[Joseph Fielding Smith] [Regarding the death of Franklin D. Roosevelt:] It has been a marvelous thing how Mr. Roosevelt influenced so many people and since his death, the crie has gone forth from many people as reported in the papers that the nation is now left helpless, or in a critical condition, with Mr. Roosevelt gone, and unable to guide the ship of state. There are some of us who have felt that it is really an act of providence. This man has been in office too long for the good of the nations. He built up the greatest political machine that was ever known; he increased the number of government employees ten times over any predecessor. It is considered that with the number on the government payrolls, and those financially influenced thereby, with their friends, something like six million votes have been controlled, if not more, and there is little chance for any other candidate with this handicap against him. Moreover, we are rapidly falling into a dictatorship, comparable with those which have been condemned by us in other countries. The liberties of the people are curtailed more and more, and the exercise of authority has been placed in the hands of boards who act as both judge and jury and jailor without justification of the law. The Supreme court of the country has fallen from its high pedestal, and has become a political machine, reversing old and staid decisions of justice, when the expediency of politics demands.
[Source: Joseph Fielding Smith Diary, as quoted in Minutes of the Apostles of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, 1910-1951, Privately Published, Salt Lake City, Utah 2010]
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