Democrat · 1933–1945
Franklin D. Roosevelt
The New Deal state, a wartime economy, Japanese-American internment, and four terms.
Franklin D. Roosevelt was president 1933–1945. The party color on the chart is Democrat. Early presidents are not forced into today’s party names. The placement note is: The New Deal state, a wartime economy, Japanese-American internment, and four terms.
The dot is economics -58 and authority +48. That is left of center on economics. The other axis sits toward authority. Color and place are allowed to disagree. Theodore Roosevelt sits left of Grover Cleveland on economics.
What was said, and what the administration did, are filed separately. Said: A new deal for the forgotten man, and — in 1940 — your boys are not going to be sent into any foreign wars. Done: Social Security, labor law, and a regulatory state. After Pearl Harbor, a world war, internment, and four terms. Where those two sentences pull apart, the dot follows the governing record, not the slogan.
The nearest other presidents on these two numbers are Lyndon B. Johnson (1963–1969, -48 / +30) and Harry S. Truman (1945–1953, -32 / +28). A small distance can join people who would have disliked each other. The chart is a compression, not a claim that they were alike.
Presidents are not placed with the Voteview roll-call score used for the current Congress. Two axes cannot carry a war, a court, a tariff, and a civil-rights record as separate facts.