"On the evening of August 14, the White House press corps was invited into the Oval Office. President Truman was seated behind his desk, with his cabinet secretaries, military chiefs, and aides standing behind him. Their beaming faces told the tale. The president came directly to the point. The Japanese government had accepted the terms of the Potsdam Declaration, and therefore, the Second World War was over. The reporters rushed back to the press room, and moments later the news was on the wires. Soon a boisterous crowd gathered outside the White House gates. Admiral Leahy noted in his diary: "A noisy celebration is going on in the city with all motor cars sounding their horns, and great crowds of shouting people milling in the streets and bringing traffic to a standstill. The radio is bearing for the news of the celebration in cities from Los Angeles to Boston, in all of which the populace seems to be celebrating the war's end with noise in crowded streets. Leahy did not approve. He felt that the occasion called for calm, thoughtful, dignified reflection, "but the proletariat considers noise appropriate and the greatest number of people in democracies must have their way.""