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The World That Wasn't: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century
Talks
The World That Wasn’t: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century
Featuring: Benn Steil, David M. Rubenstein (moderator)
The Ravenel Curry III Lecture in Foreign Policy
Monday, March 10, 2025
$35 (Members $25)
Event Details:
Henry Wallace is the most influential, and certainly the most fascinating, almost-president in American history. As FDR’s third-term vice president, and a hero to many progressives, he lost his place on the 1944 Democratic ticket in a wild open convention, resulting in Truman taking the presidency upon FDR’s death. Wallace’s life and the circumstances of his political downfall are shrouded by accusations of corruption, prompting an age-old question: what if it had gone the other way? Economist and historian Benn Steil joins David M. Rubenstein to discuss Wallace’s life and career, offering a new perspective on US policy at the dawn of the Cold War.
Benn Steil is senior fellow and director of international economics at the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of The World That Wasn’t: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century. David M. Rubenstein (moderator), co-founder and co-chairman of the Carlyle Group, is the host of History with David Rubenstein on PBS and the author of The Highest Calling: Conversations on the American Presidency, among other books.
{snip}
The World That Wasn’t: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century
Featuring: Benn Steil, David M. Rubenstein (moderator)
The Ravenel Curry III Lecture in Foreign Policy
Monday, March 10, 2025
$35 (Members $25)
Event Details:
Henry Wallace is the most influential, and certainly the most fascinating, almost-president in American history. As FDR’s third-term vice president, and a hero to many progressives, he lost his place on the 1944 Democratic ticket in a wild open convention, resulting in Truman taking the presidency upon FDR’s death. Wallace’s life and the circumstances of his political downfall are shrouded by accusations of corruption, prompting an age-old question: what if it had gone the other way? Economist and historian Benn Steil joins David M. Rubenstein to discuss Wallace’s life and career, offering a new perspective on US policy at the dawn of the Cold War.
Benn Steil is senior fellow and director of international economics at the Council on Foreign Relations and the author of The World That Wasn’t: Henry Wallace and the Fate of the American Century. David M. Rubenstein (moderator), co-founder and co-chairman of the Carlyle Group, is the host of History with David Rubenstein on PBS and the author of The Highest Calling: Conversations on the American Presidency, among other books.
{snip}
PBS has turned this address into an episode of History with David Rubenstein. Maryland Public Television station WMPT is running it now. You should be able to find it on your local PBS station, on YouTube, or on your PBS app.
Highly recommended.
This transcript is from another interview, but this is pretty much what Ben Steil had to say.
Henry Wallace and the Origins of the Cold War, With Benn Steil
Benn Steil, a senior fellow and director of international economics at CFR, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss how Henry Wallace might have changed history had he and not Harry Truman succeeded Franklin D. Roosevelt as president.
{Snip a lot of the transcript. Wallace ran for president in 1948.}
LINDSAY:
He got 2.4 percent of the votes and zero-
STEIL:
2.4 percent of the vote, 1.15 million votes, 37 percent of which came from New York City, remarkably. He got barely 1 percent of the vote in his home state, Iowa. And the third-party candidate turned out to be Dixiecrat segregationist, Strom Thurmond, who actually got thirty-nine electoral votes. So this effectively ends Wallace’s political career.
In retirement, he undergoes a certain intellectual evolution. He actually winds up, as I explained in the book, endorsing Republican Dwight Eisenhower in 1956. He develops quite warm relations with Richard Nixon. We don’t actually know how Wallace voted in 1960. But he becomes much more of a complex character in retirement.
{snip}
Benn Steil, a senior fellow and director of international economics at CFR, sits down with James M. Lindsay to discuss how Henry Wallace might have changed history had he and not Harry Truman succeeded Franklin D. Roosevelt as president.
{Snip a lot of the transcript. Wallace ran for president in 1948.}
LINDSAY:
He got 2.4 percent of the votes and zero-
STEIL:
2.4 percent of the vote, 1.15 million votes, 37 percent of which came from New York City, remarkably. He got barely 1 percent of the vote in his home state, Iowa. And the third-party candidate turned out to be Dixiecrat segregationist, Strom Thurmond, who actually got thirty-nine electoral votes. So this effectively ends Wallace’s political career.
In retirement, he undergoes a certain intellectual evolution. He actually winds up, as I explained in the book, endorsing Republican Dwight Eisenhower in 1956. He develops quite warm relations with Richard Nixon. We don’t actually know how Wallace voted in 1960. But he becomes much more of a complex character in retirement.
{snip}