On August 22, 1933, Mary meets Eleanor in the White House Rose Garden. While waiting, Mary reads that President Roosevelt, through Secretary Harold Ickes, has created the Office of the Special Adviser on the Economic Status of the Negroes and named Clark Foreman to lead it. Her excitement turns to dismay when she sees Foreman’s appointment.

Eleanor returns, first delighted by the office’s creation, then stunned by the choice. Mary denounces the decision to place a white man over Negro affairs, fearing paternalism. Eleanor acknowledges the insult but argues that Foreman’s progressive record and white access might yield results in a segregated system. Mary, recalling her reliance on white benefactors, reluctantly concedes. They agree to hold Foreman accountable and consider letting that office shoulder appointments while they redirect their energies.

Mary then raises the urgency of anti‑lynching, recounting the recent lynching of George Armwood in Maryland. She describes the mob’s brutality—beating, hanging, and burning—and the grotesque spectacle attended by thousands, with photographs as proof. Eleanor, horrified, realizes she had not grasped the full savagery.

They resolve to prioritize an anti‑lynching law despite Southern Democratic resistance. Eleanor believes Franklin’s backing could be decisive; she asks to keep the photographs to show him and to argue for the Costigan‑Wagner Bill. The chapter ends with renewed determination and a plan: monitor Foreman’s work on appointments and press the administration to end lynching.