In the meantime, the march of political events led us on to Election Day and victory. Woodrow Wilson was triumphantly elected President, with a Democratic Congress behind him. The political ambitions of some of his managers were gratified. McAdoo became Secretary of the Treasury; Daniels, Secretary of the Navy; Redfield, Secretary of Commerce; and Burleson, Postmaster-General. What my friends a few months earlier had called a hopeless cause was now a dazzling success.
In April, 1913, Senator O’Gorman telephoned me from Washington that he had been requested by the President to offer me the Ambassadorship to Turkey. I apparently astonished him when I told him please to thank the President for me, but that I would not accept. O’Gorman, whom I had known for many years, urged me to come to Washington to discuss the matter with him. He said that I had no right to refuse such a tender over the telephone. I complied with his request, and we discussed the matter one evening until well past midnight. O’Gorman used all his persuasive powers, and told me that it seemed strange that I, an entire newcomer in politics, without ever having rendered any other political service, should have the temerity to decline to be one of the President’s ten personal representatives, in the capacity of Ambassador at one of the important Courts of Europe. He told me that the President was very much disappointed at my decision; and urged me to see him personally, and explain to him my reasons for declining. He said he knew the President was very anxious to avail himself of my services, and thought it ill advised for me to refuse to obey what amounted to a command from the head of the Government. I called on the President, and he said:
“I want you to take the Embassy at Constantinople. I am convinced that the two posts that demand the greatest intellectual equipment in our representatives are Turkey and China. Therefore, I am particularly concerned to have, in these two countries, men upon whom I can absolutely rely for sound judgment and knowledge of human nature. This is the reason I am asking you to take the post at Constantinople.”
“If that is the situation,” I replied, “I should much prefer China, although it is only a ministership. And for this reason: the Jews of this country have become very sensitive (and I think properly so) over the impression which has been created by successive Jewish appointments to Turkey, that that is the only diplomatic post to which a Jew can aspire. All the Jews that I have consulted about your offer have advised and urged me to decline it. Oscar Straus has been criticized by some of his co-religionists for accepting a second and even a third appointment to Constantinople. I don’t mind criticism, but I share the feeling of the other Jews that it is unwise to confirm an impression that this is the only field for them in the diplomatic service.”