Twelve Years After

The political pickpockets who preyed upon the 20th President have yet to recruit a Warren G. Harding Foundation.* No body of nostalgic businessmen has so far formed a Calvin Coolidge Foundation. But the bosoms of thousands of professing political idealists burned last week with memories of the passionate philosopher who guided the nation from 1913 to 1921. Ten years after Thomas Woodrow Wilson's death, twelve years after he had been taken from the White House dying from heartbreak and other diseases, Woodrow Wilson Clubs foregathered in 124 U. S. towns and cities to celebrate the 77th anniversary of their idol's birth.

In Washington's Mayflower Hotel was held the chief celebration. But conspicuously absent among the 800 guests at the Woodrow Wilson Foundation banquet were surviving members of the Wilson official family. For them, there has been small welcome at the New Deal fireside. Newton Diehl Baker was practicing law in Cleveland. Carter Glass was busy holding his tongue, lest in an irrepressible moment it cry out against an Administration in which he has little confidence. John William Davis was playing holiday golf in Charleston, S. C. The only Wilsonite who had been given a high post in the new Administration, Josephus Daniels, was far away at his Embassy in Mexico City.

It fell to a comparatively unimportant Wilsonian, onetime Assistant Secretary of the Navy Franklin Delano Roosevelt, to deliver the eulogy of the Foundation's hero over two nation-wide radio hookups. It was soon clear to most of his listeners that the President had come to state his policies on Latin-American affairs rather than praise his Wartime chief. In the few passages where Wilson was touched upon, however, his former disciple was affectionate if not fervid. While assuring his audience that "we do not contemplate membership," President Roosevelt tried gallantly to put a good face on the scuttled League of Nations. He felt himself on surer ground when, praising Wilson's advocacy of peace, he declared: "The imagination of the masses of world population was stirred, as never before, by President Wilson's gallant appeal to them -- to those masses -- to banish future war. . . . Through all the centuries and down to the world conflict of 1914 to 1918, wars were made by governments. Woodrow Wilson challenged that necessity. That challenge made the people who create and who change governments think."

Of President Wilson's three daughters, Spinster Margaret and Eleanor McAdoo live. Neither was among the Foundation banqueteers, nor was Mr. McAdoo, who had flown from California to take his seat in the Senate this week. But present was Widow Edith Boiling Gait Wilson (second wife) who chatted and shook hands with another great Wartime leader, pale old General John Joseph ("Black Jack") Pershing. Also there was Francis Bowes Sayre, the other Wilsonian son-in-law whom President Roosevelt had made Assistant Secretary of State. His two children, Francis Bowes Sayre Jr. and Eleanor Axson Sayre, laid a wreath on the Wilson tomb in the crypt of the Washington Cathedral.

*A Harding Memorial Association built the tomb at Marion, Ohio, which his successors were prevailed upon, eight years after his death, to dedicate (TIME, June 22, 1931).

This file is automatically generated by a robot program, so reader's discretion is required.