The year 1932 is remarkable in the history of American presidential elections for four principal reasons. First, the outcome of the election of 1932 would signal the end of the presidential dynasty that Republicans had enjoyed since 1860 with only three interruptions—the two nonconsecutive terms of Grover Cleveland and the two-term presidency of Woodrow Wilson, which effectively arose as the result of internal schisms within the Republican Party that more than halved its electoral clout. With the end of the Republicans’ near monopoly at the federal level (and especially in the White House, which they held for fifty-six of the last seventy-two years), the election of 1932 would initiate a new era of Democratic dominance of a kind unknown since before the Civil War, Democrats achieving and then holding a political predominance that would remain, with some important exceptions, the shape of American politics until the late 1970s–early 1980s.
Second, with 1932, and beginning with trends that became visible four years earlier during the contest between Herbert Hoover and Al Smith, African Americans slowly began to move away from the Republicans. This process did not occur all at once, as some accounts have led us to believe; it happened gradually and steadily, beginning in the latter half of the 1920s, accelerating in the 1930s, and solidifying in the 1950s and early 1960s. In 1928, Smith enjoyed modestly better support from African Americans than had previous Democratic candidates, but on the whole, blacks still voted in high numbers for the Republican Hoover in both the elections of 1928 and 1932. But some evidence of a trend away from the GOP can be seen, such that by the mid-1930s, the African American vote began the slow shift en masse from the Republicans to the Democrats. Thus, the Party of Lincoln, the Great Emancipator, was in danger of losing its formerly loyal African American support to the party that, more than any other, was formerly associated with the Confederacy. As a result, throughout the better portion of the twentieth century, the majority of African Americans would support the Democrats after having held allegiance to the Republicans since Emancipation, and into the 1930s.
Third, the Democratic Party, building on trends already under way, would establish a new, unprecedented coalition of widely disparate groups, ethnicities, and interests, and thus would evolve as the more heterogeneous of the two parties throughout the remainder of the century. The most liberal Northern Democrats would become allies of the most traditional Southern conservatives; blue-collar industrial workers and tweedy intellectuals would find common cause in the party’s platform; farmers and urbanites would be drawn to the activist policies of the Democrats; Roman Catholics and Jews as well as Southern Baptists would each represent an important voting bloc for the Democrats; and a variety of racial and ethnic groups—Irish Americans, Italian Americans, Polish Americans, African Americans, and Hispanics, among others—would give the Democratic Party a pluralistic flavor seldom seen in democratic politics of any kind.
Finally, and perhaps most importantly for American politics as it would unfold over the following five decades, the campaign and election of 1932 reflected a deep shift within American political culture on ideological grounds. Beginning with the populist and progressive movements of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, American political consciousness, for good or ill, had been drawing a new vision of the relationship between government and social responsibility. Throughout the first two decades of the twentieth century, both of the two major parties—Republicans and Democrats alike—included among their diverse ranks influential progressive elements that insisted upon various degrees of governmental activism in the social and economic life of Americans, and both parties also included equally among their membership influential conservative wings. Republican presidents Theodore Roosevelt and William Howard Taft—the latter reputed, not always accurately, to be more conservative—instituted progressive reforms that preceded the liberal policies of Democratic president Woodrow Wilson. But in the early 1920s, following the death of the Republican Roosevelt, one of the century’s truly great reformers, the progressive wing of the GOP waned significantly; and by 1928, the contrast between Republican president Hoover’s self-reliant “rugged individualism” and Democrat Al Smith’s understanding of a more expansive role for government had further clarified the growing distinctions between the two major parties. In 1932, with the Great Depression smothering all vestiges of the prosperity that helped elect Harding, Coolidge, and Hoover in the landslides of the previous decade, these differences were sharply polarized as never before. While some pundits and wits complained of little real difference between the two parties and their candidates, even casual attention to their speeches, statements, and attitudes regarding the crisis at hand reveal the bold outlines of the ideological shift. By the mid-1920s, the Republicans had abandoned the progressive legacy of Theodore Roosevelt and fallen back on the mythos of self-reliance and restrained government. The Democrats were no longer the laissez-faire party of Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren, nor for that matter the party of Bourbon Democrat Grover Cleveland; instead, they were now developing along lines that would lead them to champion the imminent emergence of what would come to be called the “welfare state,” which for some was a high compliment, for others opprobrium; they were becoming the party of Al Smith and Franklin Roosevelt.
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, cousin of Theodore Roosevelt, had been one of the Democrats’ rising stars since his campaign for the vice presidency twelve years earlier. A crippling battle against polio interrupted his ambitions; but blessed with a measure of resolve beyond the reach of most human beings, Roosevelt willed himself back into the political arena, even though the paralysis that resulted from the disease left him without the use of his legs. By 1924, three years after contracting the disease, Roosevelt was fully back in the political game and, having become one of the party’s more influential forces, appeared on crutches at the national convention that year to personally nominate his friend Al Smith, delivering a speech that energized the convention and helped to seal Smith’s reputation as the “Happy Warrior.” Roosevelt furthered his comeback in 1928, successfully campaigning for the governorship of New York and winning election in a landslide. Given that Republican gains were extensive in 1928, Roosevelt’s successful campaign as a Democrat was seen as all the more remarkable; as the decade was drawing toward a close, it was clear that FDR had indeed recovered the political momentum that he had lost due to the terrible affliction that he suffered near the decade’s opening.
As Roosevelt ascended, President Herbert Hoover, confronted with the demoralizing effects of the Great Depression, dug in. Hoover, who had been elected in a landslide four years earlier, was an intelligent, honest, and capable leader; but the crisis was so extensive that his efforts, rooted in his commitment to the principles of “rugged individualism” and limited government, seemed too little and ultimately too late. Hoover firmly believed that the dynamics of private markets would inevitably pull the country up and out of the Depression, holding fast to the belief that the federal government needed to be cautious in the extent of its activity. It is not fair to Hoover’s reputation to depict him as indifferent to the sufferings of Americans during the Great Depression, or as merely the tool of monied interests looking out only for themselves. Hoover did have close ties to business, but he also had a long record of humanitarian service reaching back to his efforts to help Europeans recover in the aftermath of the Great War. But by the time of the election, the shantytowns of the homeless and unemployed that pockmarked the American urban landscape were known as “Hoovervilles,” and the candidate that once rode to a stunning political victory on the wave of prosperity was now buffeted hard by circumstances that he considered beyond his legitimate control. By 1932, the mood at the White House was somber and withdrawn, further adding to the perception that Hoover had become a distant, indifferent figure.
Nonetheless, when the Republican Party held its convention in Chicago during that summer, Hoover was nominated without any real opposition, winning over 98 percent of the delegates on the first round. Vice President Charles Curtis was also renominated, with just over 55 percent of the delegates on the first ballot. With the exception of a small number of delegates, the party rallied behind Hoover, praising his sober forbearance in responding to the economic crisis and reaffirming the principles of frugality in government and balanced budgets. The American people, the language of the platform averred, will emerge from the economic calamity even stronger, and Hoover’s leadership was noted as the principal assurance of this outcome. “This will be due in large measure,” the platform stated, “to the quality of the leadership that this country has had during this crisis. We have had in the White House a leader—wise, courageous, patient, understanding, resourceful, ever present at his post of duty, tireless in his efforts and unswervingly faithful to American principles and ideals.” The platform also reminded Americans that “true to American traditions and principles of government, the administration has regarded the relief problem as one of State and local responsibility. The work of local agencies, public and private has been coordinated and enlarged on a nation-wide scale under the leadership of the President.”
As the Democratic convention, also held in Chicago late that July, opened, Governor Roosevelt held the advantage of the front-runner. Two other candidates emerged: Al Smith, Roosevelt’s friend and predecessor as governor of New York as well as the Democratic nominee for president in 1928; and John Nance Garner from Texas, the current Speaker of the House of Representatives. Nine other names were mentioned as well, but none drew any serious support. What was once a close friendship between Roosevelt and Smith had sadly become strained since the previous convention. Smith felt that his former protégé had deliberately cut him out of the inner circle of New York politics, and by the time of the convention, both men had cooled toward each other. Smith, who had been associated with the party’s liberal/progressive wing four years earlier—and thus the heir apparent to the legacies of William Jennings Bryan and President Woodrow Wilson—had since gravitated more toward the conservative side of the party. It was now Roosevelt who most resembled Wilson, and who best drew the contrast between the Democrats’ progressive vision and the conservatism of President Hoover.
Thus at the convention, Roosevelt’s lead was commanding from the beginning, winning 666 delegates on the first ballot, Smith following in second with 201 delegates and Garner showing a distant third with 90. While it was an impressive lead, a two-thirds majority was required to win nomination; thus the balloting continued, with Roosevelt making small gains on each ballot, Smith falling further back, and Garner gaining only 11 more votes by the third ballot. Even though Roosevelt gained a few votes on both the second and third ballots, there was no evident momentum, and a strange deadlock seemed to be forming in spite of Roosevelt’s overwhelming popularity at the convention. After the third ballot, the convention recessed, and in the interim, Garner, realizing that a deadlock could sour the upcoming effort against the Republicans, was persuaded to throw in behind Roosevelt. On the fourth ballot, the California delegation, led by William McAdoo (the son-in-law of President Wilson who had almost won the nomination in 1920 and again in 1924), swung its support from Garner to Roosevelt, spurring other Garner delegates on the convention floor to follow suit. With Garner’s delegates released to Roosevelt along with several supporters of scattered also-rans, FDR was nominated with 945 votes, Smith retaining 190. The convention then selected Garner to run for the vice presidency. The long friendship between Roosevelt and Smith was now even more troubled, and while Smith joined the chorus of prominent Democrats in support of FDR, his campaign efforts were less than enthusiastic for the Democratic nominee. Editors at the Denver Post mused, for example, that one of Smith’s speeches on behalf of the Roosevelt-Garner ticket was in effect the “best speech yet for Hoover.”
With his convention victory in hand, Roosevelt went on the stump, campaigning so energetically that the frail state of his health was completely overlooked. Assisted by James Farley and Louis Howe, his closest advisers, as well as what would become known as his “brains trust” (later referred to in the singular as “brain trust”)—an informal circle of campaign managers and academics led, at least in its original form, by men such as Professor Raymond Moley of Columbia University, Adolf Berle, James Warburg, and Rexford Tugwell—Roosevelt mapped a campaign strategy and executed it with aplomb, surprising even those critics who had, as recently as the convention, underestimated him, mistaking him for something of a political lightweight. His numerous friends, supporters, and advisers provided considerable counsel and support, but Roosevelt ran the show in a way that had scarcely been seen in the politics of presidential elections. Thus with FDR, a new era of campaign politics seemed to have been ushered in. Roosevelt’s vigor, confidence, high-spiritedness, and optimism were infectious, particularly when compared to Hoover, whom some had perceived as dour and resigned to defeat. “Happy Days Are Here Again,” Roosevelt’s campaign theme song, typified the campaign’s mood more effectively than any speech or slogan, with the possible exception of one phrase, assuredly coined by Roosevelt in the following promise: “I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a New Deal for the American people.” By the next day, the New Deal was the most important slogan promoting the Roosevelt campaign and would become the defining vision of his presidency. Indeed, the Roosevelt New Deal would henceforth come to mean much more, defining the Democratic Party as well as encapsulating a new approach to the role of the public sector in American democratic thought and practice.
Naturally, the campaign focused primarily on the Great Depression and how to address it. In other areas, such as foreign policy, there was no significant difference between the two candidates; and even on some domestic issues, Roosevelt and Hoover were not as divided as our limited understanding of history has led us to believe. Roosevelt, while genuinely feared in some quarters as dangerously progressive, for the most part embraced the laissez-faire principles of free-market capitalism and, along with Hoover, believed in a balanced budget and responsible federal spending. Nonetheless, Roosevelt did draw important distinctions between himself and the president. In his Commonwealth Club address delivered in San Francisco, Roosevelt set aside his free-market proclivities and sketched ideas and policies that would constitute the basics of the New Deal, proposals that called for greater government responsibility in the economic direction of the country. “As I see it,” Roosevelt explained,
The task of government in relation to business is to assist the development of an economic declaration of rights, an economic constitutional order. This is the common task of statesman and business man. It is the minimum requirement of a more permanently safe order of things. Every man has a right to life; and this means that he has also a right to make a comfortable living. He may by sloth or crime decline to exercise that right; but it may not be denied him. We have no actual famine or death; our industrial and agricultural mechanism can produce enough and to spare. Our government formal and informal, political and economic, owes to every one an avenue to possess himself of a portion of that plenty sufficient for his needs, through his own work. (Quoted in Hammond, Hardwick, and Lubert 2007, p. 407)
President Hoover seemed defeated from the outset; in contrast to the endlessly active and enthusiastic Roosevelt, he did little to campaign throughout the summer, and it was only in October, extremely late in the campaign, that he really entered the fray, and then primarily as a defense against his critics. Hoover attempted to inform the public of those measures that he actually had taken to address the crisis, insisting that had it not been for his administration, the Depression would have been “infinitely worse.” He pointedly contrasted his rugged individualism with Roosevelt’s “alien” ideas, insinuating that with FDR and the Democrats, the very ideals that underpin American society would be replaced by “sinister” foreign doctrines similar to Bolshevism. Hoover warned that if the electorate turned to the “radicalism” of Roosevelt, “the same philosophy of government which has poisoned all Europe” would infect the values of American society as well. Roosevelt blithely dismissed Hoover, describing the latter’s administration, in apocalyptic and alliterative terms, as being spurred by “the Horsemen Destruction, Delay, Deceit, Despair.”
Roosevelt was elected president in a landslide, although it was not as quite as large as Hoover’s victory over Smith four years earlier, FDR winning 57 percent of the popular vote to Hoover’s 39 percent. The actual margin of victory was approximately the same, both elections coming in at around a winning margin of 17–18 percent. Socialist candidate Norman Thomas managed what seemed an impressive 885,000 votes (approximately), but it was only just over 2 percent of the voting electorate, a poor showing given the economically distressed times and the intensity of the discontent that had been raised over the past three years. The margin of victory for Roosevelt in the Electoral College was even more impressive: He won all but six states for a total of 472 electoral votes to Hoover’s 59, or 89 percent to 11 percent, the highest percentage of electoral votes won by a candidate since Abraham Lincoln’s 91 percent (in an election in which the southern states did not participate) in his 1864 reelection. Interestingly, even though Democrats Grover Cleveland and Woodrow Wilson had both been twice elected to the White House (1884, 1892, 1912, 1916), Franklin Roosevelt was the first Democratic candidate to receive at least 50 percent of the popular vote since Samuel Tilden in 1876 (an election that Tilden actually lost by one vote in the Electoral College) and the first Democrat to receive a true popular majority and win election to the presidency since Franklin Pierce in 1852—in other words, eighty years had passed since a Democrat had last won the White House by carrying both the Electoral College and a total exceeding a simple majority of the popular vote. After Election Day 1932, the only Democrats to whom that applied—that is, who were elected to the presidency with simple majorities (50.1% or above) in the popular vote as well as the requisite majority in the Electoral College—were Roosevelt (1932), Pierce (1852), Martin Van Buren (1836), and Andrew Jackson (1828 and 1832). One could also add Tilden to this company as the six Democrats between the party’s founding in the late 1820s/early 1830s through 1932 to have gained a majority of the popular vote in a presidential election. Roosevelt swept the South, the West, and the Midwest, and while Hoover won five of his six states in the Northeast (Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont, Connecticut, and Pennsylvania—his only other state being the border state of Delaware)—Roosevelt carried his home state of New York with its 47 electoral votes (10% of the total votes in the Electoral College) and again took what was now becoming a former Republican stronghold, Massachusetts, for the Democrats, thus repeating and reinforcing the trend that had been initiated by candidate Smith in the previous election.
In the wake of such a devastating victory, Roosevelt and the Democrats now ruled the political landscape; the Republican Party, which had dominated the federal government since Lincoln, and which had as recently as the last three elections produced a string of landslides that made the party appear invulnerable, at least in presidential elections, was now in the minority. The middle decades of the twentieth century—those decades that were marked by the worst global crises in the history of humankind, the Great Depression, World War II, and the earliest years of the Cold War—in American politics were to be dominated by the Democrats.
The American Presidency Project. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu and http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29638#ixzz1IP4Mu8Pv.
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Topping, Simon. Lincoln’s Lost Legacy: The Republican Party and the African American Vote, 1928–1952. Gainesville: University Press of Florida, 2008.