The life of John Worth Kern

by Claude G. Bowers

3rd March, 1917.

“Dear John Kern: It is not as lawyer, statesman, senate leader that we say farewell. That were easy. But to say it as friend to friend, that is hard. May we say hail again to you often.

“Thos. R. Marshall.”

These tributes of affection and respect were all the more remarkable because of the conditions under which they were paid. The capitol was in a state of considerable excitement because of the bitterness of the fight being waged over the bill granting the president power to arm our merchant ships. The country was in ferment over the measure and little else was thought of in the senate. Many, indeed the great majority of senators, had taken their departure in peaceful days without comment from their colleagues from the floor. The exception in the case of Kern was due not only to the important part he had played during four years of remarkable legislative activity, and the even-tempered and conscientious manner in which he had met the onerous duties of leadership, but quite as much to personal qualities which had, through life, endeared him to those who knew him best. He was deeply moved by these impressive manifestations of regard, and particularly pleased with the generous and kindly attitude of the men he had politically opposed. This was accentuated a few days later by a personal letter from Senator Lodge saying that “in the midst of the excitement of that closing day I felt very strongly how unfinished and imperfect all that I said in regard to your leaving the senate necessarily was,” and reiterating his expression of regret.

Thus after forty-seven years of constant political activity, and many years of public service, Senator Kern passed to private life rarely honored by his colleagues in the senate, respected by his political opponents, regretted by the president and his cabinet, and trusted by the dominate political party of the nation of which he had been a potential leader in victory and defeat.

CHAPTER XX
The Real Kern: A Composite Portrait

I

TO the great majority who knew Senator Kern as he appeared in court, in social circles, in the free and easy environment of convention and campaign, his geniality created the impression that he always preferred company to solitude. To the comparative few who knew him in the routine intercourse of daily contact he was exactly the opposite—one of the most reticent of men, given to the keeping of his own councils. Few men have disclosed their mental processes to a less degree. Throughout the greater portion of his life, when confronted with a problem, personal, political, or professional, he retired within himself and in solitude worked it out. At one period of his life when called upon to reach a decision on any matter of moment it was his practice to shut himself in a room alone and for hours debate the pros and cons over a game of solitaire. As his problems multiplied in numbers and grew in importance after his election to the senate this reticence intensified, and his tendency to withdraw within himself became more pronounced. At times when he was grappling with one of his numerous problems he would relax into sociability in moments of his own choosing, but he was passionately intolerant of intrusion at other times. He would often lock himself up in his committee room at the capitol, but more frequently he would hide himself in his private room in the Senate Office building, which was not connected with his public offices and inaccessible to the uninitiated by telephone. He alone carried the key and even those occupying the most confidential relations with him dared not intrude upon him there. Here he would sometimes shut himself in for hours at a time.

In this connection it is proper to emphasize a mental trait with which he was probably not popularly credited—an extraordinary power of concentration. Engaged in working out a problem he was able to bring all his mental powers to bear upon just that, and put all else beyond his consciousness. At such times he was utterly oblivious to anything that might be transpiring about him, and nothing could divert him.

It was not his habit to rush speedily to conclusions. He viewed the problem, always a political one after he entered the senate, from every possible angle. He weighed all reasons, for and against, with scrupulous care, brushing aside all prejudices, and coldly analyzing all possibilities. And he seldom acted at once on his first conclusion. Time and again he would return to this debate within his own mind, in the meanwhile guarding his mental processes from all others.