As the end of his term approached, President Hoover seemed to grow daily more petulant and pessimistic. The Depression, coming after twelve years of
A vigorous-looking Franklin D. Roosevelt campaigns for the presidency in 1932. His vice-presidential running mate, John N. Garner, and the conveniently placed post allowed the handicapped candidate to stand when greeting voters along the way.
Republican rule, probably ensured a Democratic victory in any case, but his attitude as the election neared alienated many voters and turned defeat into rout.
Confident of victory, the Democrats chose Governor Franklin Delano Roosevelt of New York as their presidential candidate. Roosevelt owed his nomination chiefly to his success as governor. Under his administration, New York had led the nation in providing relief for the needy and had enacted an impressive program of old-age pensions,
Unemployment insurance, and conservation and public power projects. In 1928, while Hoover was carrying New York against Smith by a wide margin, Roosevelt won election by 25,000 votes. In 1930 he swept the state by a 700,000-vote majority, double the previous record. He also had the advantage of the Roosevelt name (he was a distant cousin of the inimitable TR), and his sunny, magnetic personality contrasted favorably with that of the glum and colorless Hoover.
Roosevelt was far from being a radical. Although he had supported the League of Nations while campaigning for the vice presidency in 1920, during the 1920s he had not seriously challenged the basic tenets of Coolidge prosperity. He never had much difficulty adjusting his views to prevailing attitudes. For a time he even served as head of the American Construction Council, a trade association. Indeed, his life before the Depression gave little indication that he understood the aspirations of ordinary people or had any deep commitment to social reform.
Roosevelt was born to wealth and social status in Dutchess County, New York, in 1882. Pampered in childhood by a doting yet domineering mother, he was educated at the exclusive Groton School and then at Harvard. Ambition as much as the desire to render public service motivated his career in politics; even after an attack of polio in 1921 had badly crippled both his legs, he refused to abandon his hopes for high office. During the 1920s he was a hardworking member of the liberal wing of his party. He supported Smith for president in 1924 and 1928.
To some observers Roosevelt seemed rather a lightweight intellectually. When he ran for the vice presidency, the Chicago Tribune commented, “If he is Theodore Roosevelt, Elihu Root is Gene Debs, and Bryan is a brewer.” Twelve years later many critics judged him too irresolute, too amiable, too eager to
Hoover (Republican) Smith (Democrat)
The Roosevelt Political Revolution, 1932 In 1928, Hoover carried every state apart from the Deep South and Massachusetts; but in 1932, Franklin Roosevelt swept to a landslide victory.
Please all factions to be a forceful leader. Herbert Hoover thought he was “ignorant but well-meaning,” and the political analyst Walter Lippmann, in a now-famous observation, called him “a pleasant man who, without any important qualifications for the job, would very much like to be President.”
Despite his physical handicap—he could walk only a few steps, and then only with the aid of steel braces and two canes—Roosevelt was a marvelous campaigner. He traveled back and forth across the country, radiating confidence and good humor even when directing his sharpest barbs at the Republicans. Like every great political leader, he took as much from the people as he gave them, understanding the causes of their confusion and sensing their needs. “I have looked into the faces of thousands of Americans,” he told a friend. “They have the frightened look of lost children. . . . They are saying: ‘We’re caught in something we don’t understand; perhaps this fellow can help us out.’”
On matters such as farm policy, the tariff, and government spending, Roosevelt equivocated, contradicted himself, or remained silent. Nevertheless Roosevelt’s basic position was unmistakable. There must be a “re-appraisal of values,” a “New Deal.” Instead of adhering to conventional limits on the extent of federal power, the government should do whatever was necessary to protect the unfortunate and advance the public good. Lacking concrete answers,
Roosevelt advocated a point of view rather than a plan: “The country needs bold, persistent experimentation. It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.”
The popularity of this approach was demonstrated in November. Hoover, who had lost only eight states in 1928, won only six, all in the Northeast, in 1932. Roosevelt amassed 22.8 million votes to Hoover’s 15.8 million and carried the Electoral College, 472 to 59.
During the interval between the election and Roosevelt’s inauguration in March 1933, the Great Depression reached its nadir. The holdover “lame duck” Congress, last of its kind, proved incapable of effective action.28 President Hoover, perhaps understandably, hesitated to institute changes without the cooperation of his successor. Roosevelt, for equally plausible reasons, refused to accept responsibility before assuming power officially. The nation, curiously apathetic in the face of so much suffering, drifted aimlessly, like a sailboat in a flat calm.
•••-[Read the Document Hoover, New York Campaign Speech at Www. myhistorylab. com
Chapter Review
World History
