[In honor of Warren
Harding’s 150th birthday on November 2nd, a series
AmericanStudying the lives and deaths of presidents who passed away while in
office. Leading up to a special weekend post on a very different anniversary—my
blog’s fifth birthday!]
On public
perceptions, private realities, and the influential health of a president.
I could spend
this first paragraph writing my own version of Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s 1921
polio diagnosis and all that followed, both in his personal life and health and
in his political career; but I can’t imagine I’d do a better job covering all
those bases than did Roosevelt Library & Museum intern Amy Berish in this concise and
impressive article for the library’s website. So check out that article if
you would, and I’ll meet you back here for a couple additional thoughts!
Welcome back! In
her article, Berish touches but doesn’t dwell on the complicated question of
Roosevelt’s attempts to limit (indeed, eliminate altogether) public perceptions
of his debilitating illness. As this
article illustrates, so successful were Roosevelt’s attempts to keep photos
or other images of him in a wheelchair from reaching the public that the
discovery of an
8-second video of Roosevelt in the wheelchair was a major historical find.
Roosevelt’s stated reason for this secrecy, that he did not want Americans to
perceive him as too weak or helpless to do his job (the same reason why he
attempted to walk in
public as much as possible, despite the great challenge presented by that
action), certainly makes sense, particulary in an era of Depression and World
War. But at the same time, it’s difficult to argue that he did not recognize
that a more full awareness of his ailment might have damaged or ended his
political career—I’m not sure that I agree with those
who make the case that we could never elect a wheelchair-bound politician
in our media-satured age, but they might well be right.
At the same
time, I most definitely agree with those who argue that Roosevelt’s
illness certainly contributed to his perspective and character in ways that
were vitally important for his leadership, particularly in those dark decades. He
was a descendent of a very prominent and wealthy family, and yet was (to my
mind) better able to connect with Americans from all strata of society than
nearly any other political figure in our history. No doubt his complicated
but still inspiring marriage to the even more
impressive Eleanor Roosevelt contributed to that side to his perspective,
but I have to imagine that dealing with his illness for more than two decades
played a prominent role as well. Whether or not that illness was connected to the cerebral hemorrhage
that tragically ended Roosevelt’s life in April 1945—and it likely was, but
so too were the stresses of the war and all the crises with which he had dealt
in his three-plus terms as president—, and without romanticizing a debilitating
ailment, it could still be argued that Franklin Roosevelt’s physical struggles made
significant and meaningful contributions to some of America’s most crucial
successes and victories.
Special post
this weekend,
Ben
PS. Thoughts on
FDR? Other presidents you’d particularly want to AmericanStudy?
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