Recollections of full years - Helen Herron Taft

The corps of aides arrange all these details and each department, including the police and the secret service, has its printed and explicit orders for the day a long time ahead. Some of the police orders are interesting. For instance: “No person under the influence of liquor, disorderly in his behaviour or bearing any advertisement will be allowed in line. Conspicuously dirty persons will not be admitted.” Also: “Except in the most aggravated case a coachman will not be taken from his box and put under arrest. It will be sufficient to take his name and address and arrest him on the following morning.”

After a New Year’s Reception the White House is a sorry sight, even though by using extra strips of carpet to protect the polished floors and by removing fine rugs and breakable bric-à-brac every possible precaution is taken to make the damage as slight as possible. But it doesn’t take long to restore the house to its normal condition. The way the crowd of workmen used to go about putting the place in order after an invasion of this kind always reminded me of the well-drilled stage hands at a hippodrome who manage to set different scenes and keep things spic-and-span without even interfering with a continuous performance.

Very shortly after the New Year’s Reception, three days later in fact, we gave the next big event of the season, the Diplomatic Reception. It is understood, of course, that one of the chief occupations of the President of the United States is shaking hands. I am moved to this observation by memories of uncounted hours by my husband’s side in a receiving line at the White House when thousands of guests passed by, each separately introduced to both the President and to me and each extending an untired hand to give and to receive the hearty grasp which all good Americans so highly regard. And there is no conceivable form of work or exercise more fatiguing. If it were not for the mental stimulus afforded by the friendliness of a gay throng, by music and lights and a general festive atmosphere, it could hardly be borne.

For Mr. Taft it was never so hard because in his long public career, and especially through a political campaign, he had had considerable training for it. But for me it was somewhat more difficult. My friends used to wonder how I could stand it, but when I was well I never found it so much of a strain that I could not very quickly recover from it. When I was not feeling particularly strong I would resort to all manner of innocent pretexts to give myself short intervals of rest. I would turn around and engage in important conversation with someone behind me; I would consume minutes in taking a drink of water; or I would get into serious difficulty with my flowers or something. Then, too, I sometimes would sit frankly down and let the crowds pass by.

To me the long standing was the real strain and I soon came to a point where I was willing to sacrifice appearance to approximate comfort by wearing wide flat slippers with low heels.

The Diplomatic Reception is undoubtedly the most brilliant of the set state functions which are given at the White House each year, but to me it was never as interesting as the Diplomatic Dinner which follows it. There are thirty-nine foreign Embassies and Legations in Washington. Each Ambassador and Minister has his own distinctive and sometimes very elaborate regalia; each attaché, military and naval, wears the uniform of his service, in many cases very picturesque and often positively flamboyant; the foreign women, gowned exquisitely, are many of them crowned with tiaras and laden with jewels, and when they are all gathered around one great, glittering and gorgeously decorated table they present such a picture of varied colour and magnificence as is not to be seen on any other occasion in Washington.

I used always to wonder how they managed to get along with each other. There is an impression quite general among us that we are the only nation on earth that sends abroad diplomatic representatives without any knowledge of the French language. This is not quite true. There are a good many diplomats in Washington who do not speak French, and there are more diplomats’ wives. But as both men and women are seated at the Diplomatic Dinner in strict order of rank, there is no chance to take into consideration the seemingly important question as to whether or not dinner partners will be able to communicate with each other very freely. They do speak English, of course, but many of them imperfectly, and, taking them all, with exactly thirty-nine different accents. Imagine the wife of the Chinese Minister sitting between the Minister of Salvador and the Minister of Cuba, or the wife of the Japanese Ambassador having on one hand the German Ambassador and on the other the Minister of Costa Rica!

It all depends on how long they have been in Washington. When I first went to the White House the Italian Ambassador was the Dean of the Diplomatic Corps, with the Austrian Ambassador next, while among the Ministers those from Siam and from Costa Rica, I think, had precedence over all others. If the Minister of Haiti remained in Washington long enough he could outrank the Minister of Spain. The Minister of Haiti is the only negro diplomat in the Corps and his place at table in my time was with a group of envoys of almost equal rank who sat together near one outer end of the great crescent.