page_title: Harry S. Truman
section_title: Political life
hierarchical_section_title: Harry S. Truman / Political life
caption_attribution_description: English: Democratic Poster in 1944
context_page_description: Harry S. Truman was the 33rd President of the United States, from 1945 to 1953. He became president when President Franklin D. Roosevelt died in office.
  As president, Truman made important foreign policy decisions, such as using atomic weapons on Japan to end World War II; repairing Europe; beginning the Cold War, and getting the U.S. involved in the Korean War.
context_section_description: Truman was active in the Democratic Party. In 1922, he was elected judge of Jackson County Court.
  Two years later, Truman lost the next county judge election. However, he was elected county judge again in 1926.
  In 1934, Truman was elected Senator of Missouri. He became a member of the Interstate Commerce Committee. He was also the vice-chairman of a subcommittee on railroad safety.
  In 1940, Truman ran for re-election to the Senate. First he would have to beat another Democrat, Governor Lloyd Stark, in a primary election. The primary election would decide which Democrat would go on to face a Republican candidate in the final elections in November.
  President Franklin Roosevelt and St. Louis Mayor Bernard Dickmann both wanted Stark to win. Truman had a hard time getting money. Most people thought he would lose. However, about a month before the primary election, the railroad unions said that they wanted Truman to win. Then, two days before primary election day, Bernard Dickmann also said that he wanted Truman to win.
  Truman won by about 8,000 votes. He also won the election in November.
  Truman became the head of a committee that looked at how much money the United States was spending on defense during World War II. He found billions of dollars of spending that he thought was a waste, and could be cut out of what the U.S. was spending. Truman supported Roosevelt's leadership of the country in the war, but wanted to make the government less wasteful and more effective. He became well known for leading that committee.
  In 1944, President Roosevelt ran for re-election again. Roosevelt was in bad health and he did not have much longer to live. The Democratic Party realized that whoever they selected as Vice President could be the next president of the United States. (In the U.S. government, if the President dies, the Vice President automatically becomes the new president.)
  Henry A. Wallace, Roosevelt's former Vice President, was not chosen because he had a friendly attitude toward the Soviet Union, which many people saw as a dictatorship. Roosevelt wanted Truman as his Vice President, and Truman was chosen.
  They won the election, and Roosevelt began his fourth term as president. On April 12, 1945, shortly after his fourth inauguration, Franklin Delano Roosevelt died. Truman became president.
caption: Roosevelt/Truman poster from 1944
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