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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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Part:         Session:         Page of 912

Perkins:

Well, I don't know what Roosevelt thought of Lewis, until they came to their head-ons. He was inclined to like Lewis, certainly. At the beginning of the Administration, there was no reason why you shouldn't. Lewis was intelligent. He could be very affable, and he was very polite. He had a man of the world's manners. He could talk about more than one subject. He expressed himself very well--a little flamboyantly at times, but still very well. He was a little stiff, a little elegant, but it was all acceptable. And he was very flattering. He could be very, very flattering, and he was very flattering to the President when he began to meet him. I don't think the President ever saw Lewis until coming on the '35 or '36.

You see, Lewis began to get into public significance when he took part in the N.R.A.

Interviewer:

I was thinking more in terms of the war years.

Perkins:

Oh well, by that time the die was cast.

Interviewer:

First Lewis ran out on him in 1940.

Perkins:

I don't know whether he ran out on him. It would have been great for him to support him. It was a great surprise when Jim Farley got some money out of John L. Lewis for the 1936 campaign. It was a great astonishment. Jim never asked the President if he should do so, or asked





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