The Times Great Lives. Anna Temkin

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СКАЧАТЬ that he had no sense of inferiority to any man or people upon earth and could therefore be completely spontaneous. So American was he, indeed, that he seemed instinctively to realize the ideals which, however inarticulately, were stirring in his fellow-countrymen, and, since they were usually his own as well, it became his delight to translate them into concrete political forms. He became, moreover, in virtue chiefly of the accuracy of his intuitions, the shrewdest and most adroit of politicians. He had also the rare power of making government appear interesting and exciting, especially to the younger generation. He had, of course, his weaknesses and incapacities, though they were perhaps the inevitable concomitants of his virtues. He was assailed, for example, as a reckless spender, a plotter against the Constitution, a dictator, and an enemy of sound finance; but when due allowance is made for political animus, the substance of such charges seems small indeed beside his achievements. Added, moreover, to his many other qualifications for his exalted office he had an abounding vitality and exuberance of spirit, and, by no means least of his powers, he was a sound judge and a natural attractor of men. No doubt he was a favoured child of fortune; and yet the man who had fought and conquered a fell disease had, it seemed, wrung from that grim struggle the secret of all human victories.

      Early Life

      Wish to Be a Sailor

      Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born at Hyde Park, in Dutchess County, New York, on January 30, 1882. He was the only son of an affluent and long-established family well and widely related. President Theodore Roosevelt was his distant cousin. In him Dutch, French, Scottish, and Irish strains were mingled, but all of them had been seasoned for generations in the United States. His father, James Roosevelt, was both a man of business and a country gentleman. His mother, a remarkable woman who was to exert a great influence upon his life, was Sara Delano, a member of a French family which had left Leyden in the early seventeenth century. Although delicate he had a happy childhood, during which he was taken a number of times to Europe. Then rather late he was sent to school at Groton. As a boy he had wanted to enter the Navy – his love of ships remained with him always – but instead he went to Harvard. There, although he moved in a largely Republican set, he was known as a strong Democrat, the political faith of his immediate family; he also gained distinction by being managing editor of The Crimson, an undergraduate newspaper. After taking a full share in the university life and sports he graduated in 1904.

      On St Patrick’s Day, 1905, when he was studying law at Columbia University he married Eleanor Roosevelt, the niece of the famous Republican President. She was only a girl: but he seemed to have divined the quality of one who, herself a woman of remarkable ability, was to become a potent factor in his career and the most prominent and active mistress the White House has ever known. The young couple settled in New York, and in 1907 he was admitted to the Bar and joined the important legal firm of Carter, Ledyard and Milburn, of that city. Then in 1910 he yielded to the suggestion that he should stand for the State Senate as candidate for the Dutchess County District which for years had been a Republican stronghold. At the election his immense vitality, charm, and good humour won the day and his brilliant political career began. At its outset he made his name, for he became the central figure in a courageous and successful revolt against Tammany Hall over the election of a Senator to Washington.

      Navy Assistant Secretary

      When in 1912 Woodrow Wilson became President, Roosevelt was offered a choice of two places in the administration; but neither appealed to him. Then, however, Josephus Daniels, the new Secretary of the Navy, asked him if he would take the congenial post of Navy Assistant Secretary and he readily consented. Daniels was a pacifist of puritanical mind, but the two men got on well together, and Roosevelt, who was much the more popular with the service, was, in his capable and vigorous way, able to do a great deal to increase the efficiency of the fleet. He found, however, that the President was less helpful than he might have been. Wilson liked and admired Roosevelt, who continued to hold him in deep regard, but he hesitated to give signs of preparation for war. It was indeed only in 1916 that he consented to an increased navy, and thus gave the Assistant Secretary his chance. In June, 1918, Roosevelt was offered a nomination for the governorship of New York but refused it. Then in the next month he went in pursuit of his duties to England and afterwards to France. He was eager at the time to play a combatant’s part, but this was not to be. In London he created an admirable impression and made many friends. After the Armistice he went to Europe again.

      At the Democratic Convention of 1920, which was held at San Francisco, Governor Cox, of Ohio, was nominated to succeed Wilson, and, much to his surprise and pleasure, the convention agreed that Roosevelt should go forward for the Vice-Presidency. It was a strenuous campaign; but the fate of the Democrats was sealed, and he retired into private life with good humour and, in spite of the defeat of his party, a high reputation. He thereupon resumed his legal practice, and as an occupation for his spare time undertook to reorganize the Boy Scout movement in New York. He had, however, been subjected to a long and unbroken strain, and in the next year was smitten with poliomyelitis, a form of infantile paralysis. It might well have ended his career, but, bearing its pain and deprivation with superb courage, he triumphed first over the disease itself and then by degrees over the physical incapacity it left. ‘I’ll beat this thing,’ he said. He was never in fact to regain the full use of his legs, and to him, who had the physique and habit of an athlete, swimming was to remain his only locomotive exercise. Owing, however, to his iron will and magnificent resistance he was able to do some work in 1922, and in 1924 played a prominent part in the Democratic Convention of that year. All who knew him seemed to have agreed that his ordeal had deepened as well as strengthened a character already strong.

      Governor of New York

      By 1928 much benefited by prolonged treatment at Warm Springs, in Western Georgia, where he later established a foundation for the treatment of infantile paralysis, he was able to stand without crutches, and once again to bear the strain of active politics. It was he, therefore, who nominated his old friend ‘Al’ Smith as Democratic candidate to the Presidency, and himself on Smith’s strong persuasion stood for the governorship of the State of New York. His election to it was in the circumstances of the time a triumph, for even Smith himself failed for the first time to carry his Empire State. This important office, which raised him to Presidential status, he was to hold for two terms of two years each. His was in many ways a notable administration, for he found himself in a laboratory in which he could test the reforms he was afterwards to apply to the country as a whole. He also developed his own political technique, and it was at this period that he was among the first to exploit the political uses of the broadcast, a medium of which he became perhaps the most skilled and effective exponent of his time. Perhaps the greatest of his many problems was the administration of New York City, and when in view of certain scandals he instituted an extensive investigation into its municipal affairs, events were to show that his action had been justified. By the end of the second period of office he had greatly increased his reputation in the country at large by the just and fearless performance of his official duties.

      Elected President

      New Deal Promised

      Meanwhile the economic condition of the nation, gripped in the ever-deepening depression of those years, was going from bad to worse. The unemployment figures, in so far as they could be estimated, ran to many millions. Values were sinking to fantastic levels, factories were without orders, and a dreadful paralysis was encroaching on every normal national activity. It was against this background of gloom and widespread sense of hopelessness that the Presidential election of 1932 was held. At it the Republicans, who felt bound to vindicate their President by their votes, decided to put Herbert Hoover forward for a second time. At the Democratic Convention at Chicago there was a good deal of initial manoeuvring, but eventually Roosevelt was nominated, and once his campaign had started there was little question of the result. In it he was helped immensely by the work of the group of chosen experts known as the ‘Brain Trust’, whom he had employed to advise him, and to ensure that the votes his policy might gain would not be obtained by false pretences. Apart from the fact that the Hoover СКАЧАТЬ