June 10, 1916.
DEAR MR. JUSTICE HUGHES:
I am in receipt of your letter of resignation and feel constrained to yield to your desire. I, therefore, accept your resignation as Justice of the Supreme Court of the United States to take effect at once.
Sincerely yours,
WOODROW WILSON.
HON. CHARLES E. HUGHES,
Washington, D. C.
On the first of August, 1916, I prepared the following memorandum which explained my feelings regarding the campaign of 1916 and what appeared to me to be the weakness of the Republican party and the strength of our own candidacy:
One of the principal arguments upon which the Republican managers lay great stress in favour of Hughes' candidacy is his strength as a campaigner as evidenced in his Youngstown speech delivered years ago in a campaign in which Mr. Bryan was the leader of the Democratic hosts. The strength of that speech lies in its cool analysis of the attitude of a great emotional orator [Bryan] on public questions at a time when the Democracy was advocating economic principles of doubtful strength and virtue. In other words, the position of Justice Hughes in that campaign was that of attacking an economic principle which had cut the Democratic party in two.
The position of Hughes as a candidate in this the [1916] campaign will be radically different for he will have to face a candidate representing a united party; one whose power of analysis is as great as Hughes', and to this will be added this feature of strength in the Democratic candidate—the power of appeal to the emotional or imaginative side of the American people. Added to this will be the strength of conviction in urging his cause that comes to a man who has passed through a world crisis amid great dangers and who has brought to consummation substantial (not visionary) achievements unparalleled in the political history of the country. He will not speak to the country as the representative of a party divided in its counsels or as a dreamer or doctrinaire, but rather will he stand before the country as the practical idealist, defending, not apologizing for, every achievement of his administration.
In his Youngstown speech, Justice Hughes found no difficulty in attacking the economic theories of Bryan. In this attack he not only had the sympathy of his own party but there came to him the support of many Democrats. In this campaign he will have to attack achievements and not principles of doubtful virtue. I predict that the trip of Hughes to the West will be a disastrous failure.
When Justice Hughes' Western trip was announced, there was consternation in the ranks of the Democratic party, especially those Democrats with whom I came in contact in Washington. They declared that he would make a tremendous impression on the West and that he would destroy that great salient, and make it impossible for the Democrats to make any gains there.