During the war, Taft took leave from Yale in order to serve as co-chairman of the National War Labor Board, tasked with assuring good relations between industry owners and their workers. In February 1918, the new RNC chairman, Will H. Hays, approached Taft seeking his reconciliation with Roosevelt. In May, Taft was in Chicago at the Blackstone Hotel, and when he heard that Roosevelt and his party were dining there, walked in on them. The two men embraced to the applause of the room, but the renewed relationship did not progress past outward friendliness before Roosevelt's death in January 1919. Taft later wrote, "Had he died in a hostile state of mind toward me, I would have mourned the fact all my life. I loved him always and cherish his memory."