Graduate

By Adrian Zita-Bennett| Originally published in the Vol. 6 no. 2 (Spring/Summer 2013) issue.

Following his death on April 12, 1945, a New York Times editorial proclaimed that “Men will thank God on their knees, a hundred years from now, that Franklin D. Roosevelt was in the White House.”[1] In the decades following this munificent remark, FDR’s legacy has not waned in the least. For instance, in each of the five surveys conducted by the Siena College Research Institute since 1982, historians have ranked him as the best president in American history.[2] Likewise, in public opinion polls, FDR has continued to remain popular.[3] This consistent high regard has created and reinforced a dominant retrospective narrative that understates, if not overlooks, the nuances required to accurately assess the former president, especially in the months preceding and following his election in 1932.

Against this backdrop, Italian-American bricklayer Giuseppe Zangara’s failed assassination attempt on FDR in mid-February 1933 represents an interesting example of how the former president is memorialized; in that, the current narrative, more or less, glosses over the kinds of motives that may have spurred the attempt at all. This is not to imply that Zangara was at all reasonably justified in his attempt, but the event itself importantly illustrates that current opinions of FDR are not reflective of opinions on the man upon his landslide victory in 1932. Though the New York Times may have correctly predicted that “history will honor this man for many things”[4] following his death, the prevailing opinion throughout 1932 and into 1933 tell a different story. Therefore, this paper will advance an alternate, yet more accurate narrative of FDR that accounts for the multifaceted sentiments and circumstances surrounding the 1932 election and broader US society at the time. Not only does this approach contextualize Zangara’s assassination attempt, but more significantly, it adds a ‘sober’ analysis of FDR: namely, that there was no certainty and perhaps little likelihood that men would thank God on their knees that he emerged victorious in November 1932.

“The Threshold Of A New Era:” The 1928 Election

It is worth emphasizing that the results of the 1932 election were not solely the result of the 1932 election. That is, understanding its full significance requires an account of electoral trends and developments of at least the preceding four years. Between 1865 and 1933, the Republican Party was the dominant political party in the United States. On average, the GOP held majorities in the House two out of every three years, and in the Senate, nine out of every ten. Furthermore, Republican candidates were elected to the Presidency over 70% of the time. Indeed, the 1920s were particularly emblematic of this kind of electoral dominance, as the GOP held the House and Senate throughout the decade and the Presidency every year except in Woodrow Wilson’s final full year in office in 1920. In 1928, after incumbent President Calvin Coolidge unexpectedly declined to run for re-election,[5] GOP delegates convened for several days in mid-June and selected Coolidge’s Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover as their candidate for the upcoming November election. Hoover’s selection was commended in press reports throughout the country. Regarding his credentials, the Hartford Courant praised Hoover’s “self-made” image, the Portland Oregonian lauded the fact that he was not a “professional politician...unresponsive to the general will,” the Idaho Statesman commended his humanitarian work during World War One and stated “here is a  case [of] the Presidency seeking the man instead of the man seeking the Presidency,” and finally, the Boston Herald cited Hoover’s scientific background and frankly asked, “is there anybody in the United States today who measures up to him?”[6] Hence, not only, as the Los Angeles Times noted, would Hoover win “without difficulty” in 1928, but as the Wichita Beacon affirmed, “the nomination of Hoover mean[t] a continuation of the Republican Party in power for another eight years.”[7] Meanwhile, the Democrats selected New York Governor Al Smith as their nominee near the end of June—a choice that was commended nationally for slightly different reasons. For instance, the Salt Lake Tribune stated Smith was “the strongest candidate the Democrats could possible nominate,” the New Orleans Times-Picayune called him “the best qualified of the aspirants,” and Detroit Free Press referred to him as their “best bet.”[8] Smith’s candidacy, in essence, was lauded more so for the fact that he was the only real viable option the Democrats could offer. As New York’s The World noted, “The task which now confronts Governor Smith is no easy one [since] the Republican Party under Herbert Hoover is a formidable thing.”[9] Following what historian Allan J. Lichtman called the “most tempestuous campaign in recent memory,”[10] Hoover was elected in a landslide victory, securing forty states and garnering over 58% of the popular vote.[11] The defeat was so thorough that even in Smith’s home state of New York, where he was thought to be “invincible,”[12] Hoover emerged as a clear, albeit close, winner.[13] As an aside, in the gubernatorial election for New York, the slim results, this time, swung in the Democrats’ favour, as former President Woodrow Wilson’s Secretary of the Navy Franklin D. Roosevelt was elected by a slim margin over Coolidge’s Attorney General Albert Ottinger.[14] However, in 1928, Hoover’s resounding victory was the main story and as New York’s Herald Tribune remarked, his “stupendous victory” marked “an epoch in American political history.”[15] Though this was undoubtedly meant as a compliment for Hoover, changing circumstances and unpopular policies soon rendered such an assertion more as a criticism.

The Brief Rise and Drastic Fall of the Hoover Presidency

I am convinced we have passed the worst and with continued unity of effort we shall rapidly recover.[16]
—President Herbert Hoover, May 1, 1930

The 1928 election was a massive success for the GOP, as the landslide presidential victory was accompanied by large Republican majorities in the House and Senate. At his Inauguration on March 4, 1929, Hoover commended the work of the Coolidge Presidency for their “wise guidance in this great period of recovery” and reaffirmed that “economic progress toward prosperity” could “further [lessen] poverty.”[17] As a result, he harboured “no fears for the future of [the] country [since] it [was] bright with hope.”[18] Rather tellingly, these words were enunciated with great difficulty amidst heavy rainfall outside the Capitol.[19] In many respects, this kind of imagery was prophetic; given their response to the widespread economic ‘storm’ that was to occur just several months later. Hoover’s preference to ‘stay the course’ made him so deeply unpopular that predictions of Republican re-election in the next election became a dim prospect at best.

In late October 1929, the stock market crashed. Within two weeks, the index of common stocks fell by 40% and investor losses ballooned to more than $26 billion.[20] Coupled with this financial downturn, the US’ agricultural sector continued on an ongoing downward trend, further exacerbated by what Donald W. Whisenhunt called the “greatest drought ever recorded in the United States.”[21] On the macroeconomic level, unemployment skyrocketed from 3.2% in 1929 to 24.9% in 1933, wages decreased as prices increased, the collapse of the real estate market caused housing shortages, and most prominently, a staggering number of otherwise ‘ordinary’ Americans lost much of their personal savings.[22] As such, due to inadequate policies to curb these disturbing trends—for instance, the Smoot-Hawley Tariff of 1930[23]—in addition to worsening conditions—such as, the proliferation of ‘Hoovervilles’ for the homeless—Hoover shouldered much of the blame, regardless of whether it was truly his fault.[24] Indeed, optimistic rhetoric that characterized his first few months as President soon lost their lustre since it became abundantly clear that these aforementioned difficult circumstances were not temporary. As one woman exclaimed, “People were starving because of Herbert Hoover. My mother was out of work because of Herbert Hoover. Men were killing themselves because of Herbert Hoover, and their fatherless children were being packed away to orphanages...because of Herbert Hoover.”[25] Though the government was not considered an instrument for progress so much as its ‘manager’ during this period, Hoover was so disliked that their existed a perception that not only was he incapable of fixing the burgeoning crisis, he was outright indifferent to its devastating effects.[26]

These conditions created a lack of confidence in the country and during the 1930 midterm elections, potentially seismic electoral and political shifts were beginning to materialize. In the Senate, the GOP lost eight seats and their sizable majority was reduced to a single seat; likewise, in the House, the Republicans’ large majority (270 seats) was reduced by fifty-three into a small Democratic majority (218 to 217). In a vacuum, these results hardly seemed devastating, but given that the GOP was essentially the dominant political party since 1865, such midterm losses and the obvious lack of sustained recovery elicited considerable cause for concern. Democrats, as such, viewed it as an opportunity, though were sure not to make these intentions too obvious. As Tennessee Senator and FDR’s future Secretary of State Cordell Hull mused at the time, “Only the Democratic Party by its failure to function can save the Republican Party and its Hoover Administration from overwhelming defeat in 1932.”[27] FDR, it is worth noting, was decisively victorious in his bid for re-election, securing over 56% of the popular vote with the Republican candidate winning just over 33%.[28] Therefore, voters’ allegiances clearly shifted, thereby causing a political identity crisis for the GOP. After the 1930 midterms, two perceptions that had traditionally defined the Democrats—namely, fiscal mismanagement and ideological rigidity increasingly became a Republican ‘domain.’ For instance, in 1928 The World affirmed the Democratic Party’s commitment to “bad” and “lost causes”—namely, slavery, populism, and prohibition had “wrecked the party [over] the [previous] seventy years.”[29] Ironically, after 1930, it was the Republicans who appeared to be experiencing this kind of electorally dangerous error in judgment—namely, by not imposing greater regulations on business and the stock market and repeatedly insisting that the recovery was imminent.

Interestingly, by endorsing Hoover and Smith prior to the 1928 elections, the New York Times had perhaps not truly endorsed anyone.[30] As such, their comments on the Hoover Presidency we should more or less view as less partisan and more frank and indicative of wider public sentiment. In early 1930, though the Times acknowledged Hoover’s “misfortune,” they still criticized his leadership, stating that “he has apparently been content to act as a disappointed observer where he should have been a vigorous participant.”[31] Yet, despite this, there was a noticeable sense of hope and optimism still prevalent: “Nothing is so kaleidoscope as American politics. Its next turn may be all in favour of President Hoover.”[32] Indeed, it never turned to Hoover’s favour and attempts to curb declining public confidence and Republican popularity only served to exacerbate the situation. Instead of identifying structural issues pertaining to the government’s relationship with big business, Hoover prescribed the depression as more a “mental condition of business” than anything else.[33] For those millions of unemployed Americans and the millions more that had lost confidence in the ‘system,’ attributing the origin of their problems to a mere ‘mental’ deficiency did little to assuage increasing disgust with the President and his party. Hoover, as historian Nicholas Cripe has noted, “opposed the direct expenditure of federal funds to relieve either the unemployed or the farmers. [He] held that such relief would create a burdensome bureaucracy and destroy the initiative and self-reliance of the recipients.”[34] Thus, the great unpopularity of Hoover heading into the primary season of 1932 manifested not so much out of blame for the causes of the Depression but more for the fact he was perceived to have done little to mitigate its effects. For Democrats, this was a godsend and as one merchant affirmed in April 1931,

It seems to be fairly well conceded that...the Democratic Party with elect the President next year. The Republican Party has consistently asserted itself to be the party of prosperity. Since October 1929, we have had one of the worst slumps in our history. Despite repeated assurances from Washington...that conditions would soon improve, we are still suffering....I firmly believe that dissatisfaction with the administration and its policies is very widespread, even in Republican ranks, and that many Republicans are prepare to vote the Democratic ticket next year.[35]

Therefore, it is clear that prior to the 1932 election, the Republicans appeared to be a party on the brink of electoral disaster. Elected in a landslide in 1928 and complimented with strong GOP majorities in both congressional chambers, Hoover appeared destined to not only be a two-term president but maintain the popular policies of the Coolidge Administration, with the intention of achieving “the final triumph over poverty.”[36] However, the Great Depression changed realistic hopes of attaining this legacy. In these difficult circumstances, not just the GOP but both political parties stood at their own respective crossroads; would they ‘stay the course’ or change direction? Regardless, Hoover and the Republicans had lost much of the popularity earned since the Wilson years, and by default, the Democrats profited from this decline. As a result, towards the end of the Hoover years, barring unforeseen circumstances, the next President would in fact be a Democrat. During Hoover’s inaugural address, it must be remembered, the appearance of heavy rainfall did not seem truly fitting for the occasion, given the popularity of the new President, his party, and the perceived prosperity of the times. However, four years later, given worsening economic and social conditions, in addition to Hoover’s deepening unpopularity, that presence of heavy rain was rather perfect in a strange, perhaps cruelly ironic sort of way. Indeed, if we purport to understand the conditions that not only preceded FDR’s Presidency but Zangara’s assassination attempt, the importance of Hoover’s degeneration into a lame-duck president after a single term must not be understated. The 1932 election, to be sure, was less about Democratic merits and more about perceived Republican miscalculations.

The 1932 Primaries: Staying the Course or Changing Direction?

Much like the 1930 congressional midterms demonstrated a substantial but not catastrophic erosion of GOP support, their prospects for 1932 appeared headed down a similar path. The ongoing depression had not subsided and Republicans were largely held responsible for the country’s predicament. As Katheleen E. Kendall has noted, due to the “strong tradition of parties giving their incumbent president a second nomination,” and the fact that the “party feared a defeat because of the Depression,” the Hoover re-election ticket was practically unopposed.[37] Indeed, even former President Calvin Coolidge, still very popular, declined calls by some Republicans to make a run for the party’s nomination.[38] During the 1932 Republican National Convention held in Chicago in mid-June, Hoover won the nomination on the first ballot with over 98% of the delegate vote, a result that drew a 27 minute cheer from convention attendees.[39] As was the custom of candidates not to attend national conventions (for both parties), Hoover stated in a telegram that though the “storm still surrounds us,” he was committed to “meeting [its] effects” in the upcoming November election.[40] Afterward, the GOP emphasized their party unity despite Hoover’s unpopularity and attempted to shift focus (albeit rather unsuccessfully) on the Democratic alternative, who was to be selected in early July. It was therefore clear that the GOP approached the 1932 election by ‘staying the course.’ As a reporter noted at the convention, “So far as the convention could express the attitude of the Republican Party, it has returned definitely and wholly to the conservative fold.”[41] In the upcoming election, it remained to be seen whether most Americans would be receptive to this approach.

Meanwhile, the Democratic nomination enjoyed a greater share of the national focus relative to their GOP counterparts, for obvious reasons. Assessing his party’s chances, FDR wrote in late 1931 that “[he] was fully convinced that the cycle ha[d] swung after twelve years and that it [was the Democratic Party’s] turn next.”[42] For their National Convention to be held from June 27 to July 3, a third of the delegates were to be selected over the course of seventeen primaries.[43] In addition to FDR, and unlike the GOP, there were several prominent party members that campaigned for the treasured Democratic ticket, in a race that pitted the so-called ‘Old Guard Democrats’ against what would later be known as the ‘New Deal Liberals.’ First, most notably, was Al Smith, the 1928 nominee who lost to Hoover. Having remained very much involved with the party despite his massive defeat, the well-respected Smith—part of the Old Guard faction—looked towards 1932 as an opportunity for vindication. As well-known newspaper editor Arthur Brisbane asserted, “Any Democrat nominated in opposition to the wishes of Smith will be defeated...Smith is the head of Democratic Party in America.”[44] As well, House Speaker John Nance Garner was also regarded as a possible contender, with the influential William Randolph Hearst calling him “the nation’s one great hope” and denouncing his rivals as “internationalists.”[45] There were other candidates, such as Wilson’s former Secretary of War Newton D. Baker, conservative-minded Maryland Governor Albert C. Ritchie, Chicago’s First National Bank President Melvin A. Traylor, and General Electric Chairman Owen D. Young, who did not formally announce his candidacy despite calls to enter the race.[46]

Meanwhile, FDR represented the progressive faction of the party. Though he was already a known entity to many following his nomination as Vice-President in 1920, FDR became a serious candidate for the Democratic ticket following his razor thin victory in New York in 1928. As the New York Times noted, though it was “too early to select the new leader of the Democratic Party or to predict nominations for a date so remote as 1932,” FDR, through a “most extraordinary combination of qualities, political fortunes and diversified associations,” had made a name for himself as a candidate at the national level.[47] He was, after all, the progressive Democrat who emerged victorious in a rather conservative-minded state amidst a high tide of Republican popularity. When the Great Depression began to erode GOP support nationally, FDR became an instant contender, if not frontrunner, for the Democratic ticket in 1932, especially following his larger re-election victory in 1930. At first, FDR publically denied presidential aspirations, but privately, he confided to his aide Edward J. Flynn that he believed he could “be nominated for the Presidency in 1932 on the Democratic ticket.”[48] Indeed, this belief proved not to be misguided. In a 1931 poll of probable convention delegates by the president of Macy’s Department Stores Jesse I. Straus, FDR was ahead in thirty-nine of forty-four states (dominating the West and South), with Smith most competitive in New England.[49] This popularity continued into 1932 and it was not just limited to the Democratic Party: as an Opportunity Magazine presidential straw poll found, FDR was more popular than not only Smith, but Hoover too.[50]

Yet, for a variety of reasons, FDR’s frontrunner status by no means guaranteed his nomination. According to rules, the Democratic primaries only selected a third of convention delegates, with the rest chosen by party leaders and state conventions.[51] Thus, the fact that FDR ended up winning eleven of the seventeen primaries aided his cause but certainly did not cement his nomination. As well, an old rule—candidates must secure at least two-thirds of convention delegate support in order to be nominated—directly affected FDR’s chances.[52] After Garner won the delegate-loaded California primary quite easily, coupled with FDR’s poor showing in Pennsylvania and Smith’s dominant performance in Massachusetts, as historian Norman D. Brown has noted, the results “all but ended [FDR’s] hopes for nomination on the first ballot, and raised serious doubts if he would be nominated at all.”[53]

Sure enough, at the Chicago convention, a ‘stop Roosevelt’ movement manifested. On the first ballot, FDR easily won the most votes at 666 but was still well short of the 780 required for victory.[54] His campaign manager James A. Farley was not shocked by the result but recalled being “bitterly disappointed” that no state delegation switched their votes to “support the majority candidate,” as was customary.[55] On the second ballot, FDR gained just eleven votes, which was hardly inspiring. Before the crucial third vote, the ‘stop Roosevelt’ forces were attempting to encourage the Mississippi delegation to stop supporting FDR, as a decline in support at this point would very much be fatal to the Governor’s cause. Though a slim majority still supported Roosevelt, Mississippi delegates were still essentially split on the issue and it provoked the FDR camp to call on Louisiana’s influential senator and FDR-supporter Huey Long to discipline’ the delegates by threatening: “if you break [ranks], you sonofabitch, I’ll go into Mississippi and break you.”[56] Long’s work effectively kept FDR’s candidacy afloat, and although third ballot returns showed only a five vote gain for FDR, Long’s work still quelled the ‘stop Roosevelt’ momentum.[57] Smith obviously had no intention of conceding defeat, especially since it appeared that FDR’s own momentum was starting to stall, leaving the possibility that support could be thrown behind another candidate—namely, Smith—instead. The ‘stop Roosevelt’ forces were therefore still encouraged, and the nomination race headed to a fourth roll call. Yet, this was not necessarily a good thing for Democrats. As Montana Senator Tom Walsh lamented, the prolonged nomination process meant that the Democrats’ prospects for 1932 “wane[d] with every succeeding ballot.”[58] Since party unity was, and still is, considered a litmus test for a party’s credibility in terms of governance, that the GOP had swiftly united behind Hoover could not be of starker contrast to the process to elect the Democratic candidate. However, before the next vote, FDR’s political team—notably Walsh—struck a deal with Garner; he would be Roosevelt’s running mate as Vice-President if he released his delegates to support the Governor.[59] This option was not without difficulty either, as the vast majority of Garner’s delegates were not from his home state of Texas, but from California. Since by conceding Garner was recommending whom his delegates should support, FDR’s team still had to ensure that all these delegates came to their side, which they did so successfully.[60]

Thus, in a remarkable turnaround, instead of Mississippi’s defection potentially being the proverbial straw that broke the camel’s back, California’s endorsement had the exact opposite effect: it secured FDR’s nomination. In the fourth ballot, FDR won 945 votes, thereby easily surpassing the 780 requirement, and he officially became the 1932 Democratic presidential candidate. In a break from tradition, FDR flew to Chicago to address the convention directly before receiving formal notice of his nomination and though he admitted this was “unprecedented and unusual,” these were after all “unprecedented and unusual times.”[61] As well, FDR called on delegates to view this small procedural indiscretion as “symbolic” of change, since “from now on the task of our party [is] to break foolish traditions.”[62] Broadly speaking, this meant “a pledge...to a new deal for the American people,” though no one knew exactly what that meant.[63] His speech was met with applause, yet the nomination process still made it clear that significant factions within the Democratic Party still withheld reservations of their new leader. The Democrats were, of course, well-positioned regardless heading into the 1932 election given the country’s economic issues and Hoover’s unpopularity. Yet, the fact that convention delegates for a time were not wholly unified, nor sold on his selection, reinforced that FDR was still very much an unknown entity.

Political Tectonic Plate Shift: The 1932 Election

Even though Hoover was deeply unpopular, there was still some uncertainty regarding the 1932 election results. The conservative Democrat columnist Frank Kent, for instance, even predicted that Hoover would win in 1932, regardless of the Democratic candidate. Foreseeing an economic rebound and recovery, Kent stated that “The credit will, of course, go to [Hoover], his critics will be confounded, his popularity revived in a bound, and his triumphant...re-election assured.”[64] The importance of such predictions was not so much their accuracy but more that they reflected the still prevailing belief that the ongoing economic crisis was viewed as a temporary setback—a ‘slump’ more so than a ‘depression.’ Nevertheless, these poor conditions had the potential to be lethal for Democrats and Republicans, as fringe political parties (such as the Communists, Socialists, and to a degree, the Progressive faction of the GOP) looked upon widespread voter disenchantment as an opportunity to attract more voters to their causes out of the mainstream. Indeed, prior to FDR’s victory as the Democratic candidate, there was uncertainty whether the more progressive-minded FDR (relative to Smith and Garner) would “wipe out the third party threat” due to his more broad appeal in these difficult times.[65] As Donald A. Ritchie has noted, “with capitalism foundering and fascism and communism on the rise abroad, if Americans were going to embrace radical alternatives, 1932 seemed the most likely year to do so.”[66] On the November 8 election day, since these third parties would only win three percent of the vote, it is safe to assume that FDR’s progressivism, however vague it was, managed to mitigate their support.

Only fearing fear itself, Hoover was in fact pleased at FDR’s nomination, believing that it served to help his own chances at re-election. As the Democrats were in the process of selecting their leader, Hoover kept abreast of convention developments, and actually confided to an aide that he was “afraid of [Newton D.] Baker [as] he would be a much harder man for [him] to beat.”[67] When Garner eventually pledged his support to the Governor, Hoover, according to his Press Secretary Theodore Joslin, “smiled more broadly” than he had in a long time.[68] Though not strangers with one another (since both were part of the Wilson Administration), Hoover believed he was intellectually superior and more of a leader than his opponent. For instance, at a campaign rally in New York, he criticized FDR’s indecisiveness as Governor, the fact his did not have rigid principles, and likened him to “a chameleon in plaid” as a result.[69] However, these attacks did little to help Hoover’s cause. In polls leading up to November, FDR was firmly in front of the incumbent[70] and signs of Republican demise were evident given the results from the Maine state elections. Amidst uncertainty of his prospects, the one state Hoover was ‘sure’ about was the traditionally Republican state of Maine and as the old political maxim went: ‘as Maine goes, so goes the Union.’[71] In September 1932, with two of their three newly-elected congressmen and governor Democrats, Maine had effectively sent a grave political warning to the Hoover camp. As Garner told a crowd in Oklahoma, “Maine’s gone Democratic. You might as well make it unanimous.”[72]

To be sure, the 1932 campaign has been molded to fit the current narrative surrounding Roosevelt. According to popular discourse, the campaign pitted the ‘do-nothing’ conservative Hoover against the progressive liberal FDR and Americans voted for the latter since they looked to the government to alleviate their problems. As such, FDR is usually cited for ‘validating’ the merits behind so-called ‘big’ government. However, in actuality, his 1932 campaign advocated the opposite approach. The FDR team’s political strategy was to minimize mistakes and keep the public spotlight not so much on what exactly their ‘New Deal’ entailed but more on President Hoover’s inability to fix the economy. In addition to calling for balanced budgets, the 1932 Democratic platform called for an “immediate and drastic reduction of governmental expenditures by abolishing useless commissions and offices, consolidating departments and bureaus, and eliminating extravagance to accomplish a saving of not less than twenty-five per cent in the cost of the Federal Government.”[73] This was decidedly conservative, and decidedly in favour of a ‘smaller’ government. In fact, FDR actively criticized Hoover’s spending, unbalanced budgets, and large government bureaucracy.[74] As historian Gary Dean Best put it,

If the presidential campaign of 1932 was a contest between an old order and a new order, then many voters had good reason to believe...that it was [FDR] who spoke for the old order of fiscal responsibility and limited government—orthodox Democratic views—and Hoover who spoke for a deficit spending, activist, and experimental (albeit unsuccessful) new order that must be repudiated.[75]

Thus, it is clear that FDR’s 1932 campaign not only revealed little intention of expanding the role of government but also that his approach to the economic crisis was to be more ‘do-nothing’ than his predecessor.

The results of November 8, 1932 were among the Democrats’ greatest electoral successes. FDR won the presidency in a landslide, garnering over 57% of the vote and carrying 42 states. In the House, the Democrats gained ninety-five seats to secure the hitherto strongest House majority in history. In the Senate, too, the Democrats secured a strong majority of fifty-nine seats. Rather tellingly, Hoover’s vote totals in 1932 (15 575 474) were remarkably similar to Smith’s tally in 1928 (15 016 433).[76] Though Hoover was surprised by the results,[77] his platform was called “antiquated and outworn bunkum,”[78] with Best characterizing voter desertion of the GOP as a “reflex of action of...voters in times of economic troubles.”[79] Therefore, this meant that voters elected FDR not so much for the merits of his candidacy but more so for the simple fact that he was not Herbert Hoover. As the columnist H. I. Phillips noted at the time, “the American people were sore at so many people and things that not even George Washington and Abraham Lincoln could have won on a Republican ticket.”[80] As well, Phillips noted that “a candidate who never opened his mouth might have defeated both,” and that Hoover “was running not so much against [FDR] as against every citizen of the United States, who wanted to blame somebody.”[81] This was hardly a resounding endorsement for the new Roosevelt administration and it was evident that in 1932, Hoover was defeated in the election more so than FDR achieved victory.

“Challenging a Strong System:” Qualifying Zangara’s Assassination Attempt

The election is over
But I’ve the rotten
Feeling I will still
Be quite forgotten.[82]
—H. I. Phillips, “The Forgotten Man,” 1932

Zangara is not the one who is sick; there are others by the score in every part of the world. Zangara is a symptom of the illness gnawing at the heart of world civilization which cannot be cured by eighty-year sentences.[83]

—William M. Kelley, editor of the New York Amsterdam News, 1933

Unequivocally, these aforementioned historical circumstances greatly contextualize Zangara’s attempt on FDR’s life in Miami on February 15, 1933. With the Inauguration slated for March 4, FDR was therefore still the President-elect and had hence not fully articulated the direction of his Presidency. For his actions, Zangara was imprisoned and later sentenced to death but the entire incident revealed much about US society in 1932. From his point of view, as gleaned from thoughts jotted down whilst in jail, Zangara was clearly bothered by societal power structures since “the people that run the government do not work, and the poor working people have to support them.”[84] In general, he resented the ‘title’ more than the ‘man,’ which was clear following his admission of previous assassination attempts on Victor Emmanuel III while still living in Italy and on Coolidge and Hoover upon his arrival to the US.[85] “I want to make it clear I do not hate Mr. Roosevelt personally,” he noted, “I hate all presidents, no matter [which] country they come [from], and I hate all officials and everybody who is rich.”[86] On a broader level, regardless of whether or not Zangara legitimately cared about the plight of the poor, there was nothing significant about the 1932 election that indicated their quality of life would improve. Consider the optics of FDR’s win; he ran a low-key campaign, ‘conservative’ in all senses of the term, which meant few were in a position to differentiate between an ‘old’ and ‘New Deal;’ and after all was yet another wealthy politician whose distant cousin also happened to be elected on the party’s ticket now discredited for assuring the Depression was temporary.

Even shortly following Zangara’s attempt, outside of discussion over his motivations, reception of the incident, in some parts, revealed some harsh realities about American society in 1932. If the election, popularly defined and decided by the economy, suggested that FDR differed marginally from Hoover, this kind of maintenance of the status quo was ‘quietly’ reinforced in another respect; racial segregation in the South. Readers of the major national newspapers, such as the New York Times, the Washington Post, and the Wall Street Journal, were not reminded of the hypocrisies inherent in the ‘land of the free.’ Not only was FDR speaking in a ‘whites-only’ public space the day of the assassination attempt but he arrived to Miami  on a segregated train on which African-Americans were compelled to ride together on a single, separate coach.[87] William M. Kelley, editor of the New York Amsterdam News, pointedly speculated on the fallout of the attempt had Zangara been an African-American. Public outcry would have been more heated, he surmised, but as it was, “Zangara [was] white, [had] counsel, [and] for him there [were] stays of execution and writs of habeas corpus.”[88] Thus, he was “glad Zangara [wasn’t] a Negro, for lynching is worse than eighty years in prison.”[89] The significance of such views is twofold: first, that racial segregation, despite the 1932 election, never ceased to remain an issue; and second, regarding that issue, FDR was legitimately considered part of the problem. Therefore, Zangara’s assassination attempt serves as an important gateway into the Depression-era United States and underscores, particularly in the case of African-Americans living in the South, that the 1932 election was not a departure from the past.

As discussed in this paper, both presidential candidates in the 1932 campaign were decidedly uninspiring and did little to put the ‘poor working people’ at the forefront of their agendas. On the Republican side, Hoover was unable to mitigate the effects of the economic crisis and this made him deeply unpopular. Elected in a landslide over Smith in 1928, Hoover suffered a similar fate just four years later. Meanwhile, the Democrats gained influence in all levels of government from 1930 onwards, due largely to perceived GOP failures. As such, FDR was not universally heralded as the ‘saviour’ of the country and this was never more evident than the 1932 Democratic Convention, where his victory was anything but assured until the end. During the 1932 campaign, FDR deliberately refrained from using alarming rhetoric and ran on a platform that promised smaller government. No one knew what the ‘New Deal’ was, and for Zangara, it very much appeared the more things changed, they more they stayed the same. His violent actions were of course not justified but his negative opinion of society was not entirely unwarranted or unsurprising. Though he did not purport to kill ‘the man’ for racial inequalities, the circumstances surrounding Zangara’s attempt were defined by those ‘not present.’ That is, while all politicians may be products of their time to varying degrees, in this case, FDR’s complicity to the Jim Crow South still offers a ‘sobering’ view of the president that contrasts with current ‘rosy’ narratives. If we wish to critically assess FDR in retrospect, it is important to contextualize certain events as they occurred at the time. Indeed, with the elections of 1928 and 1932, it was not unreasonable to assume that the proverbial ‘forgotten man’ would remain just that—forgotten. FDR’s election very much threatened to maintain this status quo, not change it. Regardless of the policies enacted over his several terms in office, this caveat is still important to remember in assessing the former President.

Notes

• [1] “Franklin D. Roosevelt,” New York Times, April 13, 1945, 16.
• [2] “Siena Poll: American Presidents,” Siena College Research Institute, accessed March 1, 2012.
• [3] “Press Release: Americans Say Reagan Is the Greatest U. S. President,” Gallup Organization, accessed March 1, 2012, http://www.gallup.com/poll/146183/Americans-Say-Reagan-Greatest-Presiden....
• [4] “Franklin D. Roosevelt,” 16.
• [5] “Coolidge Decision Upsets Many Plans,” New York Times, August 7, 1927, E4.
• [6] Quoted in “Hoover’s Candidacy Applauded in Nation’s Press,” New York Times, June 16, 1928, 4.
• [7] Quoted in ibid.
• [8] Quoted in “Comment of the Nation’s Press on Nomination of Smith and Robinson,” New York Times, June 30, 1928, 3.
• [9] Quoted in ibid.
• [10] Allan J. Lichtman, Prejudice and the Old Politics: The Presidential Election of 1928 (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2000), 4.
• [11] “1928 Presidential General Election Results,” Dave Leip’s Atlas of US Presidential Elections, accessed April 2, 2012, http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1928&f=0&off=0&elect=0.
• [12] Quoted in “Comment of the Nation’s Press on Nomination of Smith and Robinson,” 3.
• [13] Hoover won by just 2.35%, but his victory still reflected Hoover’s widespread appeal. See “1928 Presidential General Election Results – New York,” Dave Leip’s Atlast of US Presidential Elections, accessed April 2, 2012, http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=1928&fips=36&f=0&off=0....
• [14] “Roosevelt is Victor by Slim Plurality,” New York Times, November 7, 1928, 1.
• [15] “Comment of Press on Hoover Election,” New York Times, November 7, 1928, 21.
• [16] Herbert Hoover, “Address to the Chamber of Commerce of the United States, May 1, 1930,” University of California, Santa
  Barbara American Presidency Project, accessed October 14, 2012, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=22185.
• [17] Herbert Hoover, “Inaugural Address of Herbert Hoover, Monday, March 4, 1929,” The Avalon Project, accessed April 2, 2012, http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hoover.asp.
• [18] Ibid.
• [19] “President Herbert Clark Hoover, 1929,” Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies Online, accessed April 2, 2012, http://inaugural.senate.gov/history/chronology/hchoover1929.cfm.
• [20] David M. Oshinsky, Polio: An American Story (New York: Oxford University Press, 2005), 43.
• [21] Donald W. Whisenhunt, President Herbert Hoover (New York: Nova Science Publishers, 2007), 73.
• [22] Edward L. Ayers et al, American Passages, Volume 2: A History of the United States: Since 1865 (Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2009), 705.
• [23] With the intention of protecting farmers against foreign agricultural imports, the tariff increase—encouraged by Hoover and pushed through the House and Senate by Republicans despite Democratic opposition—had the opposite effect of creating foreign consumer hostility to American products, which ended up hurting the demographic (farmers and agricultural workers) it was designed to aid. See William Boyes and Michael Melvin, Microeconomics, Eight Edition (Mason, Ohio: South-Western Cengage Learning, 2011), 449.
• [24] This widespread dislike of Hoover was not necessarily universal. As one radio commentator noted after the 1932 election, “Hoover will be known as the greatest innocent bystander in history.” See David M. Kennedy, Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929-1945 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1999), 70.
• [25] Quoted in Oshinsky, Polio: An American Story, 44.
• [26] This sense of aloofness dogged Hoover throughout his Presidency. Put simply, his largely anti-social personality and his personal conviction in the vitality of liberalism to right itself was not exactly the antidote to assuage widespread fear and disillusionment. See Ted Atkinson, Faulkner and the Great Depression: Aesthetics, Ideology, and Cultural Politics (Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 2006), 21.
• [27] Quoted in Jordan A. Schwarz, The Interregnum of Despair: Hoover, Congress, and the Depression (Campaign, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1970), 64.
• [28] As Daniel Scroop noted, “it was the manner of Roosevelt’s reelection as governor of New York in 1930, winning by a 725,001 margin and taking forty-two of the fifty-seven upstate counties, that thrust him to the head of the pack in the race for the 1932 presidential nomination.” See Daniel Scroop, Mr. Democrat: Jim Farley, The New Deal, & The Making of Modern American Politics (Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 2006), 30.
• [29] Quoted in “Comment of the Nation’s Press on Nomination of Smith and Robinson,” 3.
• [30] The Times said they were “happy with either.” See “Happy with Either,” New York Times, October 18. 1928. 28.
• [31] “Mr. Hoover’s Popularity,” New York Times, February 23, 1930, 54.
• [32] Ibid.
• [33] “Says Hoover Sees Slump as ‘Mental,’” New York Times, May 12, 1931, 14.
• [34] Quoted in Martin Carcasson, “Herbert Hoover and the Presidential Campaign of 1932: The Failure of Apologia,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 28 (1998): 350.
• [35] “Roosevelt leads in New Party Poll,” New York Times, April 18, 1931, 14.
• [36] Herbert Hoover, “Presidential Nomination Address, August 11, 1928,” in The Two faces of Liberalism: How the Hoover-Roosevelt Debate Shapes the 21^st Century, ed. by Gordon Lloyd (Salem, Massachusetts: M & M Scrivener Press, 2007), 26.
• [37] Kathleen E. Kendall, Communication in the Presidential Primaries: Candidates and the Media, 1912-2000 (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000), 15-16.
• [38] “Calvin Coolidge Favors Second Term for Hoover,” New York Times, September 29, 1931, 1.
• [39] “Cheer Hoover for 27 Minutes: Delegates Give 1126 ½  Votes on First Ballot, 634 ¼ ,” New York Times, June 17, 1932, 1.
• [40] “Text if telegram sent by President Hoover to Convention, Acknowledging Nomination,” New York Times, June 17, 1932, 12.
• [41] “Cheer Hoover for 27 Minutes: Delegates Give 1126 ½  Votes on First Ballot, 634 ¼ ,” 1.
• [42] Quoted in Steven Neal, Happy Days Are Here Again: The 1932 Democratic Convention, the Emergence of FDR—and How America Was Changed Forever (New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2004), 22.
• [43] Ibid., 21.
• [44] “Only Smith Can Win in 1932, says Brisbane,” New York Times, April 17, 1931, 18.
• [45] Roy V. Peel and T. C. Donnelly, The 1932 Campaign: An Analysis (New York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., 1935), 37.
• [46] Neal, Happy Days are Here Again, 23.
• [47] “The Emergence of Roosevelt,” New York Times, November 13, 1928, 25.
• [48] Quoted in Jean Edward Smith, FDR  (New York: Random House, 2007), 249.
• [49] Neal, Happy Days are Here Again, 24.
• [50] “Roosevelt Heads Opportunity Poll,” New York Amsterdam News, April 27, 1932, 11.
• [51] Neal, Happy Days are Here Again, 21.
• [52] Edwin Collins, “Century-old Two-Thirds Rule May Wreck Roosevelt’s Chances,” Daily Boston Globe, April 24, 1932, B2.
• [53] Norman D. Brown, “Garnering Votes for ‘Cactus Jack:’ John Nance Garner, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the 1932 Democratic Nomination for President,” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 104 (October 2000): 178-179.
• [54] Smith won 201 votes, Garner 90, and several other candidates split the remaining votes. See Smith, FDR, 271.
• [55] James Aloysius Farley, Behind the Ballots: The Personal History of a Politician (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1938), 142.
• [56] Quoted in Smith, op. cit., 272.
• [57] Smith, op. cit.
• [58] Quoted in Donald A. Ritchie, Electing FDR: The New Deal Campaign of 1932 (Lawrence, Kansas: University of Kansas Press, 2007), 101.
• [59] Ibid., 107.
• [60] Ibid., 108.
• [61] “Text of Governor Roosevelt’s Speech at the Convention Accepting the Nomination,” New York Times, July 3, 1932, 8.
• [62] Ibid.
• [63] Ibid.
• [64] Frank R. Kent, “Charley Michelson,” Scribner’s, September 1930, 290.
• [65] “Democrats get Progressive Bid: Insurgents Intimate Roosevelt Nomination Would Eliminate Third Party Threat,” New York Times, January 4, 1932, 13.
• [66] Ritchie, Electing FDR: The New Deal Campaign of 1932, 111.
• [67] Quoted in William G. Thiemann, “President Hoover’s Efforts on Behalf of FDR’s 1932 nomination,” Presidential Studies Quarterly 24 (Winter 1994): 89.
• [68] Quoted in Ibid.
• [69] “Indianapolis Hails Chief,” New York Times, October 29, 1932, 1.
• [70]  It appears FDR’s support peaked at the right time. In an October 1 Literary Digest survey, FDR had lead of a few percentage points over Hoover; later in a similar poll conducted on October 7, FDR held a ten-point lead. In an October 21 poll, Literary Digest stated that FDR had a “clear majority” in 39 of the 48 states sampled. See “Roosevelt Leads in Poll,” Wall Street Journal, October 1, 1932, 1; “Governor Roosevelt Adds to Digest Poll Lead,” Daily Boston Globe, October 7, 1932, 30; “Roosevelt Leading in Digest Poll, 3-2,” Daily Boston Globe, October 21, 1932, 32.
• [71] Ritchie, Electing FDR: The New Deal Campaign of 1932, 129.
• [72] Ibid.
• [73] “Democratic Party Platform of 1932, June 27, 1932,” American Presidency Project, University of California, accessed April 8, 2012, http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29595#axzz1rguZtNt6.
• [74] Gary Dean Best, Herbert Hoover: The Post-Presidential Years, 1933-1964, Volume 1 (Palo Alto, California: The Hoover Institution, 1983), xiv
• [75] Ibid.
• [76] “Popular Vote for Hoover This Year About Equal to That Received by Smith in the 1928 Election,” New York Times, December 2, 1932, 2.
• [77] After the election, Hoover contacted an old friend named Roy Roberts, who was the publisher of the Kansas City Star. Roberts recalled years later that Hoover “could ask but one question: ‘Why?’” See Ritchie, Electing FDR: The New Deal Campaign of 1932, 160.
• [78] “The Coming Roosevelt Regime,” Atlanta Daily World, November 14, 1932, A6.
• [79] Best, Herbert Hoover: The Post-Presidential Years, 1933-1964, Volume 1, xiii.
• [80] H. I. Phillips, “The Once Over: Looking back at the Landslide,” Daily Boston Globe, November 11, 1932, 20.
• [81] Ibid.
• [82] Ibid.
• [83] William M. Kelley, “Timely and Untimely Topics: Zangara Let It Get the Best of Him,” New York Amsterdam News, February 22, 1933, 3.
• [84] Quoted in Blaise Picchi, The Five Weeks of Giuseppe Zangara (Chicago: Academy of Chicago Publishers, 1998), 250.
• [85] William J. Crotty, “Presidential Assassinations,” in Modern Criminals, ed. James F. Short (New Brunswich, New Jersey: Transaction Books, 1973), 189.
• [86] “Gunman Lays Act to Body ‘Torment,’” New York Times, February 16, 1933, 1.
• [87] “Giuseppe Zangara,” Chicago Defender, February 25, 1933, 14.
• [88] Kelley, “Timely and Untimely Topics,” 1.
• [89] Ibid. It is also worth noting that Zangara was originally given four counts of attempted murder (20 years per) as he fired wildly into a crowd in FDR’s general direction. However, when one such victim died from his injuries, Zangara was sentenced to death on charges of first degree murder.

Bibliography

• American Presidency Project, University of California. “Democratic Party Platform of 1932, June 27, 1932.” Accessed April 8, 2012. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=29595#axzz1rguZtNt6.
• Atkinson, Ted. Faulkner and the Great Depression: Aesthetics, Ideaology, and Cultural Politics. Athens, Georgia: University of Georgia Press, 2006.
• Ayers, Edward L. Lewis L. Gould, and David M. Oshinsky. American Passages, Volume 2: A History of the United States: Since 1865. Boston: Wadsworth, Cengage Learning, 2009.
• Best, Gary Dean. Herbert Hoover: The Post-Presidential Years, 1933-1964, Volume 1. Palo Alto, California: The Hoover Institution, 1983.
• Boyes, William and Michael Melvin. Microecnomics, Eight Edition. Mason, Ohio: South- Western Cengage Learning, 2011.
• Brown, Norman D. “Garnering Votes for ‘Cactus Jack:’ John Nance Garner, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the 1932 Democratic Nomination for President.” Southwestern Historical Quarterly 104 (October 2000): 149-188.
• “Calvin Coolidge Favors Second Term for Hoover.” New York Times, September 29, 1931.
• Carcasson, Martin. “Herbert Hoover and the Presidential Campaign of 1932: The Failure of Apologia.” Presidential Studies Quarterly 28 (1998): 349-365.
• “Cheer Hoover for 27 Minutes: Delegates Give 1126 ½  Votes on First Ballot, 634 ¼ .” New York Times, June 17, 1932.
• Collins, Edwin. “Century-old Two-Thirds Rule May Wreck Roosevelt’s Chances.” Daily Boston Globe, April 24, 1932.
• “Comment of Press on Hoover Election.” New York Times, November 7, 1928.
• “Comment of the Nation’s Press on Nomination of Smith and Robinson.” New York Times, June 30, 1928.
• “Coolidge Decision Upsets Many Plans.” New York Times, August 7, 1927.
• Crotty, William J. “Presidential Assassinations.” In Modern Criminals, edited by James F. Short, 189-214. New Brunswich, New Jersey: Transaction Books, 1973.
• Dave Leip’s Atlas of US Presidential Elections. “1928 Presidential General Election Results.” Accessed April 2, 2012. http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/national.php?year=1928&f=0&off=0&elect=0.
• Dave Leip’s Atlast of US Presidential Elections. “1928 Presidential General Election Results - New York.” Accessed April 2, 2012. http://uselectionatlas.org/RESULTS/state.php?year=1928&fips=36&f=0&off=0....
• “Democrats get Progressive Bid: Insurgents Intimate Roosevelt Nomination Would Eliminate Third Party Threat.” New York Times, January 4, 1932.
• Farley, James Aloysius. Behind the Ballots: The Personal History of a Politician. New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company, 1938.
• “Franklin D. Roosevelt.” New York Times, April 13, 1945.
• Gallup Organization. “Press Release: Americans Say Reagan Is the Greatest U. S. President.” Accessed March 1, 2012. http://www.gallup.com/poll/146183/Americans-Say-Reagan- Greatest-President.aspx.
• “Giuseppe Zangara.” Chicago Defender, February 25, 1933.
• “Governor Roosevelt Adds to Digest Poll Lead.” Daily Boston Globe, October 7, 1932.
• “Gunman Lays Act to Body ‘Torment.’” New York Times, February 16, 1933.
• “Happy with Either.” New York Times, October 18. 1928.
• Hoover, Herbert. “Address to the Chamber of Commerce of the United States, May 1, 1930.” University of California, Santa Barbara American Presidency Project. Accessed October 14, 2012. http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid=22185.
• Hoover, Herbert. “Inaugural Address of Herbert Hoover, Monday, March 4, 1929.” The Avalon Project. Accessed April 2, 2012. http://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/hoover.asp.
• Hoover, Herbert. “Presidential Nomination Address, August 11, 1928.” In The Two faces of Liberalism: How the Hoover-Roosevelt Debate Shapes the 21^st Century, edited by Gordon Lloyd, 26-34. Salem, Massachusetts: M & M Scrivener Press, 2007.
• “Hoover’s Candidacy Applauded in Nation’s Press.” New York Times, June 16, 1928.
• “Indianapolis Hails Chief.” New York Times, October 29, 1932.
• Joint Congressional Committee on Inaugural Ceremonies. “President Herbert Clark Hoover, 1929.” Accessed April 2, 2012. http://inaugural.senate.gov/history/chronology/hchoover1929.cfm.
• Kelley, William M. “Timely and Untimely Topics: Zangara Let It Get the Best of Him.” New  York Amsterdam News, February 22, 1933.
• Kendall, Kathleen E. Communication in the Presidential Primaries: Candidates and the Media, 1912-2000. Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Publishing Group, 2000.
• Kennedy, David M. Freedom from Fear: The American People in Depression and War, 1929- 1945. New York: Oxford University Press, 1999.
• Kent, Frank R. “Charley Michelson.” Scribner’s, September 1930.
• Lichtman, Allan J. Prejudice and the Old Politics: The Presidential Election of 1928. Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2000.
• “Mr. Hoover’s Popularity.” New York Times, February 23, 1930.
• Neal, Steven. Happy Days Are Here Again: The 1932 Democratic Convention, the Emergence of FDR—and How America Was Changed Forever. New York: HarperCollins Publishers, 2004.
• “Only Smith Can Win in 1932, says Brisbane.” New York Times, April 17, 1931.
• Oshinsky, David M. Polio: An American Story. New York: Oxford University Press, 2005.
• Peel, Roy V, and T. C. Donnelly. The 1932 Campaign: An Analysis (New York: Farrar & Rinehart, Inc., 1935.
• Phillips, H. I. “The Once Over: Looking back at the Landslide,” Daily Boston Globe, November   11, 1932, 20.
• Picchi, Blaise. The Five Weeks of Giuseppe Zangara. Chicago: Academy of Chicago Publishers, 1998.
• “Popular Vote for Hoover This Year About Equal to That Received by Smith in the 1928 Election.” New York Times, December 2, 1932.
• Ritchie, Donald A. Electing FDR: The New Deal Campaign of 1932. Lawrence, Kansas: University of Kansas Press, 2007.
•  “Roosevelt Heads Opportunity Poll.” New York Amsterdam News, April 27, 1932.
• “Roosevelt Leading in Digest Poll, 3-2.” Daily Boston Globe, October 21, 1932.
• “Roosevelt leads in New Party Poll.” New York Times, April 18, 1931.
• “Roosevelt Leads in Poll.” Wall Street Journal, October 1, 1932.
• “Roosevelt is Victor by Slim Plurality.” New York Times, November 7, 1928.
• “Says Hoover Sees Slump as ‘Mental.’” New York Times, May 12, 1931.
• Schwarz, Jordan A. The Interregnum of Despair: Hoover, Congress, and the Depression. Campaign, Illinois: University of Illinois Press, 1970.
• Scroop, Daniel. Mr. Democrat: Jim Farley, The New Deal, & The Making of Modern American Politics. Ann Arbor, Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 2006.
• Siena College Research Institute. “Siena Poll: American Presidents.” Accessed March 1, 2012.
• Smith, Jean Edward. FDR. New York: Random House, 2007.
• “Text if telegram sent by President Hoover to Convention, Acknowledging Nomination,” New York Times, June 17, 1932.
• “Text of Governor Roosevelt’s Speech at the Convention Accepting the Nomination.” New York Times, July 3, 1932.
• “The Coming Roosevelt Regime.” Atlanta Daily World, November 14, 1932.
• “The Emergence of Roosevelt.” New York Times, November 13, 1928.
• Thiemann, William G. “President Hoover’s Efforts on Behalf of FDR’s 1932 nomination.” Presidential Studies Quarterly 24 (Winter 1994): 87-91
• Whisenhunt, Donald W. President Herbert Hoover. New York: Nova Science Publishers, 2007.