"There were two cats in Kilkenny
They fit and fit until of cats there weren't any."
This is almost a prophecy of what will happen now between Borah, Johnson & Co. and Root, Taft & Co., with poor Lodge mewing "peace" when there is no peace—except a larger peace outside their horizon. They have been kept united by hatred of you, by certain foreign encouragements, and by fear of the Democratic party. With the necessity to act, to do something, the smouldering fire of differences will break forth into flame. Conserve your health. Cultivate a cynical patience. Give them all the rope you can. Now and then when they make too big fools of themselves, throw in a keynote veto—not often— never when you can give them the benefit of the doubt and with it responsibility. They have neither the coherence nor the brains to handle the situation. Events will work their further confusion, events in Europe. God still reigns. The people can learn, though not quickly.
With regards,
(Signed) JOHN SHARP WILLIAMS.
One would think that after the election the President would show a slackening of interest in the affairs of the nation; that having been repudiated by a solemn referendum, he would grow indifferent and listless to the administrative affairs that came to his desk. On the contrary, so far as his interest in affairs was concerned, one coming in contact with him from day to day after the election until the very night of March 3rd would get the impression that nothing unusual had happened and that his term of office was to run on indefinitely.
One of the things to which he paid particular attention at this time was the matter of the pardon of Eugene V. Debs. The day that the recommendation for pardon arrived at the White House, he looked it over and examined it carefully, and said: "I will never consent to the pardon of this man. I know that in certain quarters of the country there is a popular demand for the pardon of Debs, but it shall never be accomplished with my consent. Were I to consent to it, I should never be able to look into the faces of the mothers of this country who sent their boys to the other side. While the flower of American youth was pouring out its blood to vindicate the cause of civilization, this man, Debs, stood behind the lines, sniping, attacking, and denouncing them. Before the war he had a perfect right to exercise his freedom of speech and to express his own opinion, but once the Congress of the United States declared war, silence on his part would have been the proper course to pursue. I know there will be a great deal of denunciation of me for refusing this pardon. They will say I am cold-blooded and indifferent, but it will make no impression on me. This man was a traitor to his country and he will never be pardoned during my administration."
CHAPTER XLVI
THE LAST DAY
I was greatly concerned lest the President should be unable by reason of his physical condition to stand the strain of Inauguration Day. Indeed, members of his Cabinet and intimate friends like Grayson and myself had tried to persuade him not to take part, but he could not by any argument be drawn away from what he believed to be his duty—to join in the inauguration of his successor, President-elect Harding. The thought that the people of the country might misconstrue his attitude if he should remain away and his firm resolve to show every courtesy to his successor in office were the only considerations that led him to play his part to the end. When I arrived at the White House early on the morning of the 4th of March, the day of the inauguration, I found him in his study, smiling and gracious as ever. He acted like a boy who was soon to be out of school and free of the burdens that had for eight years weighed him down to the breaking point. He expressed to me the feeling of relief that he was experiencing now that his term of office was really at an end. I recalled to him the little talk we had had on the same day, four years before, upon the conclusion of the ceremonies incident to his own inauguration in 1917. At the time we were seated in the Executive office. Turning away from his desk and gazing out of the window which overlooked the beautiful White House lawn and gardens, he said: "Well, how I wish this were March 4, 1921. What a relief it will be to do what I please and to say what I please; but more than that, to write my own impressions of the things that have been going on under my own eyes. I have felt constantly a personal detachment from the Presidency. The one thing I resent when I am not performing the duties of the office is being reminded that I am President of the United States. I feel toward this office as a man feels toward a great function which in his working hours he is obliged to perform but which, out of working hours, he is glad to get away from and resume the quiet course of his own thought. I tell you, my friend, it will be great to be free again."
On this morning, March 4, 1921, he acted like a man who was happy now that his dearest wish was to be realized. As I looked at Woodrow Wilson, seated in his study that morning, in his cutaway coat, awaiting word of the arrival of President-elect Harding at the White House, to me he was every inch the President, quiet, dignified; ready to meet the duties of the trying day upon which he was now to enter, in his countenance a calm nobility. It was hard for me to realize as I beheld him, seated behind his desk in his study, that here was the head of the greatest nation in the world who in a few hours was to step back into the uneventful life of a private citizen.
A few minutes and he was notified that the President-elect was in the Blue Room awaiting his arrival. Alone, unaided, grasping his old blackthorn stick, the faithful companion of many months, his "third leg," as he playfully called it, slowly he made his way to the elevator and in a few seconds he was standing in the Blue Room meeting the President-elect and greeting him in the most gracious way. No evidence of the trial of pain he was undergoing in striving to play a modest part in the ceremonies was apparent either in his bearing or attitude, as he greeted the President- elect and the members of the Congressional Inaugural Committee. He was an ill man but a sportsman, determined to see the thing through to the end. President-elect Harding met him in the most kindly fashion, showing him the keenest consideration and courtesy.