Poem on FDR. Anyone know the source? (Yes, this is a vanity)

Unknown | Circa WWII | Unknown

[Past Your Eyes]

A stranger stood at the gate of Hell

And the Devil himself had answered the bell

He looked him over from head to toe

And said “My friend, I’d like to know

What you have done in the line of sin

To entitle you to come within?”

Then Franklin D. with his usual guile

Stepped forth and flashed his toothy smile.

“When I took over in ’33,

A nation’s faith was mine”, said he

“I promised this and I promised that,

And I calmed them down with a fireside chat.

I spent their money on fishing trips

And I fished from the decks of their battleships.

I gave them jobs on the WPA

Then raised their taxes and took it away.

I raised their wages – then closed their shops,

I killed their pigs and buried their crops.

I double-crossed both young and old

And still the folks my praises told.

I brought back beer and what do you think?

I taxed it so high they couldn’t drink.

I furnished money with good loans

When they missed a payment I took their homes.

When I wanted to punish people, you know,

I put my wife on the radio.

I paid them to let their farms lie still

And imported foodstuffs from Brazil.

And curtailed crops when I felt mean

And shipped in corn from the Argentine.

When they started to worry, stew and fret,

I’d get them to chanting the alphabet.

With the AAA and the NLB

The WPA and the CCC.

With these many units I got their goats

And still I crammed it down their throats

While the taxpayers chewed their fingernails.

When the organizers needed dough

I signed up plants for the CIO.

I ruined their jobs and I ruined their health

And I put the screws on the rich man’s wealth.

And some who couldn’t stand the gaff

Would call me up and how I’d laugh!

When they got too hot on certain things

I’d pack up and head for Warm Springs.

I ruined their country, their homes, and then

Laid the blame on the ‘nine old men’.”

Now Franklin talked both long and loud

And the Devil stood with his head bowed.

At last he said “Let’s make it clear,

You’ll have to move, you can’t stay here.

For once you’ve mingled with this mob

I’ll have to hunt myself a job.”

[Past Your Eyes]

Good post, Fiji. I concur. Hoover was a damn good man and the fact that he didn’t have all that wonderful “charisma” didn’t make him any less so. He just never had the chance to make anything work.
My parents came of age in the depression. For them, it was no different than the years before. My father wrote two autobiographical books. I don’t think he ever used the word “Depression” in either of them. But he sure did hate FDR and it’s easy to see why. He graduated from high school in 1937. They got their first automobiles during the depression.
If you haven’t read “Hard Times” by Studs Terkel, you should.

[Fiji Hill]

As for books on the Depression, I would recommend Rethinking the Great Depression by Gene Smiley (Dee, 2003), an insightful yet highly readable analysis of the Depression that is less than 200 pages long, and The Forgotten Man by Amity Shlaes (Harper Collins, 2007), a current bestseller.

[Non-Sequitur]

Read the book “FDR’s Folly” if you really want to know how bad FDR’s administration was, and how his policies actually made a 3 year recession into a 12 year depression.

Huh? The 'recession' was well into its third year when Hoover left office. And if you call 25% unemployment, widespread hunger, homelessness, backrupt cities and school systems, and a banking system teetering on the edge of total collapes a 'recession' then either you have never read up on the times or you have no idea what a depression is.

[Non-Sequitur]

You are making the mistake of thinking that is possible to spend our way out of depressions. Germany got out of the depression because real wages were held down. Roosevelt, by contrast, kept propping up wages and prices which equalled continued depression.

Maybe because one quarter of the country was out of work and those still working still had to eat and put a roof over their head. Maybe in the long run depressing wages may have caused the recovery to move slightly faster, but as one of Roosevelt's advisors told a Congressional Committee, "People don't eat in the long run, Senator. They eat every day." And that took money.

You also forget that Hitler had dictatorial powers and didn't have to worry about a congress or a Supreme Court. Hitler achieved his recovery through a massive rearmament program, something not open to Roosevelt, but also through extensive public works projects and also work creation programs. There was the Labor Service and other government programs. And Jews and women were excluded from the work force as well, don't forget the impact that had on unemployment.

[Non-Sequitur]

In any case, I doubt that Hoover could have done much worse than FDR. By 1940, seven years into his presidency, the unemployment rate was still in double digits, while the Dow Jones Industrial average was half of what it was just before the stock market crash of 1929.

I disagree. When I was in High School back in the 60's, as a project my class spent a year collecting oral histories of the Depression, kind of like they did with the Slave Narratives. We talked to parents and grandparents and great-grandparents, city people and farmers, and in the overwhelming majority of the cases these people described the election of Roosevelt as if someone had opened a shade and let sun in. After 4 years of Hoover, with the depression growing worse week by week, month by month, they were beaten. They were desperate, and wanted someone, anyone to do something different. Almost without exception they were totally contemptuous of Hoover, and remember Roosevelt and his speeches the way people 30 years later would talk about Kennedy. We can speculate 80 years later what Hoover would have done and if he might have been successful, and maybe he would. But it's equally likely that the U.S. may have drifted into a socialist or facist state.

[Fiji Hill]

But it's equally likely that the U.S. may have drifted into a socialist or facist state.

A facist state? Would that be a state preoccupied with saving face or putting its best face forward?

[Fiji Hill]

Hoover, who was called the Great Humanitarian or the Napoleon of Mercy, probably saved more lives than anyone else in history, and so it is ironic that his Democratic opponents succeeded in portraying him as not caring about the victims of the Depression.

[Vigilanteman]

My Dad came from a very Democrat family. His mom, my grandmother, was actually one of the local campaign leaders in FDR's 1932 campaign. She was quite talented in both vocal and instrumental music and worked tirelessly to get FDR elected.

Dad left home in 1937 at age 18 to find any work he could because while his hometown had always struggled financially, people had managed to get by.

Much to grandma's chagrin, he became a Republican. By 1940, grandma was even more disgusted with FDR than Dad. It had become clear to even the most ardent FDR supporters like her that he wasn't what he was advertised.

FDR got elected in 1932 campaigning against much of Hoover's activism, high taxes and excess spending. Then he proceeded to sell America on the notion that Hoover failed because he had not been bold enough.

Hoover was a thoroughly decent man. He was a self-made multi-millionaire and first came to the public eye by heading up the relief efforts in Europe after World War I. He did the same thing after World War II and probably saved millions from starvation. Yes, his economic policies failed because America had never been faced with an economic downturn of that magnitude, but if any care to check the record, the Depression was much worse after four years of FDR in 1936 by doing more of what Hoover did.

[Androcles]

Nobody beats this. You loaf every day.

My god: It's like holding a directorship or being in Congress or the Senate now!

[Cooter]

They had watched Hoover do nothing for four years

Smoot-Hawley, tax increases, wage freezes,price controls... sure, that's nothing (compared to what FDR did). Actually, doing nothing - a la Silent Cal in prior recessions - would have been preferable. But FDR did have the microphone (literally, with the Fireside Chats) and he had the public eating out of his hand.

[Past Your Eyes]

Wow, how’d you manage to dredge this one up after almost two years? I had forgotten all about it.

[johnnyfox]

Good afternoon,
While restoring a historic home in Dana Point, Ca I came accross a box labeled “Original War Poetry”. I purchased the home from the original family. The home had been in the family since it was built in 1928. This poem was located in an envelope on original typewritten rice paper in destressed condition. The author appears to be ‘John Hollings Kinkade’ a WW1 Pilot in France and Italy. A founding father and original family in Dana Point, Ca.
This poem and others in the same envelope appear to be original and in fair to poor condition. They are available to be appraissed as to originality. Feel free to contact me for a color copy of my original plus history on the possible author. Johnny Fotsch “Orange County Conservative Business Leaders Assn”. occbla.com

[Past Your Eyes]

I had forgotten all about it and can’t remember who it was who gave it to me in the first place. Thanks for the offer.

[What a poem]

I think my grandfather may have?????? I just found this handwritten in my fathers basement. I started to search and found this. Maybe he just copied it but I know he used to write poetry and this reflects his feelings on the WPA.

[Past Your Eyes]

Interesting. Welcome to FR.

[Seeker1]

The author of the Poem “Rejected” is Gordon Bennett. I found the poem inside a 1935 copy of Sinclair Lewis’s It Can’t Happen Here. There are also some notes by Mr Bennett in the back of the book.

[thewojoes1]

I think I may have found the original writing. I found a very old piece of hand written paper with editing that is this poem. It is titled “Rejected” and signed by Mouse Smith. Does anyone know who this is?

[Past Your Eyes]

And this thread comes back to life again. Wow!

[nhsuz]

I was cleaning out the file cabinet of my uncle who was a Navy pilot during WWII, and I came across this exact same poem - an originally typed and 3 copies - in his belongings. I wonder what this is all about? I don’t know who to ask about this, but it sounds like it made the rounds among the troops back then!