FDR, LeHand and Eleanor
(the most unflattering pic of Eleanor that I've seen.)

After his 1920 election loss, FDR returned to New York. There, he worked as a partner in a Wall Street law firm and as a Vice President of the Fidelity and Deposit Company while also working on a political comeback. At Fidelity, FDR's secretary was Marquerite LeHand, who had also been a secretary to FDR's Vice Presidential campaign. Eleanor Roosevelt had invited LeHand to live with the Roosevelt family while LeHand cleared up leftover campaign correspondence. (Did FDR suggest that?) LeHand continued to have the title of FDR's secretary until she suffered a disabling stroke in 1941. By that time, she was performing the functions of a U.S. Presidential chief of staff, the only woman ever so to do.

Elliot Roosevelt claimed that FDR and LeHand had been having an affair the entire time; and it would seem so, even from sanitized accounts. (This is the first I've learned of an affair with anyone but Lucy Mercer, but FDR is alleged to have had extra-marital affairs with at least five women, including a distant cousin who gifted him his famous terrier, Fala!) After LeHand's stroke, FDR paid her medical bills. He also made a will leaving LeHand as much as he left Eleanor. (By this time, Mercer was very well provided for.) However, LeHand died July 31,1944, predeceasing FDR by under nine months.

FDR was not to run for office in 1922, after all: He was paralyzed in 1921, at age 39, as depicted in Sunrise at Campobello. The Roosevelt family co-operated in making of that film, with Eleanor Roosevelt on set during filming at Hyde Park. I am therefore assuming that the film is reasonably accurate, as historical films go. (It can be streamed online.) The cause of his paralysis was long thought to be infantile paralysis, aka poliomyelitis, or polio. A more recent theory, however, posits Guillain-Barré syndrome.

After FDR's paralysis, FDR's mother supposedly wanted him to retire from public lif.. Various sources claim that Eleanor, LeHand and Louis McHenry Howe urged FDR to remain in politics. Although that may be so, I'd be stunned if FDR was not the reason that FDR continued to pursue politics after his paralysis. (Following cousin Teddy to the Oval Office seems to have been FDR's goal all along, as FDR did so much of what Teddy had done, both before and after being paralyzed.) In any event, FDR and Howe did their best, both to make it seem as though FDR's physical condition were improving and to keep FDR involved in Democratic Party politics. FDR taught himself a way of moving by swiveling his torso while wearing leg braces and using a cane. Most often, FDR "walked," wearing his leg braces, with someone supporting him on one or both sides. During this time, FDR never allowed himself to be photographed in a way that revealed his disability.

After authorities forced the resignation of infamous Tammany Hall chief William Magear "Boss" Tweed, Democratic machine Tammany Hall had a series of Irish bosses. Whether or not for that reason, Alfred Emanuel "Al" Smith, who identified with the Irish Catholic part of his heritage, was a darling of Tammany Hall. Smith, who was not accused of corruption himself, had won the New York gubernatorial election in 1918, only to lose it in the Republican landslide of 1920, when FDR lost his Vice Presidential bid.

To remain publicly active in politics, FDR published an "open letter" endorsing Smith for Governor in 1922, while also making contacts in the South, which were necessary for any Democratic Presidential aspirant. Smith did regain the Governor's Mansion in the 1922 election. In 1924, hoping for a cure, FDR began visiting Warm Springs, Georgia, buying a property that would become his "Little White House," the site of his death and, ultimately, a museum. Also in 1924, Smith again ran for re-election as governor. Although Smith had not entered any Presidential primaries, FDR made a speech at the 1924 Democratic National Convention, which was held in New York City, nominating New York Governor Smith.

As with Democratic politics in general since at least 1860, the race and corruption figured prominently in the 1924 Democratic Presidential nomination. Please see also, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1924_Democratic_Party_presidential_primaries. The Klan was a significant physical presence. Please see also https://www.irishcentral.com/roots/history/when-the-klan-and-irish-catho... The 1924 Democratic National Convention, the longest continuous Democratic National Convention ever (sixteen days), was deeply divided between urban and rural factions. These factions were represented, respectively, by Smith, a product of Manhattan's lower East Side, and William Gibbs McAdoo, a Georgia native and Tennessee resident who had moved to California. The former agrarian Confederacy versus the rest of the country, especially the Northeast, had also long been a classic divide in the Democratic Party.

John William Davis, a Wilsonite elite whose views on lynching, equal rights and states rights were vomit-worthy, won the nomination on the one hundred third ballot. Davis thereby defeated Smith and other hopefuls, including auto magnate Henry Ford, a racist and an even more notorious anti-Semite, and McAdoo, not merely a Wilsonite elite, but also a son-in-law of T-Woo. McAdoo was also anti-immigrant and pro-Klan, with a history of corruption in California. (What "beauts!") Smith did, however, get re-elected Governor and go on to become the Democratic Presidential nominee in 1928, when he supposedly invited FDR to run for Governor of New York (as, of course, had cousin Teddy).

Meanwhile, in 1925, Governor Smith appointed supporter FDR to the Taconic State Park Commission, and FDR was elected chair. In that capacity, FDR butted heads with "master builder" Robert Moses, the mover and shaker of, among other things, the Long Island State Park Commission and the New York State Council of Parks. FDR accused Moses of winning support for state parks by using names like that of FDR, but then diverting funds to parks on Long Island. For his part, Moses worked to block appointment of Howe, FDR's long-time political advisor from Tammany Hall, to a position as the Taconic commission's secretary, at taxpayer expense (much as FDR put Howe on the federal payroll when FDR was Assistant Secretary of the Navy). As their respective careers progressed, FDR and Moses continued to be adversarial. Roosevelt served on the commission until the end of 1928, when FDR ran for Governor of New York.

Cartoon depicting politics under Tammany's thumb

*Parts 1-10:
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https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...
https://caucus99percent.com/content/democratic-party-my-third-and-curren...