On September 14, 1932, New York Governor and Democratic presidential nominee Franklin D. Roosevelt campaigned in Topeka, Kansas, delivering an address focused on the farm crisis. As the United States struggled through the Great Depression, farmers in Kansas and across the Great Plains faced collapsing commodity prices, heavy debt, and foreclosures.
Roosevelt’s Topeka appearance was part of a campaign that called for a more active federal response to the economic emergency. He criticized President Herbert Hoover’s administration and argued for policies aimed at relief, recovery, and assistance for agriculture and Americans burdened by debt. Earlier that summer, in accepting the Democratic nomination, Roosevelt had pledged “a new deal for the American people”—a phrase that became the defining label for his later domestic program.
Roosevelt won the presidential election on November 8, 1932, receiving 57 percent of the popular vote, 472 electoral votes, and 42 of the 48 states. After taking office in March 1933, he and Congress enacted New Deal measures involving emergency relief, employment, banking reform, and agricultural policy, establishing a much larger federal role in responding to economic hardship.
Image via Wikimedia Commons; public domain.
