The 32nd president, who held the office longer than anyone else (1933-45), Franklin Delano Roosevelt guided the country through two critical periods, the Great Depression and World War II.

A member of a prominent New York Family, he was the fifth cousin of President Theodore Roosevelt. Early on FDR showed a taste for politics and government. He served as undersecretary of the navy in the administration of Woodrow Wilson, whom he used as a model for his own career. In 1921, he contracted poliomyelitis, which left his legs paralyzed, but he learned to artfully disguise this fact when in public. In 1928, he was elected governor of New York, and four years later he ran for president on a platform that promised a "New Deal" for the American people. Elected in 1932, he took office when the country was at the lowest point of the Great Depression. With enormous vigor, he set about realizing the New Deal in concrete programs. He created a number of "alphabet agencies" (including the Works Progress Administration (WPA), the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)) designed to create jobs and instill confidence in the economy. His administration strengthened the banking system, provided relief to farmers and the unemployed, established the Social Security system, encouraged the growth of labor unions, and provided federal loans for businesses.

Despite conservative critics who deplored his activist government as "creeping socialism," his popularity was such that he was reelected in 1936 by the greatest majority in American history. But for all his efforts, the effects of the depression lingered on until the end of the decade. The economy finally rebounded with the onset of World War II, putting the country to work on a wartime basis, supplying aid to Great Britain and the Soviet Union, and building up American military strength in the event of war. War came on December 7, 1941, with the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, an attack that, in the view of some historians, FDR provoked and may have had prior knowledge of.

Although suffering from continuously failing health, he proved to be an effective wartime leader, using his considerable gifts as a communicator to uphold the morale of both the military and civilian populations. He died on the eve of victory in April 1945, mourned by most of the country as a source of inspiration. In this respect he was equaled by his wife, Eleanor Roosevelt (1884-1962), an articulate, idealistic, and tireless defender of the downtrodden. Her outspoken liberal views, particularly her support of African Americans, made her a highly controversial but very effective first lady who later served as the United States ambassador to the United Nations.

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