqualified statement that Albert B. Fall, then Secre-
tary of the Interior would resign his office on March 4th
of that year. The story had a convincing ring. Every
circumstance pointing to a resignation was covered.
Moreover, neither Mr. Fall nor the White House put
forth a conclusive denial and those of us who were left
behind, finally resigned ourselves to a good beating.
But March 4th came, in due time, and Mr. Fall re-
SCORING THE SCOOP 55
mained in the Cabinet. No resignation was tendered and
none was demanded. The rest of us breathed easier as we
reminded our respective managing editors, with some en-
thusiasm, that Michelson had fallen low in his predic-
tion. It so happened that on the succeeding March 4,
1923, however, Mr. Fall did resign and for the very rea-
sons that Michelson had given. The only trouble about
Charley's story was that he was just one year ahead of
time.
I recall an experience of my own, even more pointed.
Back in 1913, soon after Woodrow Wilson went into the
White House, word reached me from an unquestionable
source that the President was about to shake up the Civil
Service Comrtiission. He meant to fire two Commis-
sioners from that body, to promote the Chief Examiner
to one of the vacancies, and to select a woman for the
other. I had all the names and all other essential details
which I promptly worked into one of the best beats of my
Washington career.
A week passed after the story had been printed and
nothing happened. Then a month, then a year. In time
my colleagues stopped badgering me for confirmation of
a story which had been so prominently featured. It was
forgotten by all hands except the chagrined reporter who
wrote it and the gentlemen of the Civil Service Com-
mission who were involved.
Six years later, however, almost to a day, Woodrow
Wilson announced from the White House an order shak-
ing up the Civil Service Commission, firing two of the
Commissioners, promoting the Chief Examiner, and ap-
pointing the woman all of it just as I had predicted.
That was one time, I might now confess, when I did not
have the courage to write into my new story the fact that
56 COVERING WASHINGTON
the President's action had been 'exclusively forecast* in
the Sun six years before or even to call the attention of
my editors to my belated triumph.
Functioning hundreds or thousands of miles from one's
home office gives the Washington correspondent a cer-
tain degree of freedom of action and of thought, but cer-
tain difficulties naturally follow. We are pursued by an
unending line of queries from our editors, many of them
containing valuable ideas for news stories, but many
others worth remembering only because of their ab-
surdity.
The correspondent of the New York American, for ex-
ample, received this curious query one night :
We have information that there is something in the air.
Get it and send us 1000 words.
This curious order was received late one day by Louis
Garthe, correspondent of the Baltimore American :
We understand Congress will reconvene to-morrow after
a six months' recess. Please cover.
Louis Ludlow received this message one day from one
of his Western papers:
Supreme Court about to hand down decision in local gas
case. See Chief Justice White and get advance copy.
The correspondent of an Indianapolis paper was ap-
palled to receive a message to this effect:
Get interview with President Roosevelt on local political
situation. And tell him to make it short.
Perhaps the prize query came to the correspondent of a
Philadelphia paper. It ran as follows:
North American this morning has column story, Pen-
rose attitude toward direct primaries. Send us 2000 words
on this and make it hot.
SCORING THE SCOOP 57
The next sentence read:
No, 1000 will do.
Then came this line:
Better hold it to 500.
And finally this :
Never mind Penrose story. We don't want it.
There is one more that I recall, this from the editor of a
Milwaukee paper. It said :
Please rush immediately names of all unknown dead
soldiers from Wisconsin.
I remember one other amusing circumstance in this gen-
eral connection. The correspondent of the New York
World late one night received an order for a textual copy
of one of the Bryan arbitration treaties. This treaty was
printed in the World's own almanac as the correspondent
well knew. But instead of citing his editor to the page
on which it might be found, he calmly ripped out the
copy of the document and made his paper pay telegraph
tolls on three thousand words of matter in order to im-
press his home office with his resourcefulness.
CHAPTER IV
THE COURT OF LAST RESORT
AFTER the hour of noon on almost any week-day a long
line of people in single file may be seen waiting patiently
outside a door in the main corridor of the Capitol at
Washington. As one or more persons emerge from that
door, as many are permitted to enter. A single dignified
doorkeeper stands guard at this portal and one uniformed
police officer politely but firmly keeps expectant sight-
seers from blocking the passageway.
Occasionally a person with an assured air approaches
and, leaning over, announces: 'A Member of Congress/
or, ' Member of the Bar/ or, ' Newspaper Correspondent.'
Such persons, if recognized, are permitted to enter with-
out delay. None others are if the room to which the door
leads happens to be filled.
Within sits the Supreme Court of the United States,
without doubt the most august body of jurists in the
world, and in many respects, the most powerful group of
men functioning officially under this or any other govern-
ment. Any five of the nine members of this court may
decide what is and what is not law under the American
Constitution ; may vitiate any act of Congress and may
lay down a rule of conduct for the President himself.
And yet the power which these men command is not to
be defined in terms of armies, or fleets, or force in any
form. They have no armed legion with which to enforce
their mandates not even a squad of deputy marshals.
Their power proceeds solely from the profound respect
THE COURT OF LAST RESORT 59
and reverence with which their opinions are received
respect and reverence paid to learning, to wisdom and to
integrity.
Congress after Congress has offered to install this
court of last resort in a great and imposing Temple of
Justice. Masterpieces of architecture have been con-
ceived in the hope of tempting the jurists. Plans for one
monumental pile, to rival in design and in dignity the
Congressional Library, were drawn a few years ago at the
instance of spendthrift legislators. They were spread
alluringly before the court, but without beguiling effect.
The learned justices have no ambition to sit under a
gilded dome, to deliberate in palatial chambers or to
surround themselves with ornate trappings. They have
vetoed every move made to legislate them into quarters
more in keeping with the part they play in the Govern-
ment of the Republic, more befitting the vast and vital
interests with which they deal.
This court is content to occupy the historic chamber
originally set aside for the United States Senate, a
chamber which in the earlier days of the Government
echoed the orations of Webster, of Ben ton, of Clay, of
Hayne, of Crittenden, of Calhoun and of a host of other
giants of the ' Golden Age/ It is content to pronounce its
solemn judgments in a courtroom no larger than that of
an ordinary police magistrate. It is content to face an
audience of a hundred people when it might have space to
accommodate a thousand. It is content to hold its secret
conferences in an unadorned little basement room next to
the Senate barber shop.
The individual justices ask for no private offices with
expensive appointments. They do their work, off the
bench, in the libraries of their own homes with one secre-
60 COVERING WASHINGTON
tary each to assist them. The Government does not even
provide these nine men with motor cars and liveried
chauffeurs, as it does majors in the army or street inspec-
tors in the District of Columbia. Nor does the Govern-
ment pay these men of the mightiest tribunal in the land
as much for a year's service as the average lawyer gets
as a fee for making a thirty-minute argument before
them.
And yet this court sits in judgment judgment from
which there is no appeal upon cases of life and death,
upon cases involving the liberty of their fellow country-
men, upon controversies between the States of the Union,
and upon cases affecting the highest interests of individ-
uals or corporations, of communities, of municipalities,
and of the nation as a whole.
It sits five days each week, except when it is in recess,
from noon until four- thirty in the afternoon, near, yet far
from the clamor and political upheaving of the Senate to
the right of it and of the House of Representatives to the
left. Calmly and dispassionately it devotes itself to the
ends of justice on the one hand, and to the establishment
of American law on the other. It formally recesses
through the hot summer months of each year and occa-
sionally for a week or two at a time between October and
June.
The processes of this court are accompanied by no
trumpeting whatever. Its ceremony is simplicity itself.
At noon two cords are drawn across the Capitol corridor.
A guard stands at either side. A door opens and the jus-
tices march slowly from their robing- room, clad in the
gowns of their office, to the chamber of the court.
The Chief Justice leads the column. Arriving at their
seats upon the bench, the jurists remain standing until
THE COURT OF LAST RESORT 61
the court crier's ' Oyez ! Oyez ! All persons having business
with the Supreme Court of the United States are admon-
ished to draw near and give attention, for the Supreme
Court is now sitting. God save the United States and the
Supreme Court!' is concluded.
There is no other formality at the opening of the court.
There is little that is ceremonious in the proceedings that
follow. Motions are entertained and rulings are made.
No witnesses are ever examined. The spectacular phases
of ordinary court life are absent. Oratory on the part of
counsel is rare. It is discouraged by the bench.
Members of the bar are admitted to the inner circle of
the court and they address the jurists in conversational
tones. Spectators are ranged outside the bar. Not more
than one hundred may be admitted at a time. News-
paper correspondents are provided with small tables near
the bench if they cover the court regularly; if not, they
take their places among the lawyers. Except for the pre-
sence of the nine black-robed men upon the bench and the
consciousness of the power which the Government has
confided to them, the Supreme Court in ordinary session
would be a disappointing show.
There are occasions, however, when the air of the Su-
preme Court chamber is electrified with suppressed excite-
ment; when those within the hearing of the bench hang
almost breathlessly upon every sentence, every word,
every syllable that is uttered by the spokesman of the
court; when men lean forward tense and eager to catch
the meaning of a given declaration ; when smiles of tri-
umph and infinite relief pass over the countenances of
one group of litigants, while defeat and despair are read in
the faces of an opposing group ; when correspondents, as a
jurist concludes, dash madly from the room to flash to the
62 COVERING WASHINGTON
four ends of the country the fateful news contained in a
court opinion.
These scenes, almost melodramatic in their staging,
are enacted over and over on decision days, on those
Monday afternoons when ultimate judgment is pro-
nounced by a tribunal whose word is final under our sys-
tem of jurisprudence.
Once in a while the court itself contributes directly to
the dramatic effect of such a scene. Observers will long
remember a dissenting opinion delivered by the late
Associate Justice Harlan in an anti-trust case, when that
old Roman turned savagely upon his colleagues and, with
his voice pitched high, his sunken eyes flashing fire, and
his long lean arm thrust forward, he declared that to his
sorrow he had lived to see the court reverse itself twice
upon the same issue.
Other observers recall vividly opinions delivered by the
late Chief Justice White, without manuscript and with-
out reference to notes, when he half rose from his seat as
he drove home with impetuous gesture the high points of
an all-important decision.
These incidents are rare, however. Conscious as these
jurists are of the unchallenged force of their decrees, they
proceed as a rule in even tones in their declarations and
without evident emotion to the discharge of the sacred
trust reposed in them.
Occasionally this austere court relaxes. It takes an in-
tellectual holiday, so to speak. After all, it is composed of
nine very human beings with a perfectly natural taste for
an admixture of the lighter things of life with the stern
realities. These men may go for weeks and months with a
rigid bearing toward the world, gravely concerning them-
selves with the profoundly serious affairs of the nation,
THE COURT OF LAST RESORT 63
then all at once they will unbend. They will take an hour
or an afternoon off, enjoying themselves as much as a
group of schoolboys playing hookey.
A striking instance of this was staged some years ago
while the court was granting a hearing in the Owl Lake
Case, involving the disposition of certain swamp lands.
Now it is not often that an attorney appearing before this
tribunal has the courage to entertain the judges with
humor or essay a bit of levity, but upon this occasion the
late Senator Jonathan P. Dolliver of Iowa, upon a signal
from the bench, amused the court in a fashion that law-
yers and court attendants still talk about.
Senator Dolliver appeared with other counsel, not with
the slightest idea of participating, but merely to listen to
the argument of his associates. Toward the end of the pro-
ceeding, however, Associate Justice Harlan, an old friend
and admirer of the Senator, summoned a page and sent a
note down to him which read :
'It is the unanimous opinion of the court that the
case is lost unless you present an argument.'
Dolliver arose. He knew practically nothing either
about the merits or the law of the case and he had only
finished a sentence or two when Justice Harlan broke in
with:
'Just how does the decision in the case of Smith vs.
Jones apply to this case?'
And Mr. Harlan had barely finished when the then
Associate Justice White fired another question.
Dolliver ran his eye over the court and then began :
'That reminds me/ he said in his inimitable fashion,
'of the days when I was a boy up in the hills of West
Virginia/ And he proceeded to tell a story that convulsed
the whole courtroom with laughter.
64 COVERING WASHINGTON
Then came another question from the bench and Dol-
liver proceeded :
1 That reminds me of the time when I was a young fel-
low out in Iowa/ This was followed by another highly
entertaining story.
This play between the bench and the bar continued for
nearly an hour, never getting within a mile of the law
points involved in the cause and neither party to the pro-
ceeding caring a rap whether it did or didn't.
A favorite practice of the court when it is weary or
bored is to put the freshmen of the bar that is, the
younger members who are perhaps making their initial
argument before that body through a mild hazing pro-
cess. It is a trying ordeal for an attorney to appear be-
fore this body for the first time even under the most
favorable circumstances, but when the bench persists in
interrupting him, he is calculated nine times out of ten
to go straight up in the air and never descend.
It is the habit of Associate Justice Holmes, at such
times, to allow the young lawyer to get fairly under way
with his argument, then, leaning far over the bench and
shooting an arm and an extended forefinger at the attor-
ney, ask him a question on a point of law which counsel
probably never heard of in his life. Such interrogatories
are baffling enough in the case of seasoned practitioners,
and they almost invariably throw the newcomer com-
pletely off the track.
The late Chief Justice White had a particularly dis-
concerting way of exploding a question under a lawyer
standing before the court. 'What I want to know,' he
would begin, and then would come a heavy charge from
the bench that often took counsel off his feet whether he
was a fledgling or a hardened old veteran.
THE COURT OF LAST RESORT 65
Very recently there appeared before the Supreme Court,
however, an attorney who refused to be feazed by the
volley of questions hurled at him from the bench. He had
a poor case, and probably knew it as well as anybody, but
he was determined to put up the best fight that was in
him for his client. He had scarcely got fairly under way
with his argument when the Chief Justice opened on him.
'Does not counsel know,' the jurist said, with evident
irritation, 'that the court settled that issue in the case of
Brown vs. Brown?'
The attorney dodged as skillfully as he could and pro-
ceeded. A moment later Associate Justice Day stopped
him abruptly with this :
'Surely cotmsel must be aware that the point he has
just made is contrary to the court's ruling in the case of
Johnson vs. Johnson.'
Once more counsel side-stepped and sought to go on
when Associate Justice Van Devanter broke in:
' Is it not apparent to counsel that he is wasting the
time of the court, dwelling upon a matter about which
there is no judicial difference of opinion?'
One after another of the jurists frowningly, not to say
furiously, challenged the points made by the attorney,
until eight of the nine had clearly indicated to him that
they were not only out of patience, but were virtually
prepared to decide against him without leaving
