Her father indulged her, as fathers of daughters will. "I can either run the country, or I can attend to Alice," he famously said, "but I cannot possibly do both." In return, she fiercely protected his reputation, sometimes being mean about it. She so feared that Franklin D. Roosevelt's legacy would eclipse her father's that in 1940 she vowed that if she had the choice she would "vote for Hitler" instead of FDR. She took mean pleasure in the many scandals constantly popping up in the lives of FDR's children.
The marriage of Eleanor and FDR was not a happy one; they were "permissive parents" before psychologists coined the term. Their five children went through 19 marriages in a time when divorce still carried a stigma.
Both George W. Bush and Al Gore had fathers who wanted their sons to be president. Only one succeeded. Gore never seemed as at ease in politics as in campaigning for climate change, and after retiring from politics he got the life he probably always wanted, including a Nobel Prize (if not quite the massage he wanted). George W. is thought to have got the presidency his father wanted for his brother Jeb, who may still have time to get it some time after 2012 when George's legacy, like wine and cheese, improves with age.
Margaret Truman had one of the best relationships with a father who happened to be president. In her published letters from Harry, she wrote that she felt lucky "not so much to be daughter of the President of the United States than to have been his daughter." When Chelsea walks down the aisle on her father's arm, here's a wish for her wedding day that she feels that way, too.
Suzanne Fields is a columnist with The Washington Times. Write to her at: sfields1000@aol.com. To find out more about Suzanne Fields and read her past columns, visit the Creators Syndicate Web page at www.creators.com.
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