Alfred E. Smith (1873–1944), four-time governor of New York, ran for the presidency against Republican Herbert Hoover (1873–1944) in 1928. This campaign song cover capitalizes on his popular image as “Al” Smith. A workman tips his hat to the genial candidate, trusting, the cover art suggests, that he would represent the nation’s workers. However, Smith’s Roman Catholicism became a campaign issue, and Hoover, although he had a less approachable personality, won the election by a landslide.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt broadcast his first “fireside chat” in 1933. His use of the nation’s airwaves to promote New Deal programs as solutions to the Depression’s economic woes became the butt of satire three years later when, during his bid for a second term, he faced Republican Alfred “Alf” Landon (1887–1987). In this song, billed as “The Country’s Favorite Comic Song,” opponents suggest that voters, plagued by unemployment and inflated taxes, should not trust what they hear on the radio.

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