Louis McHenry Howe was a political mentor and secretary to Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Background
Howe was born in 1871 in Indianapolis, Indiana, to wealthy parents, Eliza and Edward P. Howe. He came of old New England stock. His father, who had been a captain in the Union Army, was adjutant-general of Indiana. His mother, who had two grown daughters by a previous marriage, brought up Howe as an only child. When he was seven, the family moved to Saratoga Springs, N. Y. , where his father became editor of the Saratoga Sun and a local Democratic leader and ran a thriving printing business.
Education
Throughout his life Howe worked against the handicap of chronic ill health. It prevented him from entering Yale, after his preparatory course at the Yates Saratoga Institute.
Career
Howe at seventeen became assistant editor. His two keen interests were interviewing leading politicians and directing amateur theatricals.
Until he was forty there was little notable about him – from 1907 on he was Albany correspondent for the New York Telegram. Then, in January 1911, he met Franklin Roosevelt, who was just twenty-nine and making a spectacular debut in the New York state senate. Roosevelt, tall, handsome, and dynamic, was outwardly the antithesis of Howe, but almost immediately they formed a partnership. Howe wrote publicity for Roosevelt, taught him practical politics, and shared his vaulting ambition.
In 1912, while Roosevelt was in bed with typhoid fever, Howe ran a campaign which won him reelection to the legislature and addressed him only half-facetiously as "Beloved and Revered Future President. " When Roosevelt went to Washington in March 1913 to become Assistant Secretary of the Navy in the Wilson administration, he brought Howe with him as his secretary. For the rest of his life, Howe served as Roosevelt's alter ego, working ceaselessly and resourcefully to further Roosevelt's political fortunes.
It was Howe who, with Eleanor Roosevelt, insisted that Roosevelt stay in politics after he was stricken with polio in August 1921. This was at a time when Roosevelt seemed doomed to live out his life as a retired invalid at Hyde Park. Howe managed to keep Roosevelt's interest in politics alive, engaged in ceaseless correspondence on Roosevelt's behalf, and trained Eleanor Roosevelt to be an effective campaigner. Of all Howe's services to Roosevelt, this undoubtedly was the greatest.
During the years when Roosevelt was governor of New York, from 1928 through 1932, Howe, working behind the scenes in New York City, ran an effective letter-writing organization, gauged public opinion, and helped to devise campaign strategy. With Roosevelt's election as president, he became White House Secretary and a public figure in his own right. He continued to be an important adviser until he became critically ill in 1935.
Howe died in Washington after an illness of more than a year caused by heart and chest complications. He was buried in Fall River, Massachussets.
Achievements
Personality
From early childhood he suffered from a serious heart murmur, asthma, and occasional bronchitis. He was short, thin, and ungainly; a spill from a bicycle had left his face pitted with small, dark scars. Almost out of defiance he matched his visage with untidy clothes and a sharp tongue. This masked a brilliant grasp of politics and a driving ambition for goals which his appearance seemed likely to deny him.
Quotes from others about the person
Eleanor Roosevelt has written of him, "There has seldom been a story of greater devotion to another man's success [but] this was not due to any lack of ambition. . He loved power, but he also recognized realities and he decided he would exercise more power through someone else . " (Stiles, post, p. vii).
Connections
In 1898 he married Grace Hartley of Fall River, Massachussets; they had two children, Mary and Hartley Edward.