Ii, president roosevelt had a relatively easy victory over thomas dewey, who mainly campaigned against new deal programs and for smaller government. President roosevelt would die in office six months after being reelected and Vice President harry truman became the 33rd president of the United States. Liberty university is in lynchburg, virginia. This class is just under an hour. All right, well, well get started and lets go ahead and open with a word of prayer and then well see what we can get into today. Heavenly father, thank you for today, thank you for this class, thank you for your love and mercy. I pray that you forgive us of our sins, i pray that you would be with the class as they finish up this semester. So much busyness and activity with papers and finals and job interviews and just life. Father, i pray that you would look upon them with favor, that you just help them to finish this semester strong. In jesus name we pray, amen. All right. Well, today i want us to continue our look at the world war ii era. Today well be looking at the home front and specifically examining american politics in the early 1940s. And contrary to popular belief, world war ii did not moot politics as usual in the United States. Politicians continued to bicker, issues continued to be debated, and elections continued to be held. Now, the pivotal highlight of world war ii was the president ial election. 1944 was the first president ial election since 1864, and one of only a few in all of American History to really take place while the nation was at war. So it proved to be ultimately an extraordinary election in a very difficult time. There were parades, outdoor rallies, radio advertisements, newsreels, cameras, celebrity endorsements, barbecues, rodeos, balloons, flyers, placards, pins, all the things you see here on the screen. So the election was typical, which in a sense made it remarkable. While the United States was fighting in a global war, over 56 of the voting age population, around 50 million people, participated in free and Fair Elections here at home. Now, in 1944, the president of the United States was the threeterm incumbent, democrat franklin roosevelt. We talked about roosevelt a lot already. Of course, he was, without question, one of the dominant politicians of his era, just a master politician. We dealt with him quite extensively. In 1944, we have a president ial election year, and unlike in 1940 where there was great speculation about what fdr might do as far as running for another term, an unprecedented third term that year, in 1944, there is really not that sense of anticipation. The conventional wisdom is that roosevelt will run. And so there is no real controversy, really, about whats going to take place as far as a fourth term bid. There will be some who complain, of course, but by and large, it doesnt quite generate the fury that the third term bid did in 1940. And so there is not much, even within the Democratic Party as far as rumblings concerning a roosevelt run in 1944. The real action, then, is on the republican side. So what i want to do now is take a look at some of the republican contenders in 1944, beginning with wendell wilky. Wendell wilky, of course, was the republican candidate for the president back in 1940. He was unsuccessful in that race. He had done much better, remember, than landon in 1936 and certainly hoover in 32, but he had fallen short. And ultimately he was distrusted by many conservative republicans. Former president hoover, for example, with some of his contacts in the media will circulate this notion that, you know, wilky did not really do as well as republican candidates who had toed the conservative line. He was keep deemed to be too lib rat, a little too pro deal, a little too conventionalist, and hoover and other conservatives within the gop, wilky, even in areas where hes winning, is running behind some republican candidates, and some areas where there is a republican wind at the gubernatorial level, hes not winning at the president ial level. Hes deeply upset about this rumor going about, and even will respond to mark sullivan, i believe, of the Washington Post privately and insisting that hoover and others are cherry picking their returns. And that, i actually am doing much better in some of these states and outdistancing the victors and losers. And so those who are arguing that i didnt do as well as other republican candidates because of my message, well, theyre just wrong, theyre wanting to throw the Republican Party back to the days of reactionary leaders. And so wilky will resist those characterizations for sure. But hes deemed to be too pro new deal and many conservative republicans dont trust him. He also, he lacks finesse. Time magazine describe him in 1943 as a moose on the loose. Someone who could be a wild and ram bu rambunctious campaigner. We saw this when we looked at 1940 a few days ago, and the leadup to 1944, hes really doing the same thing. At one point hes speaking to a republican womens group, i believe, in new jersey, and during the midst of the meeting, he jumps up on the table it was a little awkward he knocks over a pitcher of water and this sort of thing, and so he seems to be ridiculous as one of his contemporaries will be remark. Hes out of control, hes doing crazy things. And so wilky certainly lacks a little bit of finesse. He also had a tendency to come across as lecturing the Republican Party. We talked about this a few days ago, too, in that he would occasionally slip and say, you republicans. Remember, he had been a former democrat. And so in 1944, he has this reputation of kind of looking down on the party. Thomas dewey once remarked, he was a democrat all his life until 1940 and never got over it. So wilky has that problem. He ultimately will be the only major candidate to openly engage in the primaries. As we talked about before, the primaries were not like they are today. There is a much different road in 1944 to the president ial nomination than we would see, say, in 2012 or 2016. But there are primaries, and wilky will openly participate in a few of them, at least. In the New Hampshire primary, he will come in first. Hes really the only candidate campaigning. And yet he falls short of a strong delegate showing. I think there were around 11 or 12 delegates up for grabs in New Hampshire. And he wins six of them. And just as today, politics oftentimes is a game of expectations, and the expectation was that wilky would get around 9 or 10 of the delegates. He only gets six. Thomas dewey, who was the republican governor of new york, got three delegates and he wasnt even running, he wasnt even on the ballot, i believe. So you had a disappointing show of wilky in the New Hampshire primary. But he presses on to wisconsin where he wages a vigorous campaign. In wisconsin, hes facing a number of obstacles. For one, hes under voters are under the influence of the chicago tribune, colonel mccormicks newspaper, which is very antiroosevelt, antiinterventionist, Foreign Policy, and antiwendell wilky. Yet wilky will go to wisconsin and he will talk about Foreign Affairs, he will talk about being a liberal republican and how the party must change. And ultimately, he loses miserably. And again, hes really the only candidate in the race. And its a hard, hard blow for wilky and he drops out just a few days later. So willkies candidacy will rise and fall quickly. The partys standard barrier in 1940 will not make it in 1944. Which is kind of a tradition for the Republican Party up until a little bit later. Up to this time, at least, the Republican Party is not very keen on putting forward a loser for a second go at it. It will do that in subsequent years, in 1948 and then again in 1968. But where the democrats had a tendency to nominate people who had run for president but lost again and again, not so much characteristic of the Republican Party up to this time, at least. And so willkies candidacy collapses here in the early part of 1944. Any questions or concerns . Well, another contender i want you to remember is john w. Bricker. Bricker was the governor of ohio. He was elected in 1938, reelected in 1942. And unlike willkie, bricker will not openly participate in the primaries. He is going to wage a traditional preconvention campaign, trying to assemble delegates working behind the scenes in the leadup to the convention. There were several strengths as far as a potential bricker candidacy is concerned. Bricker, for example, was a good speaker. He had a reputation for efficiency in state government. He certainly was the favorite of conservative republicans. And he doesnt have a prewar isolationist record. And the reason he doesnt have a prewar isolationist record, that is, there is no paper trail where the opposition can say, well, in 1938 he said this, in 1939 he said this, and then in 1940 just ten months before pearl harbor, he actually said this. There is no paper trail of embarrassing remarks as it relates to Foreign Affairs. And thats because he was the governor of ohio. He had been too busy as governor to really think about Foreign Policy, and so some republicans saw that as an asset for bricker. But if bricker had some strengths, he also had some weaknesses. And, for example, hes not a national figure. He is pretty popular and well known in the midwest, but hes not a national figure. Hes not a name that most americans would just recognize. And the one that i mentioned a moment ago is he has no Foreign Policy experience and no paper trail of embarrassing remarks also works against him because he is the governor of ohio, and at a time when the United States is fighting in a global war, he has no Foreign Policy experience whatsoever. And more importantly, he even articulates that for our reporters in late 1943, i believe. He says, i dont know anything about how the postwar world should be organized. A good thing to do if you ever run for president is probably not to begin a sentence with, i dont know anything about. And so he says, i dont know anything about how the postwar world should be organized. Ive never been to europe. How can i know where the boundary between russia and poland should be . How can i know what kind of government france should have . If i should be elected president , ill get the best advice i can from the people who know something about the rest of the world, and ill do the best i can. So kind of a nice sentiment, but again, at a time when the United States is fighting world war ii, those remarks come off as a little short of where they need to be. This guy doesnt have experience. And while hes kind of a local yokel and says, you know, ill get great people to come in and help me because i really dont know much about Foreign Affairs. Ive never been to europe, i dont know about Foreign Policy at all, but ill try to get some great minds around me and to do good. Nice sentiment, but at a time of world crisis, this will turn a lot of potential Republican Voters off. And then finally i have here on the screen that he was vague. When he does begin to maneuver toward the nomination and give speeches, national speeches highlighting his Foreign Policy thoughts, they oftentimes come across as being vague, and he quickly will acquire a reputation of being somewhat of an intellectual lightweight, journalist of that era will devastatingly characterize him as an honest harding. This is a guy who wants to be liked, he is a likeable guy, hes friendly, but hes maybe not the sharpest person in the room. He doesnt have a lot of Foreign Policy experience. And more than likely, if elected president , he might be shaped by those who do have specific ideas about Foreign Policy and their ideas may not be exactly whats best for america. And so brickers candidacy really never gets off the ground. He will make a pretty big show at the convention when it assembles in late june of 1944 in chicago. But by that time, its really all over for him. Any questions or concerns about bricker . That leads us, then, to our third and final major contender for the republican nomination in 1944, and that was Thomas Edmond dewey, the newly elected governor of new york. There are several things i want you to remember about dewey, who will ultimately win the nomination in 1944. And there are several things that are really strong about him, and i want you to remember these assets, these things about dewey that are really positive and bode well for the 44 campaign. First, he was young, only 42 in 1944, and an energetic and experienced campaign. Two, he had a National Reputation as new York District attorney and a special prosecutor of 1930s gangsters legs diamond and Lucky Luciano. We talked a little about this a few weeks ago when we were in the 1930s, how dewey built up a reputation going after these kinds of gangsters. This is in the mid to late 1930s. So he has a National Reputation as a crime fighter. Three, he had a flare for the dramatic and a pleasing baritone voice that came across effectively on radio. For example, when he was running for District Attorney in 1937, you would have people all over new york assemble in places where there were radios to listen to him talk on a particular topic that evening. And so when it was announced that dewey was going to speak, you would rush to the radio because it was early reality tv to a certain extent, radio in this case. He was always dramatic. He had been a music major at the university of michigan before turning to law and going to columbia and moving in a legal career. So he understands being in front of people and hes comfortable with radio, and he would begin with phrases like something like, tonight im going to talk about murder. Committed by gangsters, invented by politicians, im going to name names. You would tune in to that. That sounds very interesting in an age before the kinds of entertainment that we have today. This is pretty compelling. Fourth, in 1942, dewey was elected governor of new york. Thats a big deal. New york had 47 electoral votes. Republicans had not won the presidency since 1928. If youre going to win the presidency, it would be very, very nice to have those 47 electoral votes from new york. New york in those days was a state that would sometimes go republican, sometimes democratic. Republicans had recovered a little bit in the midwest in the 1940 election. Still far short of what they needed to win the presidency, but the thinking here was that if we can have a candidate they take the 47 early to votes of new york combined with the 100 or so we have in the midwest combined, and you get pretty close or at least on the road toward 266, which is what you needed in 1944 to win the presidency. In the preceding 100 years, eight of new yorks governors had won their partys nomination. And four had gone on to win the presidency. And so any time there was someone elected governor of new york, there is a spotlight on them. Its going to be something that people just naturally talk about, even today. People speculate in 2016 about andrew cuomo . It is a big state. There was great speculation about dewy, he had been elected in 1942, a key state. Fifth, a fifth thing notable about dewey on the Positive Side of the equation, he had a solid record achievement as governor. He hadnt been governor long, but going into the 1944 election, he has a solid achievement as governor. Hes not just occupying the office, but hes putting forward a fund for returning soldiers, clean up the States Mental Health system, fighting vigorously for farmers and higher Food Production and lowering taxes. So dewey is considered to be a more competent governor of new york for the first year and a half or so in office. Sixth, this goes closely with point five, he had a reputation for intelligence, efficiency, and getting things done. In 1943, time marg zeen described him as a dragon slayer, armed with concentrations of modern heavy artillery, preceded by elaborate reconnaissance and followed by a staff of logistics experts. As main, District Attorney, tom dewey is a reputation of being tough. And seven, he was a party leader who reunited a weak and divided and. Once powerful state gop organization of the new york Republican Party. Had, in fact, been powerful at one point. But since 1920, the party had fallen on hard times. Really all the way back to 1912 or 1910 when Charles Evan Hughes left the governorship and went to the supreme court. The Republican Party in new york began to falter. It was weak. It was divided. It was petty. And dewey grew up as the politician in the shadow of that chaos. In the midst of that division. And squabbling in new york. And he is very interested in moving beyond that, uniting the various republican factions, conservatives, liberals, moderates, and bringing them together as one powerful unit. He does a good job of this. He organizes a top down organization, as we talked about a moment ago, dewey is tough. And he is going to be a very efficient in administration and there is a top down organization. There will be policies that are planned by a few top leaders. But dewey oftentimes is the one pushing the agenda. Hes the one engaged in the debates. Hes the one setting what is going to be done. There would be room for disagreement and he would listen, but the disagreement should never, he believes, spill out into the newspapers. Or spill out into public. This w