Customer Reviews

Country Squire in the White House

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Yes, if you want the most comprehensive viewpoint on the 1930s or on FDR you can get many modern scholarly histories.
But this is a book that tells it from the viewpoint of someone living it, "live on the air" so to speak. Flynn was moderately anti-FDR in this book (that is, he sees good and bad) but was a quite rabid anti-communist in his work a couple decades later such as While You Slept (See also John Moser's biography of Flynn). He took the viewpoint that as of 1932 when he was elected, FDR had not accomplished a whole lot: part time effort in a small law firm, some years in the NY state assembly, and a short not too memorable period as the NY governor. [Few presidents, in fact, have the accomplishments of an Eisenhower or LBJ in hand at the time of election; quite a lot are more like FDR, JFK, Carter, or (if) Obama.) He also suggests FDR took relatively little interest in economics, reading, or history, although he enjoyed stamp collecting. (Sounds like Reagan; Flynn was writing in 1940). He recalls sharp differences between some of FDR's campaign remarks in 1931/32 and his actions of 33-38. I think it's very helpful to understand modern politics and ongoing political comment in our election year of 2008 by seeing how the game was played 60 years ago - many of the moves are the same.

Country Squire in the White House was written before the 1940 presidential election, 7-8 years before author John Flynn's much longer and more well-known book The Roosevelt Myth. But because this book analyzes Roosevelt's personal nature and his general policies (and spends some time explaining the causes of the Great Depression) whereas The Roosevelt Myth would seek to evaluate only The New Deal, Country Squire provides valuable analysis and information not found in The Roosevelt Myth, and should be seen as a companion volume or a prelude to it. I recommend you read Country Squire if you read The Roosevelt Myth.

You don't need a hard copy of this book unless you dislike e-books. I found the text online, available for free download, at[...] . (Thank you, von Mises Institute.)