FINDING STRENGH IN WEAKNESS. Nicolaus Mills's article today comparing Elizabeth Edwards's grace in publicly facing breast cancer to FDR's strength in disability is very moving. The FDR memorial on the Tidal Basin here in Washington, D.C. is, I think, the most progressive landmark in the city, filled with anti-poverty, pro-peace messages. FDR's civil rights record is wanting; he interned Japanese Americans, turned away European Jews fleeing the Holocaust, and capitulated to Southern Democrats on issues such as lynching. Nevertheless, Mills shows how FDR's paralysis (the result of a polio infection) helped him identify with other victims of hardship. I wonder if this helps account for FDR's focus on social programs to lift up the poor:
Howard [University's] president, Mordecai Johnson, asked Roosevelt if the students could see that he was crippled. They had been so damaged because of their race, Johnson declared, that the president's example would inspire them. Roosevelt agreed. He let himself be lifted from his car in full public view, and then as the Howard students watched, he walked slowly and awkwardly to the platform from which he spoke. The second exception occurred in 1944, when Roosevelt visited a military hospital in Oahu, Hawaii, following a strategy session with General Douglas MacArthur. Roosevelt asked the Secret Service to wheel him through the amputee wards occupied by troops who had lost one or more arms and legs. Stopping at one bed after another and chatting with the men, he made a point of letting them see how he coped with legs that no longer worked. The visit ended with Roosevelt himself near tears.
--Dana Goldstein
