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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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as a result of political pressure to give him a job, but I'm pretty sure that those who picked him thought he had some political significance. Yet, he told me the other day, with his own mouth, that he had never had anything to do with Indiana politics, although I know and have been told that he was a state senator and in politics all the way. I said, “You can go back and catch on to Indiana politics. You'll have some fun.” Yet, he said he knew nothing about Indiana politics. Of course, Indiana politics have changed in the last ten years or more and he may be out of touch now.

I remember the President saying at that Cabinet meeting, “That's true, Claude knows about that.”

I remember saying to myself, “The President apparently is acquainted with this man,” whom I only knew a little.

I'm pretty sure that he came to one or two Cabinet meetings as Wallace's substitute before he was made secretary. I certainly knew him then. I know that when I met him in the Cabinet he was not a stranger to me. I know that he was an acquaintance. However, I don't recall seeing him enough in earlier days to have any very vigorous impression of him, but certainly by the time he was under secretary he was a much more





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