Herbert Hoover Pleads for a Resurgence of American “Rugged Individualism”, October 22, 1928
ue in part to our rich heritage of blended cultures and our abundance of exceptional characters, along with the distinctly public method of our electoral process, America has been audience for some of the most memorable and moving instances of oratory in history. These speeches were once taught in schools, picked apart and memorized by the next generation; some were speeches of commendation for our fallen, others were heralds of hope during desperate times, others were nothing short of flowery war cries. And some were closer to prophetic pleas for reform, the tenets and warnings of which are eerily applicable to this day.
Patrick Henry delivers his impassioned “Give me liberty” speech—an iconic moment in American oratory
Herbert Hoover’s final speech during his successful election bid of 1928 is of the latter nature. In it he outlined his governing philosophy and contrasted it with that which he attributed to his Democratic opponent, New York Governor Al Smith. Far from a harping condemnation of his opposition’s vision, Hoover concentrated his appeal to the American spirit of his voters which he trusted still remained despite decades of erosion by governmental corruption, the creation of the Federal Reserve and a devastating World War. He suggested a strong curtailment of the federal government and its involvement in the affairs of its citizenry—a role it had seized during World War One out of claimed necessity and, predictably, never relinquished once peace was secured.
Herbert Hoover (1874-1964)
Al Smith (1873-1944)
After eight years of Republican peacetime governance, the country was enjoying unprecedented prosperity and the election of 1928 proved to be one of the most lopsided in U.S. history, with Hoover winning 40 of the 48 states and more than 58 percent of the popular vote. No one foresaw the sharp decline of the economy that would occur only seven months into his term, one that would become wrongfully synonymous with his very name (homeless camps were often referred to as Hoovervilles) and would become known as the Great Depression. Hoover’s statements in this prosperity-timed speech would later be used against him; taunts regarding his claims about the near abolition of poverty would be made when the resultant crises of previous administrations’ mismanagement resulted in the catastrophic estimate of a 40% poverty rate in the country.
The election results of 1928
A “Hooverville” in the Seattle, Washington tidal flats 1933
Herbert Hoover himself never imagined having his name tied to such calamity—the basis of his speech were principles he himself had abided by most rigorously to raise himself up as a self-taught entrepreneur whose resources and generosity rivaled our country’s more famed tycoons. Hoover lost both of his parents before the age of eight and dropped out of school to work for his uncle at age thirteen. But as a voracious reader, hungry for knowledge, young Herbert was allowed to attend night school and studied mathematics, typing and other courses he deemed necessary for his education. Hoover later entered Stanford University and graduated with an engineering degree, first in his class in four years. While at Stanford he met and married the love of his life, Lou Henry, who bore him two children and proved his perfect match through their forty-six years of marriage.
Lou Hoover (1874-1944)
Hoover’s birthplace in West Branch, Iowa
In the years before the outbreak of World War I, he had become one of the best known and respected mining engineers, mining consultants, and financiers in the world. He had rationalized and developed gold, coal, bauxite, silver, lead and zinc mines in many countries, and had amassed a personal fortune of more than $500,000,000 by today’s standards. He was a master at identifying men who could run that economic empire, and as an organizer and leader, through hard work, genius, and personal integrity, few could question the decisions of “The Chief.”
A young Herbert Hoover in 1898—photographed in Perth, Western Australia
Belgian children being fed and cared for by the Commission for Relief in Belgium, organized by Herbert Hoover in 1914 during WWI
Yet when the sudden cataclysm of world war struck overseas, thousands of Americans found themselves trapped in Europe. The British banks would not honor checks, and ships were unavailable for transport home. The American legation turned to Hoover for help. He was already over in England, and from there he organized a relief effort for stranded Americans, loaning them cash for a signed IOU (he got most of it back eventually) and providing ships to transport them home. He later said that, from that moment on, his public life began and his business life ended.
Hoover’s inauguration on March 4, 1929
By 1928 he had won the Republican Party’s nomination and ran a campaign that was almost guaranteed a win from the start after eight years of Republican prosperity. But seven months later he received 100% of the blame for the Great Depression from the other party, who “rode to the rescue” of the nation with Socialist reforms and larger infrastructure under Franklin Roosevelt the next election cycle. Attacked from all sides as tone deaf during his four-year presidency—despite his unprecedented efforts for national relief—and vilified by FDR until the latter’s death in 1945, Hoover nonetheless became the elder statesman of the Republican Party; President Eisenhower regularly sought his counsel, and his books on mining engineering are still used today.
Presidential election results from 1932
As a self-described liberal, a “soft progressive” of the Teddy Roosevelt type, President Herbert Hoover advocated for traditional understandings of the American constitutional order, one rooted in decentralized and limited government that would work cooperatively with private businesses and individuals to advance social and economic progress. When FDR transformed the government with the New Deal during the Great Depression, Hoover saw his worst fears realized, and spoke out against these transformations for the remainder of his life, until his death in 1964.
Crowds gather during a New York bank run in the early part of the Great Depression, 1931
Below are segments drawn from his 1928 campaign speech, now famous for its coining of the term, ”rugged individualism“:
“I intend… to discuss some of those more fundamental principles upon which I believe the government of the United States should be conducted…. During one hundred and fifty years we have builded up a form of self government and a social system which is peculiarly our own. It differs essentially from all others in the world. It is the American system…. It is founded upon the conception that only through ordered liberty, freedom and equal opportunity to the individual will his initiative and enterprise spur on the march of progress. And in our insistence upon equality of opportunity has our system advanced beyond all the world.
During [World War I] we necessarily turned to the government to solve every difficult economic problem. The government having absorbed every energy of our people for war, there was no other solution. For the preservation of the state the Federal Government became a centralized despotism which undertook unprecedented responsibilities, assumed autocratic powers, and took over the business of citizens. To a large degree, we regimented our whole people temporally into a socialistic state. However justified in war time, if continued in peace-time it would destroy not only our American system but with it our progress and freedom as well.
When the war closed, the most vital of all issues both in our own country and throughout the world was whether Governments should continue their wartime ownership and operation of many instrumentalities of production and distribution. We were challenged with a peace-time choice between the American system of rugged individualism and a European philosophy of diametrically opposed doctrines—doctrines of paternalism and state socialism. The acceptance of these ideas would have meant the destruction of self-government through centralization of government. It would have meant the undermining of the individual initiative and enterprise through which our people have grown to unparalleled greatness….
There is [in this election]… submitted to the American people a question of fundamental principle. That is: shall we depart from the principles of our American political and economic system, upon which we have advanced beyond all the rest of the world…? I should like to state to you the effect that this projection of government into business would have upon our system of self-government and our economic system. That effect would reach to the daily life of every man and woman. It would impair the very basis of liberty and freedom not only for those left outside the fold of expanded bureaucracy but for those embraced within it…. Bureaucracy does not tolerate the spirit of independence; it spreads the spirit of submission into our daily life and penetrates the temper of our people not with the habit of powerful resistance to wrong but with the habit of timid acceptance of irresistible might….
By adherence to the principles of decentralized self-government, ordered liberty, equal opportunity and freedom to the individual, our American experiment in human welfare has yielded a degree of well-being unparalleled in all the world. It has come nearer to the abolition of poverty, to the abolition of fear of want, than humanity has ever reached before…. This alone furnishes the answer to our opponents who ask us to introduce destructive elements into the system by which this has been accomplished….
My conception of America is a land where men and women may walk in ordered freedom in the independent conduct of their occupations; where they may enjoy the advantages of wealth, not concentrated in the hands of the few but spread through the lives of all, where they build and safeguard their homes, and give to their children the fullest advantages and opportunities of American life; where every man shall be respected in the faith that his conscience and his heart direct him to follow; where a contented and happy people, secure in their liberties, free from poverty and fear, shall have the leisure and impulse to seek a fuller life.
Some may ask where all this may lead beyond mere material progress. It leads to a release of the energies of men and women from the dull drudgery of life to a wider vision and a higher hope. It leads to the opportunity for greater and greater service, not alone from man to man in our own land, but from our country to the whole world. It leads to an America, healthy in body, healthy in spirit, unfettered, youthful, eager—with a vision searching beyond the farthest horizons, with an open mind sympathetic and generous. It is to these higher ideals and for these purposes that I pledge myself and the Republican Party.”
Final resting places of Herbert and Lou Hoover at the Herbert Hoover National Historic Site, West Branch, Iowa
Image Credits: 1 Patrick Henry (wikipedia.org) 2 Herbert Hoover (wikipedia.org) 3 Al Smith (wikipedia.org) 4 1928 Election (wikipedia.org) 5 “Hooverville” in Seattle (wikipedia.org) 6 Lou Hoover (wikipedia.org) 7 Herbert Hoover birthplace (wikipedia.org) 8 Hoover in 1898 (wikipedia.org) 9 Belgian Relief Commission (wikipedia.org) 10 Hoover’s Inauguration (wikipedia.org) 11 1932 Election (wikipedia.org) 12 1931 Bank Run (wikipedia.org) 13 Gravesite (wikipedia.org)