A Third Term for FDR: The Election of 1940

American Presidential Elections

by John W. Jeffries

In 1940, for the first time since America's founding, a sitting president sought a third term in office. But this was only one remarkable aspect of that year's election, which was, as John Jeffries makes clear in his new book, one of the most interesting and important elections in American history.

Franklin Roosevelt's plan to pack the Supreme Court had failed; in the wake of a recent recession, his New Deal had hardened support and opposition among both parties; and the German advance across Europe, along with Japanese aggression in Asia, was stirring fierce debate over America's role in the world. Adding to the moment of profound uncertainty was FDR's procrastination over whether to run again. Jeffries explores how these tensions played out and what they meant, not just for the presidential election but also for domestic politics and policy generally, and for state and local contests. In the context of the Roosevelt Coalition and the New Deal party system, he parses the debates and struggles within both the Democratic and Republican parties as Roosevelt deliberated over running and Wendell Wilkie, a businessman from Indiana and New York City, got the nod from Republicans over a field including the rising moderate Thomas E. Dewey, the conservative Michigan senator Arthur Vandenburg, and the isolationist Ohio senator Robert Taft.

A Third Term for FDR reveals how domestic policy more than international events influenced Roosevelt's decision to run and his victory in November. A detailed analysis of the results offers insights into the impact of the year's events on voting, and into the election's long-term implications and ramifications--many of which continue to this day.

264 pages, Kindle Edition

First published March 24, 2017

About the author

John W. Jeffries, Professor Emeritus and Dean Emeritus of the College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences (Ph.D. Yale University)

Dean Jeffries specializes in twentieth-century America and American political and policy history. His distinguished teaching has earned him designation as a UMBC Presidential Teaching Professor and gained him a University of Maryland Regents Award for Teaching Excellence. Professor Jeffries is also a member of the Policy Sciences Graduate Program faculty. He is the author of articles and books on the politics and policy of the Franklin D. Roosevelt era and on the World War II American home front, including Testing the Roosevelt Coalition and Wartime America: The World War II Home Front. He is editor of the 1929-1945 volume of the Encyclopedia of American History (2003, 2nd edition 2009) and is currently working on a study of domestic policy making during World War II. Dr. Jeffries is an Organization of American Historians Distinguished Lecturer for 2004-2016.

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Reviews

[Mark · Rating 3 out of 5]

When American voters went to the polls in 1940, they faced a momentous choice. With war in both Europe and Asia, international affairs loomed larger in their minds than they had in decades. Though the conflicts were proving a boon to the American economy, the effects of the Great Depression still had not completely abated. And, most dramatically, Americans were being asked for the first time in their history to elect an incumbent president to a third term in office, a choice that was defined for many by the specter of war and the drift towards authoritarian rule throughout much of the world.

All of these factors made the presidential election of 1940 one of the most significant in its history, and one that has been the subject of numerous books. What John Jeffries offers in this compact study is a reevaluation of the contest that situates it within the political history of the decades that surrounded it. In adopting this perspective, he downplays the role foreign policy played in determining its outcome, showing that while concerns about the wars overseas were an important factor in the contest, these played out in a race the results of which were defined by the political realignment that had taken place over the previous decade and the domestic considerations which had fueled it.

This realignment was a product of the traumas inflicted by the Great Depression. With Republicans in control of the federal government at the start of the crisis, they received full blame for their failure to resolve it, thanks in part to an effective publicity operation by the Democratic Party. This heralded an organizational edge that the Democrats enjoyed throughout the decade, one that offset the Republicans’ fundraising advantages and allowed them to make the most of the demographic trends from which they were benefiting. From this emerged the “Roosevelt Coalition,” an unstable mix of voter groups that gave Democrats commanding majorities throughout the 1930s.

The victories enjoyed by Democrats in the elections of the mid-1930s were so enormous as to be unsustainable. The first signs of this were in the 1938 midterm elections, the first in a decade in which a revitalized Republican Party made significant gains at both the federal and state level. The results fueled optimism about the party’s prospects in 1940, yet so complete was the electoral devastation over the past decade that their “bench” of presidential prospects was thin. Jeffries identifies three leading candidates for Republicans that year: Michigan senator Arthur Vandenberg, Ohio senator Robert Taft, and New York district attorney Thomas Dewey, each of whom had serious drawbacks as a presidential candidate that were exacerbated by the growing importance of foreign policy as a political issue. The dissatisfaction of many within the GOP created an opening for a “dark horse” candidate who might be able to surmount these divisions and offer a more formidable challenge to the Democrats.

That candidate was Wendell Willkie. Despite being only a recent convert to the Republican Party, his emergence in the mid-1930s as a dynamic critic of New Deal policy made the utilities executive an appealing choice for many on the party’s moderate Eastern wing. Though not at first an announced candidate, thanks in part to the efforts of such influential supporters as magazine editor Russell Davenport and Oren Root, Jr., the grandnephew of one of Theodore Roosevelt’s cabinet secretaries, Willkie enjoyed a groundswell of popular support in the months leading up to the Republican National Convention. Willkie also benefited from events abroad, as his staunchly pro-Allied advocacy contrasted favorably with Taft and Vandenberg’s isolationism and Dewey’s vague and noncommittal stance. It was a potent mix that allowed Willie to emerge victorious on the sixth ballot.

Even as Willkie accepted the nomination, however, the identity of his opponent remained unknown. Jeffries notes that as early as 1937 Roosevelt faced questions as to whether he would run for a third term, to which he always responded noncommittally. While there remains no definitive proof of when Roosevelt made up his mind, the author concludes that it was likely not until early July that the president decided to run. Again, Jeffries cites domestic considerations as key, particularly the lack of a sufficiently liberal choice among the prospects who would continue to take the Democratic Party in the direction he wanted. With such contenders as Vice President John Nance Gardner, Democratic National chairman James Farley, and Secretary of State Cordell Hull deemed too conservative, Roosevelt concluded that the best way to preserve his legacy was to remain in office, which he followed up by forcing the convention to choose the left-wing Secretary of Agriculture, Henry Wallace, as his running mate.

After winning renomination, Roosevelt embarked on a “noncampaign campaign,” consisting of ostensibly apolitical inspection tours of bases and defense plants. The coolness which Roosevelt exhibited contrasted with the frenetic activities of the Willkie campaign. Though party professionals chafed at the amateurism of its management, it reflected well the candidate at the center of it. Willkie’s impulsive campaigning was both a strength and a weakness, conveying the candidate’s infectious energy in an effort characterized by chaos. By mid-October, his frustration with Roosevelt’s persistent lead in the polls led to a growing tendency towards frantic exaggeration, with claims that a third term would result in state socialism and war. Only in the final weeks did Roosevelt hit the campaign trail, at which point he cemented his lead with a series of effective rebuttals of Willkie’s charges that were mixed with promises of what might be accomplished in a new term.

Yet for all of the president’s outward confidence and his lead in the polls, Jeffries notes that on election night Roosevelt followed the returns more nervously than he had four years earlier. And while he won an impressive 54.7% of the popular vote and a commanding 449-82 result in the Electoral College, the numbers represented a decline from the lopsided figures he enjoyed previously. Jeffries sees in this the first signs of the “dealignment” that would emerge in the decades that followed, as Republicans gradually became more competitive in presidential contests. It’s a point that reflects the revisionist approach that the author takes to a well-covered subject. Though he arguably errs a little too far in the opposite direction in the extent to which he downplays the importance of foreign affairs in shaping voters’ decisions, Jeffries nevertheless provides a valuable overview of the 1940 presidential election, one that is deserving of the author’s description of it as among the most important in American history.

[Bob Miller · Rating 5 out of 5]

Jeffries shows off his depth of knowledge when it comes to wartime America, politics, and Franklin D. Roosevelt, three of my favorite topics. He argues, somewhat convincingly, that domestic politics played as great a role as international affairs in convincing FDR to run for an unprecedented third term. The book offers some insights, intended or not, about how other presidential campaign and conventions have been run compared to the two major parties' efforts in 1940. A good, quick, informative read.

Here is my Choice review:



In Wartime America (1996), Jeffries (emer., Univ. of Maryland, Baltimore County) examined the political shift away from the New Deal to more conservative trends in the elections of 1940, 1942, and 1944. His new book looks at the 1940 election with fresh eyes. Jeffries argues that intraparty squabbles more than foreign policy ultimately shaped FDR’s decision to run for an unprecedented third term. Two political missteps—FDR’s disastrous attempt to modify the makeup of the Supreme Court, followed by his unsuccessful attempt to “purge” conservative southern Democratic candidates in the election of 1938—created the drama at the 1940 Democratic convention. Meanwhile, a charismatic political amateur and newcomer, Indiana industrialist Wendell Willkie, surprised the leadership and the traditional candidates in the Republican Party. Willkie's method of conducting mass rallies electrified a grassroots campaign that helped him win the nomination. If the race for the nomination was full of drama, Jeffries contends that the general election was more predictable. Willkie, the untested and undisciplined candidate, floundered in the final months of the campaign. As the war in Europe worsened, FDR effectively used his role as commander-in-chief to coast to an unprecedented third term.
--B. Miller, University of Cincinnati-Clermont

Summing Up: Recommended. General collections and up.

[Earl Ecklund III · Rating 5 out of 5]

The 1940 presidential election is best remembered for FDR's successful bid for an unprecedented third term. Yet as as Jeffries shows at the beginning of the year that was anything but a certainty.

From 1937 on there was speculation about if FDR would pursue a third term but it seems unlikely that FDR planned to until the beginning of World War II and the sudden successful blitzkrieg campaign of Nazi Germany in overrunning most of Western Europe. While others such as Jim Farley and John Nance Garner sought the Democratic nomination the party belonged to FDR still.

On the Republican side the nomination was sought by NY city prosecutor Thomas E. Dewey, Senator Robert Taft, Senator Arthur Vanderberg and a businessman labeled "the darkest of the dark horses" Wendell Wilkie. In a stunning upset Wilkie, who had joined the Republican party only the year before, was able to capture the nomination.

Jeffries aptly describes the 1940 election campaign as "a novice dark-horse candidate new to his party ran against ain't incumbent President running for an unprecedented third term." Throughout the campaign while Wilkie made many stops FDR conducted a series of "non-political" inspections of various defense facilities throughout the country.

While FDR won in the end, in many states the margin was close enough that the result could have easily gone the other way.

I highly recommend this book on a largely overlooked campaign and election that definitely deserves more attention.

[Jon · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good overview of 1940 election w/insights into competing factions in Republican and Democratic parties. Emphasis on domestic issues rather than international events.