The rise and influence of Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War 2 Essay

The rise and influence of Franklin D. Roosevelt during World War 2 - Essay Example Franklin Delano Roosevelt, America’s longest serving President, is one of the most important political figures of the twentieth century. He led the USA through twelve years of domestic and international disorder and war. It is a general perception among people that no American President is more concerned about how he is portrayed than Franklin Roosevelt. He shrouded himself in dozens of disguises, including Sphinx, Father, Doctor, and Captain of the Ship of State. One main theme was consistent. Franklin Roosevelt invariably represented himself and was portrayed by others, as hale, hearty, optimistic, and healthy, his most brilliant disguise. That image of vigor makes ironic the debate over the depiction of Roosevelt in his memorial statues in Washington, DC, and raises complex issues about the portrayal of the best known but most enigmatic president of the twentieth century.Historians have always ranked Roosevelt as one of the greatest presidents of the United States along with George Washington and Abraham Lincoln. Franklin Roosevelt and World War II Between 1929 and 1945 the United States experienced a global depression and another world war. During t his time of grave calamity almost everywhere, economic collapse called forth political instability and nationalist movements. In Europe and Asia the rise of Italian fascism, German Nazism, and Japanese militarism intensified economic competition over markets and scarce resources, resulting in conflict and war . In the countries of Latin America the Great Depression led to breakdowns and political difficulties, the consequences of which encouraged the United States to respond in distinctive ways by fashioning a Good Neighbor policy. The Great Depression, which set in after the historic Stock Market Crash of 1929, and World War II would bring substantial expansion of the practice and its concepts. President Franklin D Roosevelt, a consummate practitioner who had been tutored in public relations by Louis McHenry Howe since 1912, would lead the way. He was elected four times against the strong opposition of the majority of American newspapers by using his true strong leadership and taking his message to the people on the nation's front pages and on radios. The term "good neighbor", a kind of commonplace in diplomatic language, took on actual meaning during the presidencies of Herbert C. Hoover and Franklin D. Roosevelt. For Latin Americans the term signified the end of an era of direct intervention by the United States in Latin American affairs. For the Roosevelt administration the Good Neighbor policy also functioned significantly in other ways: It served as an international counterpart of the New Deal by attacking the economic effects of the Great Depression and later as a means of mobilizing resistance among the nations of the New World against the Axis powers during the Second World War. As the historian Robert Freeman Smith explains, taken together the various components formed "a massive, although ill-defined government effort" under U.S direction to create "an integrated hemisphere system" characterized by high levels of "political, economic and military co-operation". FDR's success in winning public support spurred the efforts of the conservative forces, particularly Big Business, to develop programs to counter his appeals. To bring the United States out of the Depression, President Roosevelt initiated a number of actions agencies - the Agricultural Adjustment Administration, the Civilian Conservation Corps, and the Works Project Administration - that required extensively publicity in order to gain cooperation and acceptance. Thus, the public information system in the federal government was greatly enlarged in FDR's administration. In a sense and to oversimplify - the Second World