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The second pattern is more certainly the explanation of his rise. The fact that he was a social worker is overrated; by far the most important function of his jobs has always been to bring people together. He did this as head of a city charity, of a large private charity (where he first met the rich and important people who helped him on his way up), and it is one of his principal functions now. It was he whom the President first sent to meet Churchill and Stalin, and he who first suggested the Atlantic Charter meetings where Churchill and Roosevelt met for the first time. He has always been a broker in people—in short, a politician.
One current popular view of Hopkins is that he is a onetime social worker and youthful dabbler in Socialist ideas who has now turned conservative. Business Week, which knows a conservative when it sees one, recently praised him as "one who began kicking New Dealers in the teeth long before Roosevelt did."
But the stories of Hopkins' new conservatism stem mostly from old New Dealers who have found him unwilling to use his influence now for their pet projects; e.g., Hopkins thinks such agencies as the Rural Electrification Administration and the Farm Security Administration have no claim on any money or strategic material while the war is on. The war, he has told his old friends, is everything. But the cheers from conservatives may again turn to jeers.
The Warrior. The present phase of Harry Hopkins' career began one day in May 1940, when he was sick abed at his home in Georgetown. He was a lonely man. He was still Secretary of Commerce, but he was not working at the job. To visitors he explained that he was through with Washington, that he would probably edit a magazine. Then there was a call from the White House inviting him to dinner. He rose from his sick bed, went to dinner, was asked to spend the night. He did not leave the White House for three and a half years.
The Lowlands had just been invaded, and the President's eyes were on Europe. But Hopkins' first major chore was to devise and stage the Third Term Democratic Convention in Chicago. Hopkins himself is now somewhat dubious of the quality of his tactics there, but he got the result the boys wanted: Franklin Roosevelt was nominated and elected. Immediately after election, the President took Hopkins along on a Caribbean cruise. The U.S. had already helped Britain—notably by the destroyer deal. But the outlines of bigger and bolder help were in the wind. Lend-Lease was mapped out before Franklin Roosevelt got back to Washington. He had also decided to send Hopkins to London.
Hopkins spent six weeks in England, two-thirds of the time as Winston Churchill's guest. While he was planning aid-to-Britain in the quiet recesses of Chequers, Wendell Willkie arrived to acquaint himself (and the U.S. public) with the plight of the British. When Hopkins returned to the U.S., the Lend-Lease Act was ready for passage, and he was made administrator. The constant tone of his cables had been: Britain will hold.