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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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capable man, but not the thinker that Henry Stimson was. He was not a quiet calm person. He was a man of action. I haven't any idea how good an administrator he was of Navy, but I take it it was all right. Everybody seems to have thought well of him. I think he let the high command of the Navy sort of run it themselves, He kept in touch and kept in touch with the President. But, of course, the President was given to being Secretary of the Navy himself. Garner said to me once, long before this, “I've observed that the President runs a good deal of this government himself. He runs the State Department. He runs the War Department. He runs the Navy Department. He runs the Treasury Department. I don't know what the Attorney General ever gives him that he doesn't give the Attorney General first. I don't think he pays any attention to commerce. I guess Farley runs the Post Office Department. I observe that you and Wallace always run your departments. The president doesn't tell you what to do. He certainly doesn't do it in ay way I can see.”

I said, “No, I always ask him. I never do anything extraordinary without asking.”

“But you always run your department, don't you?”

I said, “Well, I never noticed any interference by the President.”





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