Wednesday, September 25, 2013

What did Herbert Hoover think of FDR?

It's fair to say that Hoover didn't have much time for FDR, either personally or politically. He thought FDR a bit of a lightweight, a shameless populist who would say anything and do anything to get elected. He contrasted what he saw as FDR's chameleon-like position on a range of issues with his own deeply held commitments, onto which he held with such tenacity, however unpopular they were with the American people.
In keeping with the prevailing prejudice, Hoover also didn't like the idea of someone as severely disabled as FDR running for high office. The fact that he actually lost to someone with such serious disabilities—and by a huge margin, too—rankled with him further.
On a political level, the two men were miles apart in their respective philosophies. Hoover stuck tenaciously to the rugged individualism to which he'd devoted his entire adult life, whereas FDR proposed the biggest single expansion of federal government in the nation's history as a means of saving the country from its worst ever economic crisis.
Relations between the two would almost certainly have been frosty in any case, but they degenerated further during the four month hiatus between FDR's election and his inauguration. During that time, Hoover asked FDR to support his policies for dealing with the banking crisis. FDR flatly refused, believing that they didn't go far enough in addressing the serious problems of the American banking industry.
On the eve of FDR's first inauguration, the two men and their wives had a less than cordial tea at the White House. The following day, Hoover virtually ignored FDR as they drove together towards the Capitol. After failing to engage Hoover in any meaningful conversation, FDR eventually gave up trying to talk to him altogether and turned to the adoring crowd that had lined the streets of Washington, waving his hat in the air as the car drove by.

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