Dodd wrote a letter to Roosevelt that he deemed so sensitive he not only wrote it in longhand but also sent it first to his friend Colonel House, so that House could give it to the president in person. Dodd urged that Phillips be removed from his position as undersecretary and given a different sort of posting, perhaps as an ambassador somewhere. He suggested Paris and added that Phillips’s departure from Washington “would limit a little the favoritisms that prevail there.” He wrote, “Do not think I have any personal axe to grind or any personal grievances about anything. I hope”—hope—“it is
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