Truman seeks an allowance for former presidents

Harry S. Truman’s campaign for an allowance for former presidents turned his post-presidential financial strain into a question of public responsibility. He did not present the request as a personal pension claim: he argued that a former president who had spent years in public service should not have to exhaust his own resources to maintain an office and explain what had happened in government. The resulting 1958 law provided an annual pension and practical support for former presidents’ work.

Financial pressures after the presidency

The immediate pressure came in part from the disappointing net return on Truman’s memoirs. Even with payments from Life spread over five years, federal and state income taxes took 67 percent. Truman contrasted that burden with the more favorable tax treatment Dwight D. Eisenhower had received on the sale of his book, Crusade in Europe: Eisenhower’s proceeds had been treated as a capital gain, and he paid a 25 percent tax. The White House had intervened when Eisenhower’s tax treatment was at issue, but the Eisenhower administration declined to become involved in Truman’s case.

Truman had also incurred substantial expenses in producing the memoirs. Staff and office space cost $153,000, and he estimated that after five years his net profit would be about $37,000. The gross payments therefore did not translate into the security he had expected. He said that selling inherited property shared with his brother and sister had kept him from being financially embarrassed; without that sale, he said, he would practically have been on relief. The episode made the vulnerability of a former president’s working life concrete: writing a public account of an administration required an office and staff, but those costs consumed much of the proceeds.

The case for public support

Truman emphasized the distinction between asking for a personal pension and asking the government to meet part of the expenses attached to former presidential work. He considered an allowance covering perhaps 70 percent of necessary office overhead a reasonable minimum. In his view, the public benefited when a former president could preserve records, maintain a working office, and tell the public what had occurred during his service.

He framed the request through comparison with retired five-star generals and admirals, who had been granted clerical assistance and related support. Truman argued that it was anomalous for a former president, after eighteen years in government service, to risk financial ruin in order to give the public an account of his administration. The comparison made his appeal less a demand for personal reward than a claim that public service carried continuing costs that should not fall entirely on the individual who performed it.

Congressional action and the outcome

With Charles Murphy’s help, Truman brought his case to Speaker Samuel Rayburn and Senate Majority Leader Lyndon B. Johnson. The appeal reached leaders in both chambers, and Congress acted in 1958. The law provided former presidents with an annual pension of $25,000, money for staff and office space, and free mailing privileges.

The result addressed the practical infrastructure Truman had identified: an allowance, a place to work, people to assist, and a means of communicating. His effort thus converted a personal financial concern—sharpened by the costs and taxation of his memoir project—into a broader arrangement for former presidents. Its central claim was that public accountability after leaving office could not be sustained without some public provision for the work.