1940 Democratic National Convention

The 1940 Democratic National Convention was held at the Chicago Stadium in Chicago, Illinois from July 15 to July 18, 1940. The convention resulted in the nomination of President Franklin D. Roosevelt for an unprecedented third term. Secretary of Agriculture Henry A. Wallace from Iowa was nominated for vice president. Despite the unprecedented bid for a third term, Roosevelt was nominated on the first ballot. Roosevelt's most formidable challengers were his former campaign manager James Farley and Vice President John Nance Garner. Both had sought the nomination for the presidency and soundly lost to Roosevelt who would be "drafted" at the convention. Henry Wallace was Roosevelt's preferred choice for the vice presidency. His candidacy was opposed vehemently by some delegates, particularly the conservative wing of the party which had been unenthusiastic about Wallace's liberal positions. Nonetheless, Wallace was ultimately nominated with the votes of 59% of the delegates, on the first ballot. Background By late 1939 President Franklin D. Roosevelt's plans regarding a possible third term in 1940 affected national politics. A Republican leader told H. V. Kaltenborn in September 1939, for example, that Congressional distrust of the president was a cause of the controversy over revising the Neutrality Acts of 1930s. The politician, who supported selling weapons to Britain and France, claimed that Roosevelt could "regain the complete confidence of Congress and the country" by announcing that he would not run for a third term. An unnamed Roosevelt advisor said, however, that doing so would reduce the president's influence on Congress and the Democratic party. Roosevelt would not announce his intentions until spring 1940, the advisor said. Throughout the winter of 1939, and the spring and summer of 1940, whether Roosevelt would run again remained unknown. The "two-term" tradition, although not yet enshrined in the U.S. Constitution as the 22nd Amendment, had been established by President George Washington when he refused to run for a third term in 1796, and the tradition was further supported by Thomas Jefferson. Roosevelt, however, refused to give a definitive statement as to his willingness to be a candidate, even indicating to his old friend and political kingmaker James Farley that he would not be a candidate again and that he could seek the nomination; Farley thus began his campaign.