Sigh; I see people aren’t reading the links.
It was well-known that he had some problems. It was NOT well known, and it was assiduously hidden, that he was fully paralyzed; moreover his extreme health in the 1944 election was also hidden.
People’s memories are wont to say “we all knew that.” I refer to a recent scholarly book on FDR’s polio, titled “FDR’s Splendid Deception”
Well, if Monica had also been blowing a Russian naval attaché or carrying Bill’s love child, her scandal might have been deserving of all the attention.
Yes, indeed, some people aren’t reading the links.
*"He barely had the capacity to maneuver his walk by swinging his hips, and leaning on the arm of a family member or aide. He was only able to achieve this for a few feet at a time. Then the intense pain and exhaustion would set in. He mastered this dangerous feat, and was able to convince people that he was not incapacitated. . .
The public saw his struggle. They either didn’t accept or understand the situation at hand. . .
There were few occasions where FDR fully recognized the extent of his disability in public. One such occasion entailed a visit to a military hospital in Hawaii. As he toured the amputee wards in his wheelchair, he went by each bed allowing the men to see him exactly as he was. These men had a personal understanding of his condition, as they watched him reveal his most personal juncture. These visits to such facilities increased. He became a hero in the eyes of many, as he advocated on behalf of others with disabilities."*
That’s from the Ability Magazine story.
There were literally thousands of people who saw Roosevelt wheeled to a point, get hauled up by aides, stagger a few steps (while the flashbulbs went off) and then sit down again, repeating the process when he left. There were, as noted, many incidents of his visiting wounded soldiers in his wheelchair. Guests to the White House saw him wheeled into and out of meetings and dinners.
He wasn’t photographed in a wheelchair, that’s true. But it was an “open secret.”
That’s some snipping. Why, you left out
As well as
as well as the very title of the book; which I confess I’ve not read but which I think speaks for itself: FDR’s Splendid Deception: The Moving Story of Roosevelt’s Massive Disability-And the Intense Efforts to Conceal It from the Public
The issue is not whether or not a lot of people were able to figure out that the problem was worse than they were being told, especially as his condition progressed and he was longer in office; no doubt many did.
The point is that there were conscious, deliberate efforts to hide the full truth, which the press – and the people – aided in. I find it interesting to compare attitudes past and present, and to see how an objectively dishonest thing can work good.
if you have a cite indicating that nearly everyone was fully aware that he was totally paralyzed all along, please share it.
I dopn’t think this thread is well-served by you and I arguing over the definition of “open secret.”
Before he was President, Roosevelt was governor of New York. Before that, he was a public figure who had polio. People in the U.S. in the 1920s, 30s and 40s knew what polio was. His opponents called him a cripple.
I went to school in the 1950s with students who had polio. We didn’t show them in wheelchairs in class photos. Does that make it an “intense effort to conceal it” or a “gentlemen’s agreement”?
And for the record, he was never “totally paralyzed.” He was paralyzed from the waist down.
Being ill in of itself is not incapacitating. As long as he’s not at death’s door and still posesses all of his mental faculties, I don’t see a problem. We “hire” a president for his brain, not for his body.
Sure, an ill president could die in office, but it’s not the end of the world if he does. That’s why we have vice presidents.
Let’s put it this way: if tomorrow Bush’s doctor found that the President has cancer, but is likely going to survive for at least the rest of his term, how would you feel? Would you expect him to resign? What if he felt that he could recieve treatment and still fulfill his duties?
I think in this case it had a lot to do with FDR’s pride: he didn’t want people to pity him. Remember that there was a lot of predjudice against disabled people at the time-- they were semi-hidden from society. Today, a disabled Pesident would probably make public service announcements and try to support causes for disabled people, trying to use his disability to help others. It simply wasn’t the way things were done back then.
It is not the press’s place to decide what the public needs to know! That’s not noble behavior at all; it’s pretentious and deceitful. It’s more respectful of FDR, yes, and it’s part of why the media used to be on more intimate terms with the government. It’s not more respectful of anyone else. Yes, it might have hurt FDR, but even if it’s true, the press is not supposed to say “we’ve decided this information is irrelevant, and we’re protecting you from your prejudices.”
Of course not, however having Polio in the 1930’s indicated a more then decent possibility of becoming seriously ill and incapacitated. While we hire a President for his brain we also want him to be healthy.
How many people really elect Presidents in order to have the vice-President step in? Any way, the health of a presidential candidate is a valid concern. Dole’s age came up in the '96 elections and Cheney’s heart condition was a concern in the 2000 elections.
If he found out before election time then I’d expect the voters to be informed. I know Reagan and Carter both underwent surguries while President so health problems aren’t necessarily enough to disqualify someone from the office.
Marc
Marc
But the press makes news judgments all the time, and in doing so *is * deciding what the public needs to know. My point was simply that I think the press in those days did a better job of deciding what we needed to know than it does now.
I think a lot of people have rose colored glasses when it comes to looking at the nobility of the press in the past.
Marc
Did the people who voted for Roosevelt the last time need to know that he was going to die before finishing his term? I’d say yes, very much so. There are no certainties in this world, but people don’t, in my opinion, vote for the VP they want to see as President. They might take it into consideration, but FDR could’ve chosen Flipper and still been elected. Telling people that he’s likely to die and Flipper is going to be sworn in can change elections.
Wait a minute. Who in 1944 “knew” that FDR was going to die in his last term? Clearly, his health was going downhill. He suffered from congestive heart failure, chronic bronchitis and maybe some other things (that were completely unrelated to the polio). He was concerned enough about dying to dump Wallace as VP and replace him with Truman. But I think there’s a big difference between “I haven’t been feeling well” and “I know I won’t be here for the 1948 election.”
I know I’ve come off as an apologist in this thread, and I’m not trying to. But it’s a lot easier to look at events 60-70 years after they happened and decide they were clearly connected in a “conspiracy” than it is to accept the fact that Roosevelt may have thought that since he had dodged death so many times he might have thought nothing would kill him.
Who would have known had the media decided that it was important to 1. find out and, 2. report it?
You defended the notion that some things that media decided not to reveal were appropriately considered things we didn’t need to know. But if the press is deciding from the outset that we don’t need to know, then they don’t ever take the time to find out what the thing we don’t need to know actually is. If they decided that the pres’s health wasn’t important to report on, I’d warrant that they had decided that the pres’s health wasn’t important enough to investigate. You don’t investigate stories you’d refuse to print.
The one thing you can say for today’s media is that they need to fill so much more airtime that they are unlikely to skip something of real importance. They don’t necessarily understand from the outset how important what they’re saying is, but because they aren’t using as much editorial discretion, we get to hear about the things that aren’t important to them but are important to us.
We’re not talking about a cold; he was in very grave health. No, he did not have absolute epistemological certainty. But he was very, very ill; in far worse health than any president that we have ever elected before or since. It’s absurd to argue that wasn’t deserving of public consideration.