Wendell Willkie
Wendell Lewis Willkie (born Lewis Wendell Willkie; February 18, 1892 – October 8, 1944) was an American lawyer, corporate executive and the 1940 Republican nominee for president. Willkie appealed to many convention delegates as the Republican field's only interventionist: although the U.S. remained neutral prior to Pearl Harbor, he favored greater U.S. involvement in World War II to support Britain and other Allies. His Democratic opponent, incumbent President Franklin D. Roosevelt, won the 1940 election with about 55% of the popular vote and took the electoral college vote by a wide margin.
Wendell Willkie
October 8, 1944 (aged 52)
- Democratic (until 1939)
- Republican (from 1939)
Willkie was born in Elwood, Indiana, in 1892; both his parents were lawyers, and he also became one. He served in World War I but was not sent to France until the final days of the war, and saw no action. Willkie settled in Akron, Ohio, where he was initially employed by Firestone, but left for a law firm, becoming one of the leaders of the Akron Bar Association. Much of his work was representing electric utilities, and in 1929 Willkie accepted a job in New York City as counsel for Commonwealth & Southern Corporation (C&S), a utility holding company. He was rapidly promoted, and became corporate president in 1933. Roosevelt was sworn in as U.S. president soon after Willkie became head of C&S, and announced plans for a Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) that would supply power in competition with C&S. Between 1933 and 1939, Willkie fought against the TVA before Congress, in the courts, and before the public. He was ultimately unsuccessful, but sold C&S's property for a good price, and gained public esteem.
A longtime Democratic activist, Willkie changed his party registration to Republican in late 1939. He did not run in the 1940 presidential primaries, but positioned himself as an acceptable choice for a deadlocked convention. He sought backing from uncommitted delegates, while his supporters—many youthful—enthusiastically promoted his candidacy. As German forces advanced through western Europe in 1940, many Republicans did not wish to nominate an isolationist like Robert A. Taft, or a non-interventionist like Thomas E. Dewey, and turned to Willkie, who was nominated on the sixth ballot. Willkie's support for aid to Britain removed it as a major factor in his race against Roosevelt, and Willkie also backed the president on a peacetime draft. Both men took more isolationist positions towards the end of the race. Roosevelt won an unprecedented third term, taking 38 of the 48 states.
After the election, Willkie made two wartime foreign trips as Roosevelt's informal envoy, and as nominal leader of the Republican Party gave the president his full support. This angered many conservatives, especially as Willkie increasingly advocated liberal or internationalist causes. Willkie ran for the Republican nomination in 1944, but bowed out after a disastrous showing in the Wisconsin primary in April. He and Roosevelt discussed the possibility of forming a liberal political party after the war, but Willkie died in October 1944 before the idea could bear fruit. Willkie is remembered for giving Roosevelt vital political assistance in 1941, which helped the president to pass Lend-Lease to send supplies to the United Kingdom and other Allied nations.
Youth, education and World War I service[edit]
Lewis Wendell Willkie was born in Elwood, Indiana, on February 18, 1892, the son of Henrietta (Trisch) and Herman Francis Willkie.[1] Both of his parents were lawyers, his mother being one of the first women admitted to the Indiana bar.[2] Willkie was the fourth of six children, all intelligent, and learned skills during the nightly debates around the dinner table that would later serve him well.[3]
Although given the first name Lewis, Willkie was known from childhood by his middle name.[4] Herman Willkie, who had come from Prussia with his parents at age four, was intensely involved in progressive politics, and in 1896 took his sons to a torchlight procession for Democratic presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan, who had come to Elwood during his campaign. The Willkie boys had a sidewalk fight with Republican youths, and though the Willkies won their battle, Bryan lost his to William McKinley. When Bryan ran again in 1900, he stayed overnight at the Willkie home, and the Democratic candidate for president became the first political hero for the boy who would later seek that office.[5]
By the time Willkie reached age 14 and enrolled in Elwood High School, his parents were concerned about a lack of discipline and a slight stoop, and they sent him to Culver Military Academy for a summer in an attempt to correct both. Willkie began to shine as a student in high school, inspired by his English teacher; one classmate said that Philip "Pat" Bing "fixed that boy up. He started preaching to Wendell to get to work and that kid went to town."[6] Faced with a set of athletic brothers—Edward became an Olympic wrestler—Willkie joined the football team but had little success; he enjoyed the debate team more, but was several times disciplined for arguing with teachers. He was class president his final year, and president of the most prominent fraternity, but resigned from the latter when a sorority blackballed his girlfriend, Gwyneth Harry, as the daughter of immigrants.[6]
During Willkie's summer vacations from high school, he worked, often far from home. In 1909, aged 17, his journey took him from Aberdeen, South Dakota, where he rose from dishwasher to co-owner of a flophouse, to Yellowstone National Park, where he was fired after losing control of the horses drawing a tourist stagecoach. Back in Elwood, Herman Willkie was representing striking workers at the local tin plate factory, and in August journeyed with Wendell to Chicago in an attempt to get liberal attorney Clarence Darrow to take over the representation. They found Darrow willing, but at too high a price for the union to meet; Darrow told Wendell Willkie, "there is nothing unethical in being adequately compensated for advocating a cause in which you deeply believe."[7]
After graduation from Elwood High in January 1910, Willkie enrolled at Indiana University in Bloomington.[8] There, he became a student rebel, chewing tobacco, reading Marx, and petitioning the faculty to add a course on socialism to the curriculum.[9] He also involved himself in campus politics, successfully managing the campaign of future Indiana governor Paul McNutt for student office, but when Willkie ran himself, he was defeated. He graduated in June 1913, and to earn money for law school, taught high school history in Coffeyville, Kansas, coaching debaters and several sports teams. In November 1914, he left his job there for one as a lab assistant in Puerto Rico arranged by his brother Fred. Wendell Willkie's commitment to social justice was deepened by the sight of workers suffering abuse there.[10]
Willkie enrolled at Indiana School of Law in late 1915. He was a top student, and graduated with high honors in 1916. At the commencement ceremony, with the state supreme court present, he gave a provocative speech criticizing his school. The faculty withheld his degree, but granted it after two days of intense debate.[11] Willkie joined his parents' law firm, but volunteered for the United States Army on April 2, 1917, the day President Woodrow Wilson asked Congress for a declaration of war against Germany. An army clerk transposed his first two names; with Willkie unwilling to invest the time to have the bureaucracy correct it, he kept his name as Wendell Lewis Willkie. Commissioned as a first lieutenant, Willkie was sent for artillery training. He arrived in France as the war was ending and did not see combat. In January 1918 he married Edith Wilk, a librarian from Rushville, Indiana; the couple had one son, Philip. In France, Willkie was assigned to defending soldiers who had slipped away for time in Paris against orders. He was recommended for promotion to captain, but was discharged in early 1919 before the paperwork went through.[2][12]
Lawyer and executive (1919–1939)[edit]
Akron attorney and activist[edit]
Discharged from the army, Willkie returned to Elwood. He considered a run for Congress as a Democrat, but was advised that the district was so Republican he would be unlikely to keep the seat even if he could win it, and his chances might be better in a more urban area. Herman Willkie wanted Wendell and Robert to rejoin the family law firm, but Henrietta was opposed, feeling that opportunities in Elwood were too limited for her sons. She got her way, and in May 1919 Wendell Willkie successfully applied for a job with the Firestone Tire and Rubber Company in Akron, Ohio as head of the legal office that advised workers on wills and other personal matters. He was soon bored there, and on the advice of his wife, left for a law firm despite an offer from Harvey Firestone to double his salary. Firestone told the departing lawyer that he would never amount to anything because he was a Democrat.[13]
Willkie became active in the Akron Democratic Party, becoming prominent enough while still with Firestone to introduce the Democratic presidential nominee, Ohio Governor James M. Cox, when he came to town during the 1920 campaign. He was a delegate to the 1924 Democratic National Convention, and supported New York Governor Al Smith through the record 103 ballots, when the nomination fell to former West Virginia congressman John W. Davis. More important to Willkie, though, was a fight against the Ku Klux Klan, which had become powerful in much of the nation and in the Democratic Party, but he and other delegates were unsuccessful in their attempt to include a plank in the party platform condemning the Klan. He also backed a proposed plank in support of the League of Nations that ultimately failed. In 1925, Willkie led a successful effort to oust Klan members on the Akron school board.[14]
After leaving Firestone in 1920, Willkie joined leading Akron law firm Mather & Nesbitt, which represented several local public utilities. Although he quickly gained a reputation as a leading trial lawyer, he was especially noted for presenting utility cases before the Ohio Public Utilities Commission. In 1925, he became president of the Akron Bar Association. One of Willkie's clients, Ohio Power & Light, was owned by New York-based Commonwealth & Southern Corporation (C&S), whose chairman, B.C. Cobb, noticed him. Cobb wrote to the senior partner of Willkie's firm, "I think he is a comer and we should keep an eye on him."[15] In 1929, Cobb offered Willkie a salary of $36,000 (equal to $638,791 today) to be corporate counsel to C&S, a job which would involve a move to New York, and Willkie accepted.[15]
Commonwealth & Southern executive[edit]
Wendell and Edith Willkie moved to New York in October 1929, only weeks before the Wall Street Crash of 1929, and found an apartment overlooking Central Park. Initially intimidated by the size and anonymity of the big city, Wendell Willkie soon learned to love it. He attended the Broadway theatre, and read through ten newspapers each day.[16] Willkie and his wife had little in common, and grew apart through the 1930s.[17] He acquired a social life, and met Irita Van Doren, the book review editor of the New York Herald Tribune who became a friend, and later his lover.[2] Cultured, brilliant and well connected, Van Doren introduced him to new books, new ideas, and new circles of friends. Unlike Van Doren, Willkie was indiscreet about their relationship, and their affair was well known to the reporters covering him during his 1940 presidential campaign. None of them printed a word.[18]
At C&S, Willkie rose rapidly under the eye of Cobb, impressing his superiors. Much of his work was outside New York City; Willkie was brought in to help try important cases or aid in the preparation of major legal briefs. Cobb, a pioneer in the electricity transmission business, had presided over the 1929 merger of 165 utilities that made C&S the largest electric utility holding company in the country. He promoted Willkie over 50 junior executives, designating the younger man as his successor. In January 1933, Willkie became president of C&S.[19]
Willkie maintained his interest in politics, and was a delegate to the 1932 Democratic National Convention. Since the incumbent Republican president, Herbert Hoover, was widely blamed for the Depression that had followed the stock market crash, the nominee would have a good chance of becoming president. The major candidates were Smith (the 1928 nominee), Smith's successor as New York's governor, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Speaker of the House John Nance Garner, and former Secretary of War Newton D. Baker. Willkie backed Baker, and was an assistant floor manager for his campaign. With a two-thirds majority needed to gain the Democratic presidential nomination, Willkie and others tried to deadlock the convention in the hope that it would turn to Baker. Roosevelt was willing to swing his votes to Baker in the event of a stalemate, but this did not occur, as Governor Roosevelt gained the nomination on the fourth ballot. Willkie, although disappointed, backed Roosevelt, and donated $150 to his successful campaign.[20]
TVA battle[edit]
Soon after taking office, President Roosevelt proposed legislation creating the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), a government agency with far-reaching influence that promised to bring flood control and cheap electricity to the impoverished Tennessee Valley. However, the TVA would compete with existing private power companies in the area, including C&S subsidiaries. Willkie appeared before the House Military Affairs Committee on April 14, 1933. He approved of the ideas for development of the Tennessee Valley, but felt that the government role should be limited to selling power generated by dams. Although the House of Representatives passed a bill limiting the TVA's powers, the Senate took the opposite stance, and the latter position prevailed.[21][22]
Negotiations took place through the remainder of 1933 for C&S to sell assets, including a transmission line, to allow the TVA to distribute energy to retail customers, leading to an agreement on January 4, 1934.[21] TVA head David Lilienthal was impressed by Willkie, who left him "somewhat overwhelmed" and "pretty badly scared".[23] C&S agreed to sell some of its properties in part of the Tennessee Valley, and the government agreed that the TVA would not compete with C&S in many areas. In October 1934, holders of securities issued by a C&S subsidiary filed suit to block the transfer. Willkie angrily denied that he had prompted the lawsuit, though plaintiffs' counsel proved later to have been paid by the Edison Electric Institute, of which Willkie was a board member. Willkie warned that New York capital might avoid Tennessee if the TVA experiment continued, and when Roosevelt gave a speech in praise of the agency, issued a statement rebutting him. By 1934, Willkie had become the spokesman for the private electric power industry.[24]
Amid this tension, Willkie and Roosevelt met for the first time, at the White House on December 13, 1934. The meeting was outwardly cordial, but each man told his own version of what occurred: the president boasted of having outtalked Willkie, while the executive sent a soon-to-be-famous telegram to his wife: "CHARM OVERRATED ... I DIDNT TELL HIM WHAT YOU THINK OF HIM"[24] Roosevelt decided that the utility holding companies had to be broken up, stated so in his 1935 State of the Union address and met with Willkie later in January to inform him of his intent.[25] In the meantime, the companies did their best to sabotage the TVA; farmers were told by corporate representatives that lines from the new Norris Dam could not carry enough power to make a light bulb glow, and the company ran "spite lines" that might not even carry power in an effort to invoke the non-compete agreement over broad areas.[26]
Through 1935, as the breakup legislation wound through Congress, and litigation through the courts, Willkie was the industry's chief spokesman and lobbyist. When the Senate narrowly passed a bill for the breakup, Willkie made a series of speeches asking the public to oppose the legislation, and a storm of letters to congressmen followed. After the House of Representatives defeated the breakup clause, investigation proved that many of these communications were funded by the electric companies, signed with names taken from the telephone book, though Willkie was not implicated. Amid public anger, Roosevelt pressured Congress to pass a bill requiring the breakup to take place within three years.[27]
In September 1936, Roosevelt and Willkie met again at the White House, and a truce followed as both sides waited to see if Roosevelt would be re-elected over the Republican, Kansas Governor Alf Landon. Willkie, who voted for Landon, expected a narrow victory for the Republican, but Roosevelt won an overwhelming landslide as Landon won only Maine and Vermont.[28] In December, a federal district court judge granted the C&S companies an injunction against the TVA, and negotiations broke off by Roosevelt's order as the litigation continued. Willkie took his case to the people, writing columns for major publications, and proposing terms for an agreement that The New York Times described as "sensible and realistic".[29] He received favorable press, and many invitations to speak.[30]
The January 1938 Supreme Court ruling in Alabama Power Co. v. Ickes, resolving the 1934 case, and the lifting of the injunction by an appeals court, sent the parties back to the negotiating table.[31] Willkie kept the public pressure on: like most corporate executives, he had not spoken out against Roosevelt's New Deal policies, but in January stated in a radio debate that anti-utility policies were depressing share prices, making it hard to attract investment that would help America to recover. "For several years now, we have been listening to a bedtime story, telling us that the men who hold office in Washington are, by their very positions, endowed with a special virtue."[32] The Saturday Evening Post dubbed Willkie "the man who talked back".[32]
Willkie and Lilienthal negotiated for a year, with Willkie wanting $88 million for C&S's properties in and around the Tennessee Valley, and the TVA offering $55 million. After a final, January 1939, legal defeat for C&S in the Supreme Court, the pace of the talks quickened, and on February 1, 1939, C&S sold the assets to the TVA for $78.6 million. Securities and Exchange Commission chairman William O. Douglas deemed Willkie to have outsmarted Lilienthal. Though defeated in the courts, Willkie had gained national stature for driving a hard bargain for his shareholders,[33] and was seen by some as a potential presidential candidate in 1940.[32]