NEW YORK, Wednesday—Our day in Chicago had one very agreeable feature—we drove out to luncheon with Mrs. Bertram J. Cahn. While a number of people came in to see me after lunch I still had plenty of time to rest before dinner and the evening meeting. The flight to New York brought us in very early Wednesday morning and I have plenty of work before me today.

It seems to me that what lies behind the whole filibuster episode in the Senate is the whole question of whether the President can carry through the promises made in his campaign and which brought him his victory.

It is logical to suppose that the people of the country were in favor of his program. The hope of the reactionaries must be that if the people do not get what they want from this Administration they will not realize that the responsibility lies in Congress and will blame the Administration. Thus, according to this reasoning, they would vote for a change. This seems to be strange reasoning, but that is the only way to explain the present behavior of the reactionaries in Congress!

I think the electorate in the United States is too well educated today, however, to make this mistake. The people have learned to fight those who oppose their will by using their vote and they now have leaders from various organizations which reach different groups of people who can make clear to them what the present action really means. Therefore, the hopes of the reactionaries are not as well founded as they might have been several years ago.

When the press and the photographers came in to see me in Chicago, one of the reporters announced that my son, Franklin, Jr., was about to run for Congress, for the seat left vacant by the death of Representative Sol Bloom. I was a little appalled by this announcement, but it was confirmed when I reached here and learned that Franklin will run if he is designated.

I felt very sad when we lost Sol Bloom, who brought not only real ability but real heart to his service as a statesman. His tradition will be a good one to follow but not easy for anyone to live up to.

In Chicago I was also informed that I would be a great-grandmother next August.

This is really quite exciting, but I can well remember when my husband's mother first became a great-grandmother. She always had looked upon our children as her own children. I think she always felt they were really her grandchildren only in name!

My children, of course, have never lived with me as long or as intimately as we did with my mother-in-law. Anna and her children have been with us at different times for long enough periods so that I can understand the way my mother-in-law felt, however, and I am quite sure that I will have as great an interest in this great-grandchild as I have always felt in my grandchildren.