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April 16, 1913, Glass Collection, Box 15/16; enclosed with this letter is one from R. C. Williken advising Untermyer that Glass “has done everything he could to discredit the great and important work performed by you [Untermyer] on the ‘Money Trust’ committee.” Untermyer, of course, had been trying to poach on Glass’s turf for nearly a year. For Owen and Untermyer, see Untermyer’s self-published
Who Is Entitled to the Credit for the Federal Reserve Act? An Answer to Senator Carter Glass
(New York, 1927), 10, reproducing a letter from Owen to Untermyer of May 14, 1927, which states: “At your home you made various engagements for me to meet severally Frank A. Vanderlip, A. Barton Hepburn, Paul Warburg and others whose intimate views I desired in framing the Federal Reserve Act.” See also Vanderlip to Robert Owen, May 31, 1913, Vanderlip Papers, Box 1-5. Warburg and Owen corresponded numerous times, but not until that fall.
    Owen reached out: A. Piatt Andrew,
Diary of Abram Piatt Andrew, 1902–1914,
ed. E. Parker Hayden Jr. and Andrew L. Gray (Princeton, N.J., 1986)
,
entries for May 19 through May 23, and also May 30.
    a loosely worded version: Willis,
The Federal Reserve System,
240.
    Untermyer invited Bryan to lunch: Untermyer,
Who Is Entitled to the Credit for the Federal Reserve Act?
12, 15.
    “waking up to the fact that the proposed bill”: House diary entry of May 11, 1913, Arthur S. Link, ed.,
The Papers of Woodrow Wilson
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1966–1989), 27:413.
    “I saw Primus”: House to Wilson, May 15, 1913, in ibid., 436. See also Willis,
The Federal Reserve System,
245.
    Instead, the assignment went to McAdoo: Broesamle,
William Gibbs McAdoo,
78, 97.
    Convinced that the Glass bill: Willis,
The Federal Reserve System,
194–95.
    “We run against so much”: McAdoo to House, May 20, 1913, House Papers, Box 73.
    The essence of the McAdoo plan: Willis,
The Federal Reserve System,
206; Richard T. McCulley,
Banks and Politics During the Progressive Era: The Origins of the Federal Reserve System, 1897–1913
(New York: Garland, 1992), 295; and Broesamle,
William Gibbs McAdoo
,
101.
    It is not certain who drafted: According to Broesamle,
William Gibbs McAdoo,
80, Williams harbored a “pathological” dislike of Wall Street. On Williams’s role, see also ibid., 104, and Willis,
The Federal Reserve System,
194–95.
    “along the lines suggested”: House to Wilson, May 20, 1913, in
The Papers of Woodrow Wilson,
27:458. A copy of this letter can also be found in Glass Collection, Box 14.
    “Pythias [McAdoo] or Owen could get him”: House to Wilson, May 20, 1913. Years later, in response to then Senator Glass’s published account of this affair, Untermyer denied any involvement, tartly adding, “Glass is either dreaming or senile” (Samuel Untermyer to Robert Owen, May 10, 1927, Glass Collection, Box 24). It is possible the idea for Untermyer to sneak into the White House—never acted upon—was House’s alone. However, Untermyer’s broader denial of any role in McAdoo’s plan does not stand up. House’s May 20 letter to Wilson, written the day after he had spoken to Untermyer, was replete with specifics (“Untermyer tells me that some of the bankers here would approve,” etc.). Also, Untermyer had been working to bring Owen together with bankers, and it is consistent with such efforts that he would have assisted in trying to hatch a compromise between them.
    RMS
Mauretania
: Warburg,
The Federal Reserve System,
1:97–98.
    “Are you serious?”: Glass,
An Adventure in Constructive Finance,
100–101; and William Gibbs McAdoo,
Crowded Years: The Reminiscences of William G. McAdoo
(Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1931), 243–44.
    “I could see clearly that”: McAdoo,
Crowded Years,
222.
    Glass recounted that he was “astounded”: “Glass,
An Adventure in Constructive Finance,
101. For collecting negative reactions, see Willis to Carter Glass, June 5, 1913, Willis