Franklin
Delano Roosevelt’s policies have had a widespread effect on the United States
and the way our legislature has conducted business over the past seventy-nine
years. He was so progressive he makes his cousin, Teddy, and Woodrow Wilson
look moderate in comparison. The next few articles will trace FDRs political
career and his motives for the policies that he instituted.
As the
famous song from The Sound of Music states,
let’s start at the very beginning. Franklin Delano Roosevelt was born into a
wealthy family, an American aristocrat. He was an only child and was doted on
by his mother. He was home schooled by private tutors until he was fourteen.
Then he attended boarding school at Groton School. Groton school
catered to the children of entrepreneurs for the purpose of building mental and
physical toughness as well as giving them high-minded principles. Until
Franklin graduated from Groton he had received a conservative education.
Harvard had a strong
influence on Roosevelt. This school introduced him to progressive ideas.
Harvard had been a conservative Christian school until 1869 when Charles W.
Eliot became its president and it transformed into a modern university. Eliot
was a progressive and introduced many progressive policies into Harvard. The
medical school became a four year program, and a bachelor’s degree was required
for admission. Mandatory attendance of chapel was ended in 1886. Eliot
developed a “spontaneous diversity of choice” which allowed students to choose
their own courses which has led to an open-ended curriculum. The changes that
Eliot made at Harvard were modeled nationwide. Roosevelt attended Harvard from
1900 – 1903. After graduation he took some graduate courses and became the editor
of the university newspaper The Crimson.
He also became a member of the Democrat party.
After
he left Harvard, Roosevelt married his cousin, Eleanor, and went to law school
at Columbia University. He never graduated with a law degree. However, he did
pass the bar exam and worked in a law firm for a few years. He did not enjoy
law but was always eager to meet a challenge. After some encouragement from his
friends and inspiration from his cousin Theodore, he entered politics in 1910. The Miller Center
The next post will cover his early political career.
