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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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helpful when it was convenient, but forgetting them when it wasn't convenient--in other words, doing something else besides promote the interests of labor. He said, “We used him.”

Now, I knew that Hillman hadn't “used” him in the beginning. I mean, Roosevelt had used him. The ideas had sprung from the Government, not from Hillman, the ideas of what to do. But Hillman had identified himself, you see, so that he didn't see the difference. Well, the old Devil had tempted him with the sin of pride, that's the point. And he lost his perspective, he lost his common sense, and he shocked me almost to death. I don't think he even realized that he was saying it to me, and that my first loyalty was to the President. I think he was so gone with this idea of himself as the boss of the labor movement of the world, and the labor movement of the world as the boss of everybody else in the world, that he was beside himself. And he expressed what must have been an inner disgust that he had been cherishing for some time toward the Roosevelts. He didn't like them because they wouldn't always do what he wanted them to do--and he had such big ideas, you know--terrific.

I'll never forget it. I said good-bye to him, but I was stunned. I wrote this all down, and I've got it somewheres upstairs. It's not among my papers. I wrote it down in black and white and put it in an envelope. I know where it is.

I though about it for some time--though about what I





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