FDR'S SENATE ALLY | Joseph T. Robinson (1872-1937)

Senate Majority Leader Joseph T. 
Robinson. (Official Senate Portrait
from the Senate website.) 

As we look back to the astonishingly fast restoration of public confidence in Washington in 1933, we should look beyond FDR to the support he had from his Cabinet and from his Capitol Hill allies.

My special interest is the first Secretary of the Treasury, Will Woodin. In the Congress, the Congressional architect of the Federal Reserve System headed the Senate Banking Committee, Carter Glass (D-Va.).

But as I look at the record, I see another early ally in the Senate, Joseph T. Robinson (D-Ark., 1872-1937), Majority Leader.

Robinson was first elected a U.S. senator in 1913 under Wilson. He was elected by his fellow Senators minority (Democratic) leader in 1923, and became the first formally titled Senate majority leader in 1933 after FDR swept both houses of Congress. Robinson’s grandest moment was probably when he pushed FDR’s emergency banking bill through both houses in seven hours (Senate Leaders) and through the Senate, one report says, in just 40 minutes. A newspaper described the process as "brute animal strength.” He was FDR’s strongest ally in the Congress. (Senate bio.)

Born on a farm near Lonoke, Lonoke County, Arkansas, on August 26, 1872, he attended the local public schools and the University of Arkansas at Fayetteville. He went on to the law school of the University of Virginia at Charlottesville; he was admitted to the bar in 1895 and commenced practice in Lonoke, Ark. (House bio.)

He was elected to the State general assembly in 1895, then as a Democrat to the 58th and four succeeding Congresses, serving from March 4, 1903, to January 14, 1913, when he resigned, having been elected Governor. When he resigned he was chairman the Committee on Public Lands of the 62nd Congress. (House bio.)

He served only 55 days as Governor of Arkansas because he was elected Senator in 1913 to fill the seat vacated by the death of Senator Jeff Davis. He was reelected in 1918, 1924, 1930 and 1936 and served from March 10, 1913, until his death. (House bio)

In the Senate, besides serving minority leader and Democratic caucus chairman 1923-1933 and majority leader and Democratic caucus chairman 1933-1937, he was chairman of the Committee on Expenditures in the Treasury Department (63rd and 64th Congresses), Committee on Claims (65th Congress), and unsuccessful candidate for Vice President of the United States on the Democratic ticket in 1928. (House bio)

From the outset, Robinson impressed other Senators with his careful speeches that could incorporate a killer’s instinct for debate. He mastered the Senate's complex rules and practices; he possessed tenacious loyalty to friends and party and a passion for detail. Wedded to his job, he arrived early each day, stayed late, and studied legislation at home. (Bacon, 64.)

Robinson was regarded as a southern progressive, like Woodrow Wilson (Arkansas Governors), and he supported Wilson even when other Democrats faltered. He championed the Keating-Owen Child Labor Act and worked to regulate railroads and other key industries. He led the Senate to arm merchant ships and voted to declare war on Germany. (Bacon, 69.) He also led the unsuccessful effort in the Senate to ratify the Treaty of Versailles. (Senate Leaders.)

Robinson gained influence in the Senate and later served as Chairman of the 1920 Democratic National Convention. In 1923, the Senate Democratic floor leader Oscar Underwood, who served as the Senate Minority Leader, resigned due to illness. By unanimous acclamation, Robinson replaced him as Democratic leader, a position he would hold until his death in 1937. (Senate Leaders.)

As minority leader, Robinson took over the distribution of patronage appointments and reformed the committee assignment process, decreeing that no senator would hold the top Democratic position in more than one important committee, a rule that survives to the Obama and Trump eras. A resident of Capitol Hill, he kept constant watch on any dissension within the Republican ranks, making deals on both sides of the aisle and helping to facilitate negotiations with the era's succession of GOP presidents. (Senate Leaders.)

At the Chevy Chase Country Club, a fellow golfer asked to move ahead of the senator's foursome. Robinson refused. During an angry exchange, Robinson socked the doctor, knocking him to the ground. The club expelled Robinson and the press called him the "pugilist" senator. (Senate Leaders.)

Robinson was the Democratic candidate for vice president in 1928, as the running mate of Alfred E. Smith. Robinson clashed with Senator James Thomas Heflin, a Democrat from Alabama, who frequently made anti-Catholic comments. Robinson took issue: "I have heard [the senator] denounce the Catholic Church and the Pope of Rome … until I am sick and tired of it, as a Democrat.” Helfin shot back: "The Senator from Arkansas can not remain leader of the Democrats and fight the Roman Catholics' battle every time the issue is raised in this body." Robinson held a vote of confidence and all senators present (Heflin was not) pledged support to their leader against religious bigotry. (Senate Leaders.)

After Smith lost to Republican Herbert Hoover, Robinson's impassioned speeches made him a national figure. He continued to score victories as the Senate's minority leader, even though his cooperative relationship with Hoover annoyed members of his party. However, since no other senator possessed Robinson's tenacity and influence, they relied on his leadership. (Senate Leaders.)

Robinson became Senate Majority Leader by a unanimous vote in 1933 when Democrats became the majority, the first Democrat to have the formal title. Some Senators resented his autocratic style and in debate he could be terrifying. (Senate Leaders.)

A Senate press gallery attendant, Richard Riedel, remembered: "When [Robinson] would go into one of his rages, it took little imagination to see fire and smoke rolling out of his mouth like some fierce dragon. Robinson could make Senators and everyone in his presence quake by the burning fire of his eyes, the baring of his teeth as he ground out the words, and the clenching of his mighty fists as he beat on the desk before him." (Riedel, 142.)

Franklin (L) and Eleanor Roosevelt with Joseph
Robinson, Washington, D.C. 1933. (National
Archives photo.)

As Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal "marshal," he ensured the passage of countless bills relating to the Depression and social policy, his most impressive victory being the Emergency Banking Act, which he pushed through both houses of Congress in seven hours, and the Senate in 40 minutes. (Senate Leaders.)

The press referred to him as "scrappy Joe." He fought with other Senators. For example, when the United States entered World War I, Robinson denounced senators who opposed the war effort. When La Follette opposed the war, Robinson questioned his patriotism on the Senate floor; La Follette had to be restrained. Robinson's response to a guard who questioned his credentials at the 1920 Democratic National Convention was a punch in the face. (Senate Leaders.)

FDR’s controversial Supreme Court packing plan proved too much for the leader. Before a final vote came to pass in 1937, Robinson suffered a fatal heart attack. Roosevelt's Court packing plan was defeated. (Senate bio.)

Robinson died in Washington, D.C., July 14, 1937. The funeral was held in the Chamber of the United States Senate. He was buried in Roselawn Memorial Park in Little Rock, Arkansas. (House bio.)

U.S. PRESIDENT, NY GOVERNOR | One Weak, One Strong

March 30, 2020—The President denied the gravity of the crisis and stuck with his free-market message. The Governor of New York State understood the crisis and took action at once. The Governor was a stronger leader than the President, or any other Governor. The President tried to squash the New York Governor, and failed. Aghast at looking like a wimp, the President took decisive action against a vulnerable group that desperately needed help. The President's callousness backfired and from then on, the President's reelection prospects were doomed.

Hoover (L) and FDR, March 1933

The context, of course, was October 29, 1929. After dropping 5 percent the day before, the NYSE index dropped another 20 percent on what is called Black Tuesday. GOP President Herbert Hoover announced that this was a temporary blip and that the economy was “sound and prosperous.” 

However, the market persisted with its decline  and by mid-1932 it was a mere 17 percent of its September 1929 peak. By early 1933, 45 percent of all farm mortgages and 40 percent of home mortgages were in default. 

Hoover's excessive optimism and lack of action was noted in early 1930 by New York State's Labor Commissioner, Frances Perkins. When Hoover said the job market was rebounding, she observed that the Bureau of Labor Statistics data did not support this statement, and the January 1930 job numbers had deteriorated. Governor Franklin Roosevelt believed Perkins, and told her so, and in March 1930, he created the first state commission on employment in the country. He then became the first Governor to support the idea of unemployment insurance. Hoover said in May that the worst was over, but Governor Roosevelt told Democrats at their annual dinner at the Commodore Hotel (now the Grand Hyatt Hotel) that he disagreed and that Hoover's crowd just didn’t care about the impact of the crisis on vulnerable members of the public. The next speaker called for FDR's reelection as Governor.

Hoover (L) and FDR, March 1933

In 1930, the GOP put up racket-busting Charles Tuttle to oppose FDR's reelection as Governor (until the Constitution was revised in 1938, New York's Governors were elected every two years). Tuttle attacked FDR for not repudiating Tammany Hall. Hoover sent three Cabinet members—(1) the Oklahoman Secretary of State, (2) a New Yorker who was Secretary of War, and (3) the Undersecretary and later Secretary of the Treasury, New Yorker Ogden Mills—to support Tuttle and attack FDR. 

FDR ignored Tuttle's attacks and instead stuck with promoting his programs for unemployment insurance and old-age pensions. Not until three days before the election did he address Tuttle's attacks on him for being too close to Tammany Hall. He said he would address the charges in the courts, where they could be proven, and not in the newspapers. He attacked one of the visiting spokesmen for Hoover as a carpetbagging outsider and the other two as defeated candidates for Governor who had already been rejected by the State. “We of the Empire State can take care of ourselves,” said FDR. Tammany’s Jim Farley meanwhile delivered the most lopsided victory of any New York Governor.

So FDR had some momentum in 1932 when he took on Hoover, who botched his reelection effort by looking savage when he should have looked kind, and vice versa. Having shown himself as a ditherer on the economy, Hoover decided to look strong by sending in the U.S. Army to rout the unarmed veterans who were assembled to ask for early payment of World War I bonuses. At the order of Secretary of War Patrick Hurley, General Douglas MacArthur led cavalry and tanks to force with tear gas the decampment of unemployed World War I veterans. The troops burned the makeshift shelters. The Capitol's Republican newspaper said: “If the Army must be called out to make war on unarmed citizens, this is no longer America.”

Meanwhile, Hoover was gentle where he should have been tough. To calm the financial markets, he needed to reassure the financial community that his Treasury policies would continue whether or not Hoover himself was reelected. He therefore asked FDR to commit himself to certain free- market and sound-money principles, though he knew that such a commitment would be incompatible with FDR’s New Deal proposals. FDR waited more than a week to respond, and then coolly replied to Hoover that it was too late for “mere statements,” showing Hoover up as too weak to take needed action. FDR stuck to that line right up to the inauguration, despite Hoover's rising panic as banks folded, gold flowed out to Europe, and unemployment rose, making the runup to the election and inauguration as disruptive as it could be. A good administrator, but not a leader, Hoover was helpless as tragedy washed over the country.

FDR beat Hoover in a huge landslide in 1932. The day before the inauguration, Hoover  told FDR, who had suggested calling on someone, “You will learn that the President of the United States calls on nobody.” FDR and Hoover famously rode together to FDR's inauguration. Hoover asked a favor of the President, to keep on a member of his staff. FDR was mostly silent. The two of them never again met.

After his first press conference, FDR paid a call to the I Street home of retired Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes, whose birthday it was, and asked Holmes for advice, thereby ignoring Hoover's advice. FDR took the advice of Holmes, who said, as a veteran of the Union Army: “Mr. President, you are in a war. Form your battalions and fight.”

The Great Depression, but not poverty, ended within weeks of the arrival of FDR, as the nation recognized that someone was in charge and people started going back to work. Key elements were: (1) Treasury Secretary William H. Woodin’s commandeering of the Bureau of Engraving and Printing to produce greenbacks, pack them up for the banks, send off the trucks to the banks, and film the entire process for the newsreels in movie theaters during the following weeks, all across the country. (2) President Roosevelt’s Fireside Chats, which showed that someone competent was in charge and that people could be confident that the country would get through the crisis. 

FDR showed public relations genius as well as an acute understanding of the nature of the problem the country faced and how it could be. He put a Republican CEO in charge of implementing the practical steps to address the panic and then rebuild the country. He told Will Woodin to handle the task of getting money out to the banks, while he crafted his Fireside Chats. The financial system they created lasted for 70 years. FDR's social safety net is still with us.

The story resonates today, as we watch President Donald J. Trump interface with Governor Andrew Cuomo. History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes. 

P.S. (May 16, 2020) ProPublica, a nonprofit investigative news source, argues that in crucial days in early March, Governor Andrew Cuomo and Mayor Bill de Blasio were slow to listen to their health experts. The story contrasts New York State with California, which had a friendlier relationship between Governor and Mayor (or San Francisco) and lost fewer lives to the coronavirus. The story is long and full of details. It succeeds most effectively at conveying the difficulty of trying to make the right decision about something unexpected when there are legitimate arguments on both sides about how best to proceed (the health experts did not always agree).  https://www.propublica.org/article/two-coasts-one-virus-how-new-york-suffered-nearly-10-times-the-number-of-deaths-as-california

HITLER | Mar 5, 1933–Nazis Win and End Democracy

This post has been updated and superseded and replaced by this one:

http://cityeconomist.blogspot.com/2017/03/hitler-mar-5-1933-germany-elects-nazis.html

This post is maintained to preserve links.

The F.D.R.-Woodin Miracle in The East Hampton Star

FDR's first Treasury Secretary, Will Woodin, is not as well known as his second (Henry Morgenthau), largely because Woodin gave the job everything he had, including his life. He died close to the first anniversary of his swearing in.

He was a fascinating person, a lover of music and a composer. He wanted to be a doctor but followed his father into the railway car business.

He made a significant contribution to the successful implementation of the New Deal, despite being a Republican and disagreeing with some of FDR's program.

Here is the story I wrote for the East Hampton Star, published today -
GUESTWORDS: The F.D.R.-Woodin Miracle | The East Hampton Star

WOODIN | FDR's GOP Friend and Financier

Will Woodin, FDR's First Secretary
 of the Treasury

March 8, 2013–The President’s opponents savaged him and his Treasury Secretary for printing greenbacks overtime, for pushing the U.S. budget deficit sky-high, for lowering the value of the dollar. 

But the President inherited from his predecessor the mess he had to deal with–the bad loans, insolvent banks, and high unemployment. After his inauguration, the President told the truth:

Some of our bankers had shown themselves either incompetent or dishonest in their handling of the people's funds. They had used the money entrusted to them in speculations and unwise loans. […]  It was the Government's job to straighten out this situation and do it as quickly as possible. And the job is being performed.

This may sound a lot like Barack Obama in January 2009. But it was actually 80 years ago this month, and President, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was speaking in the first of his famous Fireside Chats.

The man FDR picked as Treasury Secretary, William H. Woodin, was a truly fascinating railroad magnate, musician and collector of coins and etchings. He was a summer resident of East Hampton. He was called by FDR to Washington like Cincinnatus from his plow.

Who was Woodin? He was a lifelong Republican–in 1898 he ran for Congress, losing narrowly. In 1922 he was appointed Fuel Administrator by New York GOP Governor Nathan Miller. He made some Democratic friends when he was reappointed in 1923 by Miller’s Democratic successor, Governor Al Smith. He came to know and like both Governor Smith and Smith’s successor Governor Roosevelt. He supported Smith for President in 1928 and FDR in 1932. At crucial points in the runup to FDR's election, Woodin raised money for FDR, whose financial needs far exceeded his family wealth. A friend, living two blocks from FDR at 67^th and Fifth Avenue in New York City, Woodin continued to call him “Governor” after FDR relinquished the governor's job and even after FDR was elected President.

Will Woodin lived for the first time in New York City when he was sent to New York Latin and the Woodbridge School (a prep school for Columbia) and then to the Columbia University School of Mines. He was born in the coal-and-steel hills of Pennsylvania, in Berwick, Pa., west of Wilkes-Barre, where his father and grandfather ran the Jackson & Woodin foundry that made railroad wheels and rolling stock. Will wanted to become a physician but was told to prepare to work in his father’s business. He dropped out of Columbia because of illness and then, instead of returning to Columbia, he married the daughter of a judge in Montrose, Pa.–Annie Jessup, later called by her family Nan.

Will had a great sense of humor. His new wife’s family included many strait-laced Presbyterians with missionary zeal. Down-to-earth Will couldn’t wait to puncture their self-righteousness. His granddaughter Anne Harvey Gerli recalls this story:

When cousins of Nan paid her a visit at “The Heights” in Berwick for the first time, the Woodins’ coachman picked them up at the Berwick train station and dropped them off at the front door to be met inside by Nan. The cousins then suggested to her that the Woodins might consider hiring a new coachman because he, ahem, reeked of alcohol, drove erratically and was rude. Will joined them later and expressed deep sympathy, but Nan was puzzled because they didn’t have a coachman. In fact the “coachman” was Will, dressed up, playing a trick on his proper new in-laws.    

His practical jokes overflowed out of the home. It was a great day in his family when after three years’ apprenticeship he could cast a wheel by himself in the Berwick foundry. His grandson Charlie Miner says that when Will was asked to show some visitors how he did it, he changed the mold. So when the cooling time was over, and the top was raised, it revealed not a shining railway wheel but instead a cast-iron frog.

Although he returned to the family anthill in Berwick, Will’s musical and writing talent disposed him to be a cricket. After leaving Columbia and marrying Annie Jessup, he voyaged to Europe and the Near East to report for the New York Herald and other papers on Ottoman Sultan Abdul Hamid II’s killing of Armenians, foreshadowing later mass killings. His granddaughter Ms. Gerli tells the story from Nan’s perspective:

Nan was jealous of Will’s love of music and resented his going off to Europe to play music with the gypsies. The family recalled him early because his father and the business were ailing. He dutifully hurried home to help out in the business and support his family.

William Woodin at the U.S. Embassy to Cuba, where he was selling 
railroad cars. Photo courtesy Anne Harvey Gerli, Woodin’s granddaughter.

The business conditions that generated the 1893 Panic and ensuing Depression doubtless played a part in the appeal for Woodin to come home. 

His love of music was genuine–he had a good musical ear and played the guitar and piano all his life, though he rebelled against his piano teacher and stopped taking formal piano lessons at 7. He composed several melodies that continue to be performed, including the FDR March played at the President’s rain-soaked inaugural.

His ability to entertain people empowered him as a railway-car salesman, and after a second-place finish in his race for Congress, Will Woodin threw himself into a huge number of mergers and acquisitions that resulted in the American Car and Foundry Company, based in New York City. 

ACF created the first steel railway car in 1904 and sold hundreds of cars to the London and New York City subway systems.

Woodin was assistant to ACF’s chief executive and replaced him when the CEO died unexpectedly in 1915. 

Successful and entertaining, he joined many clubs in the City and East Hampton, where he became President of the Maidstone Club in 1926-27, as well as the third Commodore of the Devon Yacht Club and the founding Chairman of East Hampton’s arts center, Guild Hall.

A popular father and grandfather, he composed music for “Raggedy Ann’s Sunny Songs,” with the lyrics supplied by his friend Johnny Gruelle, whose characters include "Little Wooden Willie". Will and Nan attended the Fifth Avenue Presbyterian Church and the East Hampton Presbyterian Church with their four children and their children. His grandson Charlie Miner tells this story:

I once asked him: “Grandpa, why do we have to sit up front?” “Because,” Grandpa answered, modestly, “I gave the church some money.” I asked him: “If we give more money, can we sit in the back?” Grandpa roared with laughter.

Woodin was a collector of drawings by Cruikshank and others. When Miner was 5 years old, he was staying with his grandfather and started to read one of the books in his collection. Grandpa objected: “Those are not to be read.” Young Charlie was puzzled: “What good are they, then?” After filling the air with explanations about rare engravings, Grandpa gave up and decided the joke was on him. “Maybe you’re right, Charlie.”

Woodin was a serious coin collector. In 1913, Woodin published with a co-author a significant numismatic reference work, The United States Pattern: Trial and Experimental Pieces. Woodin sometimes used his avocations to win new friends. Miner says that his Grandpa called on the King of Siam to sell some railway cars and was lectured beforehand on Siamese protocol, the importance of backing away facing the King, etc. But when the two of them had wrapped up their negotiations, they emerged arm in arm, the King entranced with Woodin’s knowledge of rare coins.

Overall, how did Woodin do as Treasury Secretary? The economic challenge was even greater than in 2009; unemployment was 25 percent in 1933. But public opinion was more ready for sweeping action, because the Pecora Commission had for a year been stirring up public sentiment against Wall Street.

As FDR noted in his Fireside Chat, hardly any banks opened the week of his Inauguration, because almost all states had imposed bank holidays. Banks just didn't have enough currency to pay out to panicked depositors.

Woodin’s first job was mechanical, manufacturing bank notes. He had to print $2 billion in greenbacks to restore liquidity. He kept the Treasury’s Bureau of Engraving and Printing presses working nonstop. The new bills were packed in trucks and delivered to the banks, with movie cameras filming. The film clip was sent to cinemas around the country. Woodin also sent out examiners to determine the solvency of each bank, beginning with the 250 cities with clearing-houses, prior to reopening the banks one by one.

On policy matters, Woodin was cheerleader for the New Deal’s programs for direct creation of public jobs and for the Glass-Steagall Act that created the wall around bank deposits and insured them. The deposit insurance portion (Rep. Henry B. Steagall’s half) of the law is still standing although Senator Carter Glass’s wall was regrettably disassembled brick by brick by a series of lobbyists on behalf of financial interests seeking to finance risky bets in a way that would ensure that Uncle Sam paid for any losses.   

The one major policy matter where Woodin disagreed at first with FDR was on devaluation of the dollar. FDR advocated devaluation. When FDR brought it up, Woodin would say “Oh no, not that again,” according to grandson Miner. But when FDR made it clear he decided to do it, Woodin worked to make it happen, while extracting an exemption for “rare or unusual” gold coins.

Constant stress and sleep deprivation set Woodin up for an illness that persisted into December and he resigned as Secretary as of the end of 1933. He died March 3, 1934, two days short of one year from the day he accepted FDR's call and was sworn in. Miner says the immediate cause of death would today be described as a strep throat, for which there was then no cure. His austere funeral service was held at Fifth Ave. Presbyterian, attended by the President, himself no stranger to the challenges of illness, called Woodin “a martyr to public service”. Woodin's body was then taken by train to his hometown of Berwick, where he was buried in the family mausoleum.

How did they do as a team, FDR and Woodin?

Neither FDR nor Will Woodin was an expert on bank liquidity or fiscal policy. But they both understood that the country had elected FDR to act, after a disastrous posture by Hoover of inaction in the face of rising market illiquidity. Both were creative people with instincts that were nurtured by years of executive decision-making. Their decisions during the First Hundred Days were crucial in setting the course for recovery over the first part of the Depression, through 1936. The anti-deficit hawks in 1937 pressed for budget reductions that temporarily reversed the progress that had been made in the previous four years, until FDR got back on track.

The instincts of FDR and Woodin were better than those of the institutional experts, the Federal Reserve, which in fact exacerbated inflation and cycles, or the Treasury staff, which pursued the largely discredited the contemporary “Treasury View” that fiscal policy is not an appropriate tool for tackling job creation or GDP growth.

The joint success of FDR and his Republican ally is a vindication of the American democratic system of putting elected non-experts and their trusted appointees in charge of the career experts. The non-experts are more likely in a crisis to keep their eye on the problem and its solution, rather than on battles for turf, agency budgets or someone's next job. As Woodin’s granddaughter Gerli put it in an interview with me:

Grandpa could deal with the bankers because he wasn’t one of them. He was a businessman. When J. P. Morgan lost his mink coat, Grandpa went shopping in second-hand stores for ratty old mink coats and sent several of them to Morgan with a note saying he thinks he “found” the man’s missing coat.

The message is: Put someone in charge of the Treasury who is a Main Street person, not a Wall Street person. Find someone who is politically aware but can cross the aisle to get a consensus. President Obama's appointment of Jack Lew, who has worked well with him in the White House, is a fine approximation.