The 1928 Election, Herbert Hoover, and the Onset of the Great Depression

Democratic Party Fault Lines in the 1920s

Long-standing ideological splits:
- \textit{Free-silver} populists à la William Jennings Bryan vs. hard-money, anti-tariff conservatives in the Grover Cleveland mold.
New, sharper cleavages by the 1920s:
- Geography / Culture:
- Southern, rural, native-born Protestants = “drys” (pro-Prohibition, often fundamentalist, sometimes pro-KKK, often anti-evolution).
- Northern, urban, immigrant-heavy Catholics & ethnics = “wets” (anti-Prohibition, tied to big-city machines such as Tammany Hall).
- Religious & nativist overtones sharpened every dispute.

Held in Madison Square Garden, NYC.
Took 103 ballots to choose compromise nominee John W. Davis (with Charles W. Bryan for VP).
Radio coverage exposed internecine warfare to the nation.
Outcome: no faction satisfied → Republicans coasted to victory again.

Irish-Catholic, born in Manhattan’s Lower East Side tenements; self-made, no college.
Political apprenticeship in Tammany Hall; rose to four-term Governor of New York; admired across party lines for administrative acumen.
1928: first Catholic ever nominated by a major party for President; ticket balanced with dry Senator Joseph T. Robinson (Arkansas) to woo South.

Open press speculation about papal influence over a President Smith.
The Atlantic published a lawyer’s “evidence” from papal encyclicals alleging incompatibility with the Constitution’s religious pluralism.
Smith’s rebuttal: lifetime public service shows no conflict, statement—“I have never known any conflict between my official duties and my religious belief.”
Despite defenses, rural Protestant Democrats mistrusted ("wet" stance + Catholicism) → defection to Republican column ("Hoover Democrats").

Smith lost popular vote by > 6\text{ million}; Electoral College only 87 votes.
- Lost home state (NY) + five former Confederate states.
- Carried only: Massachusetts & Rhode Island + six "Solid South" states (AR, AL, LA, MS, GA, SC).
Still won majorities in the 12 largest U.S. cities → foreshadowed New Deal urban, ethnic coalition.
Anti-Catholic bigotry proved potent, yet:
- Immigrant-dense northern counties flipped Democratic for first time.
- African-American voters in the North began moving from GOP loyalty; by 1936 the realignment would be complete.
Smith’s charisma, progressive record (child-labor laws, widow’s pensions) generated enduring working-class devotion.

Nicknames: “The Great Engineer” (technical prowess) & “The Great Humanitarian” (WWI Belgian relief).
Background highlights:
- Orphaned Iowa Quaker, raised Oregon; Stanford-trained mining engineer.
- Lived/worked on 5 continents; first West-Coast & first Quaker President.
- Commerce Secretary under Harding/Coolidge; tasks ranged from 1921 recession response to crafting 1927 Radio Act framework.

Scope: water from Cairo, IL → New Orleans (~1000 miles); devastation swath 50–150 miles wide; \sim1{,}000 dead, 1.5\text{ million} displaced; \approx\$1\text{ billion} property loss.
Hoover led emergency efforts:
- Mobilized 33{,}000 workers; \$42\text{ million} (\frac{3}{4} private donations).
Racial discrimination:
- Black refugees crammed into inferior camps, denied supplies; forced labor & restrictions on leaving to satisfy white planters.
- NAACP & Black press exposed abuse → Hoover convened interracial advisory commission; adopted reforms but systemic Jim Crow persisted.
Net political effect: Hoover’s visibility, crisis competence, and partial outreach netted a large share of African-American vote in 1928.

Public perceived Hoover as “America’s handy man,” contrasting Coolidge’s passivity.
Hoover landslide carried both houses for Republicans → legislative mandate.

Original signatories: U.S., France, Germany; later dozens.
Renounced war as “instrument of national policy,” pledged peaceful dispute resolution.
Seen by idealists as Wilsonian triumph; skeptics labeled it naïve; historians view it ironically in light of WWII.
For voters: reinforced sense of perpetual peace paralleling belief in endless prosperity.

Limited federal role; nurture robust civil society not large bureaucracy.
Prefers voluntary cooperation & associative action over coercive mandates.
Feared over-expansion of state → slide toward socialism; prized community-minded Quaker individualism (distinct from TR’s rugged frontier ideal).
Personal trait: supreme self-confidence bred rigidity when facing unprecedented crises.

Special congressional session → Agricultural Marketing Act: attempted to stabilize farm prices & handle surpluses.
Mood remained ebullient; Hoover appeared to extend Coolidge prosperity.

Economist Irving Fisher (Yale): “Stock prices have reached what looks like a permanently high plateau.”
Prevailing beliefs underpinning optimism:
- Rising productivity & efficiency.
- Technological innovations & "scientific" corporate management.
- Better economic statistics.
Hoover campaign rhetoric: U.S. "closer to the final triumph over poverty"; pledged "abolition of poverty." In hindsight, hubristic.

Americans funneled savings into equities; speculative mania.
Buying on margin: investors borrowed up to 90\% of purchase price, using stock as collateral → amplified risk.
The Nation (Aug 1928) cautioned that naïve “suckers” lured by easy riches were fleeced by commission-hungry brokers.
By fall 1929, market reached “dizzying” highs, setting stage for impending crash (full collapse details beyond current transcript).

Anti-Catholic prejudice: tension between constitutional religious pluralism & sectarian bigotry.
Racial injustice in disaster relief: early case study of federal aid filtered through Jim Crow; foreshadows distributive inequities in New Deal programs.
Hoover’s associative voluntarism: raises philosophical debate over limits of private charity vs. necessity of state intervention—a debate that will intensify after the crash.

Smith’s urban ethnic coalition + Hoover Democrats → seeds of the New Deal coalition.
Hoover’s flood experience informs later Great Depression response—but limits of voluntarism soon exposed.
Kellogg-Briand optimism mirrors economic faith; both will be shattered by 1930s reality (Depression & rise of militarism abroad).

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