My husband’s position was one of very great delicacy. By the nature of our national institutions it is not possible for us to send a representative to the Vatican in a diplomatic capacity no matter what the emergency may be, and Mr. Roosevelt in sending this Commission to Rome had no intention that its office should be construed into a formal recognition of the Vatican, which could not fail to raise a storm of protest and opposition in this country. So the instructions given to Mr. Taft by Secretary Root were made very definite on this point. After reviewing the necessity for taking such action on the part of our government and covering the favourable reports on the proposed negotiations submitted by the Philippine Committees of the House and Senate, the instructions began with paragraph one:
One of the controlling principles of our government is the complete separation of church and state, with the entire freedom of each from any control or interference by the other. This principle is imperative wherever American jurisdiction extends, and no modification or shading thereof can be a subject of discussion.
Following this in numbered paragraphs, a tentative plan for the adjustment of the Friar difficulties is outlined and the instructions end with paragraph nine:
Your errand will not be in any sense or degree diplomatic in its nature, but will be purely a business matter of negotiation by you as Governor of the Philippines for the purchase of property from the owners thereof, and the settlement of land titles in such a manner as to contribute to the best interests of the people of the Islands.
These instructions were easier to receive than to carry out, since from the beginning the Vatican made every possible effort to give the mission a diplomatic aspect and to cast upon it the glamour of great official solemnity, and Mr. Taft had constantly to keep his mind alert to the danger of accidental acquiescence in a misinterpretation of his position. To take a position which would soothe the feelings of American Catholics and yet not shock the conscience of any Protestant was something like being ground between the proverbial millstones. However, Cardinal Rampolla very graciously met the businesslike ideas of the Commission and arranged a private audience with Pope Leo at which the propositions of the Philippine government were to be outlined to him.
My husband’s memory of this now historic mission to Rome seems to include little which was not directly connected with the business in hand, but Judge Smith displays a more impressionable bent. In answer to an inquiry as to what he recalls of the visit he wrote Mr. Taft a most interesting letter. All his memoranda of the trip, including letters, journals and souvenirs, were destroyed in the San Francisco fire, but he says:
“After our arrival there was a long wait that arrangements might be made for an audience with the Holy Father, but finally the date was fixed and the Commission, at high noon, in evening dress and top hats, went to the Vatican and passed up the long staircase, lined with Swiss Guards, which leads to the State apartments. We were received by the Chamberlain and several other functionaries and were conducted from one apartment to another until finally we were ushered into the presence of Leo XIII, to whom you made a statement of the matters which were to be made the subject of negotiation.
“This statement had been previously translated into French by Bishop O’Gorman and Colonel Porter, and you will remember there were some things about Bishop O’Gorman’s French which did not meet with the entire approval of Colonel Porter. Whether you arbitrated the matter and selected the appropriate phrase which should have been used I do not know, but I do know that at one time there was danger of the severance of the friendly relations which had theretofore prevailed between the good Bishop and the good old Colonel.
“My recollection of the Holy Father is that his face was like transparent parchment, that he had the brilliant eyes of a young man and that he was wonderfully alert of mind, although bent over by the weight of years.
“Of course, none of us could forget Cardinal Rampolla—tall, slender, straight, vigorous in both mind and body, impenetrable, and cold as fate. A man evidently of wonderful intellect and fully equal to any demands that might be put upon him as the diplomat of the Vatican.”
I might add that the first part of my husband’s speech, a copy of which I have, consisted of a few remarks appropriate to the presentation of a gift from President Roosevelt to the Pope. This gift was a specially bound set of Mr. Roosevelt’s own works.
When the formal interview was at an end the Pope came down from the dais on which he sat and indulged in a fifteen or twenty minute personal conversation with the members of the Commission. “He asked for the pleasure of shaking my hand,” writes my husband to his brother Charles, in the usual vein of humour which obtains between them, adding, “a privilege which I very graciously accorded him.” He also joked about Mr. Taft’s proportions, saying that he had understood he had been very ill, but from observation he saw no reason to suppose that the illness had been serious. He poked gentle fun at Bishop O’Gorman and made kindly inquiries of Judge Smith and Major Porter; then he walked with the party to the door and bowed them out, a courtesy which I believe was unprecedented.
“He had a great deal more vigour of motion,” writes Mr. Taft, “and a great deal more resonance of voice than I had been led to
