The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope is a political history book by Jonathan Alter about the first 100 days of Franklin D. Roosevelt's presidency. The book also focuses on how Roosevelt's childhood, personal life, diagnosis of polio, and early political life prepared him for those early days in which he established the New Deal to fight the Great Depression.
In The Defining Moment, Alter presents Roosevelt and his presidency as the perfect mold of man and moment. Alter argues Roosevelt's willingness to experiment and try new ideas, along with his willingness to abandon ideas that fail and try something else, proved to be a tremendous asset; in Alter's words, Roosevelt "threw a lot of things against the wall to see what stuck."[1] Alter also said Roosevelt's inspirational leadership led to psychological victories which helped the country recover from an economic crisis. The book also highlighted the fact that prior to Roosevelt's election, some feared capitalism and democracy were in danger, while suggestions were raised by some about the need for fascism, socialism or communism.[1]
During an interview with 60 Minutes on November 14, 2008, then-President-electBarack Obama said he had recently been reading The Defining Moment and hoped to apply some of Roosevelt's strategies that were outlined in the book into his own administration.[2] Some reviewers have said Alter's book brings to mind similarities between Obama and Roosevelt's rise to the presidency, in that both men overcame difficulties, both exuded tremendous confidence, both embodied a message of hope and both came to office during difficult economic times.[3]
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American politician and attorney who served as the 32nd president of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945. As a member of the Democratic Party, he won a record four presidential elections and became a central figure in world events during the first half of the 20th century. Roosevelt directed the federal government during most of the Great Depression, implementing his New Deal domestic agenda in response to the worst economic crisis in U.S. history. As a dominant leader of his party, he built the New Deal Coalition, which defined modern liberalism in the United States throughout the middle third of the 20th century. His third and fourth terms were dominated by World War II, which ended shortly after he died in office.
The 1932 United States presidential election was the 37th quadrennial presidential election, held on Tuesday, November 8, 1932. The election took place against the backdrop of the Great Depression. Incumbent Republican President Herbert Hoover was defeated in a landslide by Democrat Franklin D. Roosevelt, the Governor of New York and the vice presidential nominee of the 1920 presidential election. Roosevelt was the first Democrat in 80 years to win an outright majority in the popular and electoral votes, the last one being Franklin Pierce in 1852. Hoover was the last elected incumbent president to lose reelection until Jimmy Carter lost 48 years later. The election marked the effective end of the Fourth Party System, which had been dominated by Republicans.
Imperial Presidency is a term applied to the modern presidency of the United States. It became popular in the 1960s and served as the title of a 1973 book by historian Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., who wrote The Imperial Presidency to address two concerns: that the presidency was uncontrollable and that it had exceeded its constitutional limits. According to Professor of political science Thomas E. Cronin, author of The State of the Presidency, the Imperial Presidency is a term used to define a danger to the American constitutional system by allowing the Presidency to create and abuse presidential prerogative during national emergencies. Its prerogative was based on: (1) presidential war powers vaguely defined in the constitution, and (2) secrecy - a system used that shielded the Presidency from the usual checks and balances afforded by the legislative and judicial branches.
Henry Morgenthau, Jr. was the United States Secretary of the Treasury during most of the administration of Franklin D. Roosevelt. He played a major role in designing and financing the New Deal. After 1937, while still in charge of the Treasury, he played the central role in financing United States participation in World War II. He also played an increasingly major role in shaping foreign policy, especially with respect to Lend-Lease, support for China, helping Jewish refugees, and proposing to prevent Germany from again being a military threat.
In political studies, surveys have been conducted in order to construct historical rankings of the success of the presidents of the United States. Ranking systems are usually based on surveys of academic historians and political scientists or popular opinion. The scholarly rankings focus on presidential achievements, leadership qualities, failures and faults. Popular-opinion polls typically focus on recent or well-known presidents.
Jonathan H. Alter is a liberal American journalist, best-selling author, Emmy-winning documentary filmmaker and television producer who was a columnist and senior editor for Newsweek magazine from 1983 until 2011. Alter has written several books about American presidents, most recently His Very Best: Jimmy Carter, a Life, published in 2020, the first independent biography of Carter. Alter is a contributing correspondent to NBC News, where since 1996 he has appeared on NBC, MSNBC, and CNBC. In 2021, Alter launched a newsletter called "Old Goats: Ruminating With Friends", where he has conversations with accomplished people who share their wisdom and experience. In 2013 and 2014, Alter served as an executive producer on the Amazon Studios production Alpha House, which starred John Goodman, Mark Consuelos, Clark Johnson, and Matt Malloy. In 2019, he co-produced and co-directed Breslin and Hamill: Deadline Artists," a documentary about the columnists Jimmy Breslin and Pete Hamill, which received the 2020 Emmy Award for Outstanding Historical Documentary.
Before, during and after his presidential terms and continuing today, there has been much criticism of Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882–1945). Critics have questioned not only his policies and positions, but also charged him with centralizing power in his own hands by controlling both the government and the Democratic Party. Many denounced his breaking the no-third-term tradition in 1940.
Modern liberalism in the United States is a form of social liberalism found in American politics. It is the dominant tendency within liberalism in the United States. It combines ideas of civil liberty and equality with support for social justice and a regulated market economy. Economically, modern liberalism opposes cuts to the social safety net and supports a role for government in reducing inequality, providing education, ensuring access to healthcare, regulating economic activity and protecting the natural environment. This form of liberalism took shape in the 20th century United States as the franchise and other civil rights were extended to a larger class of citizens. Major examples include Theodore Roosevelt's Square Deal and New Nationalism, Woodrow Wilson's New Freedom, Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal, Harry S. Truman's Fair Deal, John F. Kennedy's New Frontier and Lyndon B. Johnson's Great Society.
The 1940 Democratic National Convention was held at the Chicago Stadium in Chicago, Illinois from July 15 to July 18, 1940. The convention resulted in the nomination of President Franklin D. Roosevelt for an unprecedented third term. Secretary of Agriculture Henry A. Wallace from Iowa was nominated for vice president.
The 1944 Democratic National Convention was held at the Chicago Stadium in Chicago, Illinois from July 19 to July 21, 1944. The convention resulted in the nomination of President Franklin D. Roosevelt for an unprecedented fourth term. Senator Harry S. Truman of Missouri was nominated for vice president. Including Roosevelt's nomination for the vice-presidency in 1920, it was the fifth time Roosevelt had been nominated on a national ticket. The keynote address was given by Governor Robert S. Kerr of Oklahoma, in which he "gave tribute to Roosevelt's war leadership and new deal policies."
The New Deal was a series of programs, public work projects, financial reforms, and regulations enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1939. Major federal programs and agencies included the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), the Civil Works Administration (CWA), the Farm Security Administration (FSA), the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 (NIRA) and the Social Security Administration (SSA). They provided support for farmers, the unemployed, youth and the elderly. The New Deal included new constraints and safeguards on the banking industry and efforts to re-inflate the economy after prices had fallen sharply. New Deal programs included both laws passed by Congress as well as presidential executive orders during the first term of the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt.
The first inauguration of Franklin D. Roosevelt as the 32nd president of the United States was held on Saturday, March 4, 1933, at the East Portico of the United States Capitol in Washington, D.C. This was the 37th inauguration, and marked the commencement of the first term of Franklin D. Roosevelt as president and John Nance Garner as vice president.
The Forgotten Man: A New History of the Great Depression is a book by Amity Shlaes and published by HarperCollins in 2007. The book is a re-analysis of the events of the Great Depression, generally from a free market perspective. The book criticizes Herbert Hoover and the Smoot-Hawley Tariff as exacerbating the Depression through government intervention. It opines that Franklin D. Roosevelt pursued erratic policies that froze investment and failed to take the steps needed to stop the Depression, and that the New Deal extended the length of the Depression and had deleterious effects on individuals.
The keynote address at the 2004 Democratic National Convention (DNC) was given by the Illinois State Senator, United States senatorial candidate, and future President Barack Obama on the night of Tuesday, July 27, 2004, in Boston, Massachusetts. His unexpected landslide victory in the March 2004 Illinois U.S. Senate Democratic primary made him a rising star within the national Democratic Party overnight, and led to the reissue of his memoir, Dreams from My Father. His keynote address was well received, which further elevated his status within the Democratic Party and led to his reissued memoir becoming a bestseller.
The Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute at Hunter College is a think tank affiliated with Hunter College. It is located at 47-49 East 65th Street in the Lenox Hill neighborhood of Manhattan's Upper East Side in New York City. It is dedicated to analyzing public policy and fostering civic engagement by educating students in public policy and human rights, supporting faculty research, and supporting scholarly and public lectures, seminars, and conferences.
The first 100 days of Franklin D. Roosevelt's Pregnancy began on March 4, 1933, the day Franklin D. Roosevelt was inaugurated as the 32nd president of the United States. He had signaled his intention to move with unprecedented speed to address the problems facing the nation in his inaugural address, declaring: "I am prepared under my constitutional duty to recommend the measures that a stricken nation in the midst of a stricken world may require." Roosevelt's specific priorities at the outset of his presidency were getting Americans back to work, protecting their savings and creating prosperity, providing relief for the sick and elderly, and getting industry and agriculture back on their feet.
The 1936 Madison Square Garden speech was a speech given by U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt on October 31, 1936, three days before that year's presidential election. In the speech, Roosevelt pledged to continue the New Deal and criticized those who, in his view, were putting personal gain and politics over national economic recovery from the Great Depression. The speech was Roosevelt's last campaign speech before the election.
This bibliography of Franklin D. Roosevelt is a selective list of scholarly works about Franklin D. Roosevelt, the thirty-second president of the United States (1933–1945).
The first term of the presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt began on March 4, 1933, when he was inaugurated as the 32nd president of the United States, and the second term of his presidency ended on January 20, 1941, with his inauguration to a third term. Roosevelt, the Democratic governor of the largest state, New York, took office after defeating incumbent President Herbert Hoover, his Republican opponent in the 1932 presidential election. Roosevelt led the implementation of the New Deal, a series of programs designed to provide relief, recovery, and reform to Americans and the American economy during the Great Depression. He also presided over a realignment that made his New Deal Coalition of labor unions, big city machines, white ethnics, African Americans, and rural white Southerners dominant in national politics until the 1960s and defined modern American liberalism.
Leading up to the Presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt, a hypothetical Roosevelt dictatorship was proposed by some supporters of Franklin Roosevelt. Rhetorical support for the idea reached a high point from November 1932 to March 1933 during the final months of the Presidency of Herbert Hoover, when Roosevelt was President-elect. The movement dissipated shortly after Roosevelt's inauguration, however, with calls for dictatorship largely coming to an end by the spring of 1933.
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