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The Roosevelt dictatorship was a proposed period of governance in the United States which would have seen President of the United States Franklin Roosevelt assume extraordinary powers either by an explicit grant of Congress or through an autogolpe. Rhetorical and armed support for what was variously called a "mild species of dictatorship" or a "benevolent autocracy" reached a zenith in 1933. Though Roosevelt signaled an early intent to seek extraordinary powers, and would come to exercise broad executive authority throughout his 13 years in office, he ultimately decided to govern within the limit of constitutional restrictions.
Background
editThe 1932 United States presidential election saw Franklin Roosevelt win election as President of the United States in a lopsided and crushing victory over incumbent Republican president Herbert Hoover.[1] Roosevelt's victory came at the height of the Great Depression and was buoyed by his use of pseudo-populist appeals.[1][2] Roosevelt's ascendancy occurred during an era in which the creation of totalitarian states in German, Italy, Japan, Spain, Poland, and other places has led its characterization as an age of plebiscitary dictatorship.[3]
"For Dictatorship, If Necessary"
editBetween the time of his November 1932 election, and his March 1933 inauguration, several influential voices in American political commentary called for Roosevelt to assume extraordinary powers upon taking office. In his nationally syndicated newspaper column, Walter Lippmann wrote that "a mild species of dictatorship will help us over the roughest spots in the road ahead" while the New York Herald Tribune opined similar sentiment in an editorial titled "For Dictatorship, If Necessary".[4] The magazine Commonweal, meanwhile, put forth the contention that Roosevelt should assume "the powers of a virtual dictatorship to reorganize the government".[4] Roger Babson called for limitations to be imposed on the powers of Congress, including the abolition of the Senate of the United States, while Will Rogers supported proposals to extend extraordinary powers to Roosevelt by writing that "Mussolini could take our country today and put people back to work at the rate of one million per month".[5]
The month prior to his March 1933 inauguration, the U.S. House of Representatives introduced legislation that would allow Roosevelt unilateral authority to suspend congressional appropriations, abolish government departments, dismiss civil servants at his discretion, and reduce statutory appropriations and contractual payments.[6] Bertrand Snell — leader of the Republican Party in the House — criticized the bill which, he said, would "make an absolute dictator of Roosevelt. It would give him more power than any executive leader in the world except Mussolini".[7]
Though the measure was ultimately defeated by the Senate, Roosevelt nonetheless received letters from around the nation imploring him to assume extraordinary powers.[4] One correspondent wrote that the Roosevelt administration marked the end of the influence of "special interests" in the United States and that, should "the politicians" fail to extend sufficient power to Roosevelt, "the people of this country will come to Washington and clothe you with the power".[4] Alpheus Geer, of the Association for Better Citizenship, wrote the president that "a benevolent autocracy is the most efficient form of government".[4] Another supporter wrote to Roosevelt that if he "assume[d] dictatorship", he would "be immortalized because the mass of the American people are with you".[4]
The following October, the Khaki Shirts of America, a paramilitary group led by United States Army veteran Art J. Smith, was raided by police in Philadelphia.[8] According to UPI reports, the group planned to launch a lightning strike against Washington, D.C. "with the intention of making President Roosevelt 'dictator of America'".[8] At the time of the raid, 300 armed Khaki Shirt partisans were waiting for vehicle pick-up to take them to the armory of the 111th Infantry Regiment which was to be looted of additional arms and weapons prior to the planned attack against the capital city.[8][9]
Roosevelt's response
editDuring his March 1933 inauguration address, Roosevelt enjoyed immense crowd approval when he stated that he was considering seeking sweeping authority equal to what a president might be granted during a mainland invasion of the United States:
... in the event that the Congress shall fail to take one of these two courses, and in the event that the national emergency is still critical, I shall not evade the clear course of duty that will then confront me. I shall ask the Congress for the one remaining instrument to meet the crisis—broad Executive power to wage a war against the emergency, as great as the power that would be given to me if we were in fact invaded by a foreign foe.[4]
Eleanor Roosevelt would later write that she found the moment "a little terrifying" due to the enthusiasm with which the crowd greeted the suggestion.[10] During this period, according to Benjamin Alpers, the "press almost universally noted the new president's calls for greater power and just as universally had nothing detrimental to say about them".[10]
That month Roosevelt was scheduled to address the American Legion, in what would be his first public speech since the inauguration.[11] In the first draft of his speech, he planned to declare his authority to arm and discipline the legion into an auxiliary military force to, in the words of historian Jonathan Alter, "guard banks or put down rebellions" as the president's "private army".[11] One line, removed from that draft of the speech, read:
As new commander-in-chief under the oath to which you are still bound I reserve to myself the right to command you in any phase of the situation which now confronts us.[11]
Aftermath
editUltimately, Roosevelt decided not to move ahead with the assumption of totalitarian authority, and though he would exercise increasingly broad executive powers throughout his administration, limited himself to constitutionally imposed limits.[12][13] Following the arrest of the Khaki Shirts, in October 1933, Roosevelt — addressing students of Washington College — opined that a dictatorship was unnecessary and more could be accomplished through cooperation than through coercion.[14] Nevertheless, partly as a result of the early enthusiasm of his supporters for extra-constitutional measures, he would be plagued by accusations that he sought dictatorial powers throughout his 13 years in office.[10]
A 1936 poll by the American Institute of Public Opinion saw 45-percent of the public answering "yes" to the question "Do you believe acts and policies of the Roosevelt administration may lead to dictatorship?" with affirmative answers highest among Republicans (83-percent), independent voters (53-percent), and socialists (30-percent), and lowest among Democrats (nine-percent). Residents of Vermont and Maine led states in answering yes (69-percent and 66-percent, respectively), while those of Mississippi and Alabama were most skeptical (22-percent and 20-percent, respectively) that Roosevelt was leading the country towards dicatorship.[15]
The Judicial Procedures Reform Bill of 1937, frequently called Roosevelt's "court-packing plan", reignited charges of Roosevelt's dictatorial ambitions.[16] Meanwhile, Wendell Wilkie responded to the 1940 Destroyers for Bases agreement by characterizing it as the "most arbitrarial and dictatorial action ever taken in the history of the United States". Though he agreed with the proposal, Wilkie believe it should have been authorized by Congress.[17] And, the St. Louis Post-Dispatch denounced Roosevelt as a war-crime committing dictator over the agreement.[18]
See also
edit- Business Plot, an aborted military coup targeted against Roosevelt
- Criticism of Franklin D. Roosevelt
References
edit- ^ a b "United States presidential election of 1932". britannica.com. Encyclopedia Britannica. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
- ^ Woodward, Gary C. (1983). "Reagan as Roosevelt: The elasticity of pseudo‐populist appeals". Central States Speech Journal. 34 (1). doi:10.1080/10510978309368113.
- ^ Cavalli, Luciano (1986). Changing Conceptions of Leadership. Springer. pp. 67–81. ISBN 978-1-4612-9342-2.
- ^ a b c d e f g "Dictatorship: The Road Not Taken" (PDF). marist.edu. Marist College. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
- ^ "Babson States Why He Favors Making Roosevelt Dictator". Coschocton Tribune. newspapers.com. February 20, 1933. Retrieved June 19, 2019.
- ^ "Plan Dictator Job for Roosevelt". Philadelphia Inquirer. February 10, 1933. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ "Democratic Proposal to Make Roosevelt Dictator, Meets Bitter Opposition". Visalia Times-Delta. newspapers.com. Associated Press. February 10, 1933. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ a b c "Police Prevent Planned March on Washington". Lincoln Journal Star. newspapers.com. United Press International. October 12, 1933. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ "Khaki Shirts Under Arrest". Greenwood Commonwealth. newspapers.com. Associated Press. October 12, 1933. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ a b c Alpers, Benjamin Leontief (2003). Dictators, Democracy, and American Public Culture: Envisioning the Totalitarian Enemy, 1920s-1950s. University of North Carolina Press. p. 27-30. ISBN 0807854166.
- ^ a b c Alter, Jonathan (July 1, 2006). "Author Reconstructs FDR's 'Defining Moment'". National Public Radio (NPR). Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ "This is how the American system of government will die". Vox. March 3, 2015. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ Yoo, John (January 1, 2018). "Franklin Roosevelt and Presidential Power". Berkeley Law. 21 (1).
- ^ "Recovery Lies in Cooperation, Says President". Asheville Citizen-Times. newspapers.com. Associated Press. October 22, 1933. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ Gallup, George (August 2, 1936). "Nation Discounts Roosevelt Dictatorship Trend". Rochester Chronicle & Democrats. newspapers.com. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ Glass, Andrew (February 5, 2019). "FDR unveils 'court-packing' plan, Feb. 5, 1937". Politico. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ Lindsay, James (September 2, 2011). "TWE Remembers: The Destroyers-for-Bases Deal". Council on Foreign Relations. Retrieved June 22, 2019.
- ^ "Isolation after World War I". Holocaust Encyclopedia. United States Holocaust Memorial Museum. Retrieved June 22, 2019.