Nothing to Fear, Adam Cohen
Nothing to Fear, Adam Cohen
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Nothing to Fear
FDR's Inner Circle and the Hundred Days That Created Modern America

Author: Adam Cohen

Narrator: Norman Dietz

Unabridged: 14 hr 11 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Publisher: Tantor Media

Published: 01/22/2009


Synopsis

Nothing to Fear brings to life a fulcrum moment in American history—the tense, feverish first one hundred days of Franklin Delano Roosevelt's presidency, when he and his inner circle completely reinvented the role of the federal government. When FDR took his oath of office in March 1933, more than 10,000 banks had gone under following the Crash of 1929, a quarter of American workers were unemployed, and riots were breaking out at garbage dumps as people fought over scraps of food. Before the hundred days, the federal government was limited in scope and ambition; by the end, it had assumed an active responsibility for the welfare of all of its citizens.

Adam Cohen provides an illuminating group portrait of the five members of FDR's inner circle who, more than any others, drove this unprecedented transformation. These five men and women frequently pushed FDR to embrace more radical programs than he would have otherwise. FDR came to the White House with few firm commitments about how to resolve this national crisis—as a politician he was more pragmatic than ideological and, perhaps surprising given his New Deal legacy, a fiscal conservative by nature. Instead, he relied heavily on his advisers and preferred when they had conflicting views so that he could choose the best option among them. For this reason, he kept in close confidence both Frances Perkins—a feminist before her time and the strongest advocate for social welfare programs—and Lewis Douglas, an entrenched budget cutter who frequently clashed with the other members of FDR's progressive inner circle. Rather than commit to a single solution or ideology, FDR favored a policy of "bold, persistent experimentation." As a result, he presided over the most feverish period of government activity in American history, one that gave birth to modern America.

The political fault lines of this era—welfare, government regulation, agriculture policy—remain with us today. Nothing to Fear is both a riveting narrative account of the personal dynamics that shaped the heady hundred days and a character study of one of America's defining leaders in a moment of crisis.

About Adam Cohen

Adam Cohen is assistant editorial page editor of the New York Times, where he has been a member of the editorial board since 2002. He was previously a senior writer at Time, and he is the author of The Perfect Store: Inside eBay and coauthor of American Pharaoh, a biography of Mayor Richard J. Daley. Before entering journalism, he was an education-reform lawyer, and he has a law degree from Harvard.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Steve on September 06, 2016

[URL not allowed] “Nothing to Fear: FDR’s Inner Circle and the 100 Days that Created Modern America” is Adam Cohen’s 2009 review of the early days of the Franklin D. Roosevelt presidency. Cohen is a former lawyer and member of the New York Times editorial board. He is currently......more

Goodreads review by Donald on April 24, 2020

A great history of the first hundred days of the Franklin Roosevelt presidency and five of his most prodigious advisors. This was a critically monumental time of our history, adding to the pleasure of reading this book. The author made the real lives come in to focus, revealing the foibles and the a......more

Goodreads review by Bob on April 13, 2010

When Franklin Delano Roosevelt came to office in March of 1933, banks, businesses and farms were failing, unemployment stood at 25%, thousands of Americans were going hungry, and an increasing number of citizens were talking of armed rebellion. And FDR was promising “action and action now” but he wa......more

Goodreads review by Amy on October 27, 2009

It might bore some people but I LOVED this inside look at FDR's cabinet. It's far more about Frances Perkins, Henry Wallace and Harry Hopkins (among others) than Roosevelt. But really you can't understand how we got to modern america without understanding something about this. It seems to me this is......more

Goodreads review by Elisa on July 14, 2023

Important to know that, though FDR stands as one of the most competent and history-making presidents in the US, he couldn’t have achieved much without a team. Lincoln did the same when he was in office (must read: Team of Rivals, by Doris Kearns Goodwin). And what a find Frances Perkins is! Wow. I d......more