The History of Florida (66 page)

fewer than twenty counties operated public welfare programs. Turn-

ing to Washington, Floridians suffered disappointment. President Her-

bert Hoover, while sympathetic, declined to order direct governmental

The Great Depression · 315

economic intervention. By 1930 a political stalemate had developed between

the White House and the Democratic Congress. Hoover’s private relief pol-

icy had foundered. A discontented “Bonus Army” of veterans marched on

Washington; their hovels and tents at Anacostia Flats were burned and the

marchers were dispelled by force; a food strike was threatened by midwest-

ern farmers; violence flared intermittently; and communist agitators stirred

discontent. Across America the homeless huddled in their “Hoovervilles”—

hastily constructed clusters of shacks. Many young men and women joined

adult transients to ride the rails and camp in hobo jungles. Florida drew

them like a magnet, and relief rol s swelled. Immigration was discouraged,

and for three winter seasons state policemen blocked roads and refused to

let indigent transients cross into Florida. Indecision, resentment, despair,

and fear were evident everywhere—the United States had lost its confidence.

The impasse was broken partial y in July 1932, when Hoover approved a

law that extended Reconstruction Finance Corporation powers, but it was

too little, too late. Governor Carlton asked for $500,000, and Florida got its

first relief funds in September. The number of families that went on relief

represented 36 percent of the black and 22 percent of the white population.

Per capita income had reached a low of $289. The presidential elections of

1932 promised new directions in the government’s attack on the depression.

proof

Hoover became the scapegoat for what had gone wrong, and, as the election

approached, the nation demanded change. Florida Democrats, who con-

trolled state politics, supported New York’s governor Franklin D. Roosevelt

against Hoover. Promising relief, recovery, and reform through a New Deal

for the American people, Roosevelt won the White House and easily carried

Florida, where he received 74.9 percent of the popular vote.

Significant contests in state elections, including the race for state comp-

trol er, also occurred in 1932. Besides running against two strong candi-

dates, John M. Lee and Van C. Swearinger, Ernest Amos had an extra bur-

den. J. Tom Watson, his nemesis from a previous impeachment attempt,

based a gubernatorial campaign on removing the comptroller from office.

Prosperity would never return, Watson declared, until the political power

of Amos and the state banking interests was broken. Lee won the runoff

primary comfortably and ended the career of Florida’s most controversial

comptroller. In the general election Lee had no difficulty defeating Repub-

lican Armonis F. Knotts.

The gubernatorial primary bulged with eight candidates, among them

former governors Cary A. Hardee and John W. Martin. Brooklyn-born Da-

vid Sholtz, a Jewish lawyer from Daytona Beach, placed second to Martin in

316 · William W. Rogers

the first primary. Known for his state Chamber of Commerce work, Sholtz

advocated improved education. Despite traces of anti-Semitism, he carried

the runoff to win by more than 71,000 votes. Sholtz then defeated Repub-

lican William J. Howey, winning as a strong Roosevelt supporter. The Pro-

hibition issue prompted some cynics to say that Sholtz won because people

confused him with Schlitz and thought they were voting to bring back beer.

Repeal came with ratification of the Twenty-First Amendment on 5 Decem-

ber 1933.

Unlike the hotly contested governor’s race, U.S. Senator Duncan U.

Fletcher faced no opposition in 1932. Two years later, the Senate election

pitted incumbent Park Trammell against former Alabamian Claude Pepper

and three other candidates, one of them Hortense E. Wel s, a World War I

ambulance driver and Democratic National Committeewoman. Trammell

won easily.

Politics remained important to Floridians throughout the decade. In 1936

they reaffirmed their support of Roosevelt by giving him 76.1 percent of the

vote over Republican Alfred M. Landon. The deaths of Senators Trammell

and Fletcher in 1936 forced the calling of a special primary to fill their seats.

Pepper was elected to one seat without opposition. Charles O. Andrews beat

former governor Carlton in a close primary, then defeated Republican H.

proof

C. Babcock. After serving an uncompleted two-year Senate term, Pepper

ran for reelection in 1938 and did so as a strong New Dealer. Facing four

opponents, including former governor Sholtz, he won the primary without

a runoff. Pepper’s 82.4 percent of the vote in the general election was a sting-

ing defeat for Republican Thomas E. Swanson.

Even by Florida standards, the fourteen opponents who sought the

Democratic nomination for governor in 1936 were a large number. The field

included former governor Martin, as well as Raleigh W. Petteway, who fin-

ished first, and Fred P. Cone, who trailed by 5,000 votes. Although voters

gave Roosevelt a landslide, Cone’s performance demonstrated their inde-

pendence. The Lake City banker’s conservative campaign called for “lower-

ing the budget to balance taxes instead of raising taxes to balance the bud-

get.” The voters agreed, and Cone handily defeated Petteway in the runoff

primary. He then swamped Elvey E. Cal away, his Republican adversary.

The 1940 contests likewise commanded state attention. Roosevelt won

an unprecedented third term over Republican Wendel L. Wil kie, taking

Florida by 359,334 to 126,158 votes. Seeking reelection to his Senate seat,

Charles O. Andrews faced five opponents, among them Jerry W. Carter,

former governor Cone, and Bernarr McFadden, a political novice better

The Great Depression · 317

known as a physical culturalist and publisher of true romance magazines.

Andrews led runner-up Carter by 100,000 votes and increased his margin

in the runoff primary. Republican Miles H. Draper withdrew, leaving the

incumbent unopposed. The Democratic gubernatorial nomination was

sought by eleven candidates. Future governor Ful er Warren was one of

them, but the leading aspirants were Polk County’s Spessard L. Hol and and

Volusia County’s Francis P. Whitehair. Hol and finished first, but Whitehair

forced a runoff in which Hol and repeated his primary victory. Republicans

declined to oppose him in the general election.

Florida’s politics were highly partisan and individualistic during the

Great Depression, which resulted in a string of one-term governors and the

absence of political machines. Within the framework of a one-party system,

the politics were deceptively complex. Roosevelt’s personality and federal

government activities overshadowed state politicians and their accomplish-

ments. No sweeping political changes occurred, although in 1937 the poll

tax, a means of disfranchising blacks, was repealed. Repeal meant the ad-

dition of more poor white voters but had no significant impact on blacks.

Women did not vote as a bloc, but they became important in the overall

political process. Increasingly they sought political office, especial y at the

local level. At the decade’s end the state was still solidly Democratic, and,

proof

with few exceptions, Roosevelt was a folk hero. Many named their children

after him.

Early in the decade, though, Floridians had been too caught up in the

present to worry about future politics. Even before the new president took

office in March 1933, the national experience became an action movie with

the film speeded up. Sometimes in the frantic whir of the reels, images

blurred. An air of unreality loomed, for instance, around an event in Florida

that occurred on 15 February. President-elect Roosevelt had begun to speak

at Miami’s Bayfront Park when pistol shots rang out. An assassin’s bullets

missed him but wounded five others. Unemployed bricklayer Guiseppe

Zangara was arrested as the assailant. After wounded Chicago mayor Anton

Cermak died, Zangara was retried for murder, convicted, and electrocuted.

Roosevelt’s election as such accomplished little toward calming fears.

Before he took office, the banking crisis became so serious that numerous

governors began cal ing “banking holidays,” and the index of industrial

production continued to drop. Runs on banks and hoarding of currency

were rampant. On 4 March, Governor Sholtz, in Washington for the inau-

guration, declared a five-day banking holiday for Florida (later extended

to 15 March). Roosevelt then decreed a four-day national banking holiday

318 · William W. Rogers

effective 6 March. The use of scrip was briefly al owed, and an embargo

was put on the export of gold, silver, and currency. The public responded

wel , and within two weeks stock prices rose, some hoarded currency was

reinvested, and gold and gold certificates were returned to the treasury and

reserve banks. With the prompt passage of a banking act and a reassuring

fireside chat from Roosevelt, confidence rose and the banking crisis was

checked.

Sholtz soon permitted state banks to resume business under certain

conditions. He promised “banking laws with teeth,” and the legislature re-

sponded by increasing the powers of liquidators and receivers, regulating

how banks issued preferred stock, and toughening penalties. Floridians

took the crisis calmly. Instead of hoarding money, they used their cash for

local purchases. Many stores took personal checks even though they could

not be deposited, and credit was extended. Businesses advertised that they

would accept checks and held “New Deal Sales.” In a statewide radio ad-

dress, Sholtz proclaimed that he wanted each citizen to “keep your chin

where you have it now—up. If you have confidence in God and man, main-

tain that confidence.”5 Many state banks and a number of national banks

were operating by 14 March, and Comptroller Lee remarked in June, “I be-

lieve that we are soon to be on the threshold of a new era in banking.”6 He

proof

was correct. The decade’s remaining legislative sessions did not have to deal

with either the deflation of the 1920s or the severe depression of the early

1930s.

During the special congressional session of 1933, known as the “Hundred

Days,” a record number of acts permanently changed Florida and the na-

tion. They spawned a bewildering array of bureaus and agencies. A bemused

public called the mixture “alphabet soup.” Confusion and conflict inevitably

arose. Some of the programs succeeded; others did not. Even so, the Ameri-

can people got the action Roosevelt had promised: the Emergency Bank-

ing Act; the Glass-Stegal Act, which divorced investment banking from

deposit banking and created the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

(FDIC); the Securities and Exchange Act; and many others. Rural and urban

citizens were helped by the Emergency Farm Mortgage Act and the Home

Owners Loan Corporation Act (HOLC). To aid in distributing relief funds,

the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) was created. Inte-

rior Secretary Harold L. Ickes directed a massive building program known

as the Public Works Administration (PWA). To offer relief even faster and

more directly, the short-lived Civil Works Administration (CWA) was es-

tablished. It gave the word “boondoggle” to the country and was criticized

The Great Depression · 319

in Florida by some turpentine operators and citrus growers who objected to

“high” CWA payment levels.

Southern states such as Florida benefitted from a myriad of other pro-

grams. The most popular New Deal agency was the Civilian Conservation

Corps (CCC). Known as the “tree army,” the CCC engaged in various re-

forestation and conservation projects. National y it provided work for more

than 2 mil ion young men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-five.

Most were from economical y impoverished families, and no state benefit-

ted more than did Florida. Agricultural problems were addressed through

allotment and crop-reduction programs established under the Agricultural

Adjustment Act. The AAA affected al of Florida’s farmers. Because industry

and organized labor were no less devastated than agriculture, Congress cre-

ated the National Recovery Administration (NRA). With its symbolic Blue

Eagle, the NRA attempted to put into effect industrial codes of fair compe-

tition and prices among the nation’s industries. Its other aim was to secure

collective bargaining for organized labor.

The popular New Deal measures resulted in a great Democratic victory

in the 1934 off-year elections, and set in motion the Second New Deal. What

followed was a policy of deficit financing—the idea that direct government

intervention or “pump priming” was sometimes necessary in a capitalist

proof

economy. While continuing some relief and recovery programs, the admin-