Sunday, May 01, 2005

POTUS 32: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt - The Man In The Wheelchair Who Lifted The Country On His Shoulders; The Only POTUS To Win Four Terms


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FDR admired his distant cousin Teddy Roosevelt, and set out to emulate him (but as a Democrat!). He was in the New York Senate, and was an assistant Navy Secretary under President Wilson. He was the democratic candidate for VPOTUS in 1920.

In 1921, he was stricken with polio. He fought to regain the use of his legs and at the 1924 Democratic Convention he dramatically appeared on crutches to nominate Alfred E. Smith as "the Happy Warrior." In 1928 Roosevelt was elected Governor of New York. The crutches were used mainly for photo ops and he was confined to his wheelchair.

FDR became President in 1932, succeeding Herbert Hoover. He helped the American people regain faith. He brought hope as he promised prompt, vigorous action, and in the very pit of the depression, told America in his Inaugural Address:


The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

Two years into his first term as President, the Nation began a slow recovery. But the fat cats turned against Roosevelt's New Deal. They feared his social experiments, and his removing the nation from the gold standard. And they feared the deficits he was running up (which Republicans now pile up at the greatest rate ever).

Roosevelt's response to the fat cats: a new program of reform: Social Security, heavier taxes on the wealthy, new controls over banks and public utilities, and an enormous work relief program for the unemployed.

In 1936 (and in 1940 and in 1944) he was re-elected by huge margins. And he blew it for a bit. Sure that his mandate in '36 gave him carte blanche, he sought to pack the Supreme Court (which had invalidated numerous New Deal programs) by increasing the number of justices (all of whom would be his nominees). He lost that battle, but now the government itself could and did regulate the economy.

When the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, Roosevelt led uns into a global war and worked closely with England and Russia and their leaders Winston Churchill and Josef Stalin to take out the Axis.

President Roosevelt felt the future of the world depended on relations between the Americans and Russians, and he devoted much thought to the planning of a United Nations organization.

As war drew to a close, Roosevelt's health declined, and on April 12, 1945, while at Warm Springs, Georgia, he died of a brain hemorrhage, reportedly with his girlfriend.
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4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Is this all you can do create POTUS's. Taking infomation from other people web site.

Keekee Brummet said...

Nice comment. Only four mispellings and grammatical errors in 15 words.

Hey now, knuckledragger. . .I am glad to see that Tarheels, hillbillies and mental defectives read All This Is That too. You're my people! Love, jack

Anonymous said...

Jack, given our recent exchange it seems fitting to hear Mario's poetry "Ever since Franklin Roosevelt lifted himself from his wheelchair to lift this nation from its knees -- wagon train after wagon train -- to new frontiers of education, housing, peace; the whole family aboard, constantly reaching out to extend and enlarge that family; lifting them up into the wagon on the way; blacks and Hispanics, and people of every ethnic group, and native Americans -- all those struggling to build their families and claim some small share of America."

Keekee Brummet said...

And the best part of that amazing speechwriting is how goes from that message of inclusiveness to shredding the Republicans & what they would do with the wagon:

"The Republicans believe that the wagon train will not make it to the frontier unless some of the old, some of the young, some of the weak are left behind by the side of the trail. The strong, the strong they tell us will inherit the land."