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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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Part:         Session:         Page of 912

Perkins:

Well, there was some time when the Yalta situation was discussed in Cabinet meeting. Now, I can't by any means state the date, but sometime after their return, it was discussed in Cabinet meeting, and the President said, among other things, “They've proved to be quite satisfied with the free port idea.” And we talked about the completion of the war in the East, which was then moving on very rapidly, you see. The Russians were driving the Germans baclk all the time, you know. He spoke of that, and said we had commitments from them of continuation of the war. And at this time Jimmy Byrnes broke in a and said, “Mr. President, I don't think it was quite like that.”

I remember this because I kind of shrank up inside as I realized that the President was telling us what he wanted us to know, and what it was good for us to know, and that whatever Jimmy Byrnes was saying was in contradiction of the President --was not what the President's story was meant to be at that moment.

In other words, he had to deal with his Cabinet with a view to the fact that some of them would leak.

Q:

He had too much of a Cabinet at that time.

Perkins:

Yes. Well, this was not the big Cabinet. This was the little Cabinet, but Byrnes came to it, you see, and he had to deal with it. I'm not sure that wasn't the big Cabinet --I guess it was.





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