1932
Franklin D. Roosevelt
FROM THE TIME ARCHIVE
Jan. 2, 1933
Scanning the dreary horizon of 1932 as it recedes into history, upon whom would the discerning eye of an alert U.S. citizen fix as Man of the Year?
Beyond his own shores he would find no new name that had skyrocketed intoworld consciousness during the twelve-month. Mahatma Gandhi, 1930s Man of the Year, is still a prisoner of Britain in the Poona jail and his Indian followers are quiescent if not quiet. Pierre Laval, 1931's Man of the Year, was swept out of the premiership of France last February, is today only a Senator without portfolio. The May elections put Edouard Herriot into power for six months but fortnight ago he and his Ministry went crashing out on the issue of paying the U.S. War Debt.
The year showed Neville Chamberlain, Chancellor of the Exchequer, to be
Britain's strong man but he was not yet on top; Laborite Ramsay MacDonald
continues to head the National (Conservative coalition) ministry. Prime
Minister MacDonald, more than any other official participant, was given credit
for the outcome of the Lausanne Conference in July but there have been other
conferences, will doubtless be many more.
In 1931 Adolf Hitler was Germany's rising star. In 1932 he and his Nazis
slipped back to the tune of 2,000,000 lost votes. His thunder was largely
stolen by General Kurt von Schleicher, the new Chancellor to whom many a German
looks as Man of Next Year.
Russia and Italy, one with its Stalin, the other with its Mussolini,
rocked along through the year unchanged and unchanging under dictatorship.
Turning back to his own country, the discerning citizen of the U.S. would
find more promising material. Charles Augustus Lindbergh, 1927 Man of the Year,
had become the Victim of the Year in 1932. For the loss of his son &
namesake the nation had given him all its sympathy but to him went no plaudits
for any new achievement. When in 1928 Walter P. Chrysler became Man of the Year
his Manhattan office building was starting to rise as the world's tallest, his
Chrysler Motors organized to vie with General Motors. Now the Chrysler Building
is overtopped by the Empire State and the automobile industry is pinioned on
the rock of hard times. The prestige of 1929's Man of the Year, Owen D. Young,
world financier, friend to Samuel Insull, is still great but even he has
produced no sovereign simple for prostrate business.
Banker of the Year was certainly Winthrop Williams Aldrich who last week
seemed about to succeed Albert Henry Wiggin as head of the great Chase National
but his big achievements lay ahead of him. Scanning the realm of business the
well-informed citizen would probably conclude that the biggest and boldest
strides against the economic tide were those of Errett Lobban Cord who turned
from highways to skyways in his restless effort to expand. The year proved that
there was no such thing as a Depression- proof industry. Yet John Hartford's
Great Atlantic & Pacific food stores, by holding the line, came closest to
an exception.
Most scientific citizens would award the title of Man of the Year to
General Electric's Irving Langmuir who won this year's Nobel Prize for his
surface chemistry. Yet Dr. Langmuir's work which earned the award was not
confined to 1932. And ready to dispute such a title would be the friends of Dr.
Arthur Holly Compton, 1927 Nobel Prize winner, who traveled 50,000 mi. in 1932
researching the cosmic ray.
To the attention of ordinary citizens were brought during the year the
findings of the Committee on the Costs of Medical Care rather than eminent
accomplishments by individual physicians or surgeons.
Sportsman of the Year was certainly Golfer Gene Sarazen who by winning
both the British and U.S. open championships came as close as any professional
can to Robert Tyre Jones Jr.'s record in 1930. Yet Sarazen flubbed the
Professional Championship, did not even qualify. Josef Paul Cuckoschay (Jack
Sharkey) of Boston retrieved the world's heavyweight boxing championship for
the U.S. from Germany's Maximilian Adolf Otto Siegfried Schmeling in a bout
that satisfied few patrons. All-around athlete of 1932 was Mildred ("Babe")
Didrikson of Dallas who scored more individual points in the Olympics than any
other participant. Last week Miss Didrikson turned professional.
Play of the Year was Of Thee I sing, but George S. Kaufman, its author
(with Morrie Ryskind), rarely works alone.
Into the cinema firmament swam a new star to replace Garbo and Dietrich.
Seasoned performers carried on competently rather than brilliantly.
More people went to hear Lily Pons sing than heard any other 1932 soprano.
But she was new, young, pretty.
In the book world, Allan Nevins' Grover Cleveland took high rank among
Presidential biographies and Historian James Truslow Adams (March of Democracy)
held his grip on the popular mind. But the year produced non Main Street, no
Bridge of San Luis Rey.
The Man-of-the-Year-hunter could hardly fail to spot John Davison
Rockefeller Jr. as Builder of the Year with Rockefeller Center.
Fad of the Year: Technocracy, as preached by Howard Scott.
The discerning citizen would not be satisfied with any of these
specialists as Man of the Year. Looking to Washington he would see old familiar
figures passing below the political horizon—figures for whom 1932 meant defeat
and exile. After four years of relentless effort unequaled by any man in the
White House. Herbert Hoover remained a psychological product of 1928. Millions
of citizens hoped that by some last-minute miracle he would turn out to be Man
of the Year but more millions felt—and voted—otherwise.
Alfred Samuel Smith had added nothing to his public stature by his display
of bad temper following his defeat for the Democratic Presidential nomination.
Throughout the year, along with Calvin Coolidge, he remained a distinguished
private citizen.
No new leader came out of the Senate and the old ones were either "lame
ducks" or disgruntled individualists with a narrowing conception of public
service. Borah stock was far below par.
In the House the country for a few weeks thought it had a hero in
Georgia's Crisp, sales tax advocate. But the riotous defeat of that legislation
and the subsequent defeat of its sponsor for the Senate fogged the Crisp name.
[Last week Mr. Crisp resigned from the Tariff Commission, to which President
Hoover had appointed him as a "lame duck." Jan. 1 he becomes lobbyist for
Savannah Sugar Corp.]
Flashes in the Man-of-the-Year pan: Walter Waters, commander-in-chief of
the Bonus Expeditionary Force and Milo Reno, leader of the Iowa farm strike.
— Two months ago, in a lively referendum from ocean to ocean, the people of
the U.S. chose their own Man of the Year, and clearly the election of Franklin
Delano Roosevelt to the Presidency was without equal elsewhere in the world as
an individual accomplishment. To millions & millions of "forgotten men" he
was a big-jawed, happy Messiah whose "new deal" would somehow put money into
everybody's pocket. To himself, victory was the sweet reward of long years of
careful planning, unremitting work.
The story of Governor Roosevelt's rise to be Man of the Year and 32nd
President of the U.S. is fresh in mind. Future historians describing it as a
feat of political mountain-climbing will not fail to mention:
— How Franklin Roosevelt was the deadest of dead Democrats when defeated for
the vice-presidency in 1920.
— How the following year an acute attack of poliomyelitis (infantile
paralysis) left his muscles atrophied from the waist down.
— How he, a helpless cripple, was lifted to the rostrum of the Democratic
convention at Madison Square Garden to nominate Alfred Emanuel Smith for the
Presidency in 1924.
— How he discovered the mineralized waters of Warm Springs, Ga. as a cure for
his infirmity in 1924.
— How a cane had replaced crutches when he again nominated Al Smith at Houston
in 1928.
— How Smith induced him to accept nomination for Governor of New York in 1928.
— How he was first hailed as "our next President" by friendly Georgians at
Warm Springs following his 1928 State election.
— How he was re-elected Governor by the biggest majority on record in 1930.
— How he made James Aloysius Farley his pre-convention manager and sent him
out scouting for Presidential delegates in 1931.
— How he pretended he was not a White House candidate in 1931.
— How he was examined by eminent physicians in 1931 and publicly pronounced
"sound in all respects."
— How, last January, he first announced his candidacy in time for the North
Dakota primary.
— How he, already an Elk, Odd Fellow, 32nd degree Mason and joiner of a score
more clubs and societies, joined the Improved Order of Red Man and the Tall
Cedars of Lebanon in 1930, the American Philatelic Society and the Academie
Diplomatique Internationale in 1931, etc. etc., the Maccabees last week.
— How, after winning the nomination last July on the fourth ballot, he
dramatically flew to Chicago to address the convention.
— How he campaigned 12,000 mi. during September and October.
— How he was elected Nov. 8 by 22,813,786 votes to Hoover's 15,759,266.
Man of the Year Roosevelt's climb to the Presidency represented a physical
triumph of the first order. For a decade he had fought a dogged fight to regain
control over his paralyzed legs. Today the President-elect can walk in his
braces, without crutch, stick, or assisting arm, about 15 steps. Declares his
wife: "If the paralysis couldn't kill him, I guess the Presidency won't." The
Man of the Year's attitude toward his affliction is one of gallant unconcern.
After his November election he went to Warm Springs where he addressed others
there taking the cure: "We've shown that we people here have determined to get
over the small physical handicaps which after all don't amount to a hill of
beans."
Governor Roosevelt's political comeback after 1920 involved efforts even
greater, because their object was less tangible, than his conquest of his lame
legs. Years ago Louis McHenry Howe, his friend and adviser, had inoculated him
with the White House virus. His election and re-election as Governor
re-awakened the Presidential fever, which burned with increasingly intensity as
the months at Albany wore successfully on and Herbert Hoover's prestige sank at
Washington. Forgotten now is the fact that two years ago some of Franklin
Roosevelt's oldest friends were deploring the evident, consuming degree of
ambition as almost indecent. Such ambition is the mainspring of most political
candidacies. Certainly no man without it could have become the third Democratic
President since the Civil War. Translated from ambition to realization, the
"indecent" passion becomes heroic.
After his 1930 re-election Governor Roosevelt got out and humped himself
for the national nomination. Typical were his activities during June 1931: 1)
attendance at the Governors' Conference at French Lick, Ind. where he worked
into a non- partisan speech a full-length campaign platform which stole the
headlines; 2) a stop-over in Ohio, "Mother of Presidents," to see Governor
White, James Middleton Cox and the local Democratic bosses; 3) a trip to
Manchester, Mass. to call on Col. Edward Mandell House whose support he
enlisted. In July he appeared at the Charlottesville (Va.) Institute of Public
Affairs, held court. In August he dramatized his disagreement with President
Hoover on St. Lawrence waterpower. In February 1932 he jettisoned the League of
Nations as a party encumbrance. In April he was not above talking partisan
politics over the Lucky Strike radio hour.
Yet while his ambition was burning hottest, he kept his head cool and
clear enough to make no rash mistakes. He listened carefully to the astute
Colonels Howe & House. He trusted hustling Jim Farley to line up the
important West and Midwest. He appealed to and for the Forgotten Man without
going so far off the deep end of demagoguery that he could not regain his
balance among potent conservatives.
Most Men of the Year complete their memorable achievement between Jan. 1
and Dec. 31. The Chrysler Building stands, not only completed but occupied. The
Young Plan, despite subsequent events, remains world history. But Colonel
Lindbergh after his flight was required to serve the nation year after year as
its No. 1 Hero—a role which set in motion a train of circumstances ending in
tragedy the windy night of March 1 at Hopewell, N.J. and, as Lindbergh had, Man
of the Year Roosevelt has his greater job ahead of him. Will he make good in
the White House? The country is only too ready to hope so. Yet in spite of his
campaign utterances and the activities of his "brain trust," by last week
President-elect Roosevelt had apparently only begun to arrive at his answers
for the problems of 1933. Some of the problems and their present status:
Cabinet. Yet to be selected were the ten men who can make or break ad
administration. The President-elect planned to do his choosing at Warm Springs
during January.
War Debts. Beyond flat refusal to follow the Hoover commission method his
specific remedies for this international complexity remain unknown.
Farm Relief. Yet to be worked out in detail are Domestic Allotment and
Mortgage Relief.
Economy. Promised was a billion-dollar cut. Will a member of three
American Legion posts go hammer-&-tongs after the veterans?
Tariff. Many a manufacturer wishes he knew the Roosevelt mind on rate
cuts.
Taxation. The 32nd President has yet to declare himself on the Sales Tax
or any other form of new taxation to balance the Budget. [Last week House Ways
& Means Chairman Collier announced: "In order to balance the budget at this
session I'll support the sales tax as a last resort. I want the new
administration to have a clear sheet March 4."] Last week he was considering a
revolutionary proposal to tax corporate surpluses, now estimated at
$4,000,000,000. Such a tax, it was argued, would squeeze much water out of
inflated capital structure, discourage corporate hoarding.
Prohibition. The intricacies of keeping the Repeal pledge have yet to be
developed.
A year from now the U.S. electorate will have a much more real idea of the
worth of its 1932 Man of the Year.
COVERS GALLERY: Click here to see the cover image from 1932
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