The Hurricane of Events. Langer and Gleason (B) has a remarkably detailed and vivid treatment of the Roosevelt Administration’s response to the Nazi blitz in Scandinavia and on the Continent; Tansill (B) is also useful but tends to thin out during this period. The estimate on page 415 of the effect of the “cash and carry” compromise is from D. F. Fleming’s excellent contemporary analysis, “Arms Embargo Debate,” Events, November 1939, pp. 339-346. The President’s early actions on the Panama registry question are not wholly clear, but that he initially favored the device is strongly indicated in Hull, p. 698, in Farley2, p. 210, and in PPF 3684, FDRL (Watson to Roosevelt, Nov. 10, 1939); the Maritime Commission file (OF 1705, FDRL) is, however, no more than suggestive on the matter. For Roosevelt at his most disarming, see his letter to William Allen White in this connection, Nov. 13, 1939, PLFDR, pp. 953-954. Quotations from Churchill’s messages to Roosevelt are taken from Churchill, The Gathering Storm [chap. 13] and Their Finest Hour (Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1949), the first two volumes of his epic accounts of the Second World War. Currie’s memo to Roosevelt on the economic situation is in PSF, Box 58, FDRL. The President’s continued sensitivity on budget balancing is manifested in press conferences toward the end of 1939 and in his “budget seminar” at the beginning of 1940. The relations of the White House with the Workers Alliance and with Lasser are documented in PPF 6794, FDRL. On the administrative situation in the National Labor Relations Board see J. M. Burns, “A New House for the Labor Board,” The Journal of Politics, Vol. III, No. 4, November 1941, pp. 486-508. Roosevelt’s behavior during the crisis days of spring 1940 is indicated in Ickes and in other contemporary reports; see also an excellent account in Time magazine, June 10, 1940. Roosevelt agreed that it was a “hurricane of events” in letter to Edward Weeks, May 21, 1940, PPF 5553, FDRL. The description of Roosevelt receiving news of the Allied disasters on May 26 is from Rosenman, pp. 195-196. Roosevelt described his indecision over whether to use the “stab-in-the-back” phrase in letter to Edw. Bruce, June 15, 1940, FDRL. I have relied heavily on Langer and Gleason’s detailed treatment of the diplomatic events of June 1940, but I would stress somewhat more than they do Roosevelt’s concern about Congress and the coming national conventions and election. The description of Hitler at Compiègne is from William Shirer.
“We Want Roosevelt.” Roosevelt’s concern with domestic political affairs during the spring of 1940 is reflected in Ickes3, passim. Hopkins’ admonition against third term talk is in Hopkins to Early, June 7, 1940, Hopkins Papers, FDRL. Rowe interview was very helpful on this period. On the impact of the European crisis on Roosevelt’s popularity, see Cantril, pp. 649, 756. Roosevelt agreed that the word “shrimps” was appropriate for young pacifists in letter to Roger B. Merriman, May 20, 1940, p. 1028, PLFDR; Ickes3, p. 179, suggests the President’s reaction to the isolationist sentiment. The President’s evening discussion with youth leaders was transcribed and affords a striking picture of his attitudes in June of 1940, especially on domestic affairs, discounted, of course, by the special role he assumed in trying to win the confidence of the group; the transcription is included as PC No. 649-A, June 5, 1940, FDRL. For Eleanor Roosevelt’s mixed but generally sympathetic attitudes toward the youth groups and their leaders, see This I Remember (B), chap. 12, and her column “My Day” (file in FDRL), especially Feb. 12-13, 1940. Hull, p. 858, describes his June conversation with Roosevelt on the nomination; Hull was impressed enough with the President’s remarks to write down longhand notes shortly afterwards, and I have quoted from Hull. The preliminaries to the Knox and Stimson appointments were remarkably complex, stretching over many months. See Langer and Gleason, pp. 509 ff., and sources cited therein; Ickes2, 3, passim; PPF 3855; Tully, p. 242 (although letter of William Bullitt in the New York Times, Feb. 19, 1948, p. 22, indicates that, contrary to Tully, Roosevelt had promised him the Secretaryship of the Navy, not of War); PPF 4773, FDRL; and Sherwood (B), p. 163, which is especially useful on Roosevelt’s timing of the appointments. There has been some controversy as to whether Roosevelt hoped that the appointments might lead the Republicans to call off their convention; see Eliot Janeway, The Struggle for Survival (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1951), p. 143, and Henry Steele Commager, New York Herald Tribune Book Review, Feb. 3, 1952. That Roosevelt entertained any serious hopes on the matter is doubtful in view of his announcement of the appointments just before the convention and in view of his political realism; on the other hand, it seems entirely possible to me that he made, simply as a maneuver, the statement reported by Janeway. Farley2, p. 244, and Ickes3, p. 221, both report Roosevelt’ s campaign plans immediately upon Willkie’s nomination. On the Roosevelt-Farley Hyde Park conference see Farley2, chap. 24, and Ickes3, p. 284: I have quoted Farley at p. 251 on Roosevelt’s statement. The cardinal fact that Roosevelt did not give general directions to any representative at Chicago is amply documented in Ickes3, pp. 193, 201, 203, 207, 235-236, 238, 240; Farley2, p. 264; Sherwood, pp. 176-177; Eleanor Roosevelt1, p. 218; Rosenman, p. 206; Appleby, p. 755. The convention proceedings are well described in the works cited above. Totals on the first ballot omit fractions. In describing Roosevelt’s activities in the White House I have relied wholly on Rosenman’s vivid description, although other sources agree that he was ready to decline the nomination had Wallace failed.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Roosevelt’s letters both to Delano and to Norris are in PLFDR, pp. 1045-1047. Flynn, You’re the Boss (B), p. 159, describes the gloom that pervaded the Democratic delegates upon convention adjournment.
The Hoarse and Strident Voice. This description of Willkie is based largely on the admirable biography, Joseph Barnes, Willkie (Simon and Schuster, 1952), from which I have adapted my section title. For a more critical treatment see “This Man Willkie,” The New Republic, Vol. CIII, No. 10, Sept. 2, 1940, Pt. 2. The quotation on page 433 is from Barnes, pp. 160-1. Both Sherwood (B), p. 174, and Farley2 (B), p. 252, indicate Roosevelt’s respect for Willkie’s strength as a candidate. White House planning of Roosevelt’s defense trips for political advantage is reflected in data in OF 200, Box 79, FDRL. In general, material on the 1940 campaign in FDRL is rather limited and fragmentary. Roosevelt’s comment as to who was “boss” is from PC 647-A, May 28, 1940, a long conference with members of his Advisory Commission, which happily was transcribed and included in the press conferences. Langer and Gleason (B) have a full treatment of diplomatic and military problems in the period after the Nazi blitz.
Lion Versus Sea Lion. All quotations from Churchill’s speeches or letters in this section are from his Their Finest Hour [chap. 18], the second volume of his great work on World War II. Hitler’s plans are taken from Bullock’s Hitler [chap. 17]. Langer and Gleason, chap. 22, provides a full treatment of the negotiations and events leading up to the destroyer deal; see works cited therein and also Ickes3 (B), passim, and Barnes, pp. 201-203, the latter on Willkie’s role. Walter Johnson, The Battle Against Isolation (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1944), quotes extensively from William Allen White’s correspondence on the destroyer deal. Churchill describes the Battle of Britain vividly and intimately; for a brief, dramatic account see Hanson Baldwin, “This Was Their Finest Hour,” The New York Times Magazine, Sept. 4, 1955. Henry L. Stimson and McGeorge Bundy, On Active Service in Peace and War (2 vols., Harper, 1948), p. 346, describe the President’s reluctance to move boldly on selective service legislation; see also PC No. 266, Aug. 2, 1940. Roosevelt’s pleading letter to Walsh is in PLFDR, pp. 1056-1057 (Aug. 22, 1940). It is not certain just when Roosevelt made up his mind to go ahead on the destroyer deal without Congress, but probably he had decided before he wrote Walsh and was trying here to moderate opposition that might appear in Congress. The influence with Roosevelt of the Burlingham et al. letter in the Times is evident from the President’s letter to Gilbert Montague, Sept. 19, 1940, PPF 3792. Hull (B), p. 837, relates the origin of the idea of dividing the bases into two lots. Churchill, Their Finest Hour, p. 330, de
scribes the tide of battle toward the end of August 1940. Langer and Gleason as well as Tansill (B) agree that the destroyer deal marked a decisive change in American neutrality. The Nazis’ hopes of strengthening isolationist opinion in the United States through the Tri-partite Pact are noted in Bullock, p. 563. That Roosevelt felt the destroyer deal would adversely affect his election chances is suggested in the Donovan Papers, cited in Langer and Gleason, p. 765 (footnote 61), and in Roosevelt to Walsh, Aug. 22, 1940, cited above.
The Two-Week Blitz. That the 1940 presidential election was one of the most rancorous in American history was the view of many participants and observers at the time; Barnes, pp. 206-207, 227, Time magazine, Oct. 14, 1940, and Harry Hopkins Papers, Confidential Political File, 1940 Campaign, FDRL, give examples of the low state of the campaign; see also OF 300, Democratic National Committee, 1940. Cantril (B), pp. 939-943, suggests the extent to which Roosevelt was following rather than leading public opinion on rearmament, although it must be kept in mind that the President’s chief problem was not popular attitudes but congressional opposition. For Roosevelt’s quotation of the Times article stating that the Axis wished Willkie to win, see PC No. 686, October 4, 1940; PPF 257, FDRL, reflects the special attention paid by the White House to all direct or indirect support for Willkie from German sources. Marquis W. Childs, I Write from Washington (Harper, 1342), chap. 11, provides an observer’s evocative picture of Willkie campaigning. Stimson and Bundy, p. 348, suggests the political implications of Roosevelt’s decision to go ahead with the draft. Watching the campaign closely, Sherwood was struck by the hysterical tone of the war issue; see his Roosevelt and Hopkins (B), pp. 187-188. The concern of the White House with the national-origin vote—especially the German, Italian, and Irish—is reflected in many FDRL files; see especially OF 1113; PLFDR, p. 1072; Hopkins Papers, 1940 Campaign; OF 300 (New York); and Gosnell2, p. 187. The President’s fling at the editorial writers of the Times is in PLFDR, pp. 1067-1068. Ickes3, pp. 331, 344-345, tells of Flynn’s and Roosevelt’s worry about public opinion poll manipulation. Cantril, pp. 601-602, provides polling figures on the major party vote, and a trend can be noted in both the Roper and Gallup polls toward Willkie at the end of the campaign. Three aspects should be kept in mind in interpreting these figures: polling results are usually more dependable in depicting trends than reflecting an absolute situation; a 50-50 percentage breakdown between the two major party candidates was an especially worrisome matter for the Democrats because some of their popular strength is wasted in the South as a result of the workings of the electoral college system; and polling data interpretation calls for close attention to the dates of polls. On the near-panic in the Democratic camp in October see Democratic National Convention file, 1940, FDRL; Hopkins Papers, 1940 campaign, FDRL; PPF 2361, FDRL; PPF 2425, FDRL, among other files. The Roosevelt-Ickes exchange is in Ickes3, p. 352. Two participants and observers, Sherwood and Rosenman (B), provide the best description of Roosevelt’s two-week campaign. The special attention and planning that the White House gave to radio is clear from OF 300, Democratic National Committee, Radio Publicity Box 109, 1940, FDRL. Rosenman, p. 240, describes the origin of the “Martin-Barton-Fish” phrase; both Rosenman, p. 244, and Sherwood, p. 191, describe the drafting of the Boston speech. Hull (B), p. 862, relates with some bitterness the President’s willingness to compromise on the foreign policy plank in the Democratic party platform. Krock, Krock interview, OHP, stresses that he printed the Philadelphia “pauper” remark knowing full well that the Democrats would make the most of it. Rosenman rates the Cleveland speech as Roosevelt’s best up to that time, and Sherwood, pp. 195-196, and Rosenman, pp. 247-248, vividly describe its preparation. I have checked the PPAFDR version of this speech against a recording at FDRL.
The Future in the Balance. Sherwood describes the preliminaries to the drafting of Roosevelt’s election eve speech and prayer, p. 197. Sources for description of Hyde Park election night activities are a detailed report in Time magazine, “Election Extra,” November 1940; Rosenman, p. 254; Sherwood, pp. 199-200; Eleanor Roosevelt, “My Day,” November 1940, FDRL; and Roosevelt to Henry Luce, Nov. 20, 1940, PPF 3338, FDRL. The last is an angry letter from the President criticizing Time for errors in its election night story. Roosevelt, however, did not correct the story in important respects, and his resentment probably was directed more against the invasion of his privacy than errors in the report. The Time description is corroborated in substance by newspaper reports and by Sherwood. Reilly describes Roosevelt’s brief loss of nerve in Reilly and Slocum [chap. 14], p. 66. The early anxiety on Roosevelt’s part is indicated also in Sherwood, pp. 199-200. For analysis of 1940 election results see Cantril, pp. 616-620, especially items 62, 68, 70, 72, 76, 78, 79, 80, and 82. Samuel Lubell, The Future of American Politics (Harper, 1951) evaluates the significance of class and ethnic voting in the 1940 election on the basis of election returns and voter interviews. Gosnell2, pp. 185-188, has a succinct round-up of the major studies and conclusions therefrom. He cites Douglas Waples and Bernard Berelson, Public Communications and Public Opinions (Chicago: University of Chicago Library School, 1941, mimeographed), which measured the extent to which certain topics and persons received coverage in press and radio. A brilliant, pioneering election study, Paul F. Lazarsfeld, Bernard Berelson, and Hazel Gaudet, The People’s Choice (Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1944), illustrates the advantage to Roosevelt of his radio skills and illuminates many other aspects of the campaign, on the basis of elaborate studies in Erie County, Ohio. Irving Bernstein, “John L. Lewis and the Voting Behavior of the C.I.O.,” Public Opinion Quarterly, Vol. V, No. 2, Summer 1941, pp. 233-249, is a thorough examination of this subject.
EPILOGUE
As noted in the Introduction, the first two and last sections of the Epilogue are designed chiefly to help present a rounded picture of Roosevelt’s life and are not based on extensive original research at the Franklin D. Roosevelt Library or elsewhere. I have relied almost wholly on secondary sources, most of which have been listed above.
Roosevelt as War Lord. Useful works on events of 1941 aside from those previously noted are: Herbert Feis, The Road to Pearl Harbor (Princeton, Princeton University Press, 1950), a searching analysis by a former State Department adviser; Ray S. Cline, Washington Command Post (Washington: Office of the Chief of Military History, Dept. of the Army, 1951), an authoritative study; Beard (B). I do wish to mention again Langer and Gleason, The Undeclared War (B), on which I have relied heavily and which offers the most extensive and balanced account I know of the complex events before Pearl Harbor. Roosevelt’s comments to Fulton Oursler about Russia are from PPF 212, FDRL. On Roosevelt’s handling of the union status problem after Pearl Harbor see J. M. Burns, “Maintenance of Membership: A Study in Administrative Statesmanship,” The Journal of Politics, Vol. X, No. 1, February 1948, pp. 101-116. The famous quotation from Lincoln is from J. G. Nicolay and John Hay, Complete Works of Abraham Lincoln (Lincoln Memorial University, 1894), Vol. X, p. 66.
Roosevelt as Peace Leader. The quotation on p. 464 is from Gunther2 (B), p. 334. Miss Perkins (B) quotes Roosevelt’s account of warming up Stalin, pp. 84-85. Roosevelt’s “symbol war” with Hitler is treated in J. M. Burns, “The Roosevelt-Hitler Battle of Symbols,” The Antioch Review, Vol. II, No. 3, September 1942, pp. 407-421. Former President Truman describes his reaction to his selection for vice-presidential candidate in 1944 in Memoirs by Harry S. Truman (Garden City, N. Y.: Doubleday, 1955), Vol. I, p. 193. The Roosevelt-Willkie negotiations in regard to party realignment are described fully by Rosenman (B), chap. 24, and by Barnes [chap. 21], pp. 371-379. Churchill describes Roosevelt’s appearance at Yalta in The Second World War (6 vols., Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1948-53), Vol. VI, p. 477. Works on the Yalta conference are too numerous to mention here, but one especially valuable volume because it excerpts from a dozen treatments of the subject is Richard F. Fenno, Jr., The Yalta Conference (Boston: Heath, 1955).
Democracy’s Aristocrat. My a
nalysis of Roosevelt’s personality leans so heavily on the foregoing analytical narrative, and the works used and cited, that I shall not attempt a separate listing here. I will mention only the following: Eleanor Roosevelt gave me important guidelines to understanding Roosevelt in my interview with her, although I take sole responsibility for the analysis in these pages. John M. Blum’s brilliant analysis of Theodore Roosevelt in The Republican Roosevelt (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1954) was extremely suggestive for my own treatment of Franklin Roosevelt, who had so much in common with his cousin. Clinton Rossiter called my attention to the Walt Whitman passage. My comments on Roosevelt’s dealing with evil (in its various manifestations) lean heavily on the writings of Reinhold Neibuhr.
Warrior’s Home Coming. Among the most useful accounts of Roosevelt’s death are Turnley Walker, Roosevelt and the Warm Spring Story (A. A. Wyn, 1953), chaps. 16-17; Gunther2; A. M. Smith, Thank You, Mr. President (Harper, 1946), especially chaps. 10, 13; Reilly [chap. 14], chap. 21.
INDEX
A | B | C | D | E
F | G | H | I | J
K | L | M | N | O
P | Q | R | S | T
U | V | W | Y | Z
AAA (Agricultural Adjustment Act), 168-69, 179, 181, 193-98, 205, 224, 242-43, 267, 303; modified, 224; invalidated by Supreme Court, 231, 234, 322; new Act (1938), 342
Academy of Political Science, 323
Acheson, Dean, 172, 206, 265, 440, 496
The Definitive FDR Page 74