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• Fdr fireside chats role of government full#

Again, he acted without congressional approval and in full circumvention of existing neutrality laws. In mid-September, amid the fall presidential canvass, FDR announced that he would exchange upwards of 50 American destroyers for two British naval bases and 99-year leases on several others. (Edison refused, to which the president replied tartly, “forget it and do what I told you to do.”) Hugh Johnson, FDR’s former recovery chief and by then a committed isolationist, wasn’t far from the truth when he noted that the president was “shooting craps with destiny.” When Hap Arnold, a high-ranking Army general, repeated concerns that the order would adversely affect America’s war readiness, FDR told an aide that “if Arnold won’t comply, maybe we’ll have to move him out of town.” When the Navy’s judge advocate general balked at sanctioning the transfer, FDR instructed Secretary of the Navy Charles Edison to send the “sea lawyer” on a protracted vacation. When the secretary of war voiced concern about the legality of the order, the president ordered him to comply or resign.

He did so over the strong objections of his military advisers, including Army Chief of Staff George Marshall. On June 1, weeks before France surrendered to Germany, Roosevelt unilaterally bypassed the Neutrality Act by declaring enormous caches of military equipment “surplus” and ordering that they be shipped with dispatch to Britain. In the months preceding his “arsenal of democracy” address, faced with a country that was divided about sending economic and military aid to Britain but very much against getting itself into the war, FDR worked assiduously to thread a very thin needle. Today, as America enters its 16th year of active military operations in the Middle East, and as the war on terror (at home and abroad) assumes greater prominence in the 2016 election cycle, the conversation that Roosevelt initiated so long ago remains surprisingly relevant.

Equally important, it sparked a vibrant debate over the meaning of America’s role in the world and, indeed, the very meaning of American freedom itself. After hearing it roll off the tongue of French economist Jean Monnet (who likely coined it) earlier in the year, FDR’s confidant, Felix Frankfurter, secured Monnet’s agreement “not to use that phrase again.” Now by design, it entered America’s wartime lexicon as the living expression of the country’s march away from isolation.įDR’s fireside chat laid the groundwork for America’s entry into the war less than a year later. We must be the great arsenal of democracy.”Ī canny student of language, FDR had been holding the watchwords “arsenal of democracy” in check for the right moment. To preserve universal freedom, the president urged, “we must have more ships, more guns, more plans-more of everything. … It is no exaggeration to say that all of us, in all the Americas, would be living at the point of a gun.” “If Great Britain goes down,” he warned, “the Axis powers will control the continents of Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia and the high seas. Staying true to his campaign pledge of several weeks earlier, that America would not declare war on the Axis powers unless it were attacked, the president still made a forceful case for American military support to Britain. In Asia, Japan had swallowed up large parts of China and cast a watchful eye toward the Central and South Pacific.įor over 36 minutes and 53 seconds, Roosevelt spoke to his captive audience about the imperative of American engagement in the conflict. Across the Atlantic, Britain was engaged in a death struggle with Hitler’s Germany, which had already laid claim to vast regions of Europe, from France and the lowlands in the west to Poland in the east.

Eastern time to address an increasingly restive nation on the sobering topic of war mobilization. Follow him years ago this evening, on December 29, 1940, Franklin Delano Roosevelt-recently reelected to an unprecedented third term in office-took to the airwaves at 9:30 p.m. He is currently writing a book on the making of Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society. Josh Zeitz has taught American history and politics at Cambridge University and Princeton University and is the author of Lincoln’s Boys: John Hay, John Nicolay, and the War for Lincoln's Image.