About this item

The inspiring story of an unlikely political partnership -- between a to-the-manor-born Protestant and a Lower East Side Catholic -- that transformed the Democratic Party and led to the New DealIn the late 19th and early 20th centuries, the Democratic Party was bitterly split between its urban machines -- representing Catholics and Jews, ironworkers and seamstresses, from the tenements of the northeast and Midwest -- and its populists and patricians, rooted in the soil and the Scriptures, enforcers of cultural, political, and religious norms. The chasm between the two factions seemed unbridgeable. But just before the Roaring Twenties, Al Smith, a proud son of the Tammany Hall political machine, and Franklin Roosevelt, a country squire, formed an unlikely alliance that transformed the Democratic Party.



About the Author

Terry Golway

Terry Golway is a senior editor at POLITICO. He holds a Ph.D. in U.S. history from Rutgers University.



Read Next Recommendation

Report incorrect product information.