Franklin D. Roosevelt (SparkNotes Biography Guide)
By SparkNotes
()
About this ebook
Making the reading experience fun!
SparkNotes Biography Guides examine the lives of historical luminaries, from Alexander the Great to Virginia Woolf. Each biography guide includes: An examination of the historical context in which the person lived
A summary of the person’s life and achievements
A glossary of important terms, people, and events
An in-depth look at the key epochs in the person’s career
Study questions and essay topics
A review test
Suggestions for further reading
Whether you’re a student of history or just a student cramming for a history exam, SparkNotes Biography guides are a reliable, thorough, and readable resource.
Read more from Spark Notes
King Lear: No Fear Shakespeare Deluxe Student Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5As You Like It (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No Fear Shakespeare Audiobook: Julius Caesar Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Much Ado About Nothing (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Tempest (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Macbeth: No Fear Shakespeare Deluxe Student Edition Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Bird by Bird (SparkNotes Literature Guide) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Romeo and Juliet: No Fear Shakespeare Deluxe Student Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No Fear Shakespeare Audiobook: Romeo & Juliet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Richard III (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Merchant of Venice: No Fear Shakespeare Deluxe Student Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5100 Years of Solitude (SparkNotes Literature Guide) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Autobiography of Malcom X (SparkNotes Literature Guide) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Measure for Measure (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5The Outsiders (SparkNotes Literature Guide) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Winter's Tale (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Atlas Shrugged SparkNotes Literature Guide Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsTempest: No Fear Shakespeare Deluxe Student Edition Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Merchant of Venice (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Two Gentlemen of Verona (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsHenry V (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Romeo and Juliet SparkNotes Literature Guide Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsComedy of Errors (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5A Raisin in the Sun (SparkNotes Literature Guide) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOthello (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5King Lear (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Romeo and Juliet (No Fear Shakespeare Graphic Novels) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDune (SparkNotes Literature Guide) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings1984 SparkNotes Literature Guide Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Richard II (No Fear Shakespeare) Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Related to Franklin D. Roosevelt (SparkNotes Biography Guide)
Related ebooks
The US President Who Served Longer Than Any Other President - Biography of Franklin Roosevelt | Children's Biography Book Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsOver The Top: Veterans of the First World War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Cold War: Chronicling the Most Significant Events from The Cold War for Kids Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Presidency of Franklin D. Roosevelt: Confronting the Great Depression and World War II Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsFranklin D. Roosevelt: From the New Deal to the Second World War Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGale Researcher Guide for: World War II Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Great War in America Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Eisenhower: From the War to the White House Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsChurchill and Roosevelt: A Captivating Guide to the Life of Franklin and Winston Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSummary of Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch's The Nazi Conspiracy Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGale Researcher Guide for: The Big Three: Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsA Blueprint for War: FDR and the Hundred Days that Mobilized America Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Summary of Richard Haass's The World Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSummary of The Nazi Conspiracy by By Brad Meltzer and Josh Mensch :The Secret Plot to Kill Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Fifties Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Cold War Illinois Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsGale Researcher Guide for: FDR's Foreign Policy Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsAmerica First - The Battle Against Intervention 1940-1941 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Clever Teens' Guide to The Cold War: The Clever Teens’ Guides, #2 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Wilson Administration and Civil Liberties, 1917-1921 Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsDetroit in World War II Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Decisive Moments in History: The Attack on Pearl Harbor Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Cold War (SparkNotes History Note) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsSummary of Lloyd Clark's The Battle of the Tanks Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsThe Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 21 The Recent Days (1910-1914) Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsNothing Less Than War: A New History of America's Entry into World War I Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Uncle Ted: A G.I.'s Journal of World War II Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratingsWorld War I, President Wilson and His Fourteen Points - History 5th Grade | Children's Military Books Rating: 0 out of 5 stars0 ratings
Book Notes For You
Summary of The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Untamed by Glennon Doyle: Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary of Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Summary of 12 Rules For Life: An Antidote to Chaos by Jordan B. Peterson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Summary: The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck by Mark Manson Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Think Again: The Power of Knowing What You Don't Know by Adam Grant: Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5David D. Burns’ Feeling Good: The New Mood Therapy | Summary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Eight Dates: Essential Conversations for a Lifetime of Love by John Gottman: Conversation Starters Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Workbook for Atomic Habits: An Easy & Proven Way to Build Good Habits & Break Bad Ones by James Clear Rating: 1 out of 5 stars1/5Chaos: Charles Manson, the CIA, and the Secret History of the Sixties by Tom O'Neill: Conversation Starters Rating: 2 out of 5 stars2/5The Invisible Life of Addie LaRue by V. E. Schwab: Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes (A Hunger Games Novel) by Suzanne Collins: Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5The Midnight Library: A Novel by Matt Haig: Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Summary: “Greenlights" by Matthew McConaughey - Discussion Prompts Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5American Dirt (Oprah's Book Club): A Novel by Jeanine Cummins: Conversation Starters Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Summary of Ichiro Kishimi's and Fumitake Koga's book: The Courage to Be Disliked: Summary Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5No Fear Shakespeare Audiobook: Romeo & Juliet Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5The Compound Effect: Jumpstart Your Income, Your Life, Your Success by Darren Hardy: Conversation Starters Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Summary of Tomorrow, and Tomorrow, and Tomorrow A Novel by Gabrielle Zevin Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5SUMMARY Of The Plant Paradox: The Hidden Dangers in Healthy Foods That Cause Disease and Weight Gain Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Caste: The Origins of Our Discontents by Isabel Wilkerson: Conversation Starters Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5
Reviews for Franklin D. Roosevelt (SparkNotes Biography Guide)
0 ratings0 reviews
Book preview
Franklin D. Roosevelt (SparkNotes Biography Guide) - SparkNotes
Context
F ranklin Delano Roosevelt, who was in office for an unprecedented four terms, led the United States through two of its greatest crises, the Great Depression and World War II. The extravagance of the Roaring Twenties came to an abrupt end in 1929 with the crash of the stock market. Imprudent investment, a deceptive stock market bubble, and the natural boom and bust of the business cycle led to the beginning of the Great Depression in America. The first three and a half years of the depression were marked by dramatic signs of the nation's poverty: breadlines and soup kitchens in every city, families shivering in tents on the street in the middle of winter, men around fires at railroad tracks. President Herbert Hoover, who had been ushered into office during the prosperity of the twenties, was then swept from office by the Depression. His humanitarian sentiments were tempered by a strong distaste for using federal funds for direct aid to suffering Americans and an equal distaste for deficit spending.
Roosevelt, in the election of 1932, presented a strong contrast to Hoover's seeming impotence in office, and followed through on his promise to wage war against the ravages of the depression. Roosevelt and the new Congress authorized the use of government funds for either direct aid or for job creating programs. Though the relief programs of the New Deal prevented the bottom from falling out of a suffering nation, they did not bring the economic downturn to an end. At the beginning of World War II, the depression was in its eleventh year. There were still nine million people unemployed, despite the expenditure of billions of dollars of federal funds on jumpstarting the economy.
Americans faced a lighter load than many other countries after the First World War. The imposition of harsh war indemnities on the losers of the last battle and the retreat into isolationism of both victors and losers resulted in a worldwide depression. Desperate situations in countries such as Germany–where inflation was so severe that many people were paid in cash by the wagonload and burned currency to keep warm–encouraged the rise of fascist dictators such as Hitler in Germany and Mussolini in Italy. These men took advantage of the desperate situations in their nations to rise to power on a platform of imperialist ambition.
The spirit of isolationism and the poor economic situation in Europe prompted Britain and France to look askance at Germany's violations of the Treaty of Versailles, signed at the end of the First World War. Germany began by imposing compulsory military service for all of its citizens. Since nearly all of Germany's possessions had been destroyed at the end of WWI, their factories began to produce new munitions to outfit a larger army than before. They soon had an army of over six million men with the newest and most potent weapons in the world. When Hitler began to lay claims on lands taken from the country in the Treaty of Versailles, Britain and France, suffering from their own economic problems and reluctant to fight, followed a policy of appeasement for even the most dubious of claims. Yet, Germany continued to be an aggressor. Britain and France reluctantly declared war only when Germany invaded Poland without cause, and their hopes for preventing another large-scale conflict were dashed. In the Far East, the Japanese followed through on their hopes for increased power by invading China in 1937.
The German army quickly routed France, and Britain remained the only hope for a democratic victory. The Japanese continued their attack on China but watched as their resources shrank, and they placed ever-increasing reliance on shipments from an ever more tight fisted America. Americans, however, watched both conflicts with considerable detachment because of the vast oceans that separated them from the aggressors. Roosevelt, with his experience as Assistant Secretary of War during WWI, understood the importance of what was going on across the seas. He had, however, also watched Woodrow Wilson before him try and fail to push foreign policy objectives without the support of the people. Roosevelt thus felt he could only wait, as even aid to Britain was greeted with distrust from an isolationist American populace. Roosevelt could only bide his time or risk losing his power in office.
Yet Germany, perhaps with the memory of the defeat at the hands of American troops in World War I, was reluctant to commit any violence that would require the entry of America into the war. It took the imperialist ambitions of Japan to bring America into the war. Though Roosevelt viewed Japan's aggressions against China with equal dislike as the actions of Germany and Italy, the majority of the American people did not share his view. The invasion of Pearl Harbor in December of 1941, however, became the devastating provocation that Roosevelt needed to rally the country behind him. It was thus with acute political acumen that Roosevelt led the country through the Great Depression and to its victory in World War II.
American industry, under the able leadership of Jimmy Byrnes, met the impossibly high production targets Roosevelt set. The vast numbers of jobs the war created finally managed to end the Depression, which had endured years of government spending that many historians in hindsight say was far too little too late. An Allied invasion of North Africa in November 1942 drove the Germans out and across the Mediterranean, and set the stage for an Allied invasion of Sicily and Italy in the summer of 1943. In the fall of 1943, the leaders of the Allies, Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin, met for the first time. Stalin was tired of fighting the war in Europe, and Roosevelt promised to invade Europe by spring of 1944. On June 6, 1944, Allied forces landed on the Normandy coast of France. In August 1944, they liberated Paris and in a month had driven Germany almost entirely out of France. In the Pacific, American forces had newly captured or recaptured all the strategic islands east of Japan, retaken the Philippines, and gotten close to taking Japan itself.
By the time Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin met again at Yalta, an Allied victory was almost guaranteed. The results of this meeting–the creation of the UN,