Woodrow Wilson and the World War | Page 4

point. There are instances of impulsive action on his part, when he has
not waited for advice or troubled to acquire exact knowledge of the
facts underlying a situation, but such occasions have been infrequent.
Wilson's dislike of advice has been widely advertized. It is probably
closer to the truth to say that he is naturally suspicious of advisers
unless he is certain that their basic point of view is the same as his own.
This is quite different from saying that he wants only opinions that
coincide with his own and that he immediately dispenses with advisers
who disagree with him. Colonel House, for example, who for five years
exerted constant influence on his policy, frequently advanced opinions
quite at variance from those of the President, but such differences did
not weaken House's influence inasmuch as Wilson felt that they were
both starting from the same angle towards the same point. Prejudiced
though he seemed to be against "financiers," Wilson took the opinions
of Thomas W. Lamont at Paris, because the underlying object of both,
the acquisition of a secure peace, was identical. It is true, however, that
with the exception of Colonel House, Wilson's advisers have been in
the main purveyors of facts rather than colleagues in the formation of
policies. Wilson has generally been anxious to receive facts which
might help him to build his policy, as will be attested by those who
worked with him at Paris.[1] But he was less interested in the opinions
of his advisers, especially when it came to principles and not details,
for he decides principles for himself. In this sense his Cabinet was
composed of subordinates rather than counselors. Such an attitude is, of
course, characteristic of most modern executives and has been
intensified by war conditions. The summary disregard of Lansing,
shown by Wilson at Paris, was less striking than the snubbing of
Balfour by Lloyd George, or the cold brutality with which Clemenceau
treated the other French delegates.
[Footnote 1: Mr. Lamont says of the President at Paris: "I never saw a
man more ready and anxious to consult than he.... President Wilson did

not have a well-organized secretarial staff. He did far too much of the
work himself, studying until late at night papers and documents that he
should have largely delegated to some discreet aides. He was by all
odds, the hardest worked man at the Conference; but the failure to
delegate more of his work was not due to any inherent distrust that he
had of men--and certainly not to any desire to 'run the whole show'
himself--but simply to the lack of facility in knowing how to delegate
work on a large scale. In execution we all have a blind spot in some
part of our eye. President Wilson's was in his inability to use men; an
inability, mind you, not a refusal. On the contrary, when any of us
volunteered or insisted upon taking responsibility off his shoulders he
was delighted."]
General conviction of Wilson's autocratic nature has been intensified
by his choice of assistants, who have not as a rule enjoyed public
confidence. He debarred himself from success in the matter of
appointments, in the first place, by limiting his range of choice through
unwillingness to have about him those who did not share his point of
view. It is more epigrammatic than exact to say that he was the sole
unit in the Government giving value to a row of ciphers, for his Cabinet,
as a whole, was not composed of weak men. But the fact that the
members of his Cabinet accepted implicitly his firm creed that the
Cabinet ought to be an executive and not a political council, that it
depended upon the President's policy, and that its main function should
be merely to carry that policy into effect, gave to the public some
justification for its belief that Wilson's was a "one-man" Government.
This belief was further intensified by the President's extreme
sensitiveness to hostile criticism, which more than anything else
hindered frank interchange of opinion between himself and strong
personalities. On more than one occasion he seemed to regard
opposition as tantamount to personal hostility, an attitude which at
times was not entirely unjustified. In the matter of minor appointments
Wilson failed generally of success because he consistently refused to
take a personal interest, leaving them to subordinates and admitting that
political necessities must go far to determine the choice. Even in such
an important problem as the appointment of the Peace Commission the
President seems to have made his selection almost at haphazard. Many

of his war appointments proved ultimately to be wise. But it is
noteworthy that such men as Garfield, Baruch, and McCormick, who
amply justified their choice, were appointed because Wilson knew
personally their capacity