Work in progress — cycles are added one at a time. Every quote is machine-verified against an archived source; follow the links to read it.
Albert C. Ritchie vs Alfred E. Smith
| Issue | Albert C. Ritchie | Alfred E. Smith |
|---|---|---|
| Federal responsibility for relief | States' rights and business-led recovery — no federal intervention in relief directional_stancenot_applicable Keep relief a state, local and private responsibility; urge programs sponsored by the business community; refuse RFC loans (Maryland took none until mid-1933). |
— |
| Overall role and scale of the federal government | — | War on any candidate who makes 'demagogic appeals to the masses' setting class against class directional_stancenot_applicable Oppose, and refuse to support, any Democratic candidate whose appeal sets 'class against class and rich against poor' — the 'forgotten man' politics of Roosevelt's April 7 broadcast; by implication, a campaign on repeal and business-friendly economics rather than redistribution. |
| National Prohibition | Repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment as a matter of states' rights specific_pledgenot_applicable Repeal national Prohibition and return liquor control to the states; Maryland had refused to enact a state enforcement act. |
Outright repeal of the Eighteenth Amendment — the issue Roosevelt was downplaying specific_pledgenot_applicable Repeal the Eighteenth Amendment, as Smith had urged since 1928; make repeal the central Democratic issue. |
| Tariff levels | — | Endorsement of the Smoot-Hawley tariff directional_stancenot_applicable Accept the 1930 tariff rather than campaign against it — the position Raskob tried to write into party policy in March 1931. |
| European war debts and reparations | — | A twenty-year moratorium on the war debts, writing them off in proportion to each nation's purchases of American goods specific_pledgenot_applicable Suspend intergovernmental debt payments for twenty years and cancel debt in proportion to the debtor's trade with the United States — converting the debts into an instrument for reviving exports. |