Ask the Scholar

{
    "localId": "76837815",
    "label": "Introduction to Mr. President by William Hillman and Alfred Wagg",
    "core": "doc",
    "dtoType": "document",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/76837815"
}

{
    "id": "76837815",
    "sourceUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/76837815",
    "contentType": "document",
    "title": "Introduction to Mr. President by William Hillman and Alfred Wagg",
    "citationUrl": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/76837815",
    "collections": [
        "President's Secretary's Files (Truman Administration)",
        "Longhand Notes Files"
    ],
    "subjects": [
        "Johnson, Andrew, 1808-1875"
    ],
    "iiifBase": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/truman/201518/735352-01-01.jpg",
    "thumbnailUrl": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/truman/201518/735352-01-01.jpg",
    "largeImageUrl": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/truman/201518/735352-01-01.jpg",
    "imageCount": 5,
    "hasImages": true,
    "source": "import",
    "hasTranscription": false
}

{
    "url": "https://catalog.archives.gov/id/76837815",
    "naId": 76837815,
    "levelOfDescription": "item",
    "productionDates": [
        {
            "logicalDate": "1952-01-01",
            "year": 1952
        }
    ],
    "recordType": "description",
    "ocrSource": "nara-archive"
}

{
    "seq": 5,
    "pageIndex": 0,
    "type": "document",
    "url": "https://s3.amazonaws.com/NARAprodstorage/lz/presidential-libraries/truman/201518/735352-01.pdf",
    "mediaId": "5eea74ec628a209f",
    "ocrText": "M\nИЛИТНИ MALLIUM\non\nDDAW СЕЛЯТА\nto\nand\nwill\nben\nLadies and gentlemen,\nthe\nTrue\non\nThe President\nof\nof The United States\nto\nMr. President\nby WILLIAM HILLMAN\nwith exclusive photographs, 62 in color\nby ALFRED WAGG\nPRESIDENT TRUMAN said to me: \"I want the people to know the\nPresidency as I have experienced it and I want them to know me\nas I am.\"\nThis is the idea and the theme of this book.\nI am a reporter.\nThis book began when Mr. Truman granted me a series of\nspecial interviews during which he discussed the basic policies of\nhis administration against the background of his surprising and\nreflective knowledge of American and world history. As Mr. Tru-\nman answered my questions, a book of extraordinary significance\nemerged. The President made available to me all his diaries, his\nprivate papers and correspondence. With characteristic candor\nand directness, the President spoke out as no President ever has\nwhile in office.\nHistory makes its judgments looking backward. Mistakes are\ncorrected at leisure-retrospectively. Men and events that still en-\ndure in memory frequently look different to different generations.\nThe advent of communication with the speed of light, and the\nfierce insecurity of man, swiftly growing with his expanding knowl-\nedge, have generated a new force of spontaneous world opinion.\nThis force makes its own history: on the run, propelled by\npassions quickly touched and propaganda intruding as facts. Judg-\nments are swift in the making and actions are quick to follow and\ntoo often the facts are slow to catch up. This new force of spon-\ntaneous world opinion has an enormous influence on the function\nand the leverage of the Presidency of the United States.\nNever in history has any man been assigned the responsibilities\nthe President has today.\nPresent-day human needs and still ancient human wants and\nambitions, wherever men are, seem to be reaching out for attention\nby one man-whatever his constitutional limitations may be or\nhowever constructed he is in mind and spirit. There is no parallel\nfor the world's intrusion today on the man in the White House.\nHence, a close-up view of the President in action may prove useful\nto contemporary society. Since we are living in a kind of world\nwhere there is no precedent or parallel for some vital things, we\ncannot defer to the leisure of retrospective history what ought to\nbe told now-even if only in part.\nA world facing a perilous hour and even extinction would think\nit folly to allow academic or political considerations to defer unveil-\ning the President while he is in office. Certainly the people of this\ncountry should welcome disclosure of a man they rarely meet-\nfor that in effect is what most of the presidents of the United\nStates have been to the American people. The man he would meet\n-while he is still in the White House-is what every American\nwould like to know. The man as he really is is what every Amer-\nican would meet if he were able personally to call on the President\nin the White House and spend some time discussing the State of\nthe Union and the State of the World.\nNo one understands this better than President Truman. That is\nwhy he is allowing me the unprecedented privilege of extracting\nsome notes from his diary and his memoranda, while he is still\nin the White House.\nThe history of President Truman's administration and the final\nstory of President Truman has yet to be written: first, because he\nis still in the White House, and second, because documents and\nmaterials affecting security and persons must for a time remain\nundisclosed and cannot be used. But the President, who hopes that\nhistory will remember him as a man of peace and who takes\nhumble pride in being called by some of his friends \"Mr. De-\nmocracy,\" has foregone personal consideration and even political\nconsequences in permitting me to quote him directly about the\nbasic aims of his administration; and especially to reveal his un-\nrehearsed private thoughts as he set them down from time to time\neither in his diaries or his personal longhand written notes. The\nPresident tells me he has no intention of writing a book about\nhimself, although he hopes that when he leaves the White House\nhe may lecture on the problems of government under the general\ntitle of \"From Precinct Worker to President.\"\nThe President thought it best to limit the selection of any ma-\nterial from his diaries up to the end of 1949-in order to meet any\ncharge that the writer had biased his material and had been\nmerely selective. This action partially provides the safety of not\npublishing anything so contemporaneous as to be damaging to any-\none domestic or foreign. It leaves interesting and vital historic data\nfor publication at a more propitious time. However, in order to\nprovide more comprehensive perspective in the presentation of\nthe conduct of the President and the Presidency, it has been neces-\nsary to supplement the diary with direct exposition of his views\non major events and his thinking, covering the period from the\nend of 1949 to date, as well as from April 12, 1945, when he be-\ncame President, in those instances when it was not deemed proper\nto quote either from the diaries or memoranda.\nThe reading of the complete diaries and personal notes reveals\na man sure of his purpose and so sure in his knowledge of history,\nthat he stands steadfast in the fierce stream of events today, sure-\nfooted and with a deep sense of his responsibilities, acting with\ndeliberation, often prophetic in his judgments.\nThis then is a book about and of President Truman in the\nWhite House. It is a book about the President as a person; a man\nof surprising knowledge and range of interests; of simple tastes\nand strong convictions and opinions and old-fashioned sentiments\nand forward-looking social liberalism; about his almost slavelike\ndevotion to duty and hard work; about his loneliness, a loneliness\nthat is the fate of all presidents.\nFor a President walks pretty much alone-and never more so\nthan when he is openly facing the crowd or dealing with the\ntangled problems of the country. He is most dramatic as he moves\nfrom decisions that shape the destiny of men around the world to\nthe trivialities that are an essential part of everyday life in the\nroutine of a President.\nDeeply conscious of the spontaneous world opinion that makes\nits own history today President Truman, thumbing through some\nhistory books like the professor he hopes to be some day, told me:\n\"You know, if Andrew Johnson, for example, had not given special\ninterviews to a number of different newspaper correspondents,\nvoicing his views on problems confronting him, a good deal of\nimportant historic material of the Presidency of Andrew Johnson\nmight not have been unearthed or even known.\n\"I hope, in making some things plain to you at this time,\nespecially in what I might say affects me as a person, apart from\nthe role of the President-which is all spread out on the official\nrecord-that perhaps the American people and the people of the\nworld will understand a little better what I am trying to do and\nhistorians will have additional authentic data to what is disclosed\nby the archives. The notes you have seen were never intended for\npublication and are written in simple words and are therefore not\npolished up. I hope they will serve the purpose of clarifying some\nthings, just as they helped me to clarify my thinking as I wrote\nthem.\"\nI want to make one thing clear. The President himself had for-\ngotten many of the handwritten memoranda which I found among\nhis papers, turned over to me by his private secretary. Where they\nwere used he requested that they be not changed nor edited in\nany way.\nWILLIAM HILLMAN"
}