TIME: Almanac 1993/TIME Almanac 1993.iso/time/election/32elect/32elect.010

Text File | 1992-08-29 | 8.0 KB | 155 lines

                                                                                November 21, 1932

THE PRESIDENCY

Hubris



     In golden Greece the Periclean playgoer knew by heart the
Pride & Fall theme of classic tragedy. Hubris was the offense
of the honest but haughty mortal who thumbed his nose at the
gods and arrogantly defied fate. Certain as death, nemesis
followed to wreak the wrathful gods's retribution upon such a
presumptuous creature. The hubris-nemesis pattern of drama
unconsciously taught the Hellenic lesson of moden agan or
moderation in all things. An Attic axiom: "Too much prosperity
brings ruin."

     In his great trilogy, Aeschylus made Prometheus, the fire-
bringer, pay a fearful price for defying Zeus. On seeing
Sophocles' Oedipus Rex & Oedipus Tyrannus good Athenian audiences
were properly shocked at the King's insensate stubborness in
attempting to influence economic conditions. The mythical hubris
of the Trojans before their city was sacked was only matched by
the historical hubris of the Athenians themselves just before
their defeat in the Pelponnesian War.

     Last week in the U.S. many a classicist thought he saw a
striking analogy between the Nemesis-like defeat of Herbert Clark
Hoover and the hubris of the Republican Party during the past
decade. The G.O.P. had defied the political god by declaring it
alone was "fit to rule." It had taken credit for all the good
things fate bestowed upon the land. It had promised to ut the
entire nation comfortably on Mount Olympus. Wrote Elmer Davis in
The New Republic:

     "You can search all Aeschylus and Sophocles without finding
a better example of hubris than Mr. Hoover's behavior in 1928.
(His) . . . was not the wanton violence of the ancient tragic
heroes but a smug arrogance. . . . His campaign promises ran to
that excess which above all things offended the Greek
temperament, which seemed above all things to invite the
correcting interposition of Nemesis. . . . Compare him, for
example, with Oedipus, Oedipus, like Hoover, thought very well of
himself. We first see him when his country is suffering from a
severe and unexpected depression. . . . He has appointed Kreon as
a fact-finding commission. Kreon's subsequent experiences are
reminiscent of Mr. Wickersham. . . . . But it must be admitted
that Oedipus behaves better than his modern analogue; he does not
say that it might have been worse."

     -- While President Hoover was restfully sunning himself at
his Palo Alto home last week, War Debts came crashing back into
the headlines just as everyone expected them to do once the
election was over. On De. 15 Britain is scheduled to pay the U.S.
$30,000,000 on debt principal, $65,550,000 on interest; France,
$19,261,438 on interest. Only Congress has authority to suspend
interest payments, continue the Hoover Moratorium for another
year.

     Two days after election Sir Ronald Lindsay, British
Ambassador, called upon Secretary of State Stimson, left a note
which said: "His Majesty's Government . . . believe that the
regime of intergovernmental financial obligations, as now
existing, must be reviewed. . . . The immediate objective is of a
more limited nature. . . . His Majesty's Government ask for a
suspension of the payments due form them (Dec.15)." A French note
delivered next day at the State Department suavely echoed the
request "that an extension of the suspension of payments may be
granted in order that the study of the present serious problems
now under discussion may be continued and completed in the
necessary atmosphere of mutual trust." In substance Britain and
France wanted two things from the U.S.: 1) a conference to reduce
their debts; 2) another moratorium pending such reduction.

     When this news was flashed across the continent, President
Hoover ordered out his special train a day in advance, started
back to Washington at top speed. Before he left California,
however, he dispatched a momentous telegram to President-elect
Roosevelt at Albany. After giving his successor the gist of the
British note, he declared:

     "Thus our Government is now confronted with a world problem
of major importance to this nation. . . . A year ago I
recommended to Congress that a new debt commission be created to
deal with situations that might arise. Congress declined to
accede to this. . . . It passed a joint resolution (declaring it)
to be against the policy of the Congress that any of the
indebtedness of foreign countries to the United States should be
in any manner cancelled or reduced. . . .'

     "I do not favor cancellation. . . . Substantial reduction of
world armament has a bearing on this question. If negotiations
are to be undertaken, protracted discussions would be necessary
which could not be concluded during my administration. If there
is to be any change in the attitude of the Congress, it will be
greatly affected by those members who recognize you as their
leader. . . .

     "I am loath to proceed with recommendations to the Congress
until I can have an opportunity to confer with you personally. .
. . There are also other important questions as to which I think
an interchange of views will be in the public interest. . . . A
world economic conference will be held during the coming winter.
. . . Parallel with this is the Disarmament Conference.

     "I understand that you are planning to come through
Washington sometime (this week) and I hope you will find it
convenient to stop off long enough for me to advise with you."
(Last July Governor Roosevelt asked President Hoover for an
interview on St. Lawrence water power and New York State's
interest therein. The President refused.)

     Governor Roosevelt was sick abed with a head cold in the
Executive Mansion at Albany, doing as much as he could about the
State budget. To President Hoover's invitation he replied: "I
shall call you on the telephone as soon as the time of my
departure for the South has been determined. . . . You and I can
go over the whole situation. I had already arranged to meet a
number of the Democratic leaders of the present Congress late
this month at Warm Springs. I hope that you also will see them at
the earliest opportunity because,in the last analysis, the
immediate question . . . creates a responsibility which rests
upon those now vested with executive and legislative authority.
My kindest regards. . . ." Never before in U.S. history have a
President- reject and President-elect sat down together in the
White House before inauguration to discuss grave matters of state.

     -- Detouring from the main line, President Hoover stopped to
see by moon light and floodlight the Colorado River dam which
bears his name. With resident engineers he talked the profession
jargon of engineering. To him the Hoover Dam meant "millions of
happy homes out under the blue sky of the West." Day after his
departure the first big tunnel around the dam site through the
canyon wall was opened to divert the river's flow temporarily
during construction.

     -- President Hoover's sensational campaign statement at Des
Moines to the effect that last winter the U.S. was within two
weeks of being driven off the gold standard rose again last week
to plague him when Benjamin M. Anderson Jr., economist of big
Chase National Bank, told a Manhattan audience of banking
experts:

     "There has been no time in the past 36 years when there has
been justifiable ground for doubt as to our ability to maintain
the gold standard in its full integrity. . . . The panic in early
1932 was in many ways more intense in political than in financial
circles. . . . At the lowest point of the gold holdings of the
Federal Reserve System (June 15) our Federal Reserve banks had
40% of gold against Federal Reserve notes and 35% of gold and
lawful money (almost wholly gold) against deposits and over &
above that approximately $1,000,000,000 in gold. This was our
worst position and our weakest position. And I say to you,
categorically and unqualifiedly, that this worst and weakest
position was impregnably strong.