The first word I received that the President contemplated addressing Congress, asking for the repeal of Panama Tolls, came about in this way: I was notified after dinner one evening that the President wished to confer with me in his study. When I arrived at the White House Mrs. Wilson met me and informed me of the plan which the President had in mind with reference to this matter and of his decision to issue a statement that night which would be carried in the newspapers the following morning, and of his determination to address Congress, asking for a repeal of the Panama Tolls. Mrs. Wilson showed considerable excitement over the President's proposed step when she discussed the matter with me as I arrived at the White House. She said she had argued with the President and had tried to persuade him that if he intended to do so unusual a thing that now was the inopportune moment for it for the reason that it would create a party crisis and probably a split, the result of which we could not foresee. When I went into the President's study, he read me the announcement he had prepared for the papers. The full significance and the possible danger which lay in the proposed move that the President was about to make struck me at once. Frankly I put the whole political situation in the country before him as it would be affected by his attitude in this matter, saying to him that the stand he was about to take would irritate large blocks of Irish, Germans, and other anti-British elements in the country, and that we might expect that the leaders in our own party, the heads of the various committees, like Fitzgerald of Appropriations, Underwood of the Ways and Means, and Clark, the Speaker of the House, would be found in solid opposition, and that, at a time when we needed every bit of strength to put our party programme of domestic legislation into effect, it seemed to me unwise to inject this matter, which could only be a disturbing element, into our party's councils. In discussing the matter with me, after I had presented the objections to it, which I did with great feeling and probably some irritation, he said: "I knew the view you would take of it, but, unfortunately, every argument you lay before me in opposition to the programme I have outlined in this statement is purely a partisan one and one whose value I cannot recognize at this time. I must not count the effect of a move of this kind upon my own personal political fortunes. I am the trustee of the people and I am bound to take cognizance of the fact that by reason of our attitude on Panama Tolls our treaties are discredited in every chancellery of Europe, where we are looked upon as a nation that does not live up to its plighted word. We may have made a very bad bargain with England on Panama Tolls, but it will be all the more credit to us if we stand by an agreement even when it entails a sacrifice on our part. The men who were parties to this treaty, like Joseph Choate,