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asked him what kind of a day he had had, and he said, “Oh, Cordell Hull has just left. He's a very dreary fellow. He says the outlook is bad for both Japan and Russia.” But he said it lightly, but at the same time as if he could stand no more bad news.

Mayor LaGuardia at dinner seemed like a small boy on his good behavior and didn't say much. The President talked vivaciously about various people in a gay and almost gossipy way. He discussed Roy Howard as a celebrity hunter; Ray Moley was shrugged away; and he talked about the Marshall Field paper about to start in Chicago. He said he had spoken to Mayor Kelly to see that it didn't get any gangster treatment at the newsstands.

Mrs. Roosevelt said that I had had some success that day in getting the Public Health Service to take a more open-minded attitude about birth control that afternoon. The President said that it was a political hot potato, that he'd never done much about it except in Puerto Rico. “There a few years ago,” he said, “I asked the Bishop what we were going to do about the population situation. The Bishop said, ‘Well, if you mean birth control, we can't do anything about that.’ So, I said, ‘Oh, I don't mean that, I mean let's call it adult sex hygiene or education,’ so the Bishop said, ‘I think that would be all right.’ After that,” the President said, “we got a law changed and started to try to get somewhere on this situation.”

A lot then does depend upon names.