The Soul of America: The Battle for Our Better Angels

The 32nd president of the United States, Franklin D. Roosevelt served from 1933 to 1945 as he guided the country through the Great Depression and most of World War II. A distant cousin of Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin D. Roosevelt became the governor of New York before ascending to the presidency in 1932.

Designed to keep the country afloat during the Great Depression, Roosevelt’s New Deal initiatives drew ire from both the far right, which accused him of socialism, and the far left, which accused him of appeasing capitalists. As fascism swept through parts of Europe, Meacham writes that American democracy teetered on the brink of oblivion. He cites a proposed 1933 military coup against Roosevelt hatched by far-right bankers who sought to replace the president with a dictator. On the left, Roosevelt felt threatened by Huey Long, a senator from Louisiana and a rising populist politician with authoritarian tendencies, according to the author. Roosevelt himself sensed the urgency of the moment. When a friend remarked that he would be remembered as either the greatest or the worst president, depending on his success or failure, Roosevelt famously responded, “If I fail, I shall be the last one” (150).

While holding the country together during an unprecedented economic disaster, Roosevelt faced a new threat in the rise of Nazi Germany. While Roosevelt sensed the danger of Adolf Hitler earlier than most, he struggled to prepare the country for war given that 95% of the populace in 1936 disapproved of entering a war in Europe. Only after Japan’s bombing of Pearl Harbor did Roosevelt finally have public support to enter World War II.

Although Meacham believes that Roosevelt largely tended toward America’s better angels, the president did embrace the politics of fear when he forced the internment of 117,000 Japanese Americans starting in 1942 until the end of the war.

For much of Roosevelt’s adult life, he suffered from a paralytic illness that made it impossible for him to walk without assistance. As the war continued, Roosevelt’s health declined. In 1945, less than a month before Hitler surrendered, Roosevelt died of an intracerebral hemorrhage at age 63.

Considered by many to be the greatest president of all time, Abraham Lincoln led the country through the US Civil War, abolishing slavery and preserving the Union. Born into poverty in a Kentucky log cabin, Lincoln’s rise to the presidency has become “both fable and staple in the American narrative” (24). Though morally opposed to slavery, his beliefs on white supremacy were constantly evolving. Moreover, his decision to abolish slavery in 1863 was more the result of political considerations than moral ones. A year earlier, Lincoln wrote, “If I could save the Union without freeing any slave I would it, and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing some and leaving others alone I would also do that” (55).

Despite this attitude, Meacham considers Lincoln an exemplar of negotiating the character of the American people with that of his own character and political will. The author shares this opinion with abolitionist Frederick Douglass, who said of Lincoln’s attitude toward slavery, “Measuring him by the sentiment of the country, a sentiment he was bound as a statesman to consult, he was swift, zealous, radical, and determined” (35).

Mere days after the South’s surrender at Appomattox Court House, Lincoln was assassinated by Confederate sympathizer John Wilkes Booth at age 56.

A US senator from Wisconsin, Joseph McCarthy is one of the clearest examples of a politician who exploited fear to amass power, making him the antithesis to the historical figures Meacham most admires. Beginning in 1950, McCarthy fueled widespread fears of communist subversion by baselessly alleging that numerous public officials and celebrities were Soviet spies. By manipulating the new, more direct media engagement allowed by television, McCarthy became one of the first political celebrities, dominating newscasts night after night with his increasingly paranoid accusations. According to his lawyer and confidant Roy Cohn, McCarthy’s antipathy toward communists was purely opportunistic. Meacham quotes Cohn as saying, “Joe McCarthy bought Communism in much the same way other people purchase a new automobile” (186).

Eventually, the public grew tired of McCarthy, whose political career effectively came to an end in 1954 when the Senate formally censured him. Within three years, McCarthy was dead at age 48.

Born in 1858 in New York City, Theodore Roosevelt served as the 26th president of the United States between 1901 and 1909. Prior to the presidency, Roosevelt served as New York City’s police commissioner. In that role he witnessed firsthand poverty’s effects on the populace of a rapidly industrializing nation. Partly because of this experience, he implemented a series of progressive reforms as president to protect consumers and keep corporations in check.

By and large, Meacham believes that Roosevelt tended toward the side of America’s better angels. He concludes this on the basis of Roosevelt’s welcoming attitude toward immigrants and his eventual embrace of the women’s suffrage movement. That said, Roosevelt was hardly immune to the white supremacy of his era, particularly as it concerned the West’s imperial interests in Asia. According to Meacham, these contradictions make him representative of wider attitudes in turn-of-the-century America.

Between 1913 and 1921, Woodrow Wilson served as the 28th president of the United States. Wilson’s presidency coincided with one of the most tumultuous periods in US history, during which the country saw a resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan along with extraordinarily high anti-immigrant sentiment. Wilson’s own record is marred by the fact that he resegregated numerous federal offices and supported Jim Crow laws in the South. At the same time, he championed women’s suffrage late in his presidency, albeit only after the end of World War I, when he had the political capital to do so. Like other presidents profiled here, Meacham considers Wilson a reflection of the inherent contradictions of his era.