Copyright © 2001 John F. Oyler
 

December 7,  2001
 

FDR
 

Anyone who has been following my series of columns based on old diaries from
the 1940's will be aware of the influence that Franklin Delano Roosevelt had
on our lives in those days and of the negative opinion my family had of him.
Just as Voltemart in the Harry Potter books and movie is the "One whose name
must not be spoken", FDR was referred to as "that man in the White House" in
our circles.
 

For several years I have belonged to a book review club made up of mature
(translate as pseudo elderly) men who meet once a month and discuss a book
that each of them has read. Our subjects have ranged from "Huckleberry Finn"
to Plato's "Symposium" and "The Trials of Owen Meany".
 

At one of our recent meetings David McCullough's biography of John Adams was
mentioned, as well his earlier biography of Harry Truman. I wondered out
loud if anyone knew of an equivalent biography of Franklin Roosevelt.
Charlie O'Hanlon offered to investigate.
 

One month later Charlie reported that he had found numerous books dealing
with FDR, but none that he felt was definitive. He suggested that the group
deviate from its normal practice of all reading the same book this month,
and that we each find an FDR reference that we liked, read it, and report on
its interpretation of his life and effect on our society.
 

I immediately set out to find a book that evaluated Roosevelt from the
negative, conservative perspective. Surely Westbrook Pegler, or some other
right wing mud-slinger has written something that exposes all of FDR's sins.
 

The local library had a long list of books dealing with Roosevelt, including
several with words like deceit and betrayal in the title; unfortunately none
of these were currently available. I settled on a book by William S. White
called "Majesty and Mischief", which turned out to be an excellent,
objective report on FDR.
 

Mr. White wrote this book in 1961 and used the background of Roosevelt's
death in 1945 and his funeral to record his perception of the man and his
strengths and weaknesses. He saw FDR as an extremely effective statesman
whose activities had a powerful influence on society, domestically and
internationally.
 

White was a great admirer of FDR, but acknowledged that many of his actions
-- defying the Constitution, establishing the welfare state, concessions to
Stalin, etc. -- had major negative long term consequences. No question, his
influence on our times was considerable.
 

My conclusions from this specific reference were that Roosevelt was a
masterful manipulator and, according to White, the first pragmatist to
become President. That statement forced me to do some more reading about
pragmatism. One connotation is that this philosophy depends upon the belief
that "the end justifies the means" and that the antonym to pragmatism is
idealism.
 

I also checked out FDR in Howard Zinn's "A People's History of the United
States". This turned out to be an extremely one-sided view of history as
seen by a passionate socialist. From my perspective Roosevelt always seemed
to be the epitome of "creeping socialism". Much to my surprise, Zinn painted
him as a puppet of the Establishment and a true enemy of socialism.
 

Zinn's description of the United States in the Depression years certainly
bordered on complete chaos, with massive class revolution imminent. I
certainly was too young in those days to be an accurate reporter of the
social climate, but I don't recall anything approaching chaos in Bridgeville
in the 1930's.
 

I distinctly remember my father being furloughed from the Pennsylvania
Railroad in 1937 and his desperately looking for another job. I remember
both of my parents reporting his bringing home "hobos" for supper, when we
were living in Dunkirk, New York, close to the railroad yards. This was
evidence that, although there were lots of folks wandering the country
looking for work, the hobos were decent, respectable people. No evidence of
chaos or revolution there!
 

When our group met to discuss Roosevelt, there were as many different
interpretations of him and his actions as there were interpreters. Mickey
McDermott believes that he prevented revolution and a Communist takeover. He
and my other book club cronies questioned my statement that Bridgeville was
not full of chaos, about to erupt into revolution, in the 1930's. Perhaps we
were fortunate to be a community that did not have a large contingent of
lower class, oppressed workers.
 

John Gallagher credited him with creating the middle class. John grew up in
West Virginia, close to coal mining "company towns" where the miners, mostly
immigrants, could easily be considered lower class, aspiring to become
middle class. I suspect Bridgeville's analogous situation had occurred
thirty years earlier.
 

My memories of Bridgeville in the '30's don't support his opinion. Frankly I
don't recall much of a class distinction at all. There were a few families
that were a little better off than most of us and a few who weren't quite as
well off, but most of us were in the same boat. Isn't that a definition of
middle class?
 

Larry Kennedy said there was no doubt that Roosevelt was a truly great
President. This prompted me to question the definition of "great". If great
means highly influential, Hitler and Stalin were also great. If instead
great means good, Jimmy Carter was great. If it requires both connotations,
I'm not sure any President has been great.
 

In the 1930's and '40's the tiny bit of society to which we belonged in
Bridgeville was polarized, in regard to Franklin Roosevelt. One either loved
him or despised him; there was no neutral ground. My diary reported that he
won a mock election in our seventh grade class in the 1944 Presidential
election by a 21 to 10 margin, despite my eloquent speech opposing him. I am
certain that vote reflected the opinions of our parents, rather than my
ineffectiveness.
 

I certainly am interested in feedback from any of our readers who have an
opinion on life in Bridgeville in those days, especially in regard to the
possibility of serious social unrest.
 

The book club's final consensus was that this was indeed a complex man and
that no one was really sure what he was all about.