History of John Smith Griffin
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Wartime Washington - 1945

I called Dorothy and told her about the offer. She thought I should take it and so did I, and I told Bucy I would. He said that the big boss, "Bob" Shields, in Washington, was favorable and he was sure that the job was mine. I stayed over until the following Thursday to finish up the interviews with our witnesses and Bucy went back to Washington.

When I returned on Thursday, the first thing I did was to go into Bucy's office to find out the details of my new assignment. I was in for a shock and my first real lesson in human behavior. Bucy asked me to sit down. He said that somehow the word that I was being considered for the job as Division Chief had leaked out and that others who wanted the job were putting a lot of pressure on Shields. He said that my friend Jay Knudson had gone to Shields and told him that if I were appointed, he would go to some congressman and complain that new, unexperienced men were being placed in charge of the Division and ask for a Congressional Investigation of the Office. I would have become Jay's boss, and I can see now how intolerable a position that would have placed him in. Knudson sorely desired the job himself and had told me on more than one occasion that he had been promised the job as soon as a vacancy occurred.

And so I was informed that no decision had been made and would not be made for a few weeks. Not weeks, but a month or so passed and finally Shields brought in a man from St. Louis who was employed in the Rural Electrification Administration and who knew nothing about the work or the intrigues that were going on in Washington. He was made Division Chief and remains in this position at the present time (13 years later).

In the meantime the hearing date in the General Foods case was fast approaching. Bucy told me one afternoon that because of his new assignment he would not be able to carry the load in the General Foods case and that it would be my responsibility. He said that I could select any attorney in the Division to work with me and that he would help some, but that the case was "my baby". This was again quite a shock. General Foods were represented by one of the most prominent law firms in Chicago. One of the brokers was represented by an attorney from Chicago named Lee Freeman. Freeman was and still is a ruthless attorney with no scruples and no consideration for anyone. His only objective was to win his case. Other brokers were represented by another Chicago firm and by a Washington firm. I certainly didn't feel capable of handling this case against such impressive opposition. I selected Ben Melnicoff, a very bright Russian Jew to help me, but regretted my selection almost as soon as I had made it. Ben had to run the show and when I made it plain to him that he was to help me, not me him, he was unhappy and was more of a hindrance than a help to me.

Hearings in this case lasted off and on over a period of about six months. While the hearings were going on, I received a letter from Wayne Knight, with whom I had served as a missionary in France, and with whom I had gone through law school, telling me that he was regional counsel for the Alien Property Custodian at San Francisco, and that he had received an offer from a good law firm in Los Angeles, that he intended to resign as Regional Attorney and wanted to know whether I was interested in the job, knowing that I wanted to get back to California. He assured me that if I were interested he felt sure that he would arrange the appointment. As I was very anxious to get back to California, and after talking the matter over with Dorothy I decided to accept the offer.

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