US President Franklin Delano Roosevelt was first elected in 1933, following the Wall Street Crash of 1929 and the subsequent Great Depression. This was a time of profound hardship for many Americans: After the banking system collapsed, wages fell and “One fourth of all Americans were out of a job” (90). Roosevelt, a Democrat, reversed this situation through a radical economic experiment known as the New Deal. The New Deal ushered in new financial regulations, relief for the unemployed, and heavy investments in public works programs, allowing the government to employ millions of Americans, who in turn used their earnings to precipitate an economic recovery. The New Deal also created a lasting loyalty of the working classes for Roosevelt.

In December 1941, Japan launched a surprise attack, designed to cripple the US navy, on a naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. The US declared war on Japan, entering the war on the Allied side. By 1944, the US under Roosevelt is clearly winning the war in the Pacific. In the European theatre, after D-Day, victory against Germany also seems imminent. In the November 1944 presidential election, Roosevelt is reelected by a landslide for a record fourth term. His health, however, is failing.