The United States presidential election of 1932 was the 37th quadrennial presidential election, held on

Tuesday, November 8, 1932. The election took place among the backdrop of the Great Depression that
had ruined the promises of incumbent President and Republican candidate Herbert Hoover to bring
about a new era of prosperity. The Democratic nomination went to the well-known governor of the
most populous state, New York's Franklin D. Roosevelt, who had been reelected governor in a landslide
in 1930. Roosevelt united all wings of his party, avoided divisive cultural issues, and brought in a leading
southern conservative as his running mate, House Speaker John Nance Garner of Texas.
Roosevelt repeatedly blamed Hoover for the Depression and worsening economy. With unemployment
above 20% in 1932 alone, Hoover was remiss to defend his record,
[1]
and Roosevelt promised recovery
with a New Deal for the American people.
[2]
Roosevelt won by a landslide in both the electoral and
popular vote, receiving the highest percentage of the popular vote for a Democratic nominee. The
election marked the effective end of the Fourth Party System, dominated by Republicans. Subsequent
landslides in the 1934 mid-term elections and following presidential election two and four years later
respectively, signified the commencement of the Fifth Party System, dominated by Roosevelt's New
Deal Coalition
Campaign[edit]


Hoover addresses a large crowd in his 1932 campaign.
After making an airplane trip to the Democratic convention, Roosevelt accepted the nomination in
person. In this history-making
[clarification needed]
speech, Roosevelt promised to "abolish useless offices" and
"eliminate unnecessary functions of Government", stating that "GovernmentFederal and State and
localcosts too much", and even promised to help facilitate the "restoration of the trade of the
world".
[4]
Roosevelt's trip to Chicago was the first of several successful, precedent-making moves
designed to make him appear to be the candidate of change in the election. Large crowds greeted
Roosevelt as he traveled around the nation; his campaign song "Happy Days Are Here Again" became
one of the most popular in American political history
[5]
and, indeed, the unofficial anthem of the
Democratic Party.
[6]

Although Roosevelt was not as widely known as Smith had been in 1928, his utterances made him
appealing to some of the same elements of the population that had supported Smith four years before.
Moreover, the Democrats were united as they had not been in 1928, as Roosevelt's Protestantism was
by no means detrimental as Smith's Roman Catholicism had been four years prior. The Democrats were
also united closely more so than they had been at any time in the Fourth Party System.
[7]
Cultural issues
that had dominated previous elections, like Catholicism in 1928 and the Ku Klux Klan in 1924, were
nearly dormant. Prohibition was a favorite Democratic target, as few Republicans tried to defend it.
There was a mounting demand to end prohibition and bring back beer, liquor, and the resulting tax
revenues.
[8]



Roosevelt (seated, center) at Greenway Ranch in Williams, Arizona on September 26, 1932. He is
accompanied by U.S. Senator from Arizona Carl Hayden standing far right, along withamong others
three Democrats from the U.S. Senate (seated): Pittman, Walsh, and Cohen.
In contrast, Hoover was not supported by many of the more prominent Republicans and violently
opposed by others, in particular by a number of senators who had fought him throughout his
administration and whose national reputation made their opposition of considerable importance. Many
prominent Republicans even went so far as to espouse the cause of the Democratic candidate openly.
[9]

Making matters worse for Hoover was the fact that many Americans blamed him for the Great
Depression. For more than two years, President Hoover had been restricting trade and increasing taxes
on the wealthy with legislation such as the SmootHawley Tariff Act and the Revenue Act of 1932.
Roosevelt lashed out at Hoover: "I accuse the present Administration of being the greatest spending
Administration in peacetime in all our history."
[10]
Garner accused Hoover of "leading the country down
the path of socialism."
[11]
The outrage caused by the deaths of veterans in the Bonus Army incident in
the summer of 1932, combined with the catastrophic economic effects of Hoover's domestic policies,
reduced his chances of a second term from slim to none. His attempts to campaign in public were a
disaster, as he often had objects thrown at him or his vehicle as he rode through city streets. In his
addresses, Hoover attacked Roosevelt as a capitalist president who would only make the Depression
worse by decreasing taxes, reducing government intervention in the economy, promoting "trade [with]
the world", and cutting "GovernmentFederal and State and local".
[4]
However, with unemployment at
23.6%,
[12][13]
Hoover's criticisms of Roosevelt's campaign promises did nothing more than further lower
his popularity with the public. Roosevelt himself did not have a clear idea of the New Deal at this point,
so he promised no specific programs.
[14]
It was said that "Even a vaguely talented dog-catcher could
have been elected president against the Republicans."
[15]
Hoover even received a letter from an Illinois
man that advised, "Vote for Roosevelt and make it unanimous."
Hoover called Roosevelt a "chameleon in plaid" and Roosevelt called President Hoover a "fat, timid
capon".
[16]
In the last days of campaigning, Hoover criticized Roosevelt's "nonsense ... tirades ... glittering
generalizations ... ignorance" and "defamation".
[16]

The election was held on November 8, 1932. Maine held separate state elections in September.
Results[edit]


Results by county explicitly indicating the percentage for the winning candidate. Shades of blue are for
Roosevelt (Democratic) and shades of red are for Hoover (Republican).
[citation needed]

This was the first election since 1876 in which the Democratic candidate won a majority of the popular
vote, and the first since 1852 in which a Democrat secured a majority both in the popular vote and the
Electoral College.
Although the "other" vote of 1932 was three times that of 1928, it was considerably less than what had
been recorded in 1920 (the time of the greatest "other" vote with the exception of the unusual
conditions prevailing in 1912 and 1924).
The Democratic candidate won the support of 22,817,883 voters (57.41%), the greatest vote ever cast
for a candidate for the Presidency up until that time, and 1,425,000 greater than that cast for Hoover in
1928. It is to be noted that Hoover won a greater percentage of the vote in 1928, as did Harding in 1920.
But the national swing of 35.17% impressed all who considered the distribution of the vote, and
indicated that more than one-third of the electorate has switched from supporting Republican Party to
the Democratic Party. Only once in this period had there been a comparable shift; in 1920 there was a
29.29% swing towards the Republicans.
[9]
The swing from Smith in 1928 to Roosevelt in 1932 remains
the greatest national swing of the electorate between presidential elections in the history of the United
States.
1932 was a realigning election, as Roosevelt and the Democratic ticket won a sweeping victory over
Hoover and the Republicans, extending their control over the U.S. House and gaining control of the U.S.
Senate. Twelve years of Republican leadership came to an end, and 20 consecutive years of Democratic
control of the White House began.
[16]
Until 1932, the Republicans had controlled the Presidency for 56 of
the previous 72 years, dating to Abraham Lincoln's election in 1860. After 1932, the Democrats would
control the Presidency for 28 of the next 36 years, until the 1968 election created a new alignment that
favored the Republicans, and was cemented in 1980.
Roosevelt led the poll in 2,722 counties, the greatest number ever carried by a candidate for the
presidency up until that time. Of these, 282 had never before been Democratic. Only 374 counties
remained loyal to the Republican candidate. It is to be noted, however, that 1/2 of the total vote of the
nation was cast in just eight states (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Ohio, Illinois, Indiana,
Michigan, Wisconsin), and that in these states Hoover polled 8,592,163 votes. In one section (West
South Central) the Republican percentage sank to 16.21%, but in no other section did the party poll less
than 30% of the vote cast. But the relative appeal of the two candidates in 1932, and the decline of the
appeal of Hoover as compared with 1928, are show in the fact that the Republican vote increased in
1932 in only 87 counties, while the Democratic vote increased in 3,003 counties.
The great vote cast for Hoover, and the fact that in only one section of the nation (West South Central)
did he have less than 500,000 votes and in only 3 states outside of the South less than 50,000 votes,
make it clear that the nation remained a two-party electorate, and that everywhere, despite the
triumph of the Democrats, there was a party membership devoted to neither the new administration
nor the proposals of the Socialist candidate who had polled 3/4 of the "other" vote (as well as the
highest raw vote total of his campaigns).
[17]

The Roosevelt ticket swept every region of the country except New England and carried many reliable
Republican states that had not been carried by the Democrats since their electoral landslide of 1912,
when the Republican vote was divided. The state of Minnesota was carried by a Democrat for the first
time in its history, leaving Vermont as the only remaining state never to be carried by a Democratic
candidate (and it would not be until 1964). In contrast to the states solid support of Republicans prior to
this election, Minnesota has continued supporting Democrats in every presidential election but three
since 1932 (The exceptions being 1952, 1956 and 1972).
Roosevelt's victory with 472 electoral votes stood until the 1964 victory of Lyndon B. Johnson, who won
486 electoral votes in 1964, as the most ever won by a first-time contestant in a presidential election. He
also bettered the national record 444 electoral votes for any American presidential candidate, set by
Hoover only four years earlier (and would shatter his own record when he was re-elected in 1936 with
523 votes).

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