Ongoing debate among historians as to whether history is influenced more by individuals or larger social, cultural and economic forces. I think it is of course both of those. Certainly it seems to me that franklin d. Roosevelt is a prime example of the significant of an individuals impact on history. It was broader social and Economic Conditions that allowed fdr to become a great leader, but in his case i believe it was force of personality that was a paramount element as i think we will see as we go along. Lets examine roosevelts presidency beginning with a brief look at the conditions in the country that led to his election in 1932. The economic collapse of 1920 9 had brought the worst conditions the country had experienced since the civil war. Herbert hoover seemed incapable of leading the way out of it despite some moderate attempts to do so. The suffering was widespread with approximately one quarter of the workforce unemployed and others having to take substantial pay cuts. The cold statistics do not completely reveal the suffering. Soup kitchens, bread lines in the cities were opened to help the least fortunate. You have probably seen pictures of those children. There are many stories to illustrate this, but one of the most poignant involved a schoolteacher who suggested to one of her Young Students that the child go home because the child appeared to be hungry. The teacher said perhaps you should go home and get something to eat. To which the child replied, i cannot. This is my sisters day to eat. No doubt, hundreds of thousands of stories along that line. In the midst of conditions such as these, the nation was ripe for change. Indeed, radical change might have occurred had not the American People maintained their faith in the democratic capitalistic system. For purposes of comparison, it might be noted it was conditions such as these that brought about the rise of totalitarian dictators in europe. Notably hitlers in germany and and hitler intaly germany. There is a senator who said if this country ever needed a mussolini, it needs one now. There were some persons who believed such measures as radical as fascism around the other extreme, communism, might there were others who held out hope that recovery might made through additional political channels. The 1932 election brought with it the potential for securing new leadership, a chance to remove hoover in favor of someone who might be better equipped to deal with the ordeal of a depression. The republicans renominated hoover. He had no chance to be reelected. Whether or not they were justified in doing it, the American People basically blamed hoover for the present. There were a lot of jokes and anecdotes to illustrate his unpopularity. One of the most common of those was the story he was walking down a street in washington with the secretary of the treasury. That was the days when you had payphones if any of you remember payphones. In any case, the story is hoover turned to the secretary of treasury, and asked him for a nickel to make a call. He replied, here, take this dime. Call all of your friends. In light of the widespread feeling such as that, it was obvious whomever the democrats nominated was going to be elected. The question was, who was that going to be . One who was considered was alan smith. Alan smith had run previously in 1928. He had lost hoover. He thought this might be his year. Smith was not the nominee of the democrats that year as you know because the democrats chose franklin d. Roosevelt. The roosevelt name was of course wellknown to every american of that generation. Franklin was a distant cousin of teddy roosevelt. He became accustomed in the campaign to hearing comments like i voted for your father or you look just like your old man. In any case, this association, not particularly liked by Theodore Roosevelts wing of the family, but certainly did not hurt roosevelts political career even though he was of course a democrat. Like theodore roosevelt, franklin had been born into a wealthy new york family. Like him, he had attended harvard. He had been elected the new york state legislature. He had served as governor of new york. He had even served as assistant secretary of the navy in the wilson the administration. Also like teddy roosevelt, franklin had been nominated for Vice President earlier in 1920. A lot of people did not know that. I did not know that for many years myself. Tr of course had been elected Vice President in 1900 and became president. Franklin roosevelt lost the Vice President ial race in 1920. When the democratic ticket lost to warren harding. In any case, the two roosevelts had some similarity but were also quite different in their personalities. Tr was a fiery, pugnacious tort. Sort. Always ready for a fight, either physical or political. Franklin was more sophisticated. Always eager to solve problems medically and amicably. As a young man, fdr seemed to have everything. Wealth, social position and prestige. He was charming, handsome, witty, sophisticated. His most glaring fault people sometimes felt was he was a bit overbearing, pompous, conceited, we might say. Some thought him to be plain arrogant. After 1921, that changed dramatically. That was the year that roosevelt was stricken with polio, infantile paralysis. Childs disease generally. Infantile paralysis. The disease roosevelts disease was misdiagnosed for a long time. One reason being the doctors could not imagine a grown man, and apparently healthy, strong, young adult, could have polio. But indeed, that is what he had. The terrible fight he went through to recover from that disease gave him a compassion, tolerance and the strength of will he had never exhibited before. Many persons noted this changed. One observer said roosevelt had undergone a spiritual transformation. Another one on seeing him after his recovery found him to be a different person from that charming and at times irresponsible young man of the old wilson days. The two year fight against polio had given him new moral and physical strength. One of his biographers said that , the suffering had purged him of frivolity and arrogance, enlarging his compassion and deepening his understanding. Roosevelt himself acknowledged on at least one occasion the profound influence that illness had had on his personality. This was during the depression when things were so bad. Roosevelt always seemed cheerful, upbeat. We will see a few instances of that. People how could he be so happy and carefree . Said he, if you had spent two years in bed just trying to wiggle your big toe, after that, anything would seem easy. The recovery he made and in this photograph, you can see this vibrant, jaunty appearance he usually exhibited. He made a remarkable recovery. It did not dampen his spirits but did leave him crippled and unable to walk unassisted for the rest of his life. And yet, his personality was so warm and his manner so buoyant that some americans did not realize how handicapped he was. Photographers at that time helped to perpetuate an image of a healthy roosevelt by a voluntary agreement among them not to publish pictures that showed him in situations that show him weak or incapacitated that might embarrass him. All of this together with his beautiful and powerful speaking voice and his smile proved so convincing that some americans did not realize he was virtually an invalid. The campaign of was a foregone 1932 conclusion. The nation had enough of herbert hoover. Songe roosevelt theme could be heard to the land. When people heard the cheerful here of happy days are again, they believed it or at least wanted to believe it. I will not sing it for you all. I will spare you that punishment. The verses were, and if you are old enough, you can remember. This became a theme song for the democratic party. It still may be. For many many years, happy days are here again. The skies above are clear again. Lets all sing a song of cheer again. Happy days are here again. In chicago, where he accepted the democratic nomination, he made a statement that led to the phrase we still use in which he said, i pledge to you and i pledge to myself a new deal for the American People. He later said, and this is a quote, the country needs and the country demands bold, experimentation. Above all, try something. Now, we think of roosevelt as supremely confident for reasons you will see if you do not already know about his inaugural speech. In any case, privately, it appears roosevelt was not totally confident he could successfully do his job. The story is that on the night before he was to be inaugurated, he was going to bed or being helped into bed as he had to be by one of his sons. To whom he said, all my life i have been afraid of one thing. At this point in my classes i always stopped and asked the students, what do you think that one thing was he had been afraid of . What they would say is fear because of the inaugural speech. I said, no, im not talking about that. Something tangible that he was afraid of. They rarely ever got it. It took so long i had to finally tell them. Consider that he was paralyzed. He could not move without his braces and then with great difficulty. What would you be afraid of if you could not move . Some would say fire. That is right. He said i have only been afraid of one thing, fire. But tonight, i am afraid i just fire, butraid of tonight, i just might be afraid i am not able to do this job. His public announcements never betrayed any doubt. On his inauguration day, march 4, 1933, he spoke boldly and reassuringly in what was to become his most famous line in all president ial inaugural speeches when he proclaimed, this great nation will endure as it has endured. Will revive and prosper. First of all, let me assert my firm belief the only thing we have to fear is fear itself. The impact was dramatic. Americans believed in him. They wanted to believe in him. More importantly, to believe in themselves. This renewed confidence was aided by an innovation that roosevelt came up with, the fabled fireside chats. Using the radio which by then was standard in american homes. He made direct contact with the American People. At the end of his first week in office, march 12, he delivered the first of his socalled chats. It was very lowkey. It was simply and honestly speaking to the American People. He said, i want to speak with the people of the United States. He went on to discuss the problems of the nation and in warm and understanding and reassuring tones, it is hard to imagine how unusual this was to have a personal contact with the president. This was the days before tv and dare i say it, tweets. The people listened and immediately the mood of the nation began to change from one of hopelessness and despair to one of faith and optimism. That faith was well rewarded by roosevelts aggressive action against the depression. Not many of the ideas he him he had implemented were his own but were developed by advisors. There was a group of advisers who held some minor positions in the government. The main thing is they were roosevelts advisors and socalled brain trust, from where he got many of his ideas. Roosevelt by all accounts was not a brilliant man. He did not claim to be an intellectual. What he did have one historians said was his key characteristic that made him successful was he had, a firstclass temperament. He could listen to other people, glean ideas from different sources. Weigh them and try different things. The one thing the new deal was above all i do not have time today to go into detail about all the specific new deal agencies and programs. That is beyond the purview of this lecture. But what you would see if i did that, you would see it was above all pragmatic. It was not a clearly thought out and welldefined program from the outset but it was to try different approaches to solve different problems. If it did not work, try something else. In any case, that was what was behind it. All these things were put into effect. A lot of them, during the first three months, the great 100 days of the roosevelt presidency. In that time because these programs some of which i will mention the change was such that one leading historian said , order was dead beyond one recall. In other words, it produced all produced the new america, the america all of us have grown up in. Creating the kind of democracy we have to this day. Generally speaking, roosevelt had three objectives. The socalled three rs. They were relief, recovery and reform. That was essentially the order in which he approached them. Relief find some help for the first. Unemployed and to help the people who were in desperate need. Try to bring about recovery for the economy and ultimately to reform the american system, which maybe was a bit of a reach as it turned out. In any case, he first turned his attention to reform to relief. That involved first of all, the reform of the banking system. One of the great causes of the depression was the collapse of the banks, taking with them peoples life savings. We are not terrified so much of that today. There is a safety net somewhere. There was not a safety net then. There was nobody to turn to. Roosevelt addressed this by first declaring a bank holiday. Closing all the banks and keeping them closed until the system could be strengthened and put on a sound basis before they could be allowed to open. He gave a fireside chat telling people their money would be safe in banks. They did not have to fear about losing their savings. One of the key elements of that was the creation of the federal deposit insurance corporation. Which still exists. At the time, insured deposits would be up to 5,000. Thats a lot of money in those days. I do not know what it is now, but it is more than that. People began to regain confidence in the banks. That is the key to the economic system, public confidence. That began to return. Once he had taken that initial step or those steps to improve the banking system, roosevelt turned his attention to matters of unemployment, an enormous problem at the time. Various agencies attempted to deal with this, socalled alphabet agencies were created. One of the most popular of the m all was one of the first. It was the civilian conservation corps. That really was a popular organization. So many unemployed young people. And this was designed to take young people, eventually totaled 3 million, and put them in uniform and put them to work doing some kind of work. Reforestation, swamp drainage. In other words, mainly different kinds of conservation work, when i talks me about this, one time i was in some store and the clerk an older gentleman who clearly was not or did not sound like a virginian to me. I said, where are you from . I think he said he was from brooklyn. Originally. I said how did you find your way to virginia . He said, back in the new deal in the 1930s, i was hired by the ccc and i worked in the camp. Fredericksburg. I forgot where that camp was. Im sure could be found today. I am embarrassed to say i did not know exactly where it was. It is close to fredericksburg. He said while he worked at the camp, he met a local woman and they got married and he moved here. I said, what was the ccc like . You should have heard of. He thought it was the greatest experience of his life. It put him to work. He was unemployed. In his case, it resulted in a wife as well. That was a bonus i guess. Ccc was very popular. Then there was something called , in 1933, the civil works administration. It was designed to provide temporary employment to solve an immediate crisis in unemployment. It put people to work during 1933, 1934. Thousands of people with jobs, such as leaf raking or other tasks, that appeared to some opponents as makework. Atlanta the charge of it being an organization engaging in then what was called boondoggling. Makework jobs. The cwa Something Like, would hire one group of men to dig a hole in the ground and then move onto something else. Then comes a crew to fill in the hole and fill in the next. That is probably an exaggeration. Point is, it put people to work. It had an additional effect in pump priming, in that it put money back into the economy. That was a secondary but very important aspect of many of these new deal agencies. The biggest and most complex and potentially most farreaching of the new deal efforts was the creation of the nra, the bill that was passed. Some would call it the National Recovery administration. Roosevelt caused this roosevelt called this the most important and farreaching legislation ever enacted by the american congress. That is because it attempted to create what was called a planned economy. Too complicated to get into now but it involved a great deal of voluntary selfdenial on the part of both labor and management. It was visionary. It had the prospect of we organizing, reordering the economy of reorganizing and reordering the economy. The short of it is after some initial success, the nra was struck down by the Supreme Court in a decision rendered in 1935. This was one of several Supreme Court decisions that struck at various new deal agencies and attempts. We are getting back to that in a few minutes. It also established something called the Public Works Administration. It was to provide for industrial recovery as well as unemployment relief. It undertook large projects. Think of public works. Big things. Buildings. Some i believe on this campus constructed with funds from that organization and or from another i will get to in a moment. The Public Works Administration undertook Major Construction projects. Dams, highways, public buildings and so on. The other organization with similar acronym was the wpa, the Works Progress administration. That was very different, but it had the same goal in that it attempted to provide jobs. Mainly for whitecollar workers. The pwa was more bluecollar. The wpa was designed to help people like writers, artists, musicians, actors, and so on. Again, its critics said these people were engaged in worthless projects and disparaged many of them. They did some important work particularly in preserving historical artifacts and so on. One of the things they did was to record slave narratives. The testimony, the accounts of former slaves still living. By that time, all of them are obviously quite old but those accounts have been very helpful to historians in trying to develop a better view clearer , a view of slave life. Over eight years, the wpa provided jobs for almost 9 million persons. One of the major new deal agencies. Let me insert something here kind of interesting i think. This immediate and extensive reform drew attention across the world. One upandcoming world leader had