Roosevelt and Smith served as surrogate debaters for Democratic candidate Adlai Stevenson and Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower, four years before Presidents John F. Kennedy and Richard M. Nixon held their far more famous debate, the first televised debate between presidential candidates.
More than a decade after the death of her husband, President Franklin D. Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt remained an influential figure in the Democratic Party and a strong ally of former Illinois Governor Stevenson, who had run against President Eisenhower four years earlier. Smith's 1950 “Statement of Conscience” on the Senate floor condemning the anti-Communist tactics of Senator Joseph McCarthy (R-Wisconsin) drew national attention, acclaim, and speculation that she might be a potential vice presidential candidate.
The 30-minute broadcast, featuring a white, male questioner and condescendingly introducing Roosevelt and Smith as “attractive women,” is emblematic of the social mores of the black-and-white television era. But the serious issues the presidential surrogates faced are familiar to 21st-century Americans and are likely to feature in Thursday night's debate between Biden and President Donald Trump.
The broadcast came as Britain and France sought to seize control of the Suez Canal following Israel's invasion of Egypt in late October. With the shadow of war looming darkly over the Middle East, Soviet troops invaded Hungary to put down an uprising against the Kremlin-backed Communist regime in Budapest.
From the start, Roosevelt dominated the debate: “When there was a silence to be filled, Mrs. Roosevelt filled it,” writes Smith biographer Janan Sherman.
Roosevelt criticized the Eisenhower administration for not taking action to stop the escalating conflict in the Middle East. “We didn't act quickly enough,” he said. “We were held up in part by oil interests. But these things don't happen overnight. They add up. I think anybody who has watched the situation in the Middle East escalate has been waiting for some constructive action on the part of this Administration.”
Roosevelt said events in the Middle East and Eastern Europe were connected: if the United States had taken a stronger stance in the Middle East, “the invasion of Hungary would not have taken place.”
Smith offered a succinct defense of the administration's handling of the crisis: “I think President Eisenhower did his best to calm Israel and bring Egypt into peaceful compliance,” she said.
When asked by Chicago Daily News foreign affairs reporter Peter Lisager whether US leaders could have prevented a war in the Middle East, Smith replied, “No, I don't think they could have.”
Ms. Smith's brevity was strategic. In her autobiography, she wrote that she planned to highlight as many of Roosevelt's differences with her longtime aide, Bill Lewis, as possible. Given the former first lady's ability to speak with “an impressive tone of assurance and authority,” Ms. Smith decided to keep her answers short and to the point.
“Of course, this was a risk because, as a great debater, Mrs. Roosevelt would dominate the debate and I would appear weaker in contrast,” Smith acknowledged, “but I preferred this risk to struggling with answers and exposing weaknesses.”
Smith wrote that she wore a dark dress with a pearl necklace and her trademark red rose to create a clearer image on black-and-white television and to contrast with what she and Lewis expected Roosevelt to wear: Roosevelt appeared in a beige suit and hat.
Messrs. Smith and Lewis wanted the debate to end with a two-minute closing statement, and threatened to pull the plug when told shortly before it would go on air that there was no time for a closing statement. Network executives agreed, and the closing statement went ahead.
Roosevelt concluded his speech by denounceing the Administration's position on atmospheric hydrogen bomb testing and defending President Stevenson's call to abolish the draft.
When it was his turn, Smith was relentless in his attack, citing his record of standing up to the smear tactics McCarthy used against Democrats and delivering a fierce defense of Eisenhower.
“Democratic presidents, along with allied leaders, chose Dwight D. Eisenhower to lead our country to victory in World War II and to lead NATO to stop the spread of Communism,” she added. “It's odd to see and hear Democratic leaders now accuse Eisenhower of not being a leader. Why is there this difference? It's clearly a difference of ideology and politics.”
“When Senator Smith reached out to shake Mrs. Roosevelt's hand, the First Lady removed it, turned and walked away, saying to her companion, 'Did you hear what she said?'” Lewis wrote in an editor's note to Smith's autobiography.
Her annoyance with Smith may have simply stemmed from fatigue: “The last few days of the campaign were very hard and I was very tired, trying to make my own voice heard,” Roosevelt recalled in her autobiography.
Or it may have reflected her awareness of her uphill battle as the Democratic candidate: On Election Day, Eisenhower won 457 electoral votes and 57 percent of the popular vote, handily winning a second term.
