MAN OF SPIRIT

New Zealand Herald, Volume 82, Issue 25177, 14 April 1945, Page 9

MAN OF SPIRIT

TRIUMPH OYER ILLS ABILITY FOR HARD WORK When a man fell overboard into the 1 icy waters of the Bay of Fundy in August, 1921, it has been written that the course of America's history was changed. The man was Franklin Roosevelt, who three days later contracted infantile paralysis. In a gallant fight he made a far greater recovery than was thought possible, and in that struggle the man was born anew. For, says Emil Ludwig in his biography of Roosevelt, the thing over which he had triumphed was more than his sickness; it was the despair of defeat, tlif hopelessness of his nearest and dearest, the helplessness of his doctors. . . . Such a struggle called for greater ends; he set them well ahead. The highest was just about high enough. Just as during the slow years of healing the upper part of his body developed through constant swimming, so the heart and head of this swimmer developed through his heightened selfrespect. A Priceless Attribute One of Roosevelt's priceless attributes was a knack of locking up his and the world's worries into some secret mental compartment and then enjoying himself to the top of his bent. That quality of survival, of physical toughness, of champagne ebullience, was one key to the big man. Another key was that no one ever heard him admit that he could not walk. The big man motive has been used by many of Roosevelt's biographers, both in a physical and mental sense. After the collapse of France, Time, the American weekly journal, described him thus and went on to call him "hugeshouldered and long-armed, with saus-age-sized fingers on his freckled, hairy hands. His greying hair is thin, little hollows dwell on his massive temples, brown shadows sit under bis deep, nar-row-set eyes, two big seams spread down from his clear-cut nose to make grim parenthesis round his mouth." An Unheeded Warning Roosevelt worked incredibly hard. Daily he has averaged 15 to 40 callers besides his famous press conferences, where he did most of the talking. To his private secretary "he dictated 15 to 20 letters a day. Constantly reports, documents. State papers, correspondence, cablegrams and digests streamed over his desk. There were speeches to write, messages to plan and policies to determine. He was an acute, informed observer. Months before the war he warned the nation. Isolationists, led by Borah, would have none of it. Roosevelt was tragically right. His observations were "based on detailed knowledge of the world. This knowledge even extended to small regions, including islands, and it embraced information of their peoples, habits, population, geography and economic, life. The storv is told that when a ship sank off the coast of Scotland early in the war, United States experts argued whether it hit a rock or was torpedoed. The President pondered latitude and longitude and said: "It hit a rock. They ought to have seen that rock." A naval aide, recalling the rock, disagreed. "At high tide, Mr President, the rock is submerged." "No such thing," said the President, "even at high tide that rock is 9ft out of the water." In Touch with Public Opinion

Roosevelt also kept in close touch

with public opinion. This system is not infallible, but it was of great assistance to him when he had to decide whether a noisy clamour over some particular point was deep-rooted or shallow, national' or sectional. One day five State Governors walked into the White Hou.se and presented certain demands. They hinted secession, revolution and worse unless their demands were met. Roosevelt turned them down flat. Nothing happened. The President was able to call their bluff because he knew their supporters were a limited, but extremely noisy, radical minority. But if he took cognisance of public opinion, he also was ever ready to lead it. There is no better example than the manner in which he prepared America for war. He also preferred political

honesty to popularity. This was proved by his action in thrice vetoing the costly, but desirable, Veterans' Bonus Bill, which the Senate passed over his head. A subsequent poll by the American Institute of Public Opinion showed that the President's popularity had waned.

Just as he put every effort into his work, I loose velt drew the utmost from his leisure. A genial man, he loved good company. He liked to laugh, and his laugh was a delightful roar that shook him up and down. Even in the hoarded minutes of hi,s day he found time to write lusty wisecracks in memos to his aides, or to think up little gags to spring on his press conferences. A Lover of the Open He was a democrat both in his politics and his palate. Mrs Roosevelt once said he would eat any food that

"flies through the kitchen." His genuine fondness for hot-dogs recalls the informal party at his Hyde Park home, when King George and Queen Elizabeth were regaled with plebian America's favourite snack. One whisky 'and soda was his usual teatime ration, but on special occasions he raised that

m i t. Roosevelt loved to spend his holidays

in the open. Above all, he loved the sea, and earlier in his administration he spent much time on the famous Presidential yacht. He also liked to visit Warm Springs, Georgia, and bathe in its mineral waters. It was there that

lie had been partially cured from his paralysis, and it was there that, in gratitude: he invested more than half his personal fortune in establishing a non-profit making foundation to care for «ufferera from