What Caused the Death of FDR?

New Information -- The Death of FDR

In an incredible story from the New York Post (January 3, 2010) author Eric Fettman and neurologist Dr. Steven Lomazow, after a five-year investigation, concluded in their new book, FDR's Deadly Secret, a striking historical finding about the diagnosis of President Franklin D. Roosevelt:

"It has long been known that President Franklin D. Roosevelt, during the last year of his life, was gravely ill with serious cardiac problems: He'd been diagnosed with acute heart failure in March 1944 and suffered from astronomically high blood pressure  and arteriosclerosis.

"But what the public did not know was that four years earlier, while still in the second of his four terms as president, FDR had been diagnosed with a deadly skin cancer, melanoma, in a lesion over his left eyebrow."

Fettman and Lomazow wrote that the disease eventually metastasized to Roosevelt's abdomen and brain, causing a tumor that resulted in his death on April 12, 1945. Originally, Roosevelt's doctors had publicly contended his death was caused by "a bolt out of the blue" (massive cerebral hemorrhage) not as a result of a catastrophic illness compounded by heart problems. 

Roosevelt died in his prime, at 63, in Warm Springs, Georgia, within sight of the war victory he helped forge and the peace he had hoped to underwrite.

According to reports, the agent at the Warm Springs railroad station, C. A. Pless, accustomed to greeting a smiling, waving man who could never resist the crowd, said later, "The President was the worst-looking man I ever saw who was still alive."

Although no autopsy was performed, the cause of death was reported most certainly as a massive stroke. Then, no effective treatment for hypertension existed.

Background About FDR and Illness

How much did Franklin D. Roosevelt, himself, actually know about his condition? By the time American soldiers landed in Normandy in June 1944, FDR's blood pressure was 226/118--a life-threatening level. The limited medical technology of the day, electrocardiograms and chest X-rays, showed a damaged, enlarged heart. Still, no one told FDR the bad news, nor did he ask. (Daniel Levy and Susan Brink, "A Change of Heart," U.S. News and World Report, February 6 2005)

Roosevelt’s primary doctor, Ross McIntire, had always maintained that Roosevelt was essentially healthy before he was struck down by a cerebral hemorrhage. (Barron H. Lerner, Bulletin of the History of Medicine, George Mason University's History News Network, hnn.us, July 9, 2007) McIntire was an ear, nose, and throat specialist whose main concern would be the President's head colds and sinus problems.

Levy and Brink found that early in 1944, Eleanor Roosevelt was ready to reject McIntire's diagnosis of a moderate degree of arteriosclerosis and ask for a second opinion, and in March the President went to Bethesda Naval Hospital for a thorough examination. There, a young cardiologist, Howard Bruenn, pronounced the President desperately ill. But, McIntire carefully controlled the disclosure of all medical information and believed Bruenn's view of FDR's health would disturb the president and his family.

Even more interesting, Fettman and Lomazow said Roosevelt had been informed, in no uncertain terms, in the summer of 1944 by Dr. Frank Lahey, an eminent surgeon, that he would not survive a fourth term; however, 24 hours later FDR told Democratic leaders he would run for re-election.

All the while, Fettman and Lomazow said his doctors lied to the American people, insisting the President was in fine health.

In fact, as early as the spring of 1941, Roosevelt had spent two months recovering from a life-threatening profound anemia which required as many as nine emergency blood transfusions. Fettman and Lomazow stated, "Historians have known of this profound blood loss but never understood its significance -- or realized that FDR had undergone transfusions, which we uncovered in letters between his wife and daughter, as well as evidence on the lab slips. America came within a pint of blood of having Vice President Henry A. Wallace -- who would later run for president in a campaign controlled by the US Communist Party -- in the White House."

Role of the Doctors, the President, and the Press

In keeping with the culture of the times, his personal physicians hid the grim reality of the president's failing health from the press, from the public, from his family--even from FDR himself. (Daniel Levy and Susan Brink, "A Change of Heart," U.S. News and World Report, February 6 2005)

According to Levy and Brink, "Roosevelt, his doctors, and the media had colluded to portray him as the picture of health. Long before he was elected president, in the summer of 1921 when he was 39 years old, he had fallen victim to another epidemic. Polio rendered his legs nearly useless. His walk was seldom photographed, nor was the wheelchair on which he often depended."

In February 1945, Roosevelt returned to the United States after the Yalta Conference and addressed Congress on March 1 ("President Roosevelt's Report To Congress on the Crimea Conference," New York Times, March 1 1945) Many people then were shocked to see how old, thin and frail he looked. He spoke while seated in the well of the House, an unprecedented concession to his physical incapacity.

"(He opened his speech by saying, 'I hope that you will pardon me for this unusual posture of sitting down during the presentation of what I want to say, but...it makes it a lot easier for me not to have to carry about ten pounds of steel around on the bottom of my legs.' This was his only public mention of his disability.) But mentally he was still in full command. 'The Crimean Conference,' he said firmly, 'ought to spell the end of a system of unilateral action, the exclusive alliances, the spheres of influence, the balances of power, and all the other expedients that have been tried for centuries– and have always failed. We propose to substitute for all these, a universal organization in which all peace-loving nations will finally have a chance to join.'" (Robert Dallek, Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy, 1932–1945, 1995)

The standard historical account of Franklin D. Roosevelt’s final illness and death was written in April 1970 on the 25th anniversary of the former president’s death by one of his physicians, Howard G. Bruenn.

 

MD and PhD Barren H. Lerner of Columbia University reported, "Given that Bruenn wrote in conjunction with interested parties and as a commemoration of the 25th anniversary of the death of a beloved political figure, his take on the politically controversial issues of Roosevelt’s reelection and his performance at Yalta necessarily conformed to a certain narrative. As Bruenn crafted a medical history, it took a form that supported the decisions that Roosevelt, his family members, his political colleagues and his doctor—Howard Bruenn—had made." (Bulletin of the History of Medicine, George Mason University's History News Network, hnn.us, July 9, 2007)

Implications

Fettman and Lomazow raise questions about the public disclosure of a President's ability to serve the office. They make one consider an appropriate time when a President should step down. And, the most obvious question is "What if the cover-up had played out differently and produced a sinister outcome?" History is sometimes dependent on a "roll of the dice." If Fettman and Lomazow are correct in their research, FDR's final legacy may have rested upon a huge gamble.

The Constitution provides for invoking Section 4 of the 25th Amendment. It allows that the Vice President, together with a majority of either "the principal officers of the executive departments" (i.e., the Cabinet) or of "such other body as Congress may by law provide," can declare the President disabled. As with Section 3, the Vice President would become Acting President.

Section 4 exists to be invoked if an incapacitation of the President results in both the inability of the President to discharge the duties of his office and the inability of the President to provide a written declaration to that effect. The President may resume exercising the Presidential duties by sending a written declaration to the President pro tempore and the Speaker of the House.

Should the Vice President and Cabinet remain unsatisfied with the President's condition, they may within four days of the President's declaration submit another declaration that the President is incapacitated. The Congress must assemble within 48 hours if not in session, and within 21 days it must pronounce its decision. A two-thirds vote of each House of Congress is required to affirm the President as unfit. Upon this finding by the Congress that the Vice President will "continue" to discharge the Presidential duties, implying the Vice President remains Acting President while Congress deliberates.