Personal & Confidential.
 
      
 
 
PARK LANE HOTEL
 
      PlCCADIILY
 
      LONDON, W.1
 
      
 
 
The President, 
 
      The White House,
 
      Washington, D.C.
 
      4th March 1938
 
      
 
 
Dear Chief,
 
      I have just come from the American Embassy, to put it more simply, 
      from Joe Kennedy. I know you will be glad to hear, though probably 
      you will have heard it before this, that J.K. has already made 
      a very good impression. These Britishers will hear, of course 
      in private, language from him to which their dainty ears are 
      not accustomed. He must have said some things to the godly Halifax 
      at their first meeting which that plaster saint of 1938 will 
      not speedily forget.
 
      
 
 
I write for two reasons, one, to tell you of the Joy which 
      is mine in common with most Americans, let us say, 65 rather 
      than 66 per cent. of 1936, in the day which marks the completion 
      of five great unforgettable years of your historic service to 
      our country. They have been war years, but you have been privileged 
      to be the nation's defender, defender of the dispossessed and 
      under-privileged. What higher distinction could any human achieve; 
      and in defending those who could not defend themselves save through 
      force, you have done most to save our democracy from the peril 
      which threatened in the two last Hoover years.
 
      
 
 
There is one thing more that I must add by way of postscript. 
      After Joe K. told me that he was the first Catholic to hold the 
      London Embassy post, I pointed to Choate's portrait and said: 
      "I suppose you know, J.K., that Choate was nastily anti-Irish 
      at times?" J.K's answer was: "I'll ring for the porter 
      and have the portrait removed at once". We both noted that 
      Choate was frowning at us, Joe for being an Irish ambassador, 
      and at me on general principles as Jew and Rabbi. But Joe is 
      going to give the earlier Joe a chance to hang on the wall if 
      he adapts himself