Here is the richly detailed story of the most controversial President in American history—Franklin Delano Roosevelt—from his carefree childhood, his schooling, his romance, through the tragedy of his crippling affliction, to his election to the Presidency at a time of national distress.

It is the first book that explains to people too young to remember the man and his times, the meaning of the Roosevelt era and the important issues with which he was faced. In the recreation of that era, the author has recaptured the spirit of FDR and the period he dominated. It gives a picture of the Great Depression, harsh, ugly, brutal. It details provocative, dynamite-laden events of the New Deal as the nation saw them. It shows a peaceful nations' heroic role in war. It deals frankly with the hot conflicts FDR frequently touched off; and it describes the tradition-breaking support the American people gave their four-time President.

The picture of the White House years brings into focus the events that drew banner headlines in the thirties and forties, the New Deal laws that cascaded out of Washington and the spreading Fascist imperialism that exploded into World War II. Here is the essence of the path-breaking Roosevelt policies: CCC, WPA, TVA, Social Security, the struggle to revamp the Supreme Court. Here are America's reactions to the man in the White House, who was the "inspired leader of a virile democracy" to some and a "power hungry demagogue" to others.

This is the sharply etched picture of a man who saw the nation through bitter economic crisis at home and the threat of extinction from abroad. It is a picture of the American Presidency, with its travail, its heartbreak, its loneliness and its opportunity for service. It is a document in democracy.

From the dust jacket