From Hidden Hand to Iron Fist

Keep yourself as much in the background as possible...and let everybody do the talking excepting yourself. Nothing ever kills a man's influence so quickly as to be too much in evidence." Colonel House(1)

In a previous article, How Secret Societies Rule the World, I briefly identify Colonel Edward Mandell House as a chief adviser inside the Wilson administration; however, in consideration of staying on point, further elaboration of this important historical figure was simply deemed impossible at the time. Furthermore, even when afforded the far more liberating expanse of an entire article it is difficult to put the man's full influence into proper context. In consideration of this, an impressive amount of literature has been presented in the footnotes to satisfy those wishing for an even deeper understanding of House beyond what is offered here.

Edward Mandell House's mansion, Austin Texas.

On July 26, 1858, Colonel Edward Mandell House was born in Houston Texas, the youngest of eight children (seven of which were boys) to an affluent anglophile merchant family. His father, Thomas William House, founded some of the first transportation and utility companies in Houston - even serving as it's mayor in 1862. As a young boy Edward found enjoyment in pitting classmates against each other and learned to shoot and ride at a very young age. Due to a physical ailment, House was prohibited from pursuing a military career but would attend Cornell University and was a member of the Alpha Delta Phi fraternity (closely associated with Yale's Skull and Bones and Scroll and Key fraternities). Growing up in a political household exposed Edward to social circles that most children his age weren't afforded and these relationships would leave an enduring impression upon the young Texan. It wasn't long after leaving Cornell that he too would enter the political realm but, unlike his father, he shunned the attention bestowed upon a public figure, he refused interviews and seldom accepted official appointments, preferring instead to remain in the shadows - fulfilling the far more discreet role of 'silent partner'.

House proved to have considerable political acumen and quickly developed an influential circle of friends while working in Texas state politics he referred to as "Our Crowd"(2) and, "as their leader, would focus on the acquisition of power, emphasizing personal loyalty, patronage, the deception of others, and the manipulation of the political system."(3) House would use these strategies to lead the successful campaigns of four Democratic Governors of Texas: James S. Hogg (1892), Charles A. Culberson (1894), Joseph D. Sayers (1898), and S. W. T. Lanham (1902). It is during these early formative years in Texas that House would adopt 'Colonel' as his unofficial moniker and, operating unfettered within the powerful social setting of 'Our Crowd' would quickly gain notoriety as a "kingmaker".

Early in 1896, as the progressive movement swept America, we see evidence of House thoroughly embracing the ideal of social equality as a driver for reconstruction. Sometime after the turn of the century, House walks away from state politics, choosing instead to focus on more pressing national reform issues. House, recognizing negligence on the part of the Republican Party to resolve the unchecked power of the financial interests on Wall Street, seized on an opportunity for the Democratic Party to resurrect itself from the ashes of previous presidential campaign failures in 1900 and 1904 - but he was an adviser without a candidate. House identified three qualities that his nominee would need to possess in order to complete a successful run to Washington. Firstly, his candidate had to be presentable and articulate enough to inspire the imagination of the American public. Secondly, he had to have strong enough character to withstand public opposition to some of House's more progressive social reform measures.Thirdly, and most importantly, the correct candidate must be sufficiently muted enough in his personal ideals so as to remain 'advisable'.

House began the interview process with a mayor from Texas named Gaynor but found he lacked political acuity. He also approached Charles A. Culberson, the same man he helped win the Texas Governorship in 1894, but abandoned hopes due to Culberson's failing health and his penchant for alcohol. After contemplating several other candidates, House would eventually find his man in an ambitious young progressive Governor from New Jersey named Woodrow Wilson. House writing of Wilson, "I now turned to Woodrow Wilson, then Governor of New Jersey, as being the only man in the East who in every way measured up to the office for which he was a candidate."(4) House studied Wilson intensely prior to meeting him, reading all of his speeches and studying his background. They also corresponded by letter but the two never actually met until the late afternoon of September 24, 1911 - just over a year before Wilson would be elected president - when Wilson was summoned to a small room at the Hotel Gotham in New York City. The two spoke for only an hour, but House would later write of the meeting, "they were immediately intimate". House also later relates his affection for Wilson in a letter to Senator Culberson, "The more I see of Governor Wilson the better I like him...I think he is going to be a man one can advise with some degree of satisfaction."

Wilson was the son of a preacher man. His father founded The Southern Presbyterian Church in the United States and had instilled within his son deep religious values while also providing him with a substantial education. By 1879, Wilson had graduated from Princeton Phi Kappa Psi and was studying law at the University of Virginia. In 1883 he began economics study at Johns Hopkins under one of the founders of the Progressive movement, economist Richard T. Ely. Following his time at Johns Hopkins, Wilson would spend several years lecturing at Cornell University(1886-1887), Bryn Mawr College(1885-1888), and Wesleyan where he was elected Phi Beta Kappa. In 1902, Wilson was elected president of Princeton but would vacate the position in 1910 due to a clash with university administrators over the placement of a graduate school. Publicly, Wilson announced his candidacy for the gubernatorial seat of New Jersey, and in doing so, put himself on a direct historical collision course with Colonel House. These early experiences with Presbyterianism, constitutional law, economics, progressivism, and the fraternal order would be profoundly influential in shaping both Wilson's character and his future policies as president.

From their historic first meeting in New York, House and Wilson would forge an incredible professional and personal relationship. Wilson would eventually defer to House on matters of both public and private concern. The two would grow inseparable, especially following the death of Wilson's first wife. House became Wilson's chief adviser and we see the immense trust and influence Wilson had in the Texas 'kingmaker' in a letter Wilson wrote to House in 1915, over a year after his election victory:

"You are the only person in the world with whom I can discuss everything...There are some I can tell one thing and others another, but you are the only one to whom I can make an entire clearance of the mind."(6)

Entering the second decade of the 20th century, America was in turmoil. Wilson turned his attention to the national leadership campaign just as contentious societal changes were underway. Industrialization and urbanization had violently uprooted traditional American values and we see free market laissez-faire being overtaken by a never-before-seen bastard child of capitalism known as monopoly capitalism - and from out of the melee emerged giant corporate interests, or Trusts. A progressive wave of reform had flooded every aspect of American life and the people responded violently. Farm Wars, Labour Wars, Indian Wars and School Wars each took a toll across the nation. Traditional ways of farming, education, labour and medicine were being completely overturned by the wealthy ways of industrialists and the public was accusing industry, financiers, and politicians of colluding in an unprecedented display of corruption. The importance of the time cannot be overstated. According to professor of history at Georgetown, Carroll Quigley, Western Civilization was in fact entering it's third Age of Conflict. The fate of the Western world rested in it's ability to overcome great advancements in technology, most broadly, the Industrial Revolution - America was prone to a hijack. And so it was into this tumultuous socio-political milieu that Woodrow Wilson and Colonel House would take their first historic steps together, on their march to Washington.

While 1912 would end in spectacular fashion for House, the election year did not start out well. He was forced to retreat to his Texas home due to an illness in early January but while convalescing, puts to paper what a reformed society might look like under a Wilson led government. Within a month, House had a roughly handwritten manuscript written in the form of a fictional political love story. By late February the longhand draft was typed up and following many revisions and consultations with friends, advisers and publishers, House would have the finished product in his hand by October. Entitled, Philip Dru: Administrator A Story of Tomorrow 1920-1935, it was published anonymously, sparking considerable controversy in political and public circles at the time, many speculating as to who the true identity of the author was. House himself added to the intrigue by marketing the mystery author as "a man distinguished in political councils" and that the book was filled with "facts known only to the inner circle of statecraft and finance". House's closest friends and confidantes applauded it while critics lathered it with disdain.

At the same time House was trying to get his book published, the presidential campaign was heating up. By summertime, the atmosphere around the country was filled with the progressive promise of change. Theodore Roosevelt, a Freemason(7) and Phi Beta Kappa(8), abandoned an African hunting expedition to campaign for the Republican nomination. After losing the preliminary to fellow Freemason(9) and Phi Beta Kappa(10), William Howard Taft, formed a new progressive Republican party called the Bull Moose Party. The charismatic, 'trust busting' Roosevelt promised to ameliorate corporate avarice, to dissolve the unholy alliance between corrupt business and corrupt politics by limiting campaign contributions; imposing a registration for lobbyists; and instituting a federal securities commission. William Howard Taft, a member of Skull and Bones(11), was the incumbent nominee for the Conservative Republican Party but was less sympathetic to the needs of the people. Taft sided with large corporations during anti-trust cases, even reversing key legislature invoked by Roosevelt in his previous presidency. Woodrow Wilson, also represented the progressives but on the Democratic ticket, and also promised to implement measures to counteract out-of-control corporations but supported decreased tariffs on foreign goods.

Roosevelt's progressive campaign expressed a New Nationalism, proposing a national health service, social insurance for the elderly, elimination of women suffrage, an eight hour work day, farm relief, workers compensation and support of labour unions. Where Roosevelt's platform was largely paternalistic, calling for radically increased government oversight to help curb corporate corruption, the tenets of Wilson's New Freedom campaign were less drastic and based in the philosophy of individualism. Wilson chose instead to limit the power of the federal government, proposing less radical strategies to control corporate over reach. Wilson was "skeptical of great business enterprises and emphasized the restoration of competition and the continual renewal of American society from below."(12) In the end, the campaign of 1912 would prove to be one of the most contentious in history. Wilson, under the advisement of House, would use the Republican split to his advantage in carrying an incredible forty states. However, once elected Wilson would abandon his campaign planks, implementing policy largely reminiscent of both Roosevelt's Bull Moose Party platforms and, more strangely still, the 'New Constitution' hypothesized within the pages of House's newly published 'fictional' novel.

History shows that following the election victory on November 5, 1912, and prior to his inauguration on March 4, 1913, Wilson and his wife would vacation in Bermuda. But less documented is the fact that just prior to their departure, Colonel House handed Wilson a copy of his freshly published novel.(13)(14)(15)

House had written Philip Dru in an utopian style reminiscent of other, more well known utopian works like Plato's Republic or Jonathan Swift's Gullivers Travels; however, in no way should Philip Dru be considered on the same literary level - House even admitting that it was hastily arranged and rushed to publication. But, when considering who the author was, when it was published, and the serendipitous political reform that immediately followed both Wilson's ascendancy to the Oval Office and the publication of the book,, Philip Dru proves far more deserving of our contemplation as a political confessional and probably the primary reason why it has remained in relative obscurity for over one hundred years. Like in my previous article, Brave New World Order, where it is proven that Aldous Huxley's dystopian novel, Brave New World served as an obvious 'blueprint' for a significant societal shift towards a new order, we see parallels between Colonel Edward Mandell House's fictional tale and the policies he personally initiated into reality shortly after it's publication.

As opposed to Huxley's tale that was set in the far distant future, Philip Dru is set in the very near future and is an amazing expression of the duality of House's character portrayed through the two main characters of the story. On one path we have the progressive protagonist, Philip Dru, a man of principle and discipline who, after having a life altering experience with a poor family living in the run down tenements of New York City begins a personal mission to rectify social inequality. Just as Colonel House "came to share the concern of many Americans over the corruption of the political process, the excesses of giant corporation, and the strains appearing in the nations social fabric",(16) Dru vows to introduce arrogant wealthy privilege to the plight of the poor. Dru strives to shine a light on the destructive nature of materialistic vanity and to invigorate within the more fortunate set a spark of social consciousness not temporarily placated by their occasional charity but instead fueled by a true desire to seek out and eliminate inequality. Similarities between the author and his main character go beyond ideology and are evidenced throughout the book's nearly two hundred pages. Two more obvious examples being that Dru, like House, was denied a military career due to a physical ailment, and both happened to be the youngest of seven boys.

The well meaning character of Dru is juxtaposed against the path of the story's anti hero - an egocentric, well-to-do Senator named Selywn who manipulates the minds of powerful men to serve his own self-interests as if it were a game. Through Senator Selwyn, House unveils the darker side of his personality and shows a keen willingness to participate in the more disreputable aspects of politics as if the book was a confessional exercise in the cleansing of House's tortured Texas soul. Through Selwyn, House shows the perspective that could only come from someone on the inside as he reveals a deep understanding of the true political environment, enacting scenarios that even the most casual political observer has long since suspected but could never confirm. And this overtly corrupt political atmosphere further underlined today as a managerie of lobbyists, sycophants, and demogogue's permeate the memberships of the most powerful special interest groups, NGO's and 'think tanks'. House leaves hints as to the true identity of the author through the senator as like House, Selwyn only 'tastes' wine and never drinks to excess; and like House, Selwyn's youngest daughter's name was Janet. House even leaving a more obvious clue in that where Selwyn met his potential presidential candidate, Senator Rockland, was a place penned Mandell House. In the first excerpt, taken from page 41, we see House admitting to how the two party system is compromised similar to what we see in the 1912 presidential campaign in which all three candidates were from the same university fraternal order, Phi Beta Kappa, and two were confirmed Freemasons(!)

"Masterful and arrogant wealth, created largely by Government protection of its profits, not content with its domination and influence within a single party, had sought to corrupt them both, and to that end had insinuated itself into the primaries, in order that no candidates might be nominated whose views were not in accord with theirs." Philip Dru: Administrator, page 41.

Dru, once in a position of influence, understood quickly that helping the less fortunate within his own immediate influence did little to alleviate the overall issue - often times even acting as a deterrent - and real lasting change could only be secured through aristocratic political circles. But, just as quickly, Dru recognizes the halls of public office as a tawdry system of self preservation in control of both parties and in doing so, House brings the reader face to face with the invalidity of the corrupt two party system. Here, House unveils for all the world to see, an abhorrent atmosphere of narcissists who care little for issues beyond the white granite walls of Congress. House reveals, in a very matter-of-fact way, the sordid truths that machinate beyond public purview - cloaked behind the closed doors of the people's most hallowed institutions. And more contemporaneously, we have evidence that this corruption still exists a hundred years later when we consider the police enforced refusal of Green Party leader Ralph Nader to speak at the primaries in 2000(17). And this two party infiltration by a backdoor brotherhood most famously highlighted when in 2004 both party candidates, George W. Bush, a Republican, and John Kerry, the Democratic nominee, happened to be members of Skull and Bones, the same secret Yale Fraternity as Taft. George H. W. Bush and his father Prescott, were also a members.(18)(19)(20)(21)

In the following example from Chapter 34, Selwyn's Story, Senator Selwyn - like a gangster suddenly turned informant - proudly confesses to his sins of success. Those at the helm of the political machinery are interestingly referred to as 'bosses' and is simply fascinating in that, while officially written as fiction, sounds more like an honest account of what life must have been like for young Edward growing up within the cutthroat environment of Texas state politics. It also imparts for the reader incredible insight into the absolute power that House truly sought and why he himself would avoid the bright lights of fame and recognition his entire career - instead preferring the far less public, shadowy existence of an unelected advisor:

"He was my father's best friend, and there were no secrets between them. They seldom paid attention to me, and I was rarely dismissed even when they had their most confidential talks. In this way, I early learned how our great American cities are looted, not so much by those actually in power, for they are of less consequence than the more powerful men behind them."pg 109.

In the second example taken from the same chapter, we see Selwyn admit to how the 'bosses' are able to milk the system to their advantage by tactfully exploiting the largely naive, trusting, and "selfish attitude" of the citizenry without soliciting any unnecessary public blowback:

"Any measure they desired passed by the legislature was first submitted to him, and he would prune it until he felt he could put it through without doing too great violence to public sentiment. The citizens at large do not scrutinize measures closely; they are too busy in their own vineyards to bother greatly about things which only remotely or indirectly concern them.

This selfish attitude and indifference of our people has made the boss and his methods possible. The "big interests" reciprocate in many and devious ways, ways subtle enough to seem not dishonest even if exposed to public view." page 110.

As we near the end of the novel, Selwyn divulges to Dru exactly how he built his empire of wealth and influence from a system of loyalty, patronage and the manipulation of others that sounds eerily reminiscent of House's days back in Texas mingling within the prestige of 'Our Crowd' and confirms the dangers of what we more familiarly refer today as quid pro quo, pay-to-play, or insider trading relationships. All of these confidence schemes are openly admitted as self-evident by those in power today and rarely do we witness those guilty of such crimes face anything resembling real consequence or punishment as the corruption continues on unabated today through lobbyists and superpacs. And the repeated failure of our justice system to act also serves as further evidence of a much higher level of corrupted vested interest that ferments beyond the veil of party politics holding no regard for the needs of the public that most of us either fail to see or choose to ignore.

Without doubt, these same schemes and allegiances saturate today's political landscape and indicate why we see an egregious increase in the personal wealth of politicians in the years in which they hold public office - smashing any previously held belief that their role is considered a sacrosant position of servitude not intended to be used for the acquisition of great personal wealth. And, as the author earlier alluded to and will later illuminate, there exists beyond this veil of political partisanship an even deeper loyal brotherhood of thieves forged from a dark underworld network of loyal fraternal friendships first formed on the academic campuses that presently thrives within the most prestigious universities in America that this author, in later articles will contend, is the true insidious nature of the university system. A secret, second-tier, plutocratic web of peerage and nepotism.

As evidenced even further in the following Selwyn confessional:

"I also demanded and received information in advance of any extension of railroads, standard or interurban, of contemplated improvements of whatsoever character, and I doled out this information to those of my followers in whose jurisdiction lay such territory. My own fortune I augmented by advance information regarding the appreciation of stocks. If an amalgamation of two important institutions was to occur, or if they were to be put upon a dividend basis, or if the dividend rate was to be increased, I was told, not only in advance of the public, but in advance of the stockholders themselves. All such information I held in confidence even from my own followers, for it was given me with such understanding."

In the next excerpt, House, er, Senator Selwyn discloses how he and his coterie of wealthy millionaires managed to prolong their status quo by assigning men sympathetic to their financial interests to the highest positions of influence within county, state, and federal government. Whether it be the country's natural resources, public utilities, or finance, Selwyn and his cohorts would control profits through a cohesive trust that proved very lucrative to those same loyal government officials who served to protect them. This patronage scheme reminiscent of how the early industrialists - concomitant with Wilson's presidency - were able to take control of the mass communication industry by first purchasing the most influential newspapers in America, and then, by placing one of their own as editor-in-chief, were able to distract the public from their corrupt practices while also controlling public opinion. This being the genesis of the profoundly radical, progressive, liberal media that exists today, consisting of six giant corporate conglomerates responsible for all the nations news, television entertainment, and Hollywood movies.

"By the use of all the money that could be spent, by a complete and compact organization and by the most infamous sort of deception regarding his real opinions and intentions, plutocracy had succeeded in electing its creature to the Presidency. There had been formed a league, the membership of which was composed of one thousand multi-million-aires, each one contributing ten thousand dollars. This gave a fund of ten million dollars with which to mislead those that could be misled, and to debauch the weak and uncertain."

In the chapter entitled, The Making of a President, the similarities between House and Senator Selwyn become so interwoven that it becomes hard to discern whether you are reading a fictional utopian novel or the intimate letters of Colonel House.

"It was a fascinating game to Selwyn. It appealed to his intellectual side far more than it did to his avarice. He wanted to govern the Nation with an absolute hand, and yet not be known as the directing power. He arranged to have his name appear less frequently in the press and he never submitted to interviews, laughingly ridding himself of reporters by asserting that he knew nothing of importance."pg. 52.

Following a violent Civil War initiated by Dru that successfully overthrows the Selwyn controlled monolithic government, Dru formulates a new "Code of Laws" and a new Constitution, of which he would be the sole Administrator in order to curb any further exploitation of the American people by a corrupt corporatocracy. Dru appoints himself - to the roaring applause of the masses - as Dictator who is given the responsibility of guiding America through a temporary time of turmoil that will ultimately lead to a unified utopia. Here, Dru invokes the same kind of atavism that would allow Lenin to create his Communist Soviet regime just a mere five years after Philip Dru's publication. An event in which House and his close confidente's had intimate involvement. Ultimately, Dru, fueled by his belief in 'equality of opportunity', and through an appeal to the plight of the poor, imposes a socialist system of government to be laid over top of the original Constitutional concept of the American Republic to be ruled by an absolute dictator - or, as is repeated several times both throughout the novel and during Wilson's presidency, a new order.

"The president [Woodrow Wilson] did not in those brief months achieve the "new world," the "new order," he so nobly phrased, so ardently desired, and so continuously fought for, but he chose the battleground and set forth the issues which will engage the thought of the world for many years to come." New York Times, January 21, 1922.

As evidenced by the above passage, Wilson himself would use the terms "new order" and "new world" repeatedly throughout his two terms - especially when hammering out the future of international order while at the Paris Peace conference in 1919. This phrase implies a replacement of the old, rapacious capitalist system of Western society with a more homogenous socially conscious global community. And, as one reads the book, one is struck by the many allusions to Communism. From the basic socialist tenet of wealth inequality to the concept of class struggle; from the character named Marx, to the real life authors that are cited in the novel ( Sir Oliver Lodge), we see a penchant for socialism. Lodge was an active member of the socialist organization, the Fabian Society and frequent lecturer at the London School of Economics, co-authoring two publications with none other than it's two co-founders, Sidney Webb and George Bernard Shaw. Lodge was also one of Colonel House's favourite writers.

Amazingly, what Dru institutes is in many ways mirrored in both the progressive platform policies of Roosevelt during the 1912 election campaign and the actual policies put in place by Wilson in the immediate years following it. It should also be noted that the changes initiated by Wilson were the largest progressive reform measures up until that point in American history and Philip Dru seemed to be nothing less than an internal memorandum issued to the president by his advisers that laid out the future of American domestic and foreign policy. Little wonder then, that some one hundred years later, the measures imposed by Wilson have done little to curb the corporate corruption perpetrated by the very same men who not only funded Wilson's campaign but the campaign of both Taft and Roosevelt. Wilson, like Roosevelt and Taft before him, participated in a sort of Kubuki theatre ritual of special investigative committees (Pujo) that resulted in an even more oppressive centralized governance of the people while conveniently doing very little to restrict the corrupt activities of those actually responsible. The striking similarities between Dru's dictatorial proposals and those actually imposed by Wilson in real life were so similar in fact to prompt fellow 'Inquiry' member Walter Lippmann to write in The New York Times:

"...if the author is really a man of affairs, this is an extraordinarily interesting book".(22)

The list of similarities is extensive and those I offer below, while the most considerable and most worthy of the reader's contemplation, is not exhaustive. Where Dru proposes Federal oversight of business practices, Wilson creates the Federal Trade Commission; where Dru recommends a crackdown on monopolies, Wilson passes the Clayton Antitrust Act; where Dru advances the idea of government sponsored financial reform, Wilson creates the Federal Reserve; where Dru tables government ownership of telegraph and telephone companies, Wilson hires one of House's "Our Crowd", Albert Sidney Burleson to Post Master General to acquire, "at a fair valuation", the early telecommunications industry (23); where Dru proposes a graduated income tax scheme, Wilson passes it into law; where Dru suggests an eight hour work week and a farm relief program, Wilson makes both a reality. From worker's compensation to old age pension to social insurance, wherever Dru makes a suggestion, Wilson implements it into reality as if under hypnotic control. And while the reader may or may not agree to some or all of these policies on the surface, the author's main point herein is not to dispute their validity or efficacy, it is only to have the reader regard the repugnancy of a secret underworld of unelected officials and ministers without portfolio who operate within an allegedly free and open, transparent democratic society.

"Certain of the public service corporations, Dru insisted, should be taken over bodily by the National Government and accordingly the Postmaster General was instructed to negotiate with the telegraph and telephone companies for their properties at a fair valuation. They were to be under the absolute control of the Postoffice Department..." Philip Dru, pg 107.

In Chapter 48, An International Coalition, Dru turns his attention from domestic issues to U.S. foreign policy. Acting in his official role as dictator, Dru proposes an international plan based on an anglophile solidarity to end all wars that sounds identical to what Cecil Rhodes had set out in his Last Will and Testament decades earlier and echoed by the very Anglo-centric Pilgrims Society that was largely accomplished through the concerted efforts of both the Milner Group and the Inquiry - two key organizations of which House had intimate knowledge and influence(!) It was, in fact - as proven with primary citations in my previous article, How Secret Societies Rule The World - during the Paris Peace Conference in 1919, that House directed the Inquiry to work with British delegates headed by key Milner Round Table insider, Lionel Curtis, to create both the Council on Foreign Relations and the Institute of International Affairs.

These two think tanks, the former to be located in New York and funded by J.P. Morgan, Rockefeller, Carnegie and Ford; the latter, to be centered in London and funded by the Lazar's, Warburg's and Rothschild's would form the key institution and information nucleus of what Georgetown history professor Carroll Quigley would later coin, an Anglo-American Establishment. In fact, as I will discuss at length in following articles, many of the members of the Inquiry were also tapped Phi Beta Kappa and, along with the Milner Round Table members, were all members of the very influential Pilgrims Society. Interesting to say the least when it is discovered that from this nucleus of not-for-profit organizations emerged our present day system of both public diplomacy and foreign policy as well as the intelligence communities of both the United States and Britain.

History shows that The Inquiry and The Milner Group were the primaries responsible for reparations in Paris, carving up European, Near East, Far East, and Southeast Asian borders into a more occidentally palatable configuration. Members of The Inquiry were unelected members of Wilson's entourage and almost exclusively graduates of Ivy League universities - mostly Harvard. While the Milner Group made up a considerable portion of Prime Minister Lloyd George's War administration, his British delegation to Paris, and were mainly Oxford and Cambridge graduates. Both groups of men operated beyond public scrutiny and were free of both political constraints and public considerations. They consisted of world renowned economists, political scientists, and high ranking military intelligence assets who were all members of one or several commonly shared fraternal organizations. They were free to divide global territories into 'spheres of influence' as if it were a game of Risk - and the spoils of victory were to be shared mainly by Britain and the United States.

The names of these men are rarely if ever publicized and exist in the annals of history today only as rumour and any search for the minutes of their meetings is futile as they were conveniently never recorded. Their presence would be far less compelling and perhaps more easily explained as a group of ineffectual advisers except for the fact that from their behind-closed-door, top-secret meetings originated some of our world's most historical events. From the declaration of the First World War to the armistace of 1918; from Wilson's famous Fourteen Points Speech to the Covenant of the League of Nations; from the creation of the secretive Council on Foreign Relations, the Royal Institute of International Affairs and the Institute of Pacific Relations to the founding of the United Nations, UNESCO and NATO, this clandestine group of mystery men were at the forefront of international policy while remaining obscured within the secret back pages of history and far from the spotlight of public notoriety.

With the addition of this new information it becomes easier to see why our elected officials traditionally say one thing and do another. And when one finally defers to the painful truth of a defunct two party system and a world ran by an unelected advisory group of secret society members we begin to question the real catalyst behind not only World War I, but the actions of our government throughout history. We start to see why Wilson's Fourteen Point Speech is largely built upon economic concessions of trade rather than the ideological, conventionally fed beliefs of 'liberation of an oppressed people', 'self governance', or 'democracy for all'. We begin to see why, after being promised further freedom, it is instead taken from us, and when demanding more consciousness we are deprived of it. And why, after more than one hundred years after Wilson first ran on a platform of individualism and pacifism, we see an increase in global conflict, an increase in monopolization and an even further advancement towards an Anglo-American led One World Government.

"In the meantime, Dru negotiated with them to the end that England and America were to join hands in a world wide policy of peace and commercial freedom. According to Dru's plan, disarmaments were to be made to an appreciable degree, custom barriers were to be torn down, zones of influence clearly defined, and an era of friendly commercial rivalry established."

All of the measures Dru and House imposed did little to stop the money and credit trusts from relinquishing any of their power, in fact, with the introduction of centralized system it has progressively gotten worse in the years since and one could argue that instead of ridding the world of trusts they have created one giant global one. But, make no mistake, for what Philip Dru lacks in literary value it more than makes up for in it's blatant transparency and is worth a read to anyone interested in the history of U.S. foreign policy as House stands as a clear protege to future political advisers like Henry Kissinger, or Zbigniew Brzezinski. And it is in fact - as Houston said when evaluating House's manuscript in the winter of 1912 - because "the fiction is so thin" that makes the book so incredibly interesting. The same lack of elaborate story telling that detracts from it's literary value and is the main complaint of critics also leaves it relatively free of distraction to the point that it barely qualifies as fiction - to be more accurately fitted onto the same book shelves as Brzezinski's The Grand Chessboard, or Samuel Huntington's The Clash of Civilizations.

So, what is Philip Dru?

It is a bare bones look into the mind of Colonel Edward House and an undeniable blueprint for the administrative changes he himself would have a hand in creating as the least known but most influential member of the Wilson advisory group. What is Philip Dru? It is an admission of how the political loyalty game is really played through the use of patronage and vanity. What is Philip Dru? It is, when all literary critique and political evaluation is complete, a profoundly authoritarian proposal that is nearer a political manifesto than a fictional love story. What Philip Dru is, is an emblematic portrayal of the powers that exist in our present day struggle to survive Western Civilization's Third Age of Conflict. The final question that remains to be answered is whether Philip Dru will be a blueprint of a turbulent future or an obscure, literary remnant of a naive past. Will we find a way to embrace new technology to pull ourselves from the wreckage and survive one more time, or do we succumb to the power of the hidden hand to be ruled forever by an iron fist?

You can follow the author on Bitchute, Gab, Minds, Trooth, and Twitter @TriviumMethod, and on Facebook and YouTube at Duane Hayes.

Further reading can be found on my website https://duanehayes28.wixsite.com/fromoutofthehayes

Footnotes and Citations:

1. https://books.google.ca/books?id=P1QgBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA29&lpg=PA29&dq=major+edward+sammons&source=bl&ots=gMVVRL5h2l&sig=bCoy9T1fwFiH2FFJVwLNrjJlAKM&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwipuJfM4vLfAhVJxFQKHdEoA-gQ6AEwAnoECAIQAQ#v=onepage&q=major%20edward%20sammons&f=false pg 29.

2. "Our Crowd" was a young, energetic group of influential lawyers: Frank Andrews, Thomas Watt Gregory was an attorney who would serve Woodrow Wilson as U.S. Attorney General 1914-1919; James B. Wells Jr. lawyer South Texas; Albert Sidney Burleson, attorney, assigned Post Master General by Woodrow Wilson; Joe Lee Jameson, Freemason, Colonel Houses' "right hand man".

3. Colonel House: A Biography of Wilson's Silent Partner https://books.google.ca/books?id=g1IgBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA74&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=true pg. 68.

4. file:///C:/Users/User/Downloads/The_Intimate_Papers_of_Colonel_House-Vol1-1912to1915-518pgs-POL.sml.pdf pg 43.

5. Woodrow Wilson Phi Beta Kappa https://www.pbk.org/About-PBK/Presidents

6. Paris 1919, Margaret MacMillan, page 18.

7. Theodor Roosevelt freemason https://www.mn-masons.org/masonic-history/famous-masons/masonic-american-presidents

8. Theodore Roosevelt Phi Beta Kappa https://www.pbk.org/About-PBK/Presidents

9. William Howard Taft freemason https://www.mn-masons.org/masonic-history/famous-masons/masonic-american-presidents

10. William Howard Taft Phi Beta Kappa https://www.pbk.org/About-PBK/Presidents

11. William Howard Taft was the son of Alphonso Taft, co-founder of the Skull and Bones society. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Skull_and_Bones_members

12. Colonel House: A Biography of Woodrow Wilson's Silent Partner Carle E Neu. page 66.

13. The Papers of Woodrow Wilson - Volume 25

14. Woodrow Wilson's Right Hand: The Life of Colonel Edward M. House

15. Colonel House: A Biography of Wilsons Silent Partner https://books.google.ca/books?id=g1IgBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA74&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q=philip%20dru&f=false

16. Colonel House: A Biography of Wilsons Silent Partner. https://books.google.ca/books?id=g1IgBQAAQBAJ&pg=PA74&redir_esc=y#v=onepage&q&f=true pg. 69.

17. Ralph Nader graduated magna cum laude and was initiated as Phi Beta Kappa after receiving his Bachelor of Arts Degree from, of all places, Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs. Furthermore, when considering that Nader was supported by a large contingent of high profile entertainers including Micheal Moore and his refusal of entry at the primaries was made into a Netflix documentary movie, An Unreasonable Man; and with his lengthy career in opposing the establishment, one has to ask whether he was a legitimate candidate for change; or simply an asset meant to divide votes; or were his the actions of a lifetime actor, or controlled opposition. Ultimately, this author leans towards Nader actually being a legitimate candidate and, whether orchestrated or not, the events at the 2000 primaries still serve as an indicator of a corrupted two party system.

18. George W. Bush, Skull and Bones, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Skull_and_Bones_members. See also, Robbins, Alexandra (2002). Secrets of the Tomb: Skull and Bones, the Ivy League, and the Hidden Paths of Power. Boston: Little, Brown. ISBN 0-316-72091-7.

19. John Kerry, Skull and Bones, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Skull_and_Bones_members. See also, Robbins, Alexandra (2002). Secrets of the Tomb: Skull and Bones, the Ivy League, and the Hidden Paths of Power. Boston: Little, Brown. ISBN 0-316-72091-7.

20. George H.W. Bush, Skull and Bones, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Skull_and_Bones_members. See also, Robbins, Alexandra (2002). Secrets of the Tomb: Skull and Bones, the Ivy League, and the Hidden Paths of Power. Boston: Little, Brown. ISBN 0-316-72091-7. See also, Counterpunch, May 22–29, 2009

21. Prescott Bush, Skull and Bones, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Skull_and_Bones_members. See also, Robbins, Alexandra (2002). Secrets of the Tomb: Skull and Bones, the Ivy League, and the Hidden Paths of Power. Boston: Little, Brown. ISBN 0-316-72091-7.

22. Wikipedia, Philip Dru: Administrator. See also https://www.nytimes.com/1912/12/08/archives/americas-future-pictured-in-a-decidedly-quaint-modern-novel.html

23. Burleson's term as Post Master General was highly controversial. He ruled the communications industry as a dictator: segregating the work force, forbidding the union to strike, and instituting the Espionage Act during the war, banning any and all antiwar material. Burleson's tenure as Post Master is often cited as the worst and most reactionary in history.