Appendix B

WOODROW WILSON AND COLONEL HOUSE

To the Editor of the Post—Sir: When in the days to come Macaulay’s New Zealander surveys the ruins of Westminster and tries to make sense out of the records of the Parliament of Man (Paris-Versailles, 1919) what a difficult task awaits him. In the current issue of a popular weekly Mrs. Woodrow Wilson describes the meeting at Brest between the President on his return from his disastrous February visit to Washington, his unhappy encounter with the Foreign Relations Committee of the Senate, and Colonel House, who had during his absence represented him at the conference.

When House left, Mrs. Wilson states that the President seemed to have aged ten years and that his jaw was set in the way it had when he was making superhuman efforts to control himself. He smiled bitterly as he said that House had given away everything he had won before he left Paris, that he had compromised on every side, and that he, the President, would have to start all over again, and this time it would be harder because House had given the impression that his delegates were not in sympathy with him. But, as he threw back his head, the light of battle was in his eyes and he thanked God that he could still fight.

In the light of this statement it is right and proper to examine the records and ascertain how the President began all over again and whom he sent into the battle. A week later, when the President was undeniably ill, he asked Colonel House (the man Mrs. Wilson thinks had betrayed him) to take his place in the Council of Four and he warmly endorsed, as the records show, all that Colonel House was able to accomplish there in a difficult situation.

The records also reveal that all through the month of April the President entrusted House with the difficult negotiations with the French and English, and in writing he requested House to explain to Clemenceau the American position on the issues in dispute. He asked House to make known his views to Tardieu and he sent to him innumerable and vital papers with such notations as “March 18—Won’t you be kind enough to give me your opinion? Affectionately yours, W. W.” “March 20—Let me have your comments. Affectionately, W. W.” “April 19—I would like a suggestion from you. Affectionately”; or as on May 13, “What do you suggest?”

When the hard battle was over and the Treaty was signed the President accepted the review of what had been accomplished, drawn up by Colonel House, and authorized its publication in the world press under the signature, Woodrow Wilson. On leaving for America the President chose Colonel House to represent him in the discussions that were impending with Lord Robert Cecil and other delegates as to the best way to set up the League of Nations, and when this was achieved, and gratefully acknowledged, the President sent House to London to work out the system of colonial mandates.

All these records are available in the Library of Yale University to those who care to examine them. Of course the charge of “betrayal” has been made before, but hitherto upon authority so irresponsible that it did not require notice, much less contradiction. However, it did justify me, I think, in speaking to President Charles Seymour, of Yale; to Hunter Miller, of the Department of State, and to Arthur Hugh Frazier, members of the delegation who were closest to Colonel House, and I found them in complete agreement that the “betrayal” story was entirely inaccurate. Today, however, it has seemed to me, and to others, that these corrections are due quite as much to the memory of our great war President as to the unsullied fame of his loyal lieutenant, Edward M. House.

Stephen Bonsal
Washington, January 28, 1938