American Presidents: Totalus Rankium - 32.2 Franklin D Roosevelt

Episode Date: March 6, 2021

Part 2 of our three part look at Roosevelt. In this episode he becomes governor of New York and then President all while the economy is weeping in a cupboard somewhere. So how does he do? Find out!

Welcome to Totalus Rankium. This week, Franklin D. Roosevelt Part 2. Hello and welcome to American Presidents Totalus Rankium. I am Jamie. And I'm Rob, ranking all of the presidents from Washington to Biden. And this is episode 32.2. It's Franklin Roosevelt. Yeah, we are. Here we are. Part two of a three-parter, remember, Jamie? And also, we're back, Jamie. We're back. We we are. Part two of a three-parter, remember, Jamie? And also, we're back, Jamie. We're back.

We're back. We're back after our long, long break. I even got my special pen out to make notes. Oh, nice. If you listen to Romans and Presidents and you're up to date on everything, which I know some people are, we might be repeating ourselves here. But if you only listen to Americans, welcome back, everyone. We're back've moved house um i live in a village now and uh jamie still lives under the bridge with the other trolls and my stolen wi-fi from the local house yeah that's where he lives so it's it's

good to be back and we're we're going to get get right a bit of FDR. Elbow deep in FDR. Yes we are. Let's do it. But before we do and before we have an introduction, cue the sad music Jeremy. Oh no. Yeah. Not again. Made a mistake last episode. That's the third hamster this month. episode. That's the third hamster this month. Not that mistake. Apparently I called in the last episode the SPCC, or the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Well, apparently I called them the Society for the Preservation of Cruelty to Children, which was a very different society back then. The identical acronym caused endless confusion, I can tell you. I can imagine. Yeah.

Lots of really embarrassed meetings going on where people are like, oh, no, sorry, you're against the, oh, sorry, I'm in the wrong meeting. Thrash them! Thrash the, oh, oh. I'm down the road. Sorry. Oops. That. Oops. That's embarrassing.

So, I mean, yeah, we've just, we've fallen victim to the same problem. It's that shared acronym. Well, we're living history, aren't we? We are. That's what we are. So, obviously, what I should have said was the prevention of cruelty,

not preservation of cruelty. I hope everyone will forgive me. I hope nobody uses that in a soundbite in a court case in 20 years. Right, come on then. Let's make a start, Jamie. What have you got for me? A thick denier fabric. Give me more detail.

Black fabric. Can't quite tell what it is. You quite zoomed in. But there's a chance to zoom out to be whatever you want it to be, Rob. Or is that too open for you? Do you want me to be more specific? Yeah, go on. I'm up for a challenge.

Be more specific. Okay, more specific. Okay. You zoom out from that fabric, and it's black fabric. Quite a coarse, coarse fabric, don't you? You see the strands sticking out every now and again. And you zoom out, and it's actually a goat wearing trousers. And you're on a farm.

And the farmer's hanging around with the crooks. They all carry crooks. And he's kind of like raising his eyebrows and grinning at this goat, feeling very proud of himself, thinking, ah, maybe this is how goats should wear trousers. But next to the goat, there's a goat that's got the trousers on all four legs. Okay. So you've got two different styles of goat trousers.

Go. Fair enough. No. Okay. Open on some black fabric and zoom out. And you see a goat wearing trousers. And next to it, a goat wearing two pairs of trousers. And you see a farmer looking between the two.

No, no, no, no, no, no. He's not wearing two pairs of trousers. He's wearing one pair of trousers with four leg holes in it. A quartet of trousers. Yes. Yeah, okay. The farmer is speculating which one to take to the goat show to market his revolutionary idea.

But just as he comes up, he's thinking. You can see the cogs whirring literally in his head. He's thinking. You can see the cogs working literally in his head. And yeah, all of a sudden he shouts Eureka and the light bulb flashes above his head. And you know that he's finally decided which goat it is he's going to take to the goat show. But then the light bulb flickers and you hear that sound effect that means all the electricity is suddenly gone. The kind of... And then you just see the windmill in the distance stop and then fall over.

And then you just see the dust rising up everywhere and the goats look at each other in a kind of depressed way and the farmer's shoulders slump. And then the electricity man arrives with a big bill. It seemed like a comically sized bill that he's holding and he just shouts over the fence above the dust storm that's rising time to pay up mr farmer and then freeze that image but then it all turns into an overly kind of uh cartoon-esque with lots of flourishes ink flour, and it morphs into a newspaper

cartoon where the electricity man's got the words electric reform written on him and stuff like that. Yeah. Okay. That's how we're starting. Smoothly done. Abstract. You ready? Yes. We left Roosevelt endorsing Smith to be the nominee whilst running his campaign. Do you remember? This was a while ago. Yes. No, no, no. It was about a month ago.

It's fine. I've got the... It's fine. I've got my notes. Not many notes. It's fine. You'll catch up. Remember, whilst FDR was running Smith's campaign, he also pretty much became the darling of

the Democratic Party. He showed everyone he had spirit. No, he couldn't walk, but that didn't stop him. He was going to push on. The polio wasn't going to slow him down. And let's not forget, he also had the name Roosevelt. So he had a lot of support. Or at least he had a lot of support from a large section of the party. Remember, the Democrats were very much split at this point between the urban progressive wing and the conservative, mostly rural wing under McAdoo. McAdoo. Yeah. Now, still most recognize that Roosevelt was going to be a major player in the party in the future. However, as we've seen, the Democrats were wiped out by Coolidge in 1924. Roosevelt, therefore, decided to take a bit of a step back from politics once more. He'd nipped in to run

the campaign for Smith, but now's not the time. Way to the ground's more fertile. Exactly. This is not him going, oh, forget politics. This is him deciding, yes, I do want to be president one day. How am I going to do that? I've got to enter at the right time. Me going in guns blazing now is a waste of time. The Democrats are too weak. So he decides to wait. And while he was doing so, he looked for ways to make his life more comfortable. So he heads back down south. Remember, he'd spent a lot of his time down south where the climate was better. This time he went to Georgia to a place called Warm Springs. Do they have a warm spring there? You guessed it.

You guessed it. The naming curse strikes again. Literal. Yeah, there was a warm spring there. Was it next to a big place? It was, next to lots of trees. And green fields. Yeah.

People went there, they relaxed, there was a resort. Yeah, and down he went, and generally relaxed. He felt pretty good afterwards. In fact, he thought he'd made more progress with his general health in the three weeks he stayed there than in the previous three years. That's interesting. So, being a Roosevelt, he decides to buy the resort. Why not? Screw it. Yeah a whole two-thirds of his entire wealth was poured into the place. It's not

cheap buying a resort. I mean this is buying several cottages, various swimming pools, an inn, and 1,200 acres of land. So, sizable. Then once he had Warm Springs, he set up the Warm Spring Foundation, which would become the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, a foundation that works with people with polio. That's good. Get in this iron lung. Breathe!

FDR threw all his time into this project. It became essentially his thing for a while. For $42 a week, you could stay there and be fed and looked after and be treated as much as possible for the polio you had. So it's for rich people, then. Well, yes. However, they also set up a fund which people donated into. And if anyone who couldn't afford the fees turned up, then they would just have it paid for them through the fund.

But that's communism, Rob. You can't have communism. No, no, no, that's not communism. That's private charity through capitalism. That's fine. All right. Yeah, yeah, that's all good. through capitalism, that's fine. Yeah, yeah, that's all good. Yeah, so, I mean, in theory, anyone could go there. Anyone at all.

But obviously, I mean, you're not going to get poor kids from the streets of Chicago rocking up to Warm Springs in Georgia. You needed to be able to get to the place first. But still, it wasn't just for the ultra-rich. It was, generally, it was a force for good in the world. You can definitely argue that. By this point, Roosevelt had just about figured out a way that he could, quote-unquote, walk. Yeah, he really had come on quite well. And he got to the point where he could use a cane in one hand and hold on to another person tightly with the other.

And then generally shuffle along without too much discomfort. Now this meant he could now go from place to place without using a wheelchair or a crutch. It still had its king but I mean just the visuals of it, the optics. Yeah. Roosevelt found it worked much better for someone aspiring in politics. It makes you look like you're determined, I guess. Yeah. Also, from a distance, it meant he looked far more mobile than he actually was. This is something he achieves throughout his life. A lot of people were completely unaware that their president was pretty much wheelchair-bound.

Wow. Yeah, because he did manage to come up with ways to make it look like he was more mobile. Anyway, so he spent the next four years running warm springs in Georgia and occasionally dipping into politics. And then the next presidential race was on and Smith asked him to run the campaign once more. And this convention was pretty much a rerun from the previous one. this convention was pretty much a rerun from the previous one. Again, FDR was applauded loudly when he gave his speech, and this time he looked in even better health than last time.

Remember, we ended on his speech in the last episode, how he just about managed to get to the podium using his crotch. Crawling across the stage. Pretty much. Well, yeah, he managed to get to the podium record time, and his speech was even better. It went down really well. Again, there was this real feeling that, yeah, okay, you're nominating Smith,

but who's the real popular person? Who's the future of the party here? Now, it helped that in the previous four years, the party had shifted somewhat. Smith was now the out-and-out forerunner. McAdoo was no longer a problem. McAdoo. Yeah. So, Smith became the nominee on the very first ballot. It wasn't drawn out at all.

One vote, Smith gets the nominee. However, things weren't looking good for the Democrats still. Coolidge had decided not to run again, and none other than the bullish businessman Herbert Hoover was their nominee. He'll never get it. Well, the man could get stuff done, he'd proven it all his life. And people liked the look of this Hoover. The Democrats knew that this was going to be an uphill battle, which they

were probably going to lose. But you can't really just give up in an election, so they went at it. So the election starts, and yeah, it soon becomes very obvious Smith hasn't got a hope in hell of winning, which is disappointing but not unsurprising for Franklin. Roosevelt continued with his plan. So his plan at this point was spend four more years at Warm Springs, become the governor of New York in 1932, and then run for president in 1936. So, eight-year plan. In eight years, I'll become president. However, there was a flaw in his plan. He'd become too popular within the party. too popular within the party. Yeah,

Smith was obviously busy campaigning to be the president and he also happened to be the current governor of New York. That meant the governor's seat in New York was up for grabs. Now obviously Smith couldn't run for it because he was running for president. And the Republicans had put forth a very popular

candidate. So popular that many of the Democrats decided there was only one person who could possibly win this seat in New York, and that was none other than Franklin Roosevelt. So, Roosevelt received a phone call in Warm Springs from Smith himself. I like to think he was sitting in the spring at the time. I'm guessing so. He did enjoy it in the water, did Roosevelt.

He spent a lot of time in the water because obviously he could move far more freely yeah yeah yeah so i'm guessing he had a little flamingo rubber ring floating with a phone on top i like it yeah they have the technology yeah i mean it wasn't wireless so there's a no there's a big wire trailing yeah yeah yeah everyone looking very nervous around us it's sparking slightly but there is nothing technologically impossible about the image of him in a warm spring with a flamingo rubber ring and a phone yeah exactly so it probably happened i'd go as far as to say it definitely happened cool right so picture the the flamingo rubber ring and the phone,

and then it starts ringing in a comical back and forth kind of... Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Jumpy. Anyway, Roosevelt grabs the phone, lifts it to his ear, and it is none other than Smith. How about, he said, you running for governor in New York? Franklin said, no.

Oh. Yeah. Franklin said, no. Oh. Yeah. Franklin's got a plan. It's an eight-year plan. Four more years in Warm Springs, four more years of the governor of New York, then present. So he told Smith his health was too poor still.

He's recovering. He's doing better, but he can't do it right now. Warm Springs... Splash, splash, splash. Warm Springs also needs him. I mean, he can't just it right now Warm Springs Warm Springs also needs him I mean he can't just abandon Warm Springs he needs to spend time so it can transition over to someone else

at that point over the phone you're going to here's your Negroni sir well he was told over the phone and I quote damn Warm Springs we'll take care of it for you and he was promised that any losses to the institution would be covered by several prominent democrats yeah we're just we'll make any financial

problems go away don't worry run for governor fdr still refused no that's not part of the plan i really don't want to do this thanks but no thanks so then smith asked him okay you're saying no i'm hearing no but your lips are saying no but your eyes your beautiful blue eyes are saying yes well would you franklin refuse the job if you were nominated anyway no one's saying you have to run for it but if you win the nomination anyway, are you really going to turn around and refuse to do the job? At this point, Roosevelt hesitates. Ah, this is tricky.

It wouldn't look good to refuse. Remember, the plan is in four years to become the governor in New York. He can hardly do that if four years previously he'd said, I don't want to do the job. Yes. Franklin was just hesitating, didn't say anything, and Smith jumped onto this hesitation and said, Thanks, Frank. I won't ask any more questions, and hung up.

Roosevelt was indeed nominated. Both Eleanor and Roosevelt's friend Howe telegraphed him and basically shared their condolences. They knew Franklin didn't want the job at this time, but he had no choice. He was forced to run before he found he was ready, and at a time where the Democrats were at a disadvantage. This was not going to be a shoo-in, I've been nominated, I'll become governor. The Republican opponent was very popular.

There was a very good chance he was going to lose this. And if he loses a run for the governorship, that could torpedo any hopes to become the president. Yeah. Meanwhile, the Republicans themselves were taken by surprise by Roosevelt suddenly being on the scene. So they moved to attack. Yeah. There's an obvious form

of attack if Roosevelt's running against you. Mock his disability. Essentially, yeah. Or question the ability for him to do the work on grounds of health reasons. It's maybe a more political way of putting it.

But essentially you've got it, yeah. This reminds me of watching Downton Abbey when Mr Bates starts in the very first episode. Yes. It's exactly like that. Fully, fully agree. I'm aware that Downton Abbey exists. I now know that there's someone in a wheelchair.

No, he's not in a wheelchair. Oh dear. His eligibility and his question whether he's healthy enough or good enough to do it because he uses a walking stick. Oh, I see. Very much like that then. Yes, that's what I was thinking. Yeah.

Have you watched much Downton Abbey? I've watched it all. Is it good? Actually, it is very good. I like a good period drama. I've never seen any at all. No, we hadn't either. We just thought, let's just

watch it. It's on Amazon Prime. It's all free. Let's watch it. And we binge watched it over like a week. Oh, okay. Okay. It's good. I think you'd enjoy it.

Did the butler do it? Three times, yes. Nice. Oh, Mr. Carson. All this is staying M. So yes, yeah, yeah. just like Downton Abbey. Anyway, back to FDR. Yes, the Republicans attacked him on grounds of health.

The Herald Tribune, a Republican-leaning paper, announced that it was unfair of the Democrats to draft in Roosevelt. How dare they put poor Roosevelt under so much pressure? The man's incapable of doing anything, the poor thing. Quite. But it was even more unfair on the people of New York State, all very condescending. The Democrats pointed out that being the governor was brain work and there was nothing wrong with FDR's brain,

whereas FDR himself just made a joke of it. He just stated that he wasn't running for governor. Instead, he was counting on his friends to help him walk for it. Oh, that's good. Yeah. I like that. FDR quite often used metaphors and figurative language based around walking and feet and stuff. He seemed to get a bit of a kick out of it.

That's a great technique, though. It deflates the argument, doesn't it? Yeah, yeah. Anyway, by this time Roosevelt had decided, in for a penny, in for a pound, or... In for a cent, in for a dollar. In for a cent, in for a dollar, probably, yeah. If he was going to have to do this

earlier than he wanted, then he was going to have to make it count. It was going to be a hard campaign, so he had to throw himself into it. And throw himself into it he did. He delivered up to 14 speeches a day, and he crisscrossed the state. A day? Yeah, it was full on. Was it the same speech recycled?

Obviously there was elements. Hello, New Jersey. Which is in New York, of course. Something's definitely gone wrong if he's saying hello, New Jersey, which is in New York. Something's definitely gone wrong if he's saying hello, New Jersey. Yeah, he had speechwriters, although he would also write speeches himself and amend things. But yeah, as they were on the go, we had people rewriting, redrafting speeches to keep up with current affairs and things. It was very much a full on campaign. Slowly but surely, the momentum started to gain behind him. What seemed like a long shot to begin with started to seem possible.

He might actually bloody go and win this. Now, nationally, the Democrats were falling apart all over the place. It was going to be a very clear Republican win at the national level, but all the other elections going on as well. The Republicans were cleaning up, but not in New York. Roosevelt was gaining a following. On the day of the election, Roosevelt went to bed early. The initial votes had come in and it didn't look great. Probably was going to lose. But as the night wore on, the tally started to shift.

gonna lose but as the night wore on the tally started to shift roosevelt was awoken in the middle of the night by one of his staffers to tell him it's starting to shift uh an unimpressed roosevelt said it was crazy to wake him he'd lost and he went back to bed eventually however at four o'clock in the morning roosevelt did pull ahead and in the the end, he got 2,130,000 votes. His opponent got 2,104,000 votes. Oh, that's close, isn't it? Oh, it was close. It was very close. Knife edge.

But he got it. He won by the skin of his teeth. He'd won that uphill battle. So yeah, he's now governor of New York, four years earlier than planned. And the road to the White House suddenly opens up for him. Because New

York, at that time, was the most important swing state, and it was now his for the taking in 1932 if he ran. All he had to do was not mess up as governor, and there was a good chance he could get the state to back him

if he went for president. See, that's quite tricky, because it's almost like, well, I need to make changes, but if the changes I make are bad, then I'm screwed. But if I don't make any changes, and just let things plod along, that's great for some people, because it's like I'm being effective, I'm not actually doing anything. I know what I'm trying to say here. I know what I'm know I'm trying to say you've read the minutes from Roosevelt's first meeting

after becoming governor there yeah that was almost verbatim that's what I was hoping for yeah yeah it's good um but yeah yeah pretty much he's got to not mess up in four years that's all he needs to do how hard will that be so after the governor governor's mansion he goes uh in albany the mansion was adapted for him uh the greenhouse was turned into a swimming pool so he could exercise for example i'm scared there's like a little british greenhouse the aluminium framed paint glass thing with a little with a book in the middle here you go sir here's your swimming pool yes the size of a small shed they basically just dug a hole in the shed and then poured some water in it there you go uh he also by this point had hired two men to essentially be bodyguards uh a man named uh grenerich and miller but they also doubled as helpers when it came to moving around

in public they devised a system where if they came across any stairs, Grunerich and Miller would lift Roosevelt by the elbows and carry him whilst he remained upright. They became so practiced that, again, if people were not really paying attention, if they were a bit of a distance, they probably would have thought Roosevelt was far more mobile than he was. He just went up those stairs.

Nice. Yeah, again, he manages to come across like he can move about a lot more than he can. Because he sort of establishes he doesn't need it really anyway, but he's playing the optics of it. Yeah, I mean, it's a shame he has to do that. Yes. And I'd like to say that things have changed nowadays, but they probably haven't, people's attitudes towards disabilities. Well, can you think of any disabled politicians?

Exactly. So it wouldn't surprise me if people's attitudes were very similar today than they were there. But it is impressive that he manages to face the prejudice, face on, essentially, and find ways around things. Eleanor is still with him, obviously, his wife. But their relationship by this point, purely professional after the affair. There was no love between them anymore.

Like the Clintons. Well, we'll get to them, but yeah. They didn't always agree with each other, but they were on friendly enough terms. Eleanor realized that her success, which was very successful on her own, she really had made a career for herself, but the times being the times, it was still tied to the man in her life.

So she kind of has to support Roosevelt no matter what. But didn't seem to resent it. Just got on with things. There's so much going on with Eleanor Roosevelt, but I've purposely not covered her at all because eventually she should get her own episode. So we'll just wait for her episode. But just know she's doing things in the background.

As for being governor, Roosevelt had fun on his feet. Smith before him had done a damn good job. So Roosevelt didn't have much to do. He just had to let things tick along, really. It's always good when you inherit a good economy and everything's working quite well because you can take credit for it quite easily. Yeah, exactly, so let things tick along.

He worked on extending the availability of electricity in the state. A lot of farms, in fact, almost all farms, did not have electricity still at this point, apart from that one with the goats, but that had failed. Well, yeah. Yeah. So he really wanted to push getting electricity into the rural areas of the state.

To pay for this, he proposed a gasoline tax to support struggling farms, which... Good idea. ..as you can imagine, went down very well with the rural population, less so with the urban population. To help sound the idea of a tax, which obviously taxes never go down well, Roosevelt started to do what he would become famous for. That is a fireside chat. Technology was now that most people had access to a radio. And if you wanted to, oh yes, Roosevelt realised that he could talk directly to every single person in the state.

Well, not literally every single person, but a lot. A lot of them. The technology was there. And he decided that's exactly what he would do. It soon became clear that Roosevelt had a talent for this. It's like the Twitter of the day. Oh yeah, very much so. Trump used social media in a way that no politician has done before to get his message across to people.

And that message resonated with a lot of people. That's where his support came from. And that is very similar to Roosevelt with the radio. Because Roosevelt was able to get what was usually seen as a complex issue and talk about them in terms that anyone listening over the radio would understand them and find themselves nodding along. Not just, oh, I understand now, but, oh, yeah, I understand and I agree. And you know what?

I actually feel a little bit clever because I understand this thing because this is complex stuff, isn't it? And now I understand it. I feel good about myself. It's politics to the peak. Yeah, people listened and they enjoyed finding things out. It worked very well. According to one witness,

Roosevelt was just a natural at talking over the radio. I will quote here, his face would light up as though he was actually sitting on the porch with the listeners. Oh, I enjoyed it. Oh, yeah. Yeah, definitely. So things are going well. his face would light up as though he was actually sitting on the porch with the listeners oh i enjoyed it oh yeah yeah definitely so things are going well uh soon enough it was not just members of the democratic party who were talking about him running for president next time the press had started to speculate as well roosevelt started to give speeches that were far more progressive than anything he'd done before calling out the fact that the wealth of the country was being held by the few

and reducing the rest of the population to serfs. This is full-on progressive, almost populist type of rhetoric going on here. Almost socialism. No. No. But we'll get into that later. Roosevelt was hoping to capitalise on the anger of the majority of the country

who felt poor despite the boom of the economy recently. Yes, the economy was definitely getting better. Yes, the so-called Roaring Twenties had happened, but don't forget, for a vast majority of people in the country, times were hard still, because life's hard. So if he was hoping to capitalise on this, he timed it perfectly, because then the economy just explodes. Yeah, that was the sound it made.

The crash hit, the Great Depression began, businesses failed rapidly, farms collapsed all over the country, unemployment soared in the cities, all the stuff we covered in Hoover's episode happened. Things were bad. Now, as with almost everyone, Roosevelt thought that, yeah, this is just another blip. We've been doing boom and bust economy for some time now. This is, it's another bust. It's fine. We'll get back to booming soon. In fact, he referred to the crash as, and I quote,

the little flowy downtown. But over the next couple of months, it became clear to everyone that they're in trouble. This is bad. This is seriously bad. This is far worse than any other crash we've seen. Because the economy, I guess, is quite delicate. Well, it obviously is,

but it's almost an economy built on a promise rather than something substantial i feel like i'm making really philosophical point but i don't think i've shared it well what is money yeah exactly yeah it's just a promise uh yeah well Well, exactly. Economies are fragile. When they start falling, they can fall fast. And yeah, everything starts going bad. Roosevelt, being a shrewd politician, realized immediately that this was it. This was the battleground for the next election.

And this was going to be the one he was going to run in. Bring everything forward for years. He's running in the next one. So he starts to give speeches i'll quote a line from one of them if the farmer starves today we all starve tomorrow i've heard that before i've heard that nice little sound bites the kind of thing you you want to be saying in an era where radio is used and you're running for president yeah that line went down particularly well he hit headlines across the country, not just in New York.

He's now making national news. He predicted that the Democrats would make a comeback in the next election because they were the only ones who would be able to fix the mess. Most people were still thinking the Republicans have everything sewn up. So him predicting the Democrats were coming back made some headlines. Meanwhile, Hoover continued with his policy of trying to keep confidence up by making the government look as strong and stable as possible

by doing next to nothing. Excellent. Yes. Roosevelt looked for things that could help his state. One idea that had been floating around academic circles of late was quite a radical idea. In the university, some boffins had got their noggins could help his state. One idea that had been floating around academic circles of late. It was quite a radical idea. In the university, some boffins had got their noggins together. How about, they said, here's a crazy idea. Yeah. Instead of letting all of our citizens starve to death,

why don't we set up a scheme where the employer and the employees and the government or pay into a central fund. And then if someone loses their job or can no longer work due to injury and are starving to death, we can dip into that fund and give it to the people who are dying. They're crazy ideas. It was a crazy idea. Roosevelt liked the sound of it. Sounds pretty good to me. He was one of the first politicians to lend his voice to these ideas that were coming out of academic circles. Still, Roosevelt was distracted from the presidential bid in two years' time by another election coming up because he needed to rerun to become the governor again because they were two year cycles

it went well short version it was a good omen of things to come roosevelt had become very well liked in new york last time he had won by 26 000 votes have a guess how many votes he won by this time over a million not quite but three quarters of a million. Considering you're talking around four million voted, that's an impressive margin. In fact, it was a record margin for the state. So he went from skin of his teeth to beating all the records in two years. So things may have been looking good for Roosevelt, but not really for his state. New York was doing badly. Unemployment had risen dramatically to 8 million in the state. Hoover was still promoting the idea that people start renovating their houses to get the economy moving. That was about the most that Hoover had managed to

come up with. The governor of New York started to suggest that maybe the government should actually start doing something. That society, through government, had, and I quote here, an obligation to prevent starvation, not as a matter of charity, but of social duty. Just being a human being. Yeah. So this is starting to come away from private charity, which was seen as okay. as okay this was no the government does have a duty to make sure its citizens doesn't starve so be more more of a federal government no more more federal power yes yeah although i mean you could argue states could do this independently it doesn't have to be federally led but it would have to be federally led, but it would have to be federally led. Anyway, he passed laws to make it possible for the state government to find jobs wherever possible

and pay workers using $20 million that they've managed to rustle up. If work could not be found, then the money would just be given away when it was needed. Essentially, Roosevelt found $20 million and said, figure out a way of getting this away from us and to the people in the state find jobs invent jobs do whatever you can you are the grass counter yeah yeah essentially and he set up a an emergency organization to to help organize this what money the government could not get from just moving budgets around, they would raise by taxing those who were not starving to death. So people who were earning a fair amount of money.

You're not actually starving right now, and all these people are, so sorry, you're gonna have to pay a bit more tax. As you can imagine, some people didn't like that, but considering there were more and more people literally starving to death at this time, this was quite popular. Yeah. Yeah. It had stopped becoming abstract. Debates like raising taxes to give to poor people quite often are an abstract argument, whereas now, even if you weren't starving yourself, all you had to do was step outside the door and you will find homeless people almost immediately. It was hard, hard times. So, by this point, Roosevelt was well known to be running for president, and he was, as I've said, a popular choice.

Before the next democratic convention, a poll of delegates showed that he had an overwhelming support of the delegates, polling over half of them. The rest were split between the other thoughtrunners. Even many business leaders supported the idea of them. The rest were split between the other thought runners. Even many business leaders supported the idea of Roosevelt. Yes, they were worried about some of his more populist sounding ideas about not letting the poor starve, but they realised that if the country did not get back on track somehow, their business would fail no matter how big it was. It's like, well, yeah, if no one's got money to spend on it. Yeah, exactly. So this guy seems to have some ideas.

Maybe that will work, because what we're doing now isn't. So with support for Roosevelt so obvious, the Republicans went on the attack again. He's probably going to be the nominee, so let's start attacking him. So what could we use to attack Roosevelt, they thought? Spears. No, they didn't go for Spears. Was it his disability? Oh, yeah, yeah, it was. Yeah, it was. The man can't walk, they didn't go for Spears. Okay. Was it his disability? Oh, yeah, yeah, it was.

Yeah, it was. The man can't walk, they said. How could he lead a country was essentially the message. One Republican journalist announced that if Roosevelt was really fit enough to be president, he would allow a doctor to undertake a full examination and then release the findings to the press. Roosevelt saw the opportunity and seized it. Oh yes, he went one further than this. He invited the director of

the New York Academy of Medicine to select an entire panel of doctors to perform a full examination on him, and then he invited the journalist who had challenged him to begin with to visit Albany as often as he liked unannounced.

Just turn up whenever you want. Come and see how fit I am. Calling, you bluff. That's brilliant. Oh, yes. The medical exam went very well. He was indeed very fit and healthy in every way apart from the paralysis below the knees. As you would expect, his upper body was, and I quote, exceptionally well developed. He exercised every single day swimming he was in very good health the journalist when he went to visit was just completely won over he found an alert cheerful and physically fit man and i quote merely his

knees were not much use to him that's quite a mate you wouldn't get that nowadays if you invited the presso they would slit you because of a certain agenda it's like no you're bad i'll mock you but the fact that they change his mind that's quite impressive we we will get into how journalism has utterly poisoned politics as we get into the later episodes uh but yeah journalism hasn't quite got that bad at this point no no so with the medical report and the about turn of the journalist and the fact that New York papers had a gentleman's agreement about not photographing the governor in any way that highlighted his disability, it was very easy for Roosevelt to prove to the public that he was indeed more than capable to be physically the president. So that attack line

just failed pretty much immediately. Anyway, finally, the Democratic Convention arrived. Roosevelt was by far the forerunner, but there was a problem. He may have had support from over half the delegates, but you needed two thirds of the votes at this time. And Tammany Hall conservatives had called a lot on Roosevelt recently, especially since he'd been spouting all this progressiveness. So Smith, who was a member of this faction, so the person who was running before,

he led the charge against Roosevelt, mainly accusing him of wanting to lift Prohibition. That's not a bad thing. Well, many people thought it was. Roosevelt had not really ever really got into the issue. Prohibition was a hot political potato at the time. Roosevelt realised going near it could only cause him harm. So he never really weighed in on the subject.

He was seen as damp. He was neither wet nor dry, as the pro and anti-prohibitionists were known at the time. I quite like damp. I would have preferred it if they were known as moist. Oh, yeah, but... But that would be fine. He's a bit moist on this issue. Anyway, first round of voting.

Roosevelt had 666 votes to Smith's 201. Still not quite enough, however, because there was a third candidate with 90, so he didn't actually quite have two thirds. Still, nothing a bit of backroom dealing won't fix, and after a few whiskeys, a few brandies, and a few cigars, and a few more rounds of voting, the person who was running third, a man named Garner, withdrew

and threw his weight behind Roosevelt all of a sudden. Then the momentum was with Roosevelt, and soon enough he won. Oh, and Garner, of all people, oh, guess who's vice president now? Oh. Yeah. Convenient. Very convenient. No outcries of, like, corrupt bargains or anything here, though.

Times have changed. Anyway,velt heard the news remember you don't go to your own convention no yeah so he heard the news and he announced the shock of everyone that he was going to get on one of those flying machines and head to chicago straight away to thank the convention in person yes so he going to go there and he's going to fly. Yes. Wow. Seen as a bold move. Planes. It's early days in planes. They weren't the safest

things back then. So we're 30s aren't we? 32. They're probably more familiar to what we'd recognise now. Oh yeah. Rather than the stick and fabric. Yes. We're not talking Wright brothers anymore. Anyway, he arrived at the convention and he started his speech.

In fact, I'll quote, I have started out on the tasks that lie ahead by breaking the absurd traditions that the candidate should remain in professed ignorance of what has happened for weeks until he is formally notified of that event many weeks later. My friends, may this be

the symbol of my intention to be honest and to avoid all hypocrisy So we're cutting all the ridiculousness. We've got a job to do. Let's get on with it. He then went on to finish his speech with this line. I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people. This is more than a political campaign. It is a call to arms. Give me your help, not to win votes alone,

but to win in this crusade to restore America to its own people. Yay, people cheered. Fight and talk. Yeah. Yeah. A new deal for the American people caught on. A new deal is how Roosevelt's presidency is essentially known and all the legislation he puts through.

Even I've heard of it. Well, yes, the new deal is a big thing in American politics. Anyway, the campaign started, as we saw in Hoover's episode, with him shooting veterans outside the White House and telling people that no one was actually starving, Roosevelt was not going to have much trouble. This was going to be a walk in the park. In fact, he spent most of his time repairing rifts within his own party. The progressive wing were very, very happy with him, as you can imagine. But Roosevelt didn't want to just court the progressive wing. He wanted to unify the party. So he went to try and cheer

the conservatives up a bit. He spent a while during the campaign with those high up in the conservative wing, assuring them that he wasn't going to go off the deep end, don't worry. Yeah, I'm saying some of these things, but it's politics. Don't worry, I'm not gonna go crazy. Your businesses will be safe. And when the election came, no one was surprised. With a record-breaking turnout of 40 million, Roosevelt won 23 million to Hoover's 17. 57% of the popular vote, the Electoral College was an utter whitewash. 472 to Hoover's 59. Oh yes, Roosevelt is president and the country was in a mess. Yep, Roosevelt spent the time between the election and the presidency picking his cabinet seats and generally steering clear of Hoover. Hoover wanted Roosevelt to publicly endorse Hoover's actions to help with confidence in the markets.

Come on, Roosevelt, tell everyone I did a good job and that way the markets will think that everything's fine was essentially what Hoover tried. Roosevelt just refused, realising all this would do was decrease confidence in him when he was president. No one likes you, Hoover, get over it, essentially, was the message. Now, it was around this time that Roosevelt was in Miami to give a talk.

He was perched on the back of his open seat car to give the talk, and he spoke to the crowd around him. Once finished, he slid back into his seat and started up a conversation with the mayor of Chicago, who had approached the car. Suddenly, five shots rang out. The mayor fell to the ground, and a member of the Secret Service grabbed his hand as it just erupted with blood. A woman behind the car was hit twice. The driver started off, realising that this was an assassination attempt, but Roosevelt ordered it to stop. So the driver stopped. Then a member of the Secret Service shouted,

go, go, go. So the driver started again and then Roosevelt shouted stop again. So it stopped again. Yeah, Roosevelt wanted the mayor to be picked up first. He'd been shot right in front of him. So they quickly huddled the mayor into the car and then raced to the hospital. The president-elect cradling the bleeding mayor in his arms the whole way. The mayor died a couple of weeks later. The assassin was executed for the murder. He had attempted to kill Roosevelt because, I quote here, I hate all presidents, no matter what country they come from.

Yeah, it was someone who just hated rich people in charge. It's what happens when a lot of people are struggling to live. You're going to get some of those people who are also a bit unhinged. Yeah. And unfortunately, there wasn't much protection for presidents back then. So, yeah. Anyway, Roosevelt survived. It later came out only because a woman in the crowd had seen the assassin

and had managed to knock his arm as he aimed. So it wasn't a case of this was a bad shot. It's like if the woman hadn't noticed, Roosevelt would have been killed here. So there you go. Assassination attempt survived. So he gets a point, I think. I know we've had this debate before. I can't remember what we said.

Yeah, but it's like at what time in your life? I think if you've been elected president, you definitely deserve the point, even if you've not been inaugurated yet. So I'm giving them the point there. Anyway, Roosevelt was already popular, but nothing gains you popularity like an assassination attempt gone wrong. His popularity surged even more. As bank after bank collapsed around the nation,

people started to become convinced that if anyone was going to get them out of this mess, it was going to be Roosevelt. So, Inauguration Day comes around. It was cold, it was damp, it was miserable, the streets were full of people struggling to feed their families. It wasn't a fun time. No, Roosevelt gave a speech that he hoped would install some hope. What the country needed more than anything at this time was belief that the economy was stable enough to pull through. People needed to not fear that any investment made at this time would fail. They needed to trust that the banks would not fall apart and their money would be lost.

In short, fear was causing the run on the banks, and they needed to stop it. Hence the line in his inauguration speech that has lived on quite well. And I quote, First of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. Nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advent. I've heard of that. That's a famous line from the president, isn't it? It is

Up there with that's not what you can do for your country No hang on Rolls off the tongue just like that Yeah yeah I know it well And I did not have sexual relations with that woman You see all the classics All the classics

Roosevelt's now fully President And he gets to work immediately. The first 100 days, he gets so much done, it's pretty much why the first 100 days is now a thing and why people talk about it, because it's always compared to Roosevelt. How much can you get done? Look how much Roosevelt did.

Yeah, he did. Yeah, the very next day, he called a bank holiday, which nowadays just sounds nice doesn't yeah brilliant hey bank holiday uh no no this was a quick shut the banks down before they all collapse oh so necessity yeah yes very much so in the meantime a special session of congress would work on the emergency banking act which would give the president far more powers in regards to banks and the mints. He then met with governors from all 48 states, explaining to them that he had to close the banks,

please don't be angry, and I also really need your support from everyone, I don't care who you are, a progressive democratic, a conservative democrat, a republican, I don't care, you need to support me, otherwise we are in deep doo-doo. I believe was the words he used. And he was riding such a high popularity, the governors swung behind him, regardless pretty much of faction or party. However, things then got tricky. Bankers were called in. Okay, the banks were in trouble. Let's get the people who know what they're talking about. Let's call the bankers in and ask them, state clearly and conciselyely what do you need to happen to fix this? And I will make it happen. Money, they all shouted.

Well, no, to the dismay of Roosevelt. Because if it was that, then that was something they could aim for. But to the dismay of Roosevelt and his cabinet, the bankers all had very different opinions on what needed to happen. And it appeared that no one really knew. The economy is very complex, and yes, there are people who know far more than other people, but even the experts disagree when it comes to the economy

because it is insanely complex. So, after 48 hours of non-stop meetings, it was finally decided. They would print more money. No! Don't do that! Have you seen germany well that that was literally what they were saying uh have you seen germany right now no no we can't do that um however yes runaway inflation bad but also banks collapsing because none of the money is moving is equally bad so we need to figure out a way of getting money to move, but we need to try and stop hyperinflation. Okay, so here's what we'll do. We will print more money,

but the new money would not be backed by gold or silver, but by the assets of the Federal Reserve. We back by something different. Hopefully, this means we can print more money so when the banks open they won't default on all their payments and collapse immediately and it should hold for now no this is not ideal this is not perfect no one wants to do it but if we don't do it the banks will literally fall over and when i say literally i mean full-on collapse in the street fall over oh that's how banks are made like the uh famous silent movie star, what's his name? Not Charlie Chaplin, Buster Keaton. Yeah.

Where the house falls and he's just in the middle. Yeah. Like that. Just like that. Excellent. Yeah, that's what they decide to do. However, for this to work, there needed to be hope. Because if the banks opened and everyone rushed to withdraw their savings all at once

because they all thought that the economy was falling apart then the entire system would collapse this would rip the country apart i like a policy of hope it's like how would how uk's dealt with coronavirus let's just hope it sort itself out well you see the difference is in when it comes to a virus that's a very physical thing the economy is as you alluded to earlier it's far more abstract and people's hope and opinions really can make actual differences what takes trust can i spend my money will i get my money exactly get lost or should i go and get all my money out now and put it under the mattress? If everyone decides to do that, then everything's falling apart. This will destroy the country.

My grandmother did that. What, destroy America? Partly. But she literally had thousands of pounds just stuffed under her bed. Because she didn't trust banks. Well, there you go. Brilliant. How did you find out about that?

We found it. Literally a suitcase full of money. Nice. Did you go and buy something with the suitcase full of money? No, we put it in a bank account for her. Oh, you totally should have done. There's not many times in life you can buy something with a suitcase full of money. You could have done it.

Full of pennies, yeah. Anyway, Roosevelt has to figure out a way to stop there being a run on the banks. So he needs to instill hope into the country. How's he going to do it? Trust. So I'm going to put my money in the bank. Watch. He goes in, donates his money, and the bank account says,

right, you have now nothing in your account. Sorry. Well, if he went into a bank on his own yeah the papers would publish it but it's slow it's it's not ideal he has a very effective form of communication don't forget podcast well radio well yes radio his uh first ever fireside chat as president and we are going to listen to it yes i'm gonna play a snippet of it not all, I'm going to play a snippet of it. Not all of it, but I'll play about a minute of it. Just know that throughout, the language drips with confidence.

Confidence in the system, confidence in the public, and confidence in himself. Full of reassuring phrases such as, I know you will understand, and as an intelligent public, and the kind of thing that will make the listeners feel good about themselves it really is a very good speech uh but because it's over 10 minutes long i'm not going to play it all but here is here's a little bit of it it is possible that when the banks resume a very few people who have not recovered from their fear may again begin withdrawals. Let me make it clear to you that the banks will take care of all needs except of course the hysterical demands of hoarders and it is my belief that hoarding during the past week has become an exceedingly unfashionable

pastime in every part of our nation. It needs no profit to tell you that when the people find that they can get their money, that they can get it when they want it for all legitimate purposes, the phantom of fear will soon be laid. People will again be glad to have their money where it will be safely taken care of and where they can use it conveniently at any time. I can assure you, my friends, that it is safer to keep your money in a reopened bank than it is to keep it under the mattress. The success of our whole national program depends, of course, on the cooperation of the public on its intelligent support and its use of a reliable system i wish my gran had listened to that so as you can see just very simply and clearly putting forth to the public it's gonna be okay

don't worry apart from those unfashionable people. That was very cleverly done. You can't call the public stupid. You can't call the public greedy or unwise. But you could call them unfashionable, the ones that aren't doing the right thing. Which, you know, from the 1920s was a massive thing. Exactly, yeah. So, yeah, this is...

He was very good at this um i'm just going to play the very end of it now uh which is just the last couple of lines it has been wonderful to me to catch the note of confidence from all over the country i can never be sufficiently grateful to the people for the loyal support that they have given me in their acceptance of the judgment that has dictated our course, even though all our processes may not have seemed clear to them. After all, there is an element in the readjustment of our financial system more important than currency, more important than gold, and that is the confidence of the people themselves. Confidence and courage are the

essentials of success in carrying out our plan. You people must have faith. You must not be stampeded by rumors or guesses. Let us unite in banishing fear. We have provided the machinery to restore our financial system, and it is up to you to support and make it work it is your problem my friend your problem no less than it is mine together we cannot fail a lot of inclusive pronouns in that us we you yeah it's good if you can imagine after after hoover essentially doing nothing and saying pull your socks up having someone walk into the White House and change laws almost immediately and then come onto the radio and say, we've done this, we've done this, we've done this. All I need from you is to do this and this and we'll be fine. People loved it.

It was hugely popular. And don't forget, he'd recently survived an assassination attempt, which also makes people very popular. Because of this, the message worked. The banks reopened, and not only was there no run on the banks, but people actually turned up to return money that they'd taken out. Wow. Yeah, the stock market had a bounce. The immediate banking crisis was over.

Roosevelt solved it. Just from cleverly chosen words. Confidence. Yeah. Confidence and hope. Wow. And obviously the legislation that he brought in, actual changes, but yes, a lot of it was just getting people to believe that it's going to be okay. And making people aware of what's going on as well. That's a powerful tool later that day uh roosevelt spoke at a dinner party he was hosting and i'll quote him i think it's time for a beer yeah there was a bit of a pause and then people went oh yes within hours the wheels were put in motion to repeal the 18th amendment by putting in the 21st amendment which was ratified in uh de that year. And I must admit, I do love the list of amendments

because the first 10 are the Bill of Rights, set in stone, rights for the citizens. And then you get several about tweaking various laws. And then you've got like the big one, like the 13th, abolishing slavery. A few more civil rights come in. And then you get the 18th Amendment, no more alcohol. And then there's some more tweaking of laws. And then 21st bring the alcohol back we've had enough we're sorry we're sorry after three amendments we're sick of this yeah so there you go alcohol is back well it never really

gone away no all it had caused was uh the rise of crime around the selling of alcohol. So that solved a lot of the problems that were in place because alcohol was illegal. And now it's legal in tax as well, so that's good. Yeah, yeah. So all that was good. So with that in place and also with the immediate banking crisis over, Roosevelt turned to the wider problems of the Depression, namely that everyone was starving to death because no one had any money because businesses were failing.

Yeah. So, time for a new deal. A series of laws and departments created aimed at making the country work again. We're going to have a look at three things implemented very briefly for time. So, what do you want to look at? The PWA, the CCC or the AAA?

They love their acronyms. They did. Let's go with the PWA. PWA, the Public Works Administration. Oh, yeah, definitely. Oh, yes. It sounds exciting, doesn't it? Sounds like a right laugh.

Go on. It was. Hijinks. Yeah. Larks. Bants, as the kids say today, was had in the offices at the time. Archbishop of Banterbury, as people say. Yeah, when they weren't putting whoopee cushions on each other's chairs and

buckets above the door, they were also overseeing the construction of large-scale public works. Now, the PWA didn't hire people. It organised the hiring of people by businesses. It connected the dots. You owe their their business you're trying to build a bridge look at all these people over here who need work why don't you guys meet up so so was this like a again like a federal thing or was it yes yeah helping states match things up i guess it's tricks if if it works i don't know if it does that it's hard to argue that that federalization actually can help so you mean it's hard to argue that it's not a good thing yes yeah yeah yes but you would get people who yeah believe that states rights trump everything

it doesn't matter whether it's a good thing or not. It should be the states. So the states should implement their own version of it. So there was some opposition, but this does work. It provided jobs for thousands upon thousands. However, the man in charge, Ikes, ended up being a little bit too timid for Roosevelt's tastes. Ikes was a believer in spending wisely, not quickly. The PWA was doing little, waiting for the best opportunities, whereas Roosevelt wanted them to be throwing everything at the wall to see what sticks. So he set up the CWA,

the Civil Works Administration. Basically, funds were taken off the PWA and relocated to the CWA, and for five months over the winter of 1933 and 1934, cwa workers laid 12 million feet of sewer pipes built or improved 255 000 miles of roads built 40 000 schools 3 700 playgrounds and a thousand airports that is impressive over the winter wow yeah yeah this was more what roosevelt had in mind it was grab anyone who was looking for a job find anything that needs doing at all and get them doing it so then it gets the economy moving brilliant yeah okay next up you can choose the ccc or the aaa i'll go for the aaa the agricultural adjustment administration oh farms animals farms farms this was a department set up to organize AAA. I'll go for the AAA. The Agricultural Adjustment Administration. Oh, farms. Animals. Farms. Farms.

This was a department set up to organise who was growing what, and to make sure that farms were not growing a surplus, leading to devalued crops. Farmers were starving, so they were growing as much as they could, so they could make more money. But that meant everyone was growing too much. Everyone was growing corn.

Yeah, which meant the value of their stock was going down. It was just a spiral of depression, basically. Quite literally. The AAA was set up to pay farmers not to farm. You there, stop growing corn. We've got enough corn. We will pay you money to not grow corn. Why don't you go and grow, don't know chickpeas I don't

know make some hummus so so it's paying them to redo their farm essentially well yeah but it was more important they didn't grow the corn if it was corn that they were going after it grows something else if you want what's important is that you don't grow corn because if you grow corn we'll end up with far more corn than we need if we stop growing too much corn we'll have just the right amount of corn and that means the corn will be the correct value supply and demand levels would be on par with each other everything would level out and then we can ease it and you can start growing what you want again nice i imagine that change would take at least a year. Oh, yeah, yeah.

This is not short term. This is going to take a while. It was also unprecedented governmental control. Yeah. This is the polar opposite of the direction Hoover was heading in, which was essentially do what you want, pull your socks up. This was we are the government and we're going to tell you what to grow and when to grow it.

Here's some money that we have taxed from other people. This shows effective government. But also, you know, if you're not a federalist, you could say, well, it's... Imagine if you've got a government that hasn't got the best interests at heart. Oh, yeah, yeah. Just as before, you've definitely got people who opposed it, but as we've come across before,

there were so many people starving to death that, you know what, having someone come along and just sort things out is just a relief to most people. We can get into the ins and outs of whether we should have a strong government or not when people are fed. I will quote to Roosevelt herevelt here i will tell you frankly that it's a new and untried path but i tell you with equal frankness that an unprecedented

condition calls for the trial of new means to rescue agriculture so yeah this is a big one but we gotta do it so that just leaves the ccc what do you think they were is it business corporate yeah corporations i mean the word core is there hardcore it is the civilian conservation core that was my next guess to be fair this was created to organizing the hiring of hundreds of thousands of unemployed youths basically round up all the young men and make them work on rural projects. This was a bit controversial to some because it essentially created work camps run by the army

because you needed someone to organise it and the army were good at organising. Yeah, this was where young men were kept on strict regimes and they worked for next to nothing. In fact, a dollar a day was their wages. Yeah, labour groups cried that this would devalue work across the land as you can imagine a valid argument yeah uh roosevelt defended the move yes okay they're earning next to nothing he didn't quite put it

that way uh but we are paying their food and they're bored. The money is also, by law, mostly being sent back to their families. So they're not hoarding it or wasting it. The money is going to feed families. So again, it's not ideal, no, but this is young men off the streets, families with one less mouth to feed, and a bit more cash for hundreds of thousands of families. And also, bit of a bonus, lots of trees are being planted. That's good for the year.

Yeah, rivers are being cleaned up, things like that. So yeah, a real sort of conservation push as well. If it wasn't a win-win, at least no one was losing as much as they were. And in the end, actually, this was a very popular move and seen as a huge success. So all that's going on. There were also many other things, but I just picked three and then decided to leave it at that for time reasons. But things like that are being pushed forward. Again, this is all in the first 100 days. But Roosevelt was then forced to look into taking the dollar off the gold standard. If you take the dollar off the gold standard, the dollar would lose value. Exports, therefore, would increase because foreign countries would look to America with their decreased value in the dollar and go, oh, let's buy from America. Everything's cheaper there at

the moment. The increase in exports would get the economy moving. Yes, the dollar would be worth less, but America's been self-sufficient before very successfully. We can build in-house, and Americans in America won't notice the difference because they're all trading in dollars. So they're trying to downplay their imports by what export, but not import as much. Yeah, exactly. Now, that was one viewpoint that Roosevelt was hearing. Of course, then there was the opposite, which was, oh no, no, no, you cannot take the dollar off the gold standard. The only way for the economy to recover is for the government spending to come under control and for the markets to have confidence in the dollar. Everything needs to stabilise. Nothing needs to rock the boat anything more

than we've already done. The gold standard ensured that confidence. If you come off it, that's destabilization. Everything will spiral. Runaway inflation would occur. Look at Germany. You've got two compelling arguments there. And Roosevelt was no economist. This was his weakest area and he knew it. But he also knew one thing. If they stayed on the gold standard, the government would not be able to afford the New Deal work programs. Fair enough. As soon as he learnt that, he took the dollar off the gold standard. Go on!

There's arguments for and against, but okay, if the New Deal doesn't work with the gold standard, then take off the gold standard. Many big businessmen were horrified by big businessmen. I mean businessmen who were like twice the size of normal humans. I was hoping you'd say that.

Yeah. This is the end of Western civilization, the budget director announced apparently. I can only assume he announced this whilst flailing his arms in the air and running through a window. How's the Empire State from the 92nd floor. Big gorilla on the side. Oh, it's about that time, isn't it? It is. Yes, it is. Yeah. Oh, brilliant.

Sorry, I forgot to mention the big gorilla that attacked New York at the time. Well, yeah. Would that have been when Roosevelt was governor or president? Do you know when the film was? I'm going to... It's certainly in the 30s. Let me find out. 1933. Oh, just as his president brilliant

can you imagine that briefing sir yes the economy is really struggling but there is one other thing we need to look at we've got to pay for a lot of damage in New York why? it's fine as anyone who's seen the film the monkey got sorted out in the end, so it was fine.

Sorry, gorilla, I should say. Gorilla. So, gold standard removed. Roosevelt had one unexpected supporter, however. J.P. Morgan. That's right, he's still alive. Oh, wow. One of the few old robber barons who supported the move with what can only be called common sense

i was gonna say like can't not because everything's doing will help everything move you'll get more money if you allow it to happen well this is morgan's argument yes if you stay on the gold standard things would be more stable for businesses, great, but it would be worse for the poor. Now, usually big businesses don't worry too much about that because their job is to make profits. However, Morgan pointed out, the poor made up most of the country and there is limits. And when you push them enough, they might seek to do something about all the problems. And that will be even worse for business than going off the gold standard. That's true.

Yeah. JP Morgan really started to think, this could lead to revolution. This needs to be sorted. There's a... I can't... I say it's a famous quote. I can't quite remember it,

but it's like, you stop somebody having three meals and they'll revolt. Yeah, yeah, exactly exactly along those lines this is uh this is how bad things were you've got the the most robber barony of robber barons going yeah actually maybe we need to uh just uh press the pause button for a bit here and try and work things out now we're going to weather all of the new deal stuff that i've talked about and and also things that I haven't talked about, actually helped the country more in statesmanship.

Yeah. Because there was some debate over whether this was the right thing to do at the time or not. But I'm just going to say here, people at the time generally thought that it did help the country. Debate in retrospect whether it did all you want. People in the time thought that it was good, or at least most people did. Other things I can point out, unemployment started to go down. The GPD of the country started to go up.

That's positive, because more people working, more you can tax as well. Working a dollar a day. Things undoubtedly were better for the average American after the first couple of years of Roosevelt's presidency. Now, he did have his opponents, obviously. Those on the left of the party wanted more of what he was doing and were unhappy that he was starting to talk about reducing government spending. They were unhappy that he was even considering business concerns. He should just full-on, full-throttle New Deal stuff until the

cows come home. In particular, they were unhappy that he was trying to reduce the pensions for veterans to try and save some money he also had opponents on the right uh mostly but by no means all republicans were horrified by the progressive agenda but obviously there's that solid faction democrats as well mostly from the south who also were horrified uh in a fireside chat in 1934 he he addressed his critics. I'll just quote this one rather than playing it. Get f***ed. Essentially.

I'll quote. The simplest way for each of you to judge recovery lies in the plain facts of your individual situation. Are you better off than you were last year? Are your debts less burdensome? Is your bank account more secure? Are your working conditions better? Is your faith in your own individual future more firmly grounded? Roosevelt was confident enough in his successes that he could pose these questions to the general public and expect yeses. That's pretty good. I mean, when you can use rhetorical questions,

that's a good sign. Yeah, he's doing well. Meanwhile, in the White House itself, Roosevelt had settled down to a routine. Eleanor and Franklin were still on their professional relationship-only path. They were very rarely seen together. They essentially lived separate lives in the mansion. Roosevelt awoke at eight. He had eggs for breakfast. He read the news while smoking his first camel of the day. I see you mean cigarette. Yeah, but who knows? Crazy times about that.

Bring in the camel. At 10.30, he went to the Oval Office and he stayed there till six. For obvious reasons, people came to him more than usual. He stayed at his desk. It was just easier that way. The press crowded round the Oval Office to ask him questions, and Roosevelt answered openly, although he was very clear when things were on and off the record.

At six o'clock, he'd go for a swim. Sometimes he'd go off for a drive. And then it was cocktail hour. Hooray! Martinis with whoever was around, essentially. Never Eleanor, who disapproved of Martini hour But Roosevelt mixed the martinis himself

Apparently and was often very liberal With the amounts because he was busy chatting At the time and not really paying attention To how much is going into the glass Do you think every time they did a toast They went 21st? I'm guessing so I'm guessing that's why he repealed it right at

the start it's like there's no way i am spending four years in the white house without martinis so repeal that immediately and then it was time for food uh usually with the people who's having martinis with he'd have dinner and he would have some really bad food oh i know yeah apparently the white house got a reputation for bad food at this time because Eleanor was in charge of the hiring of the White House domestic staff and she had hired an old friend called Mrs Nesbitt to oversee things.

And according to the report, Mrs Nesbitt had a habit of deciding that certain food was too fancy and another habit of standing over the cooks and demanding that they do things her way that sounds atrocious boil that veg more more it's yellow more yeah pretty much like that apparently when king george the sixth came to visit wow they put in an order for some coffee and she sent them tea because it was and i quote better for them. Now, in case you're worried that we are

making fun of a poor woman just trying her best in the White House, there's another little story for you, and you can judge her on that, because she also refused to put the best linen on the beds for, and I quote, those people when the President of Brazil came to stay. Oh, okay, yeah. Yeah, so I think we're allowed to make fun of her bad food. I think so. You'll be pleased to know Roosevelt was able to install his own cook on the third floor just for himself, eventually. Which is good. And Mrs Nesbitt survived all of Roosevelt's presidency,

but Truman fired her almost immediately after assuming office because he put in an order and she said, no, we're on rations. So he just went, get out. Fantastic. So there you go. A lighthearted story about a racist bad cook. Fantastic. Yeah. Still back to the depressing economy. Roosevelt is now pushing a social security system. That's his next thing he's going to do. The country is doing better, but better's relative. Yes.

And better than 1932 didn't mean good. More needed to be put into place to aid those people struggling. A social security system was simple. In i'll quote roosevelt here from the cradle to the grave everyone ought to be in the social security system out of interest like you hear americans about my social security what is it well it's essentially this i mean obviously things have changed over over time but this is the birth of it at this time it's a self-funding scheme where the employed and the employers would pay into a scheme uh not the government uh but the the employer and the employee would pay into a scheme and then uh if people fell on hard times the government would use that money and give back

to people ah so socialism it is in its most basic form, a form of wealth distribution, yes. So, I mean, you could stretch this quite far and say, actually, the USA is a socialist country. No, you could not. Now, you might be wondering why the government wasn't going to put anything into this. Roosevelt pointed out that it would be unfair to 1980s America to make

them pay for present America. So, just so you know, Roosevelt had the 1980s on his mind. Wow! Yeah. There's no way what he's thinking, though, was what the 80s was. What, Hulk Hogan?

Yeah. Yeah. Because I bet that's what he was thinking. I am a real American. Kiss. Magnum P.I. Oh. Yeah.

Tom Selleck, essentially. Rootswap didn't want Tom Selleck to pay for 1930s America. Dallas. Exactly. I mean, 80s America had enough problems as it was. They didn't need to worry about 1930s. Yeah, they did. So that's why the government wasn't going to pay in. Now, the obvious problem, of course, if the government aren't paying, in the short term, this was going to make everyone a little bit poorer and everyone's already struggling but Roosevelt insisted the employees have to pay in to this scheme we can't just make the businesses pay in now there was one very simple reason why he insisted that the employees pay into it as well and when you think about it it's ingenious it wasn't based on anything to do

with being fair or anything like that is it the same as the pension scheme in the UK? It's like you all pay into it over your working career, but that money just gets taxed, essentially, and you get a smaller percentage at the end of your life. Yeah, yeah, it's like that. But why? Why make it like that? Well, Roosevelt pointed out that if the employees pay into it,

it makes the policy invincible. No future politician will be able to repeal this if people have already invested into it. Oh, yeah, that is quite clever. Yeah, if you make businesses pay on their own, then businesses will go, yeah, yeah, we'll cut the losses, whatever, just stop. But no, if you've got people who are investing their own money into it, no politician is going to say, that money we forced you to save no longer belongs to you. And no future government's going to say, we'll give it all back either.

So there you go. It just cemented it in. Now, there was predictable pushback from the robber barons of the day. I'll quote here. The president of general motors said with unemployment insurance no one will work he said again we see the american dream philosophy rear its head here because if all you need to do to succeed is work hard then those that have not succeeded have clearly not worked hard so they must be lazy yeah if they're lazy already and

you give them enough to scrape by an existence for themselves without starving, then they'll stop working altogether. After all, all the ambitious and hard-working people won't need this, because by definition they will have already succeeded. So that was the mindset of many people who opposed it. It was this idea that only the weak and the lazy will use this and they don't deserve it. Most Republicans were against it, but also many Democrats. In fact, one Democratic governor said, and I quote here, it would take the romance out of life. We may as well protect a person from every experience life affords spoken like a true rich person who has no idea what poverty is like it's romantic being poor jamie didn't you know that

everyone that makes decisions about poor people is in by rich people and that's shocking to think because it's like well my experience is like this so everyone should be like this. Yeah, yeah, it is... A lack of empathy. Empathy's not the right word. Lack of... Well, yeah, yeah. Lack of empathy. Also, just lack of experience. If you've never experienced what it's like to scrape by your existence,

having practically nothing, it is very hard to understand what that's like. But a vast majority of Americans did understand what it was like to struggle. And as you can imagine, this was all popular with them. So it sailed through. By the time of the 1936 election, GPD had risen 50%. Six million jobs had been created. Unemployment had fallen a third.

The country was far from fixed, but most felt like it was going in the right direction. In fact, over half, 53% of people, told Fortune magazine in a poll that the depression was over. There was a feel-good feeling to the country. The upcoming election was even more of a foregone conclusion than the last one. The most important thing to happen in the build-up to the election was that Roosevelt was so powerful at this point in the Democratic Party, he was able to repeal the two-thirds rule for the nomination process. So no longer did a candidate need to get two-thirds of the votes, you just needed a simple majority. Now what this meant is that the Democratic South lost a lot of power, because that faction

used to be able to hold on to their block and stop people getting two-thirds and become kingmakers. So the democratic South lost a huge amount of their political power because of this. Now this, along with many other things, contributes to the drastic change in the two parties that we're starting to see. Several Democrats who were critical of Roosevelt for several reasons, but mainly that his New Deal did not go far enough and was too pro-business, they formed a third party, the Union Party at this time. So we're back to a three-party system again. The GOP nominated a man named Landon, and Landon realised attacking the New Deal was suicide. Everyone loved the New Deal, so he didn't attack the New Deal.

That meant he had pretty much nothing to say. The Union Party decided that the only way to gain traction in a two-party system was to spew hate. One member of the Union Party announced, I'll teach them how to hate religion and patriotism. Keep going on that. It's the only way to get them het up. So they were just going to run a hate campaign to try and gain traction. It's almost the beginning of modern politics.

One person high up in the party implied that bullets would be a good alternative to getting rid of Roosevelt if ballots did not work. Yeah, things got a bit nasty, but ultimately the GOP policy of doing not much and the union policy of stirring up hatred just utterly failed. The union party gained nothing at all and fell apart. Roosevelt got 28 million votes and Landon got 17 million votes.

Nearly 61% of the popular vote. The Electoral College, get this, Roosevelt, 523, Landon, 8. I would call that a decisive win. Oh yes, the second term was on. It really is. But this one's not going to go as well as the first. In order to sum it up, I'm going to try and put it in one sentence

because a lot goes on and I've had to simplify this a lot. Roosevelt had become so powerful in his party that he attempted to take on what he saw as the systematic problems of the country and the party, and he failed. Now, three things were holding the country back, at least as he saw it. Number one, the Supreme Court. Although I focused on many of the successes of the New Deal legislation so far, many things had been caught up in the Supreme Court. According to Roosevelt, the elderly judges were finding, let's face it, dodgy precedent to declare several of Roosevelt's proposals unconstitutional, and something had to change. Number two, now that the country was back on track, they really needed to cut back on all this spending.

According to Roosevelt, Hoover wasn't wrong when he said they needed to balance the government books. He was just wrong to say that it took precedence over stopping people starving. Well, people weren't starving quite as much anymore, so let's start balancing the books again. And then number three, the Democrats were now a progressive party looking out for the working man. Those conservative Democrats, mostly in the South, need to accept that. And if not, they need to go. So... This is the way it is, Dan. So he decides to take on the Supreme Court and the conservative faction in his own party

and revert the economy back to what it used to be. Like I say, none of this goes well. In an attempt to change the Supreme Court, he decides to what it used to be. Like I say, none of this goes well. In an attempt to change the Supreme Court, he decides to pack it. Something that's been in the news a lot recently. He announced that the elderly judges were swamped with work and new judges would be

added to help them. And, oh, who gets to choose the judges? Mr. Prez. Yeah, and he just does this out of the blue. It is weird that it's a lifetime role that doesn't seem right yeah it's also weird that the president gets to pick and yeah it's they could have spent a bit longer in in the uh in the meeting right at the start of the series with the the supreme court maybe they could have had a few more debates over it.

There were a couple of cracks starting to show, shall we say. Anyway, many people supported the idea of packing the court, mainly because the Supreme Court was being seen as holding up legislation that would help people. However, packing the courts was too much for most politicians in Washington. This was full-on constitutional change, they saw it as. much for most politicians in Washington. This was full-on constitutional change, they saw it as. Then the Chief Justice publicly announced, and Chief Justices don't publicly announce things usually, but came out and announced that more judges just meant more debates and the slowing down of procedure. Wouldn't help anything. We're not late on anything. We're getting through all

of the things that we're supposed to. What are talking about this is a clear attempt to just pack the court with your own supporters yeah uh roosevelt saw support for the idea erode rapidly uh not just from the politicians but the public kind of saw this for what it was which was a power grab the huge majority of democrats in congress split on the issue and roosevelt ended up damaged, not being able to get anything done. So that just fails. Next up, the economy. 1937, things are solidly on track now, at least so they seem. In fact, things are approaching pre-depression levels.

So it's time to cut back. The WPA budget was slashed. The AAA slowed down its farm payments. The Federal Reserve Board raised the reserve that banks needed by 50%, meaning in simple terms there would be less money to move around. And if the plan worked, the budget would have been balanced in two years. They've spent a fortune, and this would get it all back in two years. If it worked, it would have been amazing.

But it was far, far too much too soon. The economy was getting better, but it was still very shaky and almost everything overnight just collapses again unemployment which had been doing so well starts to skyrocket once more again there was a split in the party those that argued that they must stay the course the budget must be balanced

we've got to keep with it now and then there were those who said no no no it was no, it was working before. We need to go back. We shouldn't have done this. Unfortunately, the vigorous approach at the start of the first term was lost. At the start of his first term, Roosevelt had swept in with a raft of ideas and a bucket of optimism, and he just sorted out Hoover's mess. This time the mess was his so he stalled he can't just say this is all rubbish let's try this because it was all his idea he's invested a lot into exactly so for about half a year he just stalls and tries to stay the course and things just progressively get worse and worse in the end he relents he has to go back to spending. So, money was poured back into the New Deal schemes.

And the economy stabilised and started to recover once more, but the damage had been done. Most of the work over the last few years had been wiped out. They were essentially going to have to start again. Which is a shame. Now, as you can imagine, Roosevelt, by this point, not in a good mood. This term's not going as well as the last one. His support in the party was failing, and the Republicans were starting to feel hopeful for the next election.

Do you think he's just there in his office going, I wish I had two more terms to sort this out? Maybe. Maybe he was. Well, he decides that if those dissenters in the party would not stop attacking him, then they should not be in the party. And in a move never really seen on such a level, Roosevelt let it be known that certain members had his backing in the upcoming primaries, and certain Democrats did not. And to start with, this works. A couple of his men, as it were,

got in in elections. But then one of his detractors won a primary. Roosevelt took it personally and went full on. He used his fireside chat to warn the general population against those, and I quote, that posed as progressives and then voted against change. They are the real enemy. Yeah, the Republicans are bad, but what's worse is a bad Democrat. And then he approved of the WPA using its resources to help one of his supporters. That's a government department throwing its weight behind a political candidate. Is that okay? That's not okay. This was far too much for most in Washington.

To cut a long story short, essentially this results in the Hatch Act, a little known act, I imagine, until very recently when people started talking about it again, barring political participation by federal employees. There have been many cases in very recent times where the Hatch Act has arguably been broken, but nothing really happened, which is interesting uh but yeah it starts because roosevelt essentially stepped over the line now some argued yeah he's going after the let's face it incredibly racist and unpleasant people who are ruining the democratic party is how they put it but most politicians in the democratic party just saw it as Roosevelt grabbing too much power for himself. Because he was.

Yeah, I was going to say, it certainly looks that way. Yeah, it's a power grab. And it's a power grab that failed. He attempted to fully move the Democratic Party to the progressive left, but it didn't work. There remained a strong Southern Democratic faction within the party. A combination of losing all three of these battles meant that Roosevelt's popularity was at its lowest ebb since being elected.

And then Kristallnacht happened. Ooh. Ooh. Yeah. 10th of November, 1938, half a world away in the old world, the Nazi government burnt down synagogues, smashed up Jewish businesses, and rounded up around 20,000 Jews and sent them into camps. Now, this shocked the United States.

Now, obviously, Hitler's actions were well known in the United States. They weren't oblivious to what was going on in the world, but they also had their own problems to deal with. So, yeah, there's stuff going on in Europe, but it's Europe. Europe's always fighting. And there's stuff going on over here that we need to concentrate on. It just didn't really affect the lives of everyday Americans, what was going on in Europe. However, Kristallnacht kind of made Europe somehow more real in the imagination of the average American. real in the imagination of the average American. This wasn't abstract countries changing with the tides of time. This was actual people being rounded up and sent to camps. Opinion, already trending in the direction, to be fair, started to be that something needed to be done. Now,

Roosevelt was way ahead of public opinion here. He'd been watching Europe uneasily for some time now, just not really able to do anything about it because he had other problems. Four days after Kristallnacht, however, he met with all those relevant to discuss expanding dramatically the United States Air Force. He had a feeling it was going to be needed soon. In fact, the United States Armed Forces was currently estimated to be 18th in the world roosevelt was convinced that it really needed to be much higher because he was also convinced that this was not an abstract war on another continent america was actually at risk here but it makes sense like um because europe have spent thousands of years fighting each other they built

up the armies they know how to fight us hasn't really had that empire building mentality no no it's been internally building so it's it's at this point it's proved a few times that it's strong enough to fight off european powers if they were to come over the sea but no they've certainly never had to test their armed forces against a unified europe which is what roosevelt started to see not everyone agreed with him though many people doubted that this was really a problem the united states had to get involved in let's just leave europe to Europe. They're always fighting. We've got problems enough as it is over here. Roosevelt told the Senate Military Affairs Committee, very bluntly, however, if England and France fall, then the rest of Europe will fall. If the rest of Europe falls,

their empires in Africa and South America will fall. If that happens, then the United States would be encircled. Quote here, This is not a pipe dream. Would any of you said six years ago when this man Hitler came into control of the German government, a German busted, a nation that owed everyone, disorganized, not worth considering as a force in the world, would any of you said six years ago

that Germany would dominate Europe completely and absolutely? Because Hitler had a very similar mentality to resort in a way build confidence yeah yeah hitler had done in a very short time an amazing yes amount of building it was astonishing how quickly germany grew scary so quick many people doubted whether it was a real force or not. Roosevelt was convinced, however. Debate raged on over whether this was something that they really needed to focus on. When Hitler invaded Poland, Britain and France declared war, and the largest war in history was about to start.

And that's where we end episode two. Oh, cliffhanger. I wonder how it ends. Oh, well, don't forget you can download the pod bean and itunes as you probably already have and also quick announcement at the end uh which we kind of already did in the roman one in case you didn't hear that one uh we are back which is great but we are going to be making a change to how we uh release the podcast to put it very bluntly, changes in my life mean that either I go back to work full-time, in which case this podcast takes a hit, or I make a bit more money through this podcast. Now, the Roman series has a patron thing, which we've had ticking along in the

background, but it's never something we've really pushed um but what we're going to do is we're going to have a go at making uh a patron for the american series as well um and we're going to have a go at producing patron only episodes for the american and the roman series far more regularly um and making them more interesting more details will follow but just know we are thinking of having a patron for the American series and it might be something to do with the Founding Fathers

is our thoughts at the moment at some point soon we will be setting up a patron on the Podbean site where you can sign up and if you think that we have given you $5 a month worth of entertainment in the past,

then if you could throw it our way, we'd be hugely grateful. Because we love doing the podcast and we really don't want to have to slow down. So, yeah, it's the way we're going to do it. We're not going to do adverts. I don't like adverts in podcasts. No, adverts are rubbish. They it's the way we're gonna do it um we're not gonna do adverts i don't like they're just they get in the way i don't like them um so we're gonna try and do it this way i don't want to have to pretend that i use harry's razors because i don't oh no what's oh what's the

it's like the dollar razor club or something that's on loads of podcasts yeah all the time and we don't use them and we never will we're not right here so yeah uh so we're gonna have a go at doing that more details will follow um obviously we'll let you know when things are up and running nothing's going to change immediately fdr part three will be out in two weeks time yep um so we will see you yes see you then and and also you can see us on twitter and facebook so please uh go on to that as well we post stuff yes we do um and uh yeah until next time goodbye goodbye Jad? Jad, are you crying?

Yes, I am. Oh, it's Mrs. Nesbitt again, isn't it? It's Mrs. Nesbitt. She's been frightfully awful to me. Well, what has she done? Has she destroyed your dish again? She destroyed my dish verbally. Did she force you to use her ingredients again? She did. She gave me a list.

Cecil, she gave me a list. What is that there, Chad? It looks like a block of cheese. Is that a wooden car? It's a toy car. Why is there a block of cheese on a wooden car? She said this is how you make a strawberry jelly. A strawberry jelly?

Oh, this reminds me of yesterday's meal. You weren't here. You didn't see, did you? No, I was being whipped down below. Oh, dear. No, yesterday's meal. You weren't here. You didn't see, did you? No, I was being whipped down below. Oh, dear. No, look, there's still some left over here. You see this? What's that?

It's a bit of beef. Yes. A bit of beef here and half a Wellington boot. What do you think that's meant to be? Beef Wellington? Well, you'd think, wouldn't you? Because that would be clever. That would be a play on words.

That would be a pun. But oh, no. No? No. No, it's not a Beef Wellington, is it no No, it's not a beef wellington, is it? No, what is it? It was a cup of tea, Cecil A cup of tea? But there's no cup

There's no tea, and now I've got to take it to His Majesty George VI Oh good lord Yes, he's staying This is the worst cup of tea that I'll ever have He's not going to like it at all, is he? Of course he's not What if we ask him if we can improve the tea?

Improve the tea? How? We could ask him if he'd like some milk. Good God, no.