HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Seaforth News, 1945-04-19, Page 6Death of Roosevelt
Ends Career
Of Service
Mr. Roosevelt shouldered burdens as
heavy as any Chief Executive ever
carried. While he stood up larder a
job which had wrecked the health of
many a predecessor, the years natur-
ally left their: mark on him.
The tradition -shattering. presiden Influenza, sinusitis and bronchitis
tial career of Franklin Delano weakened him in the winter of 1943 -
Roosevelt spanned jnlbulent' years 44 and rumors spread: about his
of peace in which be worked to lift health, In April 1944, he bundled up
the nation out of a depression and his old clothes and took a month off
multuous years of war when he to convalesce in shirt sleeves on the
played a dominant role in cheating Iangorous plantation coast of South
an allied victory, Carolina, When he returned to Wa-
While ,he gained the adulation of shington his physician said he was ,in
millions, 'the unprecedented moves as good shape as any man of 62
he ` made and the political theories could hope to be and that his condi-
he embraceor made him the frequent tion offered no bar to another four
target for blistering• criticism. years in the White House.
Accusations ranged from - "dema- Mr. Roosevelt accepted the fourth
.goguery" to "dictatorship." The tern- nomination by radio from a
public debt, jumped to a record naval base at San Diego, Calif. Im-
peacetbne high, then to even greater mediately he boarded a cruiser for
wartime peaks. Critics charged the his first wartime trip into the Pacific
President with trying to "pack" the and consultations in Hawaii—where
,Supreme Court after that tribunal a sneak punch brought America into
had thrown out several of his favor- the war on December 7, 1941—with
ite projects and he sought to inject top commanders in the battle against
new blood by reorganizing the mem Japan.
bership. Some party stalwarts for- He long since had broken all Pres-
sook him. idential travel records, and war did
But he became the first president not deter him from pushing the
• in history to be elected to a third mileage up around 300,000.
term—and by a smashing majority Time after time, he or Mr. Chun
—and then won the nomination for .chill dared the dangers of Atlantic
a fourth. crossings for epochal conferences
Mr. Roosevelt had attained a sub- . which shifted the Allies frons the de -
gantlet international stature in the fensive to the offensive and changed
years when he was concerned prim-IiI the course of combat around the
arily with applying revolutionary re -1 world.
medies to an economic blight rooted ' Standing out in sharp relief in the
in World War I, ; light of events the next summer,
And after the flames of a second were their meetings at Cairo and
global conflict were kindled, he be- Teheran, Iran, at the close of 1943.
came the pivotal statesman of more In a series of parleys, they talked ministration (AAA) was designed to
than 30 United Nations which pool- with Premier Joseph Stalin of Rus- help farmers through crop control
ed their might to smash a German- sia, Generalissimo Chiang Kai-Shek measures. Laws were passed to in -
Italian -Japanese Axis, of China and President Inonu of sure bank deposits and to provide
Kings and queens, presidents and neutral Turkey. 1government aid for home owners
prime ministers, traveled to the Italy had already been knocked facing mortgage foreclosures.
White House to consult him. out of the war. So at Cairo and Teh- ; The Constitution was amended to
The military strategy of nations ran, strategy was perfected for ob- , repeal national prohibition, Social.
representing 75 per cent of the 'iterating the military power of Ger- security benefits were provided by
earth's surface and 60 per cent, of many and Japan. I legislation. A wage -hour law was.
its population—a strategy that sent It called for Gen- Dwight D. Eis- enacted for labor. A "good neighbor"
American fighting men, American enhower, who had welded British policy was established for the west -
war weapons, food and dollars to and American arms in the Mediterr- 1 ern hemisphere.
combat the Axis—was mapped at anean into a mighty and victorious "Alphabet agencies" were created
conferences in which he took a lead- force, to aniline command of inva- in profusion: such letter combine-
ing part, cion forces poised in .Britain for a tions as NRA, RFC, AAA, CCC,
He constantly shuffled and revised knockout blow at Germany from the TVA,. WPA, PWA, HOLC, FHA and
a prodigious war production pro- west, many others became familiar house -
gram, framed stupendous war bud- First, at a desert hotel in the sha- hold terms.
gets to be met by taxes that hurt, dow of a great pyramid, the Ameii-
proclaiming that there must be a
"new deal" for the "forgotten man"
Thus his administration got its
name. Anil the New Deal label stuck
even in later years when the Pres-
ident wanted to substitite the slogan
"Win the war;"
When Mr. Roosevelt went into the
Presidency at the age of 51, the
United States had an estimated 12,-
000,000 persons unemployed,' prices
were depressed to new low levels,
foreign trade shrunken and the na-
tional banking system extremely
nervous as the result of widespread
bank failures.
One of his first acts was to pro-
claim a national banking holiday
that closed every financial deposit-
ory in the country for ten days
while readjustments were made. He
summoned Congress into special
session to implement by law a na-
tional recovery program that shat-
tered precedents. One hundred days.
later virtually his every request had
been granted and he held' powers
never before entrusted to a Presid-
ent in
resid-ent'in peacetime.
Many of the steps he took were
disputed at thetime, and later, on"
economic, social, moral and constitu-
tional grounds. Some were success-
fully contested in the courts, but
others stood the test of time.
The National Industrial Recovery
Administration (NRA) was set up
by Congress in response to the Pres-
ident's request for machinery to ob-
tain seller reemployment, shorten
the working week, pay decent wages
for the shorter week and prevent un-
fair competition and overproduction,
The Agricultural Adjustment Ad -
and; also at home, fought an infla-
TIII S. 1AFORTH NEWS THURSDAY, APRIL 19, 1945
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The New Deal also represented
bigger government budgets, larger
deficits, heavier taxes and abandon-
ment of the gold standard. In- the
beginning there was a "brain trust"
whose college professor members
were credited with formulating
many of the Rooseveltpolicies.
There was swift acceptance by
Congress of early reforms, then a
gradual stifeniug against White
House recomMeridations and an
abortive "purge" in which the Chief
Executive tried in 1938 to get the
political scalps of legislators he con-
sidered too conservative, He failed
in all but one instance.
A startling, unsuccessful Presi-
dential attempt was made to reor-
ganize the United States Supreme
Court •so as to pump "new blood".
into a .tribual which had ruled un-
constitutional some of Mr, Roose-
velt's pet measures including the
NRA and AAA.
This attempt split the party wide
open. Opponents of the plan said it
was an effort to "pack" the tribune'
to' make it see the Chief Execu-
tive's way.
The third and fourth term bids
brought from the opposition such
cries as 'indispensable man," "one-
man government," and "dictator-
ship," But such terms were not new
to Mr. Roosevelt..
He had heard mutterings and
them loud roars of "dictatorship"
when he proposed reorganizing the
Supreme Court and the executive
branch of the government.
And he had heard charges of
"warmongering" long before his
second term- was up. His utterance
and actions in the field of inter -
natio' affairs evoked protests that
he was compromising the nation.
Acts Against Aggressors
Unquestionably Mr. Roosevelt had
caught a glimpse of war on the
horizon. As early as 1937, in a
"quarantine" of "aggressor na-
tions."
He repeatedly advised America
to prepare for any emergency. He
urged repeal of a "neutrality" law
that banned shipment of arms to
warring nations. He said opponents
of this step were "gambling" that
there would be no second world
wah.
Tn January, 1939, the President
called for "measures short of tear"
tion peril hardly less dangerous to
the nation than its enemies at arms.
Hedrew up with United Nations
colleagues, as the war progressed,
blueprints for peace—a peace de-
signed to avoid the hasty mistakes of
the Versailles treaty.
International conferences on a.
scale never before seen in history
helped the President to formulate
his war plans. Rising to a pinnacle of
world attention with him in these
cotinrils was Britain's sturdy Prime
Minister, Winston' Churchill,
His intimates =aid nothing less
than the threat of war itself, could
have prompted Mr. Roosevelt to stir
un political turmoil in tremendous
proportions by shattering- the 250-
yeer-old two -term presidential tradi-
tion begun by George Washington,
and then running for a fourth term.
Tn. 1910. the Chief Executive told
the Desmcratie National Convention
he was accepting renomination for
a third term only because of a storm
raring in Europe. He was reelected
overwhelmingly over Wendell L.
Winkle. the Republican candidate,
Four years later, Mr, Roosevelt
said his »reference was to retire to
the family estate at Hyde Park, N.Y,
where be was born January 30,
1882. He told Democratic leachers in
a letter:
"A11 that is within me cries out
to go back to my home on the Hud-
son River, to avaid public responsib-
ilities, and to avoid also the publicity
which in our democracy follows ev-
ery step of the Nation's Chief Exe-
cutive,
"Such would, be my choice. But we
of this generation chance to live in
a day and hour when our Nation has
been attacked and when its future
existence and the future existence
of our chosen method of government
are at stake.
To win this war wholeheartedly,
unequivocally and as quickly as we ,
can is our task of the first import-
ance. To win this war in such a way
thattherebe no further world wars sia pounded hard on the eastern,
in the foreseeable future is our se-' front and by fall Allied arms were
cond objective. To provide occupa- on German soil. Victory in Europe
tions, and to provide a decent sten- was in sight:
dard of living for our men in the And in the Pacific, Allied forces
armed forces after the war, and for won successes in Burma, flushed the
all Americans, are the final object- Japanese from one island stronghold
Ives, after another, dealt serious blows to'
"Therefore, reluctantly, but as a the enemy's navy and sent bombers
good soldier . . I will accept and :winging with increasing frequency
se,rvie in this office, if I am so order- over the heart of Nippon.
ed by the commander-in-chief of us War was far from Mr. Roosevelt's
all --the sovereign people of the Un- thoughts on. that March 4, 1933,
ited States." when he declared in his first ,inaug-
His ],republican opponent was ural address that the only thing Am -
Gov Thomas, E. Dewey of New York. erica need fear was "fear itself."
A tremendous figure of a man, Of aristocratic lineage, a scion of
despite legs left withered and use- wealth, he .came to power in the
less by infantilet paralysis in 1921, midst of a strangling depression,
to defeat aggressors. He declare
in his third -teen- campaign the
next year that America's objective
was to fend off aggressors from
the western hemisphere. To fathers
and mother's he gave a solemn, re-
peated assurance — which was
hurled back at hint later that
"your boys are not going to be
sent into foreign wars."
Europe went to war in Septem-
ber, 1939, and Mr. Roosevelt
watched the Axis rws roughshod
over country after country, The
President took realistic steps.
`Arsenal of Democracy'
He and his Congressional sup
porters remodeled the Neutrality
Ant .to allow "cash-and-carry" pir-
shase of arms by belligerents— a
step favoring the Allies, since Ger-
many couldn't get through the Brit-
'sh blockade.
After. the Nazi swarmed through
Holland and Belgium in 1940, Mi•.
'Roosevelt set up a billion dollar
nnrergency arms program and e
Nationl Defence Advisory Commis-
sion which evolved .later into the
War Production Board,
)3e laid down the principle that
the preservation of Britain and the
British navy were necessary to
American safety, and in September
1940, traded fifty old destroyers
to Britain for naval and air . base
sites in the Western Atlantic, The
next month, selective service be•
came law; A new army was drafted,
Naval and air programs were ac-
celerated, industry put on a wartime
basis, and America became the
"arsenal of democracy."
Japan's Treachery
In March, 1941, the dollar sign'
was wiped from munitions for the
Alies in a multi -billion lend-lease
few months after his third teras be-
gan, the Chief Executive declared
an "unlimited national emergency."
The United States had watched
uneasily the victorious sweep of
Japanese arms thtrough the South-
west Pacific and had attempted to
check it by persuasion.
But suddenly Japan, borrowing
a technique of surprise and treach-
ery from her Axis partners, struck
Peal Harbor with planes and sub-
marines on that fateful Sunday,
Dec. 7, 1941—at the very moment
when her emissaries in Washington
deceitfully talked peace with Sec -
1 rotary of State Cordell Auld. The
attack left many United States war-
ships sunk or seriously damaged
and caused more than 3,000 casual -
ti es.
asual-ties,
It was day, Mx, Roosevelt de-
clared.: "which will jive in ialfamy,"
The 'Survival War'
President Roosevelt called World
War, II the 'survival war."
In his war message the day after
the Pearl Harbor attack, he said
Japan had struck a "dastardly"
blow while stili at peace with this
nation,and added, "'No matter how
logo it may take us to overcome
this premeditated invasion, the
American peopple in their righteous
might will win through to absolute.
victory,"
Germany and Italy declared war
on the United States the morning of
Dec. 11, and Congress, at the Presi-
dent's request, adopted a war 'reso-
lutien the same day after the Chief
Executive had said in a message:
"The forces endeavoring to en-
slave the entire world now are
moving toward this hemisphere.
Never before has there been a
greater challenge to o life, liberty
and civilization..
"Delay invites great danger.
Rapid and united effort by all of.
the peoples of the world who are de-
termined to remain free will insure
a world victory of the forces of
justice and of righteousness over the
forces of savagery and of barbar-
ism"
arbarism,"
Mr. Roosevelt's mother, Sara
Delano Roosevelt, gray-haired and
aristocratic, ',was present at three
Presidential inaugurations. She died
on Sept. 7, 1941.
His wife, Anna Eleanor Roose-
velt, the favorite niece of President
Theodore Roosevelt, was a distant
cousin. The Republican President
gave the bride away when the
young couple were married March
17. 1905.
Five children were born to the
union, one daughter, Anna Eleanor,
who became Mrs. Curtis Dail and
later Mrs. John Boettiger, and four
sons, James, Elliott, Franklin, jr.,
and John.
All the boys served as officers
the armed services during World
War II, James in the marines,
Elliott in the Army, and Franklin
and John in the Navy.
can President, the British Prime T H E
Minister and the Chinese Generaliss-
imo agreed that Japan must be utter-
ly defeated and her empire destroy- i
ecl by stripping away ]ands acquired
in decades of conquest. Military
measures necessary to fulfill these ;
aims were considered.
The Generalissimo flew back to
Chungking, Roosevelt and Churchill
t1ew to Teheran, where the adjoin-
inc Soviet and British embassies i
formed a single compound surround-
ed by grim Russian toomy-gunner
guards.
Stalin. who had left his country ,
for the first time since the revels
tion, invited the American Presid-
ent to stay at the Soviet embassy
during his participation in perhaps
the most significant of all United
.Nations war talks.
Fnus' days of deliberation produc-
ed, Roosevelt, Churchill and Stalin .
said, a determination that "our na-
tions shall work together in the war
and in the peace that will follow,"
They added that they had concerted
plans for the destruction of the Ger-
man forces, and had reached com-
plete agreement as to the scope and
timing of operations from the east, ,
west and south.
From Teheran, Stalin went back
to Moscow, Roosevelt and Churchill
to Cairo, to be joined by President
Tnontt, Three days of conferences in
Cairo brought forth another com-
munique which reported that the
closest unity existed between the
Unitech States of America, Turkey
and Great Britain in• their attitude
toward the world situation,
Enroute home, the President stop-
ped at battle -scarred.: Tunis, Malta
and Sicily. The Secret Service had to
restrain him from looking in on
fighting in Italy.
By mid -1944 the full significance'
of the Cairo -Teheran meetings had
become apparent.
In fulfillment of the commitments
the invasion of France got under
way from the west and south, Rus-
tr®
c
ANADIAN
W A Y
0 F
LIFE
"...where the heart is!"
SITTING by the fireside at home—
digging, in the garden for fun—
lazy weekends just fishin'—these
things mean comfortable, pleasant
living, the kind of living your man
overseas is dreaming of, fighting for.
Make sure these simple, pleasant
things exist for him when he comes
back. Remember that it is possible
for them to exist only if his dollar
is worth a dollar!
By protecting his dollar, we help
to protect his future. That's why we
must realize NOW the dangers that
lie incareless,; unnecessary buying.
Never buy two where one will do.
Buy only what', we need. We must
support rationing and price control
and enco#'ragp .othersto support
them, and we must;ai'oid ALL deal-
ings with black "markets._
These are the rules. If we break
them, we can be certain that we will
start our country - his country —
on the spiral of inflation. Prices
shoot sky-high. Wages try to catch
up, and never succeed. You may
pay a dollar for 30 cents worth of
goods, and this means your dollar—
your soldier's . dollar — is worth
only 30 cents.
There's no limit to inflation, and
there's no stopping it once it starts.
So, let's make sure OUR boys will
come back to a protected dollar
—
a dollar that will buy a full dollar's
worth of goods. Let's keep up the
fight ;against inflation, every day, in
every way we can, so that our men
overseas can look forward to pleas-
ant, satisfying living,.:. the Cana-
dian way of life.
Published by W.1113 BRJIWING. INDUSTRY (ONTARI to reveal the dangers of inflation:
e ;:.
Make this Pledge Today!
1 pledge myself to do my part
in fighting inflation:
By observing rationing and avoiding
black markets in any shape ne
form.
By respecting price controls and other
anti-inflation measures, and re.
fraining from careless and unneces-
sary buying. T will not buy two
where one will do, nor will I buy
a "new" where an "old" will do.
By buying. Victory Bonds and War
Savings Stomps, supporting ttx-
ation, and abiding
by all such measures
which will lower the
cost of living and
help keep prices ata
normal level.