F.D.R.'s Path

F.D.R.’s Rough Road to Nomination

By Jean Edward Smith
Campaigning for History:
Reflections on the American Presidency in a Political Season
The New York Times
May 14, 2007

Presidential candidates now jockeying for position might take comfort when they recall Franklin D. Roosevelt’s perilous route to the Democratic nomination. Even F.D.R., one of America’s most successful presidents, had to work long and hard to get his party’s support for the job. And the last night of that effort was the longest and hardest of all.

In 1932, the leadership of the Democratic National Committee was firmly in the hands of Al Smith loyalists. Convention rules required a two-thirds majority for nomination, and the party’s last three presidential candidates – James Cox of Ohio, the Wall Street lawyer John W. Davis and Al Smith – in addition to House Speaker John Garner and Senate minority leader Joe Robinson, were on record supporting the stand-aside economic policies of the Hoover administration and the ill-conceived and exorbitant Smoot-Hawley tariffs on imported goods.

Roosevelt was an outsider. Serving his second term as governor of New York, he could not even count on the solid support of the Empire State’s delegation at the convention. Tammany Hall was for Smith, as were the organizations of Boss Hague in New Jersey and Gov. Joseph Ely in Massachusetts. California and Texas backed Speaker Garner; Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio supported lackluster favorite sons as stalking horses for Newton D. Baker, the former secretary of war; Maryland was solid for its longtime governor, Albert C. Ritchie; Virginia would vote for Harry Byrd; Tom Pendergast was on the fence in Missouri; and Oklahoma’s “Alfalfa Bill” Murray was ready to play the role of spoiler.

With the exception of Murray, all of F.D.R.’s rivals were from the pro-business, hard-money, establishment wing of the Democratic Party and decried the possibility of government intervention to revive the economy. “Let natural forces take their course, as free and untrammeled as possible,” said Governor Ritchie.

Roosevelt’s strength lay in the solid South, the farm states west of the Mississippi, and the Yankee kingdom (Maine, New Hampshire and Vermont). It was rural, Protestant, preponderantly dry and suffering mightily from the Depression. Roosevelt had been the nation’s first governor to take action to confront the Depression. In the summer of 1931 he summoned the New York Legislature into special session, rammed through an emergency appropriation to provide relief and raised state income taxes to cover the costs.

“Modern society, acting through its government,” said F.D.R., “owes the definite obligation to prevent the starvation or dire want of any of its fellow men and women who try to maintain themselves but cannot.”

F.D.R. solidified his position as the party’s most progressive candidate with his “forgotten man” speech to a national radio audience in the spring of 1932. After castigating the top-down relief efforts of Herbert Hoover, Roosevelt said, “These unhappy times call for plans that put their faith in the forgotten man at the bottom of the economic pyramid.”

The conservative wing of the Democratic party was aghast. “I will take off my coat and fight to the end against any candidate who persists in any demagogic appeal … setting class against class and rich against poor,” rasped Al Smith.

The battle lines were drawn. Seventeen states had nominating primaries in 1932, the rest chose their delegates in caucus or convention. Just as today, New Hampshire held the first presidential primary, and F.D.R. swept the state with 61.7 percent of the vote, taking all eight convention delegates. Iowa, Alaska, Washington and Maine fell into line. Roosevelt carried Georgia eight to one. In North Dakota he went head-to-head against Murray and polled 62.1 percent of the vote, with many Republicans crossing over to vote in the Democratic primary.

When the convention opened on June 27, Roosevelt held a clear majority of delegates but was still 100 votes shy of the two-thirds required for nomination. If the establishment forces could deny F.D.R. a first-ballot victory, they might deadlock the convention and force a compromise choice. The Democratic party’s two-thirds rule was the nemesis of presidential front-runners, and in the eyes of the party’s old guard, Roosevelt was ripe for a fall.

Nevertheless, F.D.R.’s majority gave him control of the convention. His candidate for presiding officer, Sen. Thomas Walsh of Montana, was elected, and the credentials of three pro-Roosevelt delegations (Louisiana, Minnesota and the Virgin Islands) were accepted.

Prohibition was the culture-war issue of the day, and Roosevelt’s adversaries saw an opportunity to drive a wedge between him and his supporters. Most of the country clamored for repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment (which established Prohibition), but F.D.R.’s convention strength lay in the dry states of the South and West. Rather than take a stand, Roosevelt stepped aside. “I can run on whatever plank the convention adopts,” he told his supporters.

When Roosevelt’s name was placed in nomination, the massive organ at Chicago Stadium broke into a solemn rendition of “Anchors Aweigh” – commemorating F.D.R.’s eight years in the Navy Department under Woodrow Wilson.

“Sounds like a funeral march,” snapped Bronx boss Ed Flynn. “Why not play something peppy, like ‘Happy Days Are Here Again’?” From that day on, “Happy Days” became the Roosevelt anthem.

After a long night of nominations, balloting began at 4:28 a.m. on July 1st. When the roll of the states was complete, Roosevelt held 666 votes, substantially more than all of his rivals combined, but 104 short of the 770 required for nomination. With F.D.R. that close to victory, Farley fully expected a number of states to switch before the results were announced, but that did not happen.

A second ballot began at 5:17 a.m. and was not completed until 8:05 a.m., the longest ballot on record, as state after state asked that its delegation be polled individually. The result showed little change. Roosevelt gained 11 votes and Smith dropped 7, but the lines were holding.

Roosevelt’s opponents believed he had peaked, and although the convention had been in session for 18 hours, pressed for a third ballot. Any crack in the governor’s ranks would spell disaster. The focus fell on Mississippi, which under the unit rule had given all 20 votes to F.D.R. on the first two ballots. But Sen. Pat Harrison was holding the delegation for Roosevelt by a vote of only 10 ½ to 9 ½. If Mississippi departed from the unit rule, the erosion of F.D.R.’s strength would begin.

Huey Long jumped into the breach. Charging into the Mississippi delegation he shook his fist in the face of Governor Sennet Connor (who supported Baker). “You break the unit rule, you sonofabitch, and I’ll go into Mississippi and break you.” Mississippi held fast on the crucial third ballot. Roosevelt picked up an additional five votes, and Smith dropped four. “There is no question in my mind,” said Ed Flynn, “but that without Long’s work Roosevelt might not have been nominated.”

The convention then adjourned until 8 p.m. That afternoon House Speaker Garner, who was in third place, decided to withdraw. “I think its time to break this thing up,” he told his supporters. Farley and Sam Rayburn, Garner’s manager, put together a deal for the speaker to be nominated as the vice-presidential candidate, and when California was called on the fourth ballot, William McAdoo announced that California and Texas were switching to Roosevelt. Delegation after delegation followed suit, and F.D.R. was nominated 945 to 190 ½ — with Al Smith staying in the fight to the bitter end.

The Democratic party no longer requires a two-thirds majority, states seldom vote under the unit rule, and the spread of presidential primaries has reduced the convention to little more than a rubber stamp. But as primary day on Feb. 5, 2008, approaches, candidates might wish to remember that crucial third ballot at Chicago in 1932, when F.D.R. was saved by a half-vote in the Mississippi delegation. Even the tiniest of advantages can make a big difference.