Running for reelection in 1936, Franklin Roosevelt emphasized that the New Deal had averted revolution. He referred to the threat of communism, but I don’t believe he had ever really believed communism was in the offing; what he really feared in 1933 was dictatorship.
In the course of defending democracy, he argued, the New Deal had achieved the highest form of conservatism.
Never has a Nation made greater strides in the safeguarding of Democracy than we have made during the past three years. Wise and prudent men—intelligent conservatives—have long known that in a changing world worthy institutions can be conserved only by adjusting them to the changing time. In the words of the great essayist—‘The voice of great events is proclaiming to us—Reform if you would preserve.’ I am that kind of conservative because I am that kind of liberal.
Anyway it seems like some people need to hear this sort of thing.