James Wolfenden - 9th Term

9th Term

In spite of all the opposition, FDR won his fourth, and last term, beating Dewey, with 25.6 million votes to 22 million. Governor Dewey, however, officially led Roosevelt in the county, 78,533 to 64,021.

When the voting machines were tallied, Wolfenden had 67,081 to O'Rourke's 64,484. However, some 10,000 absentee ballots, cast mostly by those in the military, remained to be opened on November 22. Not to take chances, the Democrats received court permission to place a twenty-four hour watch on the vault where the ballots were locked away.

O'Rourke could only overcome Wolfenden's narrow lead of 2,597 votes by taking 64% of the soldiers' ballots, a difficult, but not impossible task. As the ballots were counted over the next several weeks, it was clear that Wolfenden would be reelected, with the final totals of 72,289 (51.5%) to 68,161 (48.5%).

Contrary to the Republicans' predictions, there was some ticket-splitting, since O'Rourke had polled some 4,100 votes more votes than the top of the Democratic ticket. According to party sources, due to his close call in the election, Wolfenden promised McClure that he would not run again in 1946.

In December, it was announced that Wolfenden would tour the Pacific war fronts.

In 1945, Delaware County's congressman voted with 299 other members to override the veto of a tax bill that President Roosevelt described as "not a tax bill, but a tax relief bill providing tax relief not for the needy, but for the greedy". Wolfenden also voted that year for Congress' first pay raise since 1925. Other notable bills that he voted or took positions on in his last term were the Manpower Draft Bill (N); giving permanent status to the House Un-American Activities Committee, which investigated Communists and other "undesirables", (Y); the Trade Agreements Act (N); outlawing the Poll Tax, which was used to prevent blacks in the South from voting, for federal elections (Y); the Full Employment Act (Paired Against); Federal Aid to airports (N); the School Lunches Act (Y).

On April 12, 1945, President Roosevelt died of a massive cerebral hemorrhage and Vice President Harry Truman was sworn in, as the war in Europe was moving towards a close.