God Blessed America with FDR

It was a bitterly cold day in March of 1933, when Franklin Delano Roosevelt took the oath of office as President of the United States.

FDR had a very ebullient spirit that had him waving his hat to the crowd on his way to the inauguration. Then current president Herbert Hoover did not like him, and did not share in his friendliness with the crowd that day.

The emotional need of the crowd, indeed of the country, was for a cheery charming personality who brought hope to the people. Banks were closing, jobs were not to be found, and the economy was about to fold. Roosevelt had the attitude that the country would survive this. He came up with one idea after another, one program after another to get the government involved in putting the country back to work. It worked to some avail, but the problem was so deep, the spirit so down, that it would take time and effort on a continuing basis to bring the country back to a productive, fulfilling climate that kept everybody busy.

Sometimes the best laid plans of mice and men go surely to ruin, it is written. But the plans of God for his creation, His people never come to ruin. He sees His purposes through in the people He uses. It may take a long time to bring prosperity to fruition. The National Restoration Act, the WPA, were Roosevelt-era programs that progrressively put more people in jobs, but it was a European madman named Hitler who really kickstarted the final push that ended the Great Depression. Add to this the Japanese, with their Tanaka Plan for world takeover, and America had a double squeeze put on it.

On the day of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the Japanese general who oversaw their military campaign said “we have awakened a sleeping giant, and filled him with a terrible resolve”. Not long after the attack on Pearl Harbor, Germany declared war on the US. So, an American president who saw Hitler rise to power and take over Europe, also saw an Asian threat, and had to mobilize a country to re-tool its factories and make tanks instead of cars, airplanes and warships instead of other human conveniences. Disaster makes an excellent incentive to human industriousness, and losing the entire naval fleet made an equally forceful kickstart to replacing America’s defensive ability. The sleeping giant had to get its military act together and in a hurry. Never before in history did a country have a war on two fronts at the same time. Roosevelt made it his number 1 priority to win this war, and it cost him with his wife, because her agenda was slightly different. She wanted the war effort to make a better life for less advantaged Americans, minorities and such. She supported the war effort because she saw the need, but she never forgot the black soldiers, the alien Americans who were standing side by side with the rest of young America. The plight of minorities never left her heart.