Editing Eddie Cantor (section)

== Activism and philanthropy ==
Cantor was the second president of the [[Screen Actors Guild]], serving from 1933 to 1935.

He invented the title "The March of [[Dime (United States coin)|Dimes]]" for the donation campaigns of the [[National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis]], which was organized to combat [[polio]]. It was a [[Play on words|play]] on ''[[The March of Time]]'' [[newsreels]] popular at the time. He began the first campaign on his radio show in January 1938, asking listeners to mail a dime to President [[Franklin D. Roosevelt]]. At that time, Roosevelt was the [[Franklin D. Roosevelt's paralytic illness|most notable American victim of polio]]. Other entertainers joined in the appeal via their own shows, and the [[White House]] mail room was deluged with 2,680,000 dimes—a large sum at the time.

Cantor also recorded a spoken introduction on a 1938 Decca recording of "[[Alexander's Ragtime Band]]" by [[Bing Crosby]] and [[Connee Boswell]] in which he thanks the listener for buying the record, which supported the National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis. That record hit No. 1 on the charts, though Cantor did not sing on it. A lifelong [[Democratic Party (United States)|Democrat]], Cantor supported [[Adlai Stevenson II|Adlai Stevenson]] during the [[1952 United States presidential election|1952 presidential election]].<ref>''Motion Picture and Television Magazine'', November 1952, page 33, Ideal Publishers.</ref>