Leo Thomas Crowley (August 15, 1889 – April 15, 1972) was a senior administrator for President

Franklin D. Roosevelt Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882April 12, 1945), also known as FDR, was the 32nd president of the United States, serving from 1933 until his death in 1945. He is the longest-serving U.S. president, and the only one to have served ...

as the head of the Foreign Economic Administration. Previous to that he had served as chief of the

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is a State-owned enterprises of the United States, United States government corporation supplying deposit insurance to depositors in American commercial banks and savings banks. The FDIC was cr ...

(FDIC) and as Alien Property Custodian. Crowley was a significant administrator, troubleshooter, and political operative for Roosevelt from 1934 to 1945. In 1943, Time magazine dubbed Crowley the "Nation's #1 Pinch Hitter," and one commentator called him FDR's "manager par excellence". Historians later discovered that late in the 1930s, senior Washington officials learned that Crowley had embezzled from his banks in Wisconsin in the 1920s and 1930s. This information was suppressed because of Crowley's political and administrative usefulness. Biographer Stuart Weiss wrote that Crowley's story is:

the darker story of the businessman as speculator and embezzler, whose fraud was covered up in Wisconsin and Washington.... n part it isthe morally complex and compelling story of Crowley as a bureaucrat and politician in Washington, administering multiple major agencies, often simultaneously;...but also deeply involved in conflicts of interest a later generation would find unacceptable and even incomprehensible.

Early life

Leo Crowley was born to Thomas and Katie Crowley in Milton, Wisconsin, immigrants of Irish Catholic origin. He went to the

University of Wisconsin A university () is an institution of tertiary education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. ''University'' is derived from the Latin phrase , which roughly means "community of teachers and scholars". Uni ...

. His father worked for the

Milwaukee Road The Chicago, Milwaukee, St. Paul and Pacific Railroad (CMStP&P), better known as the Milwaukee Road , was a Class I railroad that operated in the Midwestern United States, Midwest and Pacific Northwest, Northwest of the United States from 1847 ...

. Young Leo delivered groceries and saved his tips from customers. In 1905, with $1000 he bought a part of the General Paper Company, some of the products of which he had been bringing to customers. He worked hard to grow the company, and his share in it, until he owned it outright in 1919. That year he took over the T. S. Morris company with financing from Milo Hagen and W.D. Curtis. Selling stock in this company relieved its debt, and he bought a wholesale grocery for his brothers to run, and land in

Madison, Wisconsin Madison is the List of capitals in the United States, capital city of the U.S. state of Wisconsin. It is the List of municipalities in Wisconsin by population, second-most populous city in the state, with a population of 269,840 at the 2020 Uni ...

Political life

Crowley began his entry into the political arena by supporting Albert G. Schmedeman for governor of Wisconsin. The biographer Weiss says "He managed Schmedeman as a parent might his children, and as he managed his family and most of the nurses at Saint Mary's Hospital." Crowley served as a delegate for

Al Smith Alfred Emanuel Smith (December 30, 1873 – October 4, 1944) was the 42nd governor of New York, serving from 1919 to 1920 and again from 1923 to 1928. He was the Democratic Party (United States), Democratic Party's presidential nominee in the 1 ...

at the

Democratic National Convention The Democratic National Convention (DNC) is a series of presidential nominating conventions held every four years since 1832 by the United States Democratic Party. They have been administered by the Democratic National Committee since the 18 ...

. He thus came in contact with Jouett Shouse and John J. Raskob, operatives for Al Smith.

Progressivism Progressivism is a Left-right political spectrum, left-leaning political philosophy and Reformism, reform political movement, movement that seeks to advance the human condition through social reform. Adherents hold that progressivism has unive ...

was strong in Wisconsin, as expressed by Senator John J. Blaine and the newspaper ''

Capital Times ''The Capital Times'' (or ''Cap Times'') is a weekly newspaper published Wednesday in Madison, Wisconsin, by The Capital Times Company. The company also owns 50 percent of Capital Newspapers, which now does business as Madison Media Partners. ...

'' edited by William T. Evjue. Crowley was effective in bringing about a progressive-democratic alliance for the election of Franklin Roosevelt. From the mid-1930s, Leo T. Crowley was more than just the head of a powerful agency the FDIC. He also negotiated with Congressional leaders on banking issues and played a central role in designing new federal banking laws. He promoted Roosevelt's political interests in Wisconsin by working with the state's left-wing Progressive Party for the 1936 and 1940 elections. At the same time Crowley also served as a crucial link between Roosevelt, and right-wing forces in Congress and the national bank community. In 1940, he was considered --but not chosen--for the chairmanship of the Democratic National Committee. It was the Glass–Steagall Act that created the

(FDIC), one of the most popular elements of the

New Deal The New Deal was a series of wide-reaching economic, social, and political reforms enacted by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in the United States between 1933 and 1938, in response to the Great Depression in the United States, Great Depressi ...

because it protecting the bank accounts of local depositors. Biographer Weiss tells of the incredible tale of how the nearly-bankrupt Crowley became the leader in banking security and thus ended the epidemic of

bank run A bank run or run on the bank occurs when many Client (business), clients withdraw their money from a bank, because they believe Bank failure, the bank may fail in the near future. In other words, it is when, in a fractional-reserve banking sys ...

s that had closed thousands of small banks. Crowley's special capacity for smoothing troubled waters drew him closer to FDR. A wartime cabinet-level conflict involving foreign economic operations in Europe and North Africa threatened cabinet solidarity. So Crowley became head of the Foreign Economic Administration in September 1943, with responsibility for

Lend-Lease Lend-Lease, formally the Lend-Lease Act and introduced as An Act to Promote the Defense of the United States (),3,000 Hurricanes and >4,000 other aircraft) * 28 naval vessels: ** 1 Battleship. (HMS Royal Sovereign (05), HMS Royal Sovereign) * ...

and Edward R. Stettinius Jr., was promoted to Undersecretary of State. Crowley was now a cabinet member in the Roosevelt administration.

Crowley as embezzler

The skeleton in Crowley's closet was his misappropriation of funds in 1931. Working under the direction of Secretary of the Treasury Henry Morgenthau Jr., the

Comptroller of the Currency The Office of the Comptroller of the Currency (OCC) is an independent bureau within the United States Department of the Treasury that was established by the National Currency Act of 1863 and serves to corporate charter, charter, bank regulation ...

J. E. T. O'Connor, investigated Crowley's banking record in Wisconsin. O'Connor found multiple cases of illegal financial enrichment by Crowley totalling tens of thousands of dollars. Roosevelt liked Crowley and could not risk a humiliating scandal that could seriously damage the New Deal. Crowley had unusually close relations with the President and top presidential adviser James F. Byrnes. They blocked Morgenthau from firing Crowley, but he was moved to another agency and Morgenthau kept silent. Crowley also made adroit moves that gave him a political base and preserved him in office. For example, He had received the Order of Saint Gregory the Great from Pope

Pius XI Pope Pius XI (; born Ambrogio Damiano Achille Ratti, ; 31 May 1857 – 10 February 1939) was head of the Catholic Church from 6 February 1922 until his death in February 1939. He was also the first sovereign of the Vatican City State u ...

in 1929. Furthermore he made friends with both Democrats and Republicans in Washington, and did favors for Congressmen. Everyone liked him and no one suspected his past history. Roosevelt liked Crowley's administrative competence and loyalty to FDR, so he moved him to the powerful position of alien property custodian, where he did not have opportunities for embezzlement and did not report to Morgenthau. Furthermore, he also could keep a salary from an outside business Biographer Weiss concludes that, "Crowley had won a striking personal victory."

Later life

Back in the business world, Crowley was named chairman of the

in December 1945 and made it turn a profit until the mid-1960s. He continued contact with the White House: President

Dwight Eisenhower Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower (born David Dwight Eisenhower; October 14, 1890 – March 28, 1969) was the 34th president of the United States, serving from 1953 to 1961. During World War II, he was Supreme Commander of the Allied Expeditionar ...

appointed Crowley to the

United States Commission on Civil Rights The U.S. Commission on Civil Rights (CCR) is a bipartisan, independent commission of the United States federal government, created by the Civil Rights Act of 1957 during the Eisenhower administration, that is charged with the responsibility f ...

in his second term, and he was known to have dined with

Lyndon Johnson Lyndon Baines Johnson (; August 27, 1908January 22, 1973), also known as LBJ, was the 36th president of the United States, serving from 1963 to 1969. He became president after assassination of John F. Kennedy, the assassination of John F. Ken ...

. Leo Crowley died on April 15, 1972, in a hospital in

. Very negatively for Crowley in 1955,

Harry Truman Harry S. Truman (May 8, 1884December 26, 1972) was the 33rd president of the United States, serving from 1945 to 1953. As the 34th vice president in 1945, he assumed the presidency upon the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt that year. Subsequen ...

wrote about how Crowley had caused a

problem Problem solving is the process of achieving a goal by overcoming obstacles, a frequent part of most activities. Problems in need of solutions range from simple personal tasks (e.g. how to turn on an appliance) to complex issues in business an ...

with the Soviets when Germany was defeated. The episode was recounted by daughter Margaret Truman in 1973. She adds:Margaret Truman (1973) ''Harry S. Truman'', page 255, Wm. Morrow & Company :...the real lesson was one that he hesitated to state in his memoirs – the extreme hostility which certain men in government, such as Mr. Crowley, felt toward Russia. It did not make my father's task any easier, to find the middle path between these men and the Henry Wallace types, who could not believe the Russians were capable of any wrongdoing.

References

External links

* Truman Presidential Library
Photograph in Truman Cabinet
(7th from Left). *
Collection of letters and works by Leo Crowley
from

FRASER Fraser may refer to: Places Antarctica * Fraser Point, South Orkney Islands Australia * Fraser, Australian Capital Territory, a suburb in the Canberra district of Belconnen * Division of Fraser (Australian Capital Territory), a former federal ...