With the issuance of press releases acquainting both members of Congress and the American people with the nations new nuclear bomb, President Truman found himself the recipient of considerable attention. During the Pacific war's hectic final days, most Americans backed the president and supported nuclear bombing. The president could not answer all the telegrams and letters addressed to him, pro or con, but the following telegram of protest from an eminent Protestant clergyman elicited an answer.

Read the telegram from Samuel McCrea Cavert to President Truman, August 9, 1945
Read President Truman's response to to Samuel McCrea Cavert, August 11, 1945

1. Bishop C. Bromley Oxnam was a leading Methodist; John Foster Dulles (secretary of state in the Eisenhower administration, 1953-1959) was a leading Presbyterian layman.

2. There is a remarkable contrast between this letter and the president's response to Senator Russell (document 12). It is explainable only by the almost daily rise and fall of hopes for peace as event followed event: Hiroshima, Russian entry, Nagasaki, and five more days (August 10--14) until Japanese acceptance of the Potsdam Declaration.