FDR’s Splendid Deception book cover

Last month I wrote about how I came to get interested in Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal. My current project, to read all my New Deal books once more and then dispose of them, continues.

I’ve just finished another book, somewhat different to the others, FDR’s Splendid Deception, by Hugh Gregory Gallagher. The subtitle explains: “The moving story of Roosevelt’s massive disability and the intense efforts to hide it from the public.” The author contracted polio at the age of nineteen and has been wheelchair-bound ever since, so brings an understanding to the subject that others might not have.

Franklin Roosevelt was born in 1882 to a well-heeled family; Theodore Roosevelt, later to be President (1901-09), was a fifth cousin. FDR was destined for success and in 1913 at 31 he became Assistant Secretary to the Navy, serving in this capacity through WW1. James Cox selected FDR as his running mate for the 1920 presidential election but lost to Warren Harding.

Then disaster struck. In 1921 FDR contracted polio, which left his legs paralysed. His political ambitions were done for. Or were they?

Urged on by his wife and close advisor Louis Howe, FDR resolved to continue in public life. He laboriously taught himself to walk short distances while wearing iron braces on his legs. Until his death he would spend much of his time at Warm Springs, Georgia, believing in the recuperative powers of the waters.

FDR got his big break in 1928 when the governor of New York State, Al Smith, resigned so as to run for president. He persuaded FDR to nominate for the governorship. FDR won by a whisker, then by a more than comfortable majority in 1930. Having shown that his disability was no obstacle to political leadership, he won the Democratic nomination for the 1932 presidential election, then won the election by a handsome margin (see below).

Those who know something about FDR probably think first of his speeches and his wireless fireside chats, his wonderful delivery accentuating his fine choice of words, for example:

• I pledge you, I pledge myself to a new deal for the American people. [First inaugural address 1933]
• The only thing we have to fear is…fear itself [First inaugural address 1933]
• I see one-third of a nation ill-housed, ill-clad, ill-nourished. [Second inaugural address 1937]
• The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little. [Second inaugural address 1937]
• Yesterday, December 7, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy—the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by the naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.

Could a wheelchair-bound person win a presidential election today? I doubt it especially if their politics were at variance from the mainstream media.

But things were different then. The picture on the front cover of the book is one of only two known to exist showing FDR in a wheelchair. To quote Gallagher’s book (pp.93,94):

During his first campaign for governor, FDR made it a rule that photographers were not to take pictures of him looking crippled or helpless. His actual words, said to some newsreel cameramen taking his picture as he was being helped out of a car in 1928, were “no movies of me getting out of the machine, boys.”

And from then on, remarkably, no such photographs were taken. It was an unspoken code, honoured by the White House photography corps. If, as happened once or twice, one of its members sought to violate it and try and sneak a picture of the President in his chair, one or another of the older photographers would “accidentally” knock the camera to the ground, or otherwise block the picture. Should the president himself notice someone in the crowd violating the interdiction, he would point out the offender and the Secret Service would move in, seize the camera and expose the film. This remarkable voluntary censorship was rarely violated.

Did the press’s self-imposed censorship matter? For the first three elections arguably not. FDR’s physical limitations did not materially affect his ability to serve as president. Indeed several surveys note him as one of the USA’s best presidents but by 1944 things were different. The demands of wartime leadership had taken their toll. FDR was not a well man as many could see. Key advisors Tommy Corcoran and Ben Cohen decided to tell their beloved leader that he should stand down and not contest the 1944 election, but when it came to it Corcoran couldn’t get the words out and Cohen, the ‘parfit gentil knight’ of the New Deal, chickened out and sent FDR a letter, which was ignored. FDR would contest and win the election but his fourth term ended just months later with his death on April 12, 1945 aged just 63.

Electoral College votes (FDR/others) and share of popular vote:

1932: 472/59, 57.4%;

1936: 523/8, 60.8%;

1940: 449/82, 54.7%

1944: 432/99, 53.4%

The book: FDR’s Splendid Deception, by Hugh Gregory Gallagher, Vandamere Press 1994, ISBN 0-918339-33-2