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Home , Eleanor and Franklin, Fireside chats, Grace Tully, Louis Howe, Togo Tanaka

Franklin D. Roosevelt Through Eleanor’s eyes

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This transcript was run through an automated transcription service and then lightly edited for clarity. There may be typos or small discrepancies from the podcast audio.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: March 4, 1933. A grey and cold Inauguration Day.

Outgoing president and incoming president Franklin Delano Roosevelt had on their winter coats, and they had blankets wrapped around their legs as they rode side-by-side in an open touring car from the to the East Portico of the Capitol building for Roosevelt's swearing in.

There were secret ramps set up so that FDR could wheel himself nearly all the way to the stage. And then with the help of his son James, he propped himself out of the wheel chair and walked slowly to the lectern. He stared out at the crowd of Americans who were gathered there to watch his inauguration during these dark days of the , and he took the oath of office.

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT CLIP

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: Roosevelt's hand was on his family's 250-year-old Dutch bible. The page was open to 1 Corinthians 13, which has the words:

“Love is patient. Love is kind. It does not envy. It does not boast. It is not proud. It does not dishonor others. It is not self-seeking. It is not easily angered. It keeps no record of wrongs. Love does not delight in evil, but rejoices with the truth. It always protects, always trusts, always hopes. Always perseveres.”

I'm Lillian Cunningham with The Washington Post, and this is the 31st episode of “Presidential.”

PRESIDENTIAL THEME MUSIC

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: This episode is about love, in a way. FDR had four terms in office -- 13 years. So instead of spending a lot of time on the nuts and bolts of the and World War II, we're going to do something a little different and examine the presidency and leadership style of FDR through the prism of .

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 1 We do first need a picture of Franklin, though, before are a pair. So, my first guest is the director of the FDR Presidential Library & Museum, Paul Sparrow.

PAUL SPARROW: So happy to be with you.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, Paul: Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born in 1882, Hyde Park, , at the very site where his presidential library is now. So, what was life like for him growing up there?

PAUL SPARROW: Well it's about a thousand acres on the Hudson River, right here in the middle of the Hudson Valley, and it's just an incredibly beautiful location. His mother had a very difficult childbirth, so he was the only child. His father was much older than his mother. He really was the apple of their eye. I mean, they devoted themselves to his life. So, he had everything he wanted.

This was a wonderland filled with animals. He would sail in the summer and ice boat in the winter. So, his upbringing here really deeply influenced him in terms of his later policies -- the way he created national forests and national parks. It gave him a deep sense of confidence in himself. They would often go to Europe for months at a time with Franklin and take him to the world capitals. He spoke German fluently. They spent a lot of time in Germany. So, that sense that the world is a larger place also influenced Franklin very much. He had a very sophisticated world view, even at a fairly early age.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, he goes off to Groton, the prestigious boarding school and then to Harvard. His father died shortly after he starts college. What is cementing itself in him during this time? What sort of character traits and also political propensities are starting to show themselves?

PAUL SPARROW: His Harvard years -- you look at them, and you don't find anything that would indicate the sort of greatness that was to come. He had this enormous self-confidence. He had this ability to focus on the things that he wanted to do. But there was nothing that you would describe as extraordinary. It was almost like he was biding his time. He's not a particularly outstanding student. I mean, he was popular and he was effective, but he was not number one in his class or, you know, the great school leader or a great athlete or anything.

Now, this was a period when you see was emerging as a major political leader. And I think that influenced him probably more than anything that happened to him at college.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: They were both progressives, but technically FDR was a Democrat, while Theodore Roosevelt at that time was a Republican. Anyway, it's around this time that Eleanor enters the picture. And so, with me to talk about her now is Allida Black, the founding editor of the Eleanor Roosevelt Papers and also a professor at the George Washington University. Thanks so much for being here, Allida.

ALLIDA BLACK: Oh, Lillian. I'm very excited. Thanks for having me.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, what was Eleanor's childhood like? And, you know, how is it that she and Franklin strike up a relationship?

ALLIDA BLACK : Well, you know, Lillian, one of the things that's so amazing to me about Eleanor

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 2 Roosevelt is the extent to which she transcended her childhood. I mean, her childhood was really dominated by fear and disappointment. Her mother was one of the most beautiful women in New York and was convinced that her daughter was the ugliest child born in the universe -- so ugly that she called her ‘granny’ -- and her father was an alcoholic who became addicted to medication after he hurt his back in a sporting accident. And so, while she worshiped him, he would often forget her.

And so, she was torn between love that disappointed her and love that told her that she wasn't worthy. And here she is. She becomes a woman whose life is defined by combating fear. And that's one of the things I think that really attracted FDR to her. I mean, granted, she was Teddy Roosevelt's niece.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, her father was Teddy Roosevelt's brother.

ALLIDA BLACK : Yes.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And so, Franklin and Eleanor had sort of a distant --

ALLIDA BLACK: They were fifth cousins, once removed. And while they had met when they were young children, the interest in each other -- the spark, so to speak -- happens when Eleanor comes back from London after going to school, and they run into each other on a train going from New York to Poughkeepsie and Tivoli, their respective homes.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: From what you know about Eleanor, what would FDR have been like on a date? What was it about him that attracted her? What did she find in him as a good complement to her personality?

ALLIDA BLACK: Well, you know, they really were exact opposites. But they had very core beliefs, and I think what they saw in each other was something that no one else saw.

She didn't see him as a dandy, as a pretty boy who had all this ambition and no skill. She saw a serious side of him. And he saw in her a kindred spirit, I think, that was not only just the Roosevelt Legacy and not this sense of duty, but this fierce passion -- this commitment to risk herself to make the world better. I mean, she wasn't your normal debutante.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And so, Franklin was very close with his mother, who famously wasn't very supportive of the idea that he would propose to her, right?

ALLIDA BLACK: Well, let's just say there were always three people in this marriage. Sarah very much thought that Eleanor was not worthy enough of FDR -- although, she ultimately changes her mind and becomes Eleanor's fierce ally.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: Why was it, to begin with, that she didn't think she was worthy?

ALLIDA BLACK: Well, no woman would be good enough for FDR for Sarah. FDR was the sole focus of Sarah's life. And so, no one could ever live up to the love or the expectations that she had for her son. And Eleanor was shy. Sarah had some concerns that maybe FDR was falling for Eleanor because he was on the rebound. But she ultimately came to love and admire and cherish Eleanor.

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 3 LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: You had mentioned how she was sort of naturally shy. Maybe, if you could do just a little compare and contrast between the natural leadership gifts that FDR had and Eleanor had, and what each of them had to work on over their careers?

ALLIDA BLACK: Well, if there was ever a child who was in a household that made a child feel unworthy, it was Eleanor. If there was ever a child who felt like they could do anything in the world without failure, it was FDR. So, they come from diametrically opposite childhoods.

What happens to Eleanor is that she goes to school in London at the Allenswood Academy, which is basically where Centre Court, Wimbledon is now. And she was taught by this extraordinary woman, Marie Souvestre. And Marie Souvestre saw in Eleanor greatness. I mean, there's just no doubt about it. Eleanor became her pet. And Marie Souvestre pushed her. She pushed her to read everything, to learn multiple languages and she says to her, 'You will never know what you think until you can argue the position of your fiercest critic with equal respect.'

And Eleanor writes one day, 'I finally learned that I have a brain. I have argued the Boer War with Mademoiselle, and I have won each time.' And Mademoiselle Souvestre lets her stay with her during the summers, and they travel together. And she teaches Eleanor independence and teaches her the most fundamental thing: When you travel, you are a guest in a country. So, you just don't go to the opera or to the fashion shows. You volunteer in hospitals. You volunteer in settlement houses. You volunteer in soup kitchens. And so, she showed Eleanor the world outside of a world that Eleanor had ever experienced.

When she leaves Allenswood, Marie Souvestre gives her a letter that Eleanor will carry with her for years. And it's basically says, 'Of course you must go home and make your debut. You are a Roosevelt. But first and foremost, you were my Eleanor. And I expect great things from you in your own right in this world.'

And so, Souvestre helped Eleanor become a leader, so much so that Eleanor would have a picture of Mademoiselle Souvestre in her office, in her bedroom and in her living room -- everywhere she lived.

And so, you know, they come to leadership differently. They come from FDR being confident and entitled and curious and ambitious and fascinated with his cousin Teddy; and Eleanor comes to it through sort of an innate curiosity, a heart connection and a primal understanding that to live a life worth living, you must transcend fear.

Franklin and Eleanor marry in 1905, a year or two after college. And Franklin has a brief law career in New York City before he is elected to the New York State Senate in 1910. It's at that time that he strikes up a friendship with , who is a journalist turned political adviser who will help shape the rest of FDR's life.

ALLIDA BLACK: And Louis Howe, I guess you could say, would be a combination of David Axelrod and Paul Begala personalities. Although, he was tiny. I mean, he was like 5'3. He was a gnome. He chainsmoked. He was always covered in cigarette ash, had horrible asthma, coughed more than I do.

And he saw in FDR the spark of a president. When FDR was serving his first term in the state legislature, he really began to take FDR under his wing and taught him how to give speeches and

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 4 managed the press for him.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And so he helps FDR climb the next rung up the political ladder, which is a big job as assistant secretary of the Navy during World War I while 's in office. But then in the span of a few years, there are two big personal events that really shake Franklin and Eleanor's marriage and their lives together.

One was that in 1918, Eleanor realizes that he's been having an affair with her social secretary Lucy Mercer. And then the other is that, in the summer of 1921, FDR ends up with polio and paralyzed from the waist down.

ALLIDA BLACK: Well, Lillian, I really liked the way that you pair those because it shows the full range of the Roosevelt marriage and their ability to love one another in new ways.

I mean, Eleanor was devastated. It was a double whammy when she discovered the love letters from Lucy Mercer to Franklin. Not only had Franklin betrayed her, but he had betrayed her with a woman who was her right-hand, her social secretary. And she leaves, offers him a divorce. Sarah comes in to mediate. They reconcile.

And the thing that is marvelous about the Roosevelts is that they learn to love each other in new ways. They get past this sort of teenage, movie star, idealistic love to a love that's based on mutual respect, trying to build a new life together -- one that they want, one that they see for themselves, rather than one that sort of forced on them.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, the polio and the paralysis -- how does that change their relationship as well? It doesn't just make her a caregiver, right?

ALLIDA BLACK: The thing that's so remarkable to me about polio is what it says about both of them, because Eleanor had just developed her own independent life. She and FDR had figured out how to be together and be a couple, but be their distinct personalities at the same time. She was beginning to be an activist. She had a life of her own, making her own friends.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And all of this is prompted by the affair.

ALLIDA BLACK: And then all of a sudden, when FDR has polio, it's not just his legs that are immobilized; it's his entire body. I mean, Eleanor has to learn to insert a glass catheter. She has to give him enemas. She has to lift him up, turn him over. So there's a new level of trust and intimacy that develops. You go from the brokenheartedness of Lucy to the intense partnership of polio -- because she understands that FDR has to believe that he will walk. And she will not allow anyone to tell him that's not possible.

So, she reinforces his fierce will, his unbridled confidence; and for the first time, stands up to Sarah and says, 'Mama, you cannot go in there and tell him that you are taking him back to Hyde Park. The last thing he needs to be is a gentleman squire.' And so, in many ways. I think polio had a major effect on him.

When you're born in privilege, you know, when you're born with a silver spoon in your mouth and you're pampered, pampered, pampered -- I mean, there's a huge arrogance that comes with that.

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 5 And what polio did to him was tamper that arrogance and, in Eleanor's words, give him ‘patience and never-ending persistence.’ And so, when he had to rebuild his life and his whole image of himself -- what he could do for his country and what his marriage would be like and how could he play with his children -- there's just this ebullience that was there. You just couldn't get rid of it. I mean, you never heard FDR say he was never going to walk again. Polio is the defining part of their marriage, as well as FDR's character.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, because of his polio, Eleanor also ends up almost his surrogate in a political capacity for a while, right? Because she's going out to these events that he can't attend. And so, how does that also transform their political identity?

ALLIDA BLACK: Well, that's the story that Eleanor wants told. Eleanor wants told that she only became political after FDR got polio. In reality, she's very political before polio sidelines him. And so, she's already developing the skills. What happens now is that she does it much more often and in a greater arena -- not only for her issues, which are the living wage, sanitation, education, old age pensions, the right to organize -- but for his issues. Because FDR, from 1921 until 1928, will spend most of his time away, trying to find a cure. So, for six months in each year, they will be apart.

So, while FDR will write letters and become a leader in the national party, it's Eleanor who becomes the leader in the state party. And she and Louis Howe develop a great friendship. And Louis so believed in Eleanor that he also thought that he could make Eleanor president.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: It is a remarkable thought for the time.

ALLIDA BLACK : A huge toughness -- I mean, Eleanor just thought, 'Are you crazy?' But he taught Eleanor how to work a room and also helped her writing style. And in 1928, when asked FDR to succeed him as the Democratic , he does so. He tells a close aide, and this is a direct quote, “Because Eleanor is more well-known among the party faithful than anyone in the state.”

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, FDR does win the seat to become governor of New York. Yet, it was during those six or seven years beforehand that many of the views he'll take to the White House began to coalesce. Here again is Paul Sparrow.

PAUL SPARROW: That period in there, between when he contracts polio and when he runs for governor of New York in '28, is critical to understand how he developed a lot of his policies in the New Deal -- because during that period, he discovered Warm Springs, Georgia.

He went down to Warm Springs, Georgia and sort of converted this into a polio rehabilitation center. And he bought a home down there. It immersed him in one of the most brutally poor areas of the country. He saw the incredible plight of these sharecroppers and these tenant farmers and how extraordinarily oppressed they were by the system. And I think it developed in him, at that moment as he was recovering from his own polio, a great empathy for these people and an understanding that America could never live up to its ideals if it didn't address this extraordinary inequality and the abject poverty that these farmers were suffering.

It's one of the things that motivated him, for example, for the whole Tennessee Valley Authority. He wanted to bring electricity to these poor, rural areas because he knew without electricity, they

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 6 would never be able to develop -- they would never have industry, they would never have commerce. And so, that period was formative, and I think it really strongly influenced him in many of the policies you see him implement once he gets into the .

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, FDR goes from recuperating in Warm Springs to being governor of New York during the start of the Depression. And then he wins the presidency in the 1932 election, booting Herbert Hoover out of office.

PAUL SPARROW: In 1932 when the election took place, America was at its most desperate situation in our history. More than 30 percent of the population was unemployed. At that point in time, the federal government had no responsibility. If you were starving in the street, federal government had no responsibility to help you. And banks were foreclosing at the rate of hundreds every week. Huge swaths of the Midwest were suffering from a terrible Dust Bowl. Industry had collapsed. It was a desperate time. Hoover was trying anything he could to fix the economy, but it was just spiraling out of control.

So, at the moment he took office, it was really a dark period. And so, America turned to him to do something, and as he said, 'Try something. If it doesn't work, try something else.'

The two overriding characteristics of Franklin Roosevelt were his extraordinary optimism and his confidence in his own abilities. He believed that he could make America great again after this terrible Depression. He strongly believed in his own personal charisma to convince people to do the things that he wanted them to do.

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT CLIP

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: This is FDR’s first inaugural address, in March of 1933. He came into the White House with a massive agenda called the New Deal that was designed to lift the country out of its economic depression. It included iconic programs like the Civilian Conservation Corps, the Civil Works Administration, the Federal Housing Administration, the Public Works Administration, the , the Tennessee Valley Authority, the Works Progress Administration, the , ditching the Gold Standard, the Glass Steagall Act, the FDIC, the food stamp plan.

Now, Roosevelt had Democratic majorities in both the House and the Senate when he came into the White House, which was a big part of how he was able to push through so much of this legislative agenda in his first hundred days. But there was also another factor that helped him advance his agenda -- and that was his really powerful communication style.

With me to talk about how FDR persuaded the American people to support all of these very progressive plans is one of the current president's White House speechwriters: Sarada Peri. Thanks for being here.

SARADA PERI: Thanks. It's great to be here. Thanks for having me.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, Sarada: Even from this very first inaugural address that FDR gives, with the iconic line that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself,” we start to see how oratory is a key tool in his leadership toolbox, right? So, what was so effective?

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 7 It seems like he takes a very different rhetorical approach than Hoover. We heard last week how Hoover tended to try building public confidence by essentially playing down the problems and saying, 'Oh, things aren't that bad.'

SARADA PERI: You know, this speech was kind of an attack, I think, on the psychology of the Great Depression -- time to speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly. I mean, he goes through this really honest accounting of the nation's woes in a way that Hoover just hadn't done -- that really nobody had done. And suddenly, all these people who have been suffering are realizing that their leader is hearing them, is understanding where they are. This is kind of a direct counter to how Hoover was behaving.

Then, immediately after, he says, 'This great nation will endure, as it has endured -- will revive and will prosper.' He's not saying that everything's OK right now, but he's saying we will get there. And that we always have. And he does this a lot. He draws on history to say we've always gotten out of sticky situations we're in, and we'll do it again together.

To immediately inject action was enormous at the time, because Hoover had shied away from action, especially government action, right? So, he was saying: We have a crisis at our hands. You all are suffering, but we can actually do something about it. And when I say, 'we,' I mean, 'We, the people -- our government, our system of self-government.'

Throughout the speeches, as you go on, he's basically quite slowly justifying this enormous expansion of executive power, but he's doing it within a psychological argument. I mean, it's an injection of confidence right off the bat as soon as he gets up there. And I think, in a way, this wasn't just a repudiation of Hoover's policies, it was a repudiation of Hoover's communication style.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And so, this mix of straight talk and optimism becomes FDR's signature type of rhetoric throughout his presidency, really.

SARADA PERI: I think his great gift was to understand the public climate and to trust that he could acknowledge where they were and then also move them along to where they needed to go.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: Well, and his series of on the radio were a great example of this, right? He treated these radio addresses almost like an ongoing conversation with the public, where he could slowly explain and build his policy case over time.

SARADA PERI: And that was new and unusual. So, I think it's worth thinking about the fireside chat first as a medium, right? So, Roosevelt comes into office, and radio is getting bigger. And he immediately grasps this technological revolution. He understands the power of radio and he understands that, in order to succeed in this medium, he needs to shift the way that delivering speeches happens. So, if you think about times before then, you imagine people getting up on a stump and delivering these formal speeches.

They were long. You had to make it worth the while of people who were coming a long distance to see you speak. You maybe didn't have a microphone, and so you were shouting -- you've got to make sure the person in the back can hear you. So now, we come up with this technology that is totally different. You are now in people's living rooms. You are with them.

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 8 FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT CLIP

SARADA PERI: Roosevelt grasped exactly what that meant for his style, and it worked perfectly because he naturally had a more conversational style and this lovely tone of voice. He was very interested in making sure that people understood what he was actually talking about.

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT CLIP

SARADA PERI: What's so interesting about this is his voice just sounds really calm. And remember, the country is falling apart. I mean, it's not really an exaggeration to say that the economy is in tatters, and people are freaking out. And he kind of very calmly explains what he's going to do. He's treating the American people like intelligent consumers of information. He once said that, 'Before each fireside chat, I tried to picture a mason at work on a new building, a girl behind a counter, a farmer in his field.'

He tried to picture the actual American people and what they were thinking, and what they were feeling and how he could reach them. What he understood about great communication is that: Even if you're the president and you're giving some highflying speech about intricate policy, everything starts with empathy.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: Eleanor also ends up using radio and media very powerfully to help FDR's agenda. But unlike FDR, who gave that first fireside chat on the banking crisis only a week into his first term, it takes Eleanor a bit longer to establish what her role will be in the administration.

ALLIDA BLACK: The first thing she has to do is she has to convince FDR to let her do something. Because FDR makes her resign all her positions. She could no longer teach. She's on the board of 17 major organizations, and FDR says, 'You've got to stop.' And she says, 'Well, Franklin, let me help you with your mail.' He says, 'No.' 'Well, let me go out and travel for you like I did when you were governor.' He says, 'no.'.

And she's terrified and very sad of living a life confined to what she called ‘white glove’ tasks -- you know, like wearing a white glove and running it down the banister of the White House to make sure it's dusted properly. So, she has to figure out how to have her voice heard.

And the is encamped in Anacostia -- they're World War I veterans, and they have lost everything in the Great Depression, everything. They're living in old military tents with their families. They're living in tents made of newspaper and corrugated cardboard and old roddie clothes. And Hoover really lost the election by sending the army to dislodge the bonus encampment. And so, Louis and Eleanor drive over there.

Now, I want you to think about it this: Eleanor has refused Secret Service protection. She drives her own car. She's just out and about in Washington going to a hobo encampment, and she stays there for hours. She eats beans with her fingers out of a paper cup. She asks them what their lives were like. You know, she asked what their expectations are.

And so, the next day, and The Washington Star both had the same line emboldened in the story. “Hoover sent the troops. FDR sent his wife.” And so, FDR begins to realize that Eleanor can be a good copy. And so, she begins to go out.

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 9 LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: She also starts writing her own monthly magazine column.

ALLIDA BLACK: It is called, 'Mrs. Roosevelt's Page.' And the first article is titled, 'I Want You To Write To Me,' and it comes out at the end of August. They've been at the White House five months, and she says, 'You know, we've done all these programs. We've done bold persistent experimentation. But we don't know if it's working. The only way we're going to know if it's working is if you tell us your experiences with it. So, write to me. Tell me about your lives. Tell me about your needs. Tell me if you think these programs are working.’

The thing that's so stunning is that from August 31 to December 31, Eleanor Roosevelt gets 350,000 letters. And so, what both she and FDR are doing is really building a relationship with the American people and the federal government.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And Eleanor is, of course, also championing particular causes like women's rights, civil rights, advocating to help the young, the poor.

PAUL SPARROW: She was the conscience of FDR's administration. She had a unwavering sense of right and wrong, and she would always take the position of what was morally right. Franklin was much more the political pragmatist -- 'I don't want to lose this state. I have to negotiate for this. This Congressman's not going to support this.'

He wanted to find the solutions that would get things done. And Eleanor wanted him to do the right thing. She was his most vocal critic internally, and often, he would use her to go out and say things to gauge the public's reaction. And then if the public's reaction was positive, he would embrace those positions and make them happen. If the reaction was very negative, he could back away from it and say, 'Oh, that's just my wife, you know, I have no control over her.' But, of course, they worked very closely.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: One day early in his administration, FDR instated the Economy Act, which put a number of female government workers out of jobs who were married to male government employees. And that was one early example where Eleanor didn't just act as FDR as conscience in private.

ALLIDA BLACK: I mean, they have dueling editorials in the same papers.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: She criticized it publicly.

ALLIDA BLACK: Publicly -- she's like -- immediately she's out there and she's like, 'No.' And it takes a while, but in 1935, she changes his mind, and the women are rehired.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And there are also several initiatives where Eleanor is actually the main proponent, herself, right? She's not just supporting or challenging or reacting to FDR's ideas.

ALLIDA BLACK : She took a sense of accomplishment in 1935 from two programs. The first is the National Youth Administration, which really is the precursor to AmeriCorp today. The other thing that she does that is of long-lasting importance is: Eleanor really is the number one advocate for the Federal One programs -- the Federal Writers' Project, the Federal Dance Project, the Federal Theater Project.

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 10 Because artists and musicians and archivists and librarians, they're out of work. They're starving. And so, what they do is they are put to work performing for the American people. Zora Neale Hurston writes 'Their Eyes Were Watching God' while she is working for the Federal Writers Project. John Steinbeck writes 'The Grapes of Wrath.'

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: She also took a very public stand on civil rights when she resigned from the DAR because the DAR wouldn't let the famous black singer perform in its hall. And it's not just that Eleanor resigned -- she actually helped arrange for Anderson to perform at the Lincoln Memorial, instead.

ALLIDA BLACK : She made civil rights much more of a national issue. When she resigns from the DAR on February 27, 1939, it goes on the front page of 483 newspapers. And so, when Marian Anderson sings at the steps of Lincoln, that transforms the Lincoln Memorial into a civil rights monument. And Eleanor very much arranges for the radio broadcasts to occur. And that's the first live coast-to-coast broadcast music event in the history of radio.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: During their time in the White House, Eleanor gave somewhere around 300 radio addresses, which is about the same amount as FDR did. What were her programs like and how did they complement or run counter to the radio programming that FDR had?

ALLIDA BLACK : The most stunning radio address she gave was December 7, 1941 -- Pearl Harbor Day.

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT CLIP

ALLIDA BLACK: It's not FDR's. Eleanor had a regularly scheduled radio broadcast that afternoon. She took the first roughly four minutes of it to speak to the American people. And she says:

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT CLIP: “For months now, the knowledge that something of this kind might happen has been hanging over our heads. And yet, it seemed impossible to believe, impossible to drop the everyday things of life and feel that there was only one thing which was important -- preparation to meet an enemy no matter where he struck. That is all over now. And there is no more uncertainty. We know what we have to face, and we know that we are ready to face it.”

ALLIDA BLACK: And then she ends it on this ultimate, triumphant, resolute note. She says:

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT: “You cannot escape anxiety. You cannot escape a clutch of fear at your heart. And yet, I hope that the certainty of what we have to meet will make you rise above these fears.”

ALLIDA BLACK: And so, that really sets the stage for the president's address to Congress the next day.

ELEANOR ROOSEVELT: “We are the free and unconquerable people of the of America.”

SARADA PERI: So, the day of the speech was an address to Congress that FDR gave on December 8, 1941 -- the day after Pearl Harbor. Sam Rosenman and Robert Sherwood were in New York -- so his speech writing team is basically gone. It's all him. So, he just dictated the speech to his

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 11 secretary, .

PAUL SPARROW: And as she describes it, he leans back, takes a long drag on his cigarette, looks up at the ceiling and dictates the first draft of the speech in one pass -- no stopping. She then goes and types it up, brings it back to him.

It's about two-and-a-half pages long. And he carries that speech with him all day, and he's making little notes. And, of course, he makes one of the most famous edits in history.

SARADA PERI: In his original draft, it says, “Yesterday, December 7, 1941: a date which will live in world history, the United States of America was simultaneously and deliberately attacked by Naval and Air Forces of the Empire of Japan.” Well then, as he's editing draft number one, he crosses out ‘world history’ and replaces it with 'infamy.'

And he deletes 'simultaneously' and he changes it to 'suddenly.' And at the end of that sentence, he had actually added 'without warning.' And then he crossed that out. So, the sentence we end up with is:

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT: “Yesterday, December 7, 1941 -- a date which will live in infamy.”

SARADA PERI: And if you think about that word-choice change, from 'world history' to 'infamy,' it's not just a rhetorical flourish, it actually gives greater meaning. He is making a judgment call about what this moment is. It is an act that is treacherous and that requires some kind of response. And it's part of what speech writing is about, which is clarifying to the point of finding the right word.

PAUL SPARROW: And so, when you listen to his speech, it's only a little over six minutes long. It is beautifully structured. It is precise in its definitions of what happened and what's going to happen. And it's brilliant in its passion and anger, but at the same time unrelenting confidence America will prevail, so help us God. And that's the message that he knew the American people needed to see at that point.

FRANKLIN DELANO ROOSEVELT: “No matter how long it may take us to overcome this premeditated invasion, the American people in their righteous might will win through to absolute victory.”

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: As America enters World War II, how does the dynamic between Eleanor and Franklin change?

ALLIDA BLACK: During the pre-war years, they are much more in sync. They are more collaborative. They have the same priorities.

When the war comes, their relationship changes dramatically. First of all, Louis Howe, who really was the broker between them, is dead. And so, the one person that can treat both of them as equals is no longer on the scene. And Harry Hopkins, who was the great social reformer and the architect of the extraordinary work relief programs, moves into becoming basically an assistant president for the war and totally puts his devotion with FDR.

Eleanor believes that the lesson of World War I is that we won the war, but we lost the peace -- meaning that we had military victories, but when we came home, we didn't really capitalize on our

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 12 image as the savior of democracy to make America more democratic. For example, she will say like: We cursed Hitler yet support Jim Crow.

And so as FDR says 'Say goodbye to Dr. New Deal and hello to Dr. Win-the-War,' Eleanor that afternoon will have her own press conference and say, 'I, for one, will not put the New Deal away in lavender.'

And they're not together much. She travels more. He is closeted more with his military advisers. And so, a painful distance develops between the two of them.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: So, this isn't a strategic split to say, 'Well, you focus on this thing. I'll focus on the homefront.' It's that their priorities really are diverging?

ALLIDA BLACK : Well, I mean, if FDR wanted to stop it, he could've stopped it.

PAUL SPARROW: I think it's particularly evident in the Japanese internment story. Eleanor Roosevelt was adamantly opposed to the idea of locking up American citizens of Japanese descent. She argued vehemently not to do this. But FDR was under tremendous pressure from the military, from Southern Democrats, from a lot of the West Coast politicians.

They wanted these Japanese citizens locked up, and she fought him tooth and nail, right to the point where he had to say, 'Eleanor, you can't fight me on this. Stop it.' So, after is issued in February of 1942, what does Eleanor do? She goes to visit the camps.

ALLIDA BLACK: Eleanor's fighting to adopt Japanese-American families; to let Japanese men who want to fight, fight; to improve the conditions in the camp. And my favorite example of this is the man who led the riots in ’s name was Togo Tanaka. All of his belongings were destroyed in the camps, but he had a daughter and named his daughter Eleanor after her.

So, what Eleanor does is to say that race is a problem we cannot hide in our closet. Democracy will progress as long as race progresses, and we're all on trial to show what democracy means.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: FDR is elected to the presidency an unprecedented four times. And his last swearing into office is on January 20, 1945. This is right when World War II is starting to turn toward allied victory, but the war is still very much raging.

ALLIDA BLACK: By 1945, I think the Roosevelts still loved each other -- well, I know the Roosevelts still loved each other. I just don't think they knew how to love each other, in a way. They had become so much partners in trying to help the nation that they were not partners in helping each other. Eleanor was on the road so much in '43, '44 and '45. And FDR had so much pressure with the war. They had become not strangers, but distant, in a way.

And FDR had asked Anna, his daughter, to help arrange for Lucy to come back in the White House when Eleanor was away.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: This is Lucy Mercer, the woman whom FDR had the affair with decades before. In April 1945, FDR goes down to Warm Springs, Georgia with Lucy, and while he's there with her, he has a cerebral hemorrhage and he dies.

Presidential podcast wapo.st/presidential 13 ALLIDA BLACK: And so, once again, Eleanor finds out that Lucy is back in FDR's life. And she takes the train from Washington down to Warm Springs. She goes into his bedroom and sits with his body for a few minutes in a very private, intimate way and comes back out and arranges for the body to be brought back to Washington. It's a 16-hour train ride.

And as they put the casket on a train, all the people of Warm Springs just turn out -- all the farmers. And Eleanor sits in the window of the train and stays awake the entire time and watches all of the American people along the railroad.

She was sad for herself but she was just, I think, grief-stricken for the American people because of all the outpouring that they saw. I mean, sure, some people hated FDR, people hated Eleanor. But he was the most beloved, and she was the most beloved person in the world. And he had been president for 13 years. And the war wasn't over yet. And so, she she carried that.

And then she had to decide, you know, what was next for her and what she could do. And people came to her to ask her to run for the Senate from New York or be secretary of Labor or be president of a college, you know.

And she just says, 'You need not worry. My voice will not be silent.' But she felt like if she was that public, it would somehow weaken or disparage FDR's legacy. And so, Eleanor will go to her grave, lying, saying that she never influenced FDR on policy, and totally obscuring the role she had in setting up the United Nations. You know, the role that she had in domestic policies in the United States.

LILLIAN CUNNINGHAM: And how does she die?

ALLIDA BLACK : She died of tuberculosis that was misdiagnosed. But she was with it until the end. I mean, always prodding, always challenging. She had 103 fever, she was bleeding from the inside of the throat, but she stayed alive to finish her last book, 'Tomorrow Is Now,' which was written to young people. She says: ‘Saying aloof is not a solution. It is a cowardly evasion.’

I mean, Eleanor would say, 'Courage is more exhilarating than fear. And in the long run, it is easier. All we have to have is the courage to face ourself in the mirror, and take one step at a time.'

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