Franklin D Roosevelt

Franklin D Roosevelt became the thirty-second President of the United States of America in 1932, in a time his country was still shaken by the Depression and the mass unemployment that followed. He was a vigorous transformer and an eminently man, and his scheme of rehabilitation carried out under the Works Progress Administration did much to set the country on the road to prosperity again. He was President for four consecutive terms – indeed a remarkable achievement.

But who was this Franklin D Roosevelt? He was born on 30 January 1882 in a wealthy family of untitled aristocracy of New England. He studied at Croton and Harvard and eventually graduated in law at the Columbia Law School in New York and was admitted to the bar in 1907 and joined a Law Firm in New York.

Although he came from a family of great and important politicians, initially he was not very concerned with politics. However, the Democrats of New York State was not making any political grounds and in 1910 they invited Franklin D Roosevelt to run for the New York State Senate in what they thought was a hopeless case. He accepted it and decided to give it a run for the money – above all hopes he won the election. This was the turning point in his career as he was now hooked on politics!

In 1912 Franklin D Roosevelt got the post of Under-Secretary of the Navy and in this post he excelled himself – the efficiency of the USA’s fleet in the closing phases of World War I was largely due to his hard work as administrator. Franklin D Roosevelt’s career up to the 1920’s had been one of constant success. He worked hard and became a clever politician respected by friend and foe. However, bad luck stroked when he was smitten down with infantile paralysis (poliomyelitis). He was a helpless cripple but the true guts of the Roosevelt family came through and against all odds he began the long road to recovery, lovingly supported by his wife. Fortunately he held on to his post and within a year he was back in office with crutches.

In 1928 he was elected as Governor of New York State which he repeated two years later with even a bigger majority. His four years as Governor covered the period the stock exchange collapsed which started the world-wide depression. It was no surprise he was nominated for the presidency and when elected in 1932 he pledged to put a deal together for the American people, who suffered from the Depression. He started a campaign which restored prosperity and respectability amongst the American people again.

He started working with instant energy and fearless originality. He repealed prohibition, restored the banks, went off the gold standard and create work for men to earn back their self-respect. He succeeded within a short period of time to pull America out from the slums and internationally he led the USA away from isolation. When World II broke out he took the USA out of its historical neutrality and supported his allies vigorously. He took the USA to war with the allies as promised and he was one of the architects of peace which followed the war, although he passed away sadly on 12 April 1945.

But, his task was done. He had taken charge of the USA in its darkest hour of ruin and despair and pulled it together and restored its prosperity and sanity. Internationally he came to the rescue of a world collapsing into another dark age of defying human rights of people. World-wide he restored the rule of law.

He definitely takes his place with a Washington and a Lincoln as one of the most single-hearted leaders in the fight for his country’s greatness.

Hendrik