Allied Leaders of World War Two/Roosevelt, Part Two

"Roosevelt & The New Deal"

Roosevelt's political skills, especially his public speaking, had developed tremendously, and his inconsistencies drove logical, technocratic Republican incumbent, Herbert Hoover, nuts. Roosevelt portrayed Hoover as a big spender, while at the same time saying how he would help people in need, which meant he would have to spend more money. Trade was a hot issue in those times, as it is today, and tariffs were used to control incoming goods from foreign lands. High tariffs were obviously used to lower imports, while lower tariffs were used to increase particular products. Two of Roosevelt's advisers wrote lines for speeches for him; one favoring high tariffs, one favoring low tariffs. After reading both, Roosevelt told the two men to sit down and "blend the two together." Roosevelt straddled issues like this, often taking a firm position, ON BOTH SIDES! With the country in deep distress, Roosevelt's inconsistencies didn't bother the electorate much, and he and Democrats won a huge victory in November 1932. Between election day and the day of Roosevelt's taking office,* banks began to fail in increasing numbers. Upon taking office, Roosevelt closed the banks, calling it a "bank holiday," in order to stop runs on the banks, and to buy time to develop and implement a plan to keep the country's financial system from going further off the rails. The usual free market complainers believed such intervention meant the end of civilization was near, but the country survived, so did most of the banks (and bankers), and the overwhelming number of Americans didn't wave hammer and sickle banners or join the Communist Party.

Roosevelt and Congress moved a large amount of legislation though to try to improve confidence and stabilize the downward slide. I have written various times about FDR, and here are some links to more; I hope you will check out both:

http://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2009/07/new-deal-era-now-end.html

http://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2007/09/great-depression-part-twelve.html

Next... "Roosevelt As War Leader"

* In those times, presidents did not take office until March 4. By the next election, the date had been changed to January 20, as it still is today. The gap between election day and taking office had been necessary when the country was founded, as people and information traveled more slowly.

WORD HISTORY:
Thee-While no longer in general every day usage, this word is still encountered in old texts and hymns, and it is still used by quaint religious sects. English once used "thu," which later became "thou," for "you," in the singular nominative case (German still uses "du" and Frisian uses "do"). The accusative and dative case form of "thu" ("thou") was "the" (later "thee").^ This "seems" to go back to Indo European "te," also with the meaning "you," which then gave its Old Germanic offspring "thehk." This then gave Anglo-Saxon "the," which later became "thee." German has "dich," Low German "di," West Frisian "dy," Dutch (seems to be archaic or dialect now) "dij," Norwegian has "deg," Icelandic has "thér," Danish and Swedish have "dig."

^ Grammar in the old Germanic dialects/languages was very complex, and some other modern Germanic languages, including standard German, have retained much of the complexity; although luckily, English grammar has been simplified over the centuries. The terms above mean this: nominative case simply means when a word is used as the subject of a sentence or phrase; accusative and dative cases mean when a word is used as the object of a sentence or phrase. Examples: "You gave me the coat." "You" is the subject of the sentence and is thus in the nominative case. "Me" is the dative case form of "I," as it is the recipient of the action, "giving the coat." Languages change word forms to show differences in usage. "The coat" is in the accusative case, as it is the item being given. In a simple example like this, German is similar to English, but it retains the complexity, because the word for "the," in this case, "den," shows the "Mantel" (coat) is in the accusative case. "Mantel" is grammatically a masculine noun; thus, "der Mantel," but it changes to "den Mantel" in the accusative. Hey, I told you it is complex: "Du gabst mir den Mantel."