| . . . here I was, in a country where a right
to say how the country should be governed was restricted to six persons
in each thousand of its population. . . I was become a stockholder in a
corporation where nine hundred and ninety-four of the members furnished
all the money and did all the work, and the other six elected themselves
a permanent board of direction and took all the dividends. It seemed to
me that what the nine hundred and ninety-four dupes needed was a new deal.
- A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur's Court |
Cartoon from the Dave Thomson collection |
|
Concluding his nomination acceptance speech as Democratic nominee for President of the United States in 1932, Franklin Delano Roosevelt said: "I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people. Let us all here assembled constitute ourselves prophets of a new order of competence and of courage. This is more than a political campaign; it is a call to arms. Give me your help, not to win votes alone, but to win in this crusade to restore America to its own people." After his election, the legislation that was passed to address the crisis of The Great Depression became known as "New Deal" legislation. The period of the New Deal ended when the U.S.A. turned its attention to World War II. |
For more on Franklin Roosevelt and Mark Twain, see The New York Times, September 5, 1936.
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