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Battle of the National Hotel. Waving away the presidency, Batista put the students' idol, Professor Ramón Grau San Martin, at the head of the government. But the sergeant upped himself to colonel and chief of staff, and fired almost the entire army officers' corps. The ousted officers holed up in the National Hotel. Batista sent soldiers to disarm them. Welles, who lived at the hotel, stopped that showdown by seating himself midway between the rival forces in the long lobby and imperturbably discussing Emily Dickinson's poetry with Adviser Adolf Berle until the soldiers withdrew. But 25 days later, fighting broke out at the hotel. After Batista's soldiers had lobbed 200 shells into the building, the officers surrendered. Batista, then only 32, was master of Cuba.
Back in Washington as Assistant Secretary of State, Welles arranged for U.S. recognition, a quota for Cuba in the U.S. sugar market, and abrogation of the odious Platt Amendment, which gave the U.S. the right to intervene to keep order in Cuba. Though Batista had endless trouble finding the right President (he tried out seven in seven years, and finally took over the job himself), order and prosperity gradually returned to the island.
Down with Dynasties. With prosperity, a new decorum settled on Batista. His table manners improved, he got a tailor and a manicurist, acquired millionaire friends and some notions of good taste. Visiting Washington in 1938, he found out that his official host, Chief of Staff General Malin Craig, usually wore just two decorations. Tossing his own beribboned tunic to an aide, he roared: "Rip off all but the two top rows."
When he called on President Roosevelt a few days later, he confided that he was getting up a new constitution and asked F.D.R.'s opinion on whether Presidents should succeed themselves. F.D.R. solemnly assured him that they should not, and what is more, should not even succeed their successors. It's the only way, said F.D.R., to prevent dynasties. Batista was much impressed. He wrote a non-succession provision into his constitution. So after finishing his own four-year term in 1944, he could not lawfully stand again for the presidency till this year.
Off to Florida. In 1944, democracy was on the march in all the main theaters of war, and dictators were out of season. In that winy atmosphere, Batista tried something brand-new in Latin American dictator politics: he ran off a free and fair election. His man was soundly beaten. This was annoying, but there was nothing to do but graciously turn the presidency over to the winner, his old colleague Grau San Martin, and get out. Besides, staying in Havana at the time would have been asking for a Tommy-gun clip in the back.
The ex-Strong Man departed for Florida and applied himself to setting his personal affairs in order, notably arranging to divorce his first wife, Elise, and marry again. Money was no problem. Eleven years of managing payrolls, contracts, the national lottery, sugar quotas and other traditional means of political enrichment had made him enormously wealthy. Havana insiders estimate his fortune at $50 million, and credit him with one of the handsomest gestures ever made by an active, vigorous man who wanted a younger and prettier mate: he reportedly gave Elise a twelve-story apartment house, other valuable property and $8,000,000 in cash.