New York State Governor Franklin D. Roosevelt Central Subject and Correspondence Files

This bulk of this series is arranged alphabetically by subject. Materials pertaining to investigations of the government and magistrate's courts of the City of New York are filed at the end of the series.

Franklin D. Roosevelt was born in Hyde Park, New York on January 30, 1882. In 1905, he married Anna Eleanor Roosevelt and together the couple had six children. Roosevelt first entered government service upon election to the New York State Senate from his home district in 1910. He was appointed Assistant Secretary of the Navy by President Woodrow Wilson in 1913 and served in that position until 1920. That same year, Roosevelt received the Democratic Party's nomination for vice president and joined the ticket of presidential candidate James M. Cox. Following Republican candidate Warren Harding's defeat of Cox, Roosevelt returned to private life.

With the support and encouragement of Governor Alfred E. Smith, Roosevelt received the state Democratic Party's nomination for governor when Smith ran for president in 1928. Despite Smith's loss to Herbert Hoover in the national election, Roosevelt was elected governor by a narrow margin. He was reelected in 1930 before successfully pursuing the presidency himself in 1932. Reelected in 1936, 1940, and 1944, Franklin D. Roosevelt died in office on April 12, 1945 at the age of sixty-three.

As governor, Roosevelt successfully placed the issue of social security benefits for the elderly on the political agenda for future action. He promoted development of the state's hydroelectric power resources and favored state ownership and operation of power generating facilities, along with reform and tighter regulation of utility rate-making procedures. He defended the constitutional authority of the governor's office regarding formulation of the state's budget and supported a constitutional amendment to extend the term of the governor from two to four years. Following violent and destructive riots at two of the state's correctional institutions, the governor ordered an investigation of the state's prison and parole systems. Even prior to the onset of the Great Depression, Roosevelt supported a number of measures to ease the economic hardship of the state's farmers: tax relief; creation of a New York Milk Shed to control prices; economic planning and alternative land usage; rural electrification; road construction; and subsidies to support agricultural research.

Roosevelt was among the first governors to recognize the level of economic distress that the nation was facing following the stock market crash in October of 1929. In March 1930, he announced the appointment of a Commission on Stabilization of Industry, composed of business and labor representatives, to develop a long-term program for industrial mobilization and prevention of unemployment. Roosevelt became the first governor in the nation to propose unemployment insurance, funded through joint contribution by employees, employers, and government, to alleviate human distress and support the economy in times of market fluctuation. He also secured the legislature's approval for the establishment of the Temporary Emergency Relief Administration (TERA), which was to administer "unemployment and distress relief" for an "emergency period" of seven months beginning November 1, 1931. In November of 1932, the state's electorate approved a bond issue extending the life of TERA into the administration of Governor Herbert Lehman.

In addition to the worsening economic crisis, Roosevelt was forced to address serious issues of crime and corruption. Carefully balancing his personal opposition to Prohibition and desire to stem the proliferation of organized crime with the political necessity of courting temperance forces, Roosevelt argued for repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment in favor of local option and local enforcement of strict liquor-control laws. He also appointed a Commission on Revision of the Banking Law in response to a Moreland Act commission investigation of the Banking Department's operations in the case of City Trust Company. Roosevelt balanced his need to retain the political support of Tammany Hall with pressure from Republican opponents and reformers to address corruption in New York City's government and magistrate's courts. In August 1930, he requested that the First Department of the Appellate Division of the Supreme Court conduct an investigation of the city's magistrate's courts and proposed Samuel Seabury to oversee the process. In March of 1931, Roosevelt asked Seabury to lead an investigation into charges of inefficiency and incompetence on the part of New York County District Attorney Thomas C. T. Crain. In the summer of 1932, the governor convened hearings in response to charges, brought forth by the Joint Legislative Committee on the Affairs of the City of New York and the Joint Legislative Committee to Investigate New York City Government, of negligence and incompetence on the part of New York City Mayor James J. Walker.

Scholarship concerning the life and political career of Franklin D. Roosevelt is voluminous. Works consulted in preparation of this finding aid include Davis, Kenneth S. New York: Random House, 1985; and Smith, Jean Edward. New York: Random House, 2007.

The central subject and correspondence files of Franklin D. Roosevelt document the governor's response to social and economic issues both immediately prior to and following the onset of the Great Depression. Specific topics include social security benefits for the elderly; child welfare; unemployment insurance; industrial mobilization and employment stabilization; banking failures; establishment of the Temporary Emergency Relief Administration; income and direct tax reduction; economic assistance to farmers and rural infrastructure development; agricultural research and development; development, ownership, and operation of hydroelectric power resources; examination and reform of the Public Service Law and utility rate-making policies; establishment of the New York Power Authority; investigation of state prison and parole systems following riots at Dannemora and Auburn; revision of the state's system of civil and criminal judicial administration; and shortage of resources for proper care of patients in state mental hospitals.

Records in this series also document the governor's investigative powers and his efforts to address serious issues of crime and corruption. Topics include Prohibition and repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment; baseball pools and lotteries; investigation of the state Banking Department's operations in the City Trust Company case and resulting efforts to revise the state Banking Law; Appellate Division First Department investigation of the New York City magistrates' courts, including magistrate George Ewald; Samuel Seabury investigation into charges of inefficiency and incompetence on the part of New York County District Attorney Thomas C. T. Crain; hearings held by Governor Roosevelt in response to charges, brought forth by the Joint Legislative Committee on the Affairs of the City of New York and the Joint Legislative Committee to Investigate New York City Government, of negligence and incompetence on the part of New York City Mayor James J. Walker; and investigation and removal from office of Thomas M. Farley, sheriff of New York County.

The files themselves consist predominantly of original letters and telegrams from public officials and private citizens and organizations; unsigned copies of replies or memoranda from the governor forwarding correspondence to state or local government officials for action; copies of state and local government officials' replies to the governor and/or the original correspondents; and in some cases, unsigned copies of replies from the governor or his secretary directly to the original correspondents. Cross reference cards are present throughout the files, indicating alternate locations of material relevant to specific subjects or correspondents.

Given that a significant number of Governor Roosevelt's files pertain to investigations of inefficiency, incompetence, and misconduct on the part of state and local government officials, and commissions created to address public policy issues raised by these investigations, a voluminous body of preliminary and public hearing transcripts is included therein. These files also contain copies of legal documents including subpoenas, exhibits, statements of charges filed, briefs, opinions, and orders. Additional records include press releases and intermediate and final reports of legislative commissions and investigative bodies.

This series has been microfilmed on 219 rolls and is available for use onsite or through interlibrary loan.

The Index roll of the microfilm copy of these records contains a list of original folder titles; an alphabetical list of special subjects, with cross-references to folders in which material is found; and a list of range of contents of each microfilm roll.

Access to certain records documenting Moreland Act investigations is restricted. Records are subject to review by State Archives staff prior to disclosure.