Outraged by what he thought was not only illegal action but a desecration of the Capitol, President Hoover ordered the World War I veterans camped out just below the Capitol on Anacostia Flats to go home. Most obeyed, but a stubborn remnant defied the order and held their ground. On July 28, with characteristic ineptitude, Hoover ordered the National Guard under General Douglas MacArthur to drive out the pitiful veterans and their families and set fire to their ramshackle shelters and belongings. It was the one achievement of Hoover’s administration that to this day lingers in the public mind. That fall he lost the presidency to Franklin Roosevelt by over seven million votes.