HERBERT HOOVER | Herbert Hoover accepts the Republican nomination, as the shadow of the Great Depression looms large in the American psyche

Property from the Collection of Elsie and Philip Sang

HERBERT HOOVER

TYPESCRIPT SIGNED ("HERBERT HOOVER"), A TRANSCRIPTION OF HIS 1932 ACCEPTANCE SPEECH FOR THE REPUBLICAN NOMINATION

Thirty-one pages (11 x 8 1/2 in.; 280 x 216 mm), Washington, D.C., 11 August [1932], additionally signed and inscribed "I assume this is the earliest text — though I have not checked it | H." Paper-clipped at upper left, minor handling wear. 

Herbert Hoover accepts the Republican nomination, as the shadow of the Great Depression looms large in the American psyche

Hoover's campaign for reelection in 1932 was defined by his administration's response to the economic turbulence and rising unemployment of his first term, a response characterized by his opponents as cold and out of touch. As he accepted his second nomination to the Republican ticket, in the minds of most Americans, his name had become inextricably linked to those economic horrors. In acknowledgement of the painful realities of the Great Depression, he opens his speech on a stark note before going on to defend his record, and paint a rosier picture of recovery:  

"In accepting the great honor you have brought me, I desire to speak so simply and so plainly that every man and woman in the United States who may hear or read my words cannot misunderstand. The last three years have been a time of unparalleled economic calamity. They have been years of greater suffering and hardship than any which have come to the American people since the aftermath of the Civil War ... With united effort we can and will turn the tide toward the restoration of business, employment, and agriculture. It will call for the utmost devotion and wisdom. Every reserve of American courage and vision must be called upon to sustain us and to plan wisely for the future. "

Hoover would lose to Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his promise of a "New Deal" recovery by a landslide, clinching only 59 electoral votes to Roosevelt's 472.