Franklin D. Roosevelt

“ History proves that dictatorships do not grow out of strong and successful governments but out of weak and helpless governments. If by democratic methods people get a government strong enough to protect them from fear and starvation, their democracy succeeds, but if they do not, they grow impatient. Therefore, the only sure bulwark of continuing liberty is a government strong enough to protect the interests of the people, and a people strong enough and well enough informed to maintain its sovereign control over its government. ”

“ I am still convinced that the American people, since 1932, continue to insist on two requisites of private enterprise, and the relationship of government to it. The first is a complete honesty at the top in looking after the use of other people's money, and in apportioning and paying individual and corporate taxes according to ability to pay. The second is sincere respect for the need of all people who are at the bottom, all people at the bottom who need to get work—and through work to get a really fair share of the good things of life, and a chance to save and rise. ”

“ T. Roosevelt is likely to be the next Republican nominee for President. Within the last six weeks it has become quite manifest that Taft cannot be elected. ... And so you see, the whirligig of time has made another turn. Big Business in New York is looking to Roosevelt as a statesman who is practical. The West regards him as the champion of the plain people. He is keeping silent, but no doubt like the negro lady he is quite willing to be "fo'ced."
On the Democratic side all of the forces have united to destroy Wilson, who is the strongest man in the West. The bosses are all against him. ”

“ No realistic American can expect from a dictator's peace international generosity, or return of true independence, or world disarmament, or freedom of expression, or freedom of religion--or even good business.
Such a peace would bring no security for us or for our neighbors. "Those, who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." ”

“ They realize that in thirty-four months we have built up new instruments of public power. In the hands of a people's Government this power is wholesome and proper. But in the hands of political puppets of an economic autocracy such power would provide shackles for the liberties of the people. ”

“ The cry was raised against the great corporations. Theodore Roosevelt, the first great Republican progressive, fought a Presidential campaign on the issue of “trust busting” and talked freely about malefactors of great wealth. If the government had a policy it was rather to turn the clock back, to destroy the large combinations and to return to the time when every man owned his individual small business. ”

“ Throughout the world, change is the order of the day. In every Nation economic problems, long in the making, have brought crises of many kinds for which the masters of old practice and theory were unprepared. In most Nations social justice, no longer a distant ideal, has become a definite goal, and ancient Governments are beginning to heed the call.
Thus, the American people do not stand alone in the world in their desire for change. ”

“ This nation has placed its destiny in the hands and heads and hearts of its millions of free men and women; and its faith in freedom under the guidance of God. Freedom means the supremacy of human rights everywhere. Our support goes to those who struggle to gain those rights or keep them. Our strength is our unity of purpose. To that high concept there can be no end save victory. ”

“ We find our population suffering from old inequalities, little changed by vast sporadic remedies. In spite of our efforts and in spite of our talk, we have not weeded out the over privileged and we have not effectively lifted up the underprivileged. Both of these manifestations of injustice have retarded happiness. No wise man has any intention of destroying what is known as the profit motive; because by the profit motive we mean the right by work to earn a decent livelihood for ourselves and for our families.
We have, however, a clear mandate from the people, that Americans must forswear that conception of the acquisition of wealth which, through excessive profits, creates undue private power over private affairs and, to our misfortune, over public affairs as well. ”

“ I certainly would not indicate a preference in a state primary merely because a candidate, otherwise liberal in outlook, had conscientiously differed with me on any single issue. I should be far more concerned about the general attitude of a candidate towards present day problems and his own inward desire to get practical needs attended to in a practical way. We all know that progress may be blocked by outspoken reactionaries, and also by those who say "yes" to a progressive objective, but who always find some reason to oppose any special specific proposal to gain that objective. ”

“ But his labour was in itself a definite and practical contribution to the unification of all parts of the country in support of common principles. When people carelessly or snobbishly deride political parties, they overlook the fact that the party system of government is one of the greatest methods of unification and of teaching people to think in common terms of our civilisation.
We have in our own history three men who chiefly stand out for the universality of their interest and of their knowledge—Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt. ”

“ The Congress has understood that under modern conditions government has a continuing responsibility to meet continuing problems, and that government cannot take a holiday of a year, or a month, or even a day just because a few people are tired or frightened by the inescapable pace, fast pace, of this modern world in which we live. ”

“ This is a very delicate way of saying that he must have a sort of "kitchen cabinet" made up of men like you and myself who will be willing to talk frankly to him, and whom he will listen to with confidence and respect. If he can get the Southerners into line with the Northern Democrats he can make over the Democratic Party and give it a long lease of life. If he cannot do this, and his party splits, Roosevelt's party will come into possession of the country in four years, and hold it for a long time ... ”

“ Third, by an impressive expression of the public will and without regard to partisanship, we are committed to the proposition that principles of morality and considerations for our own security will never permit us to acquiesce in a peace dictated by aggressors and sponsored by appeasers. We know that enduring peace cannot be bought at the cost of other people's freedom. ”

“ We have undertaken a new order of things; yet we progress to it under the framework and in the spirit and intent of the American Constitution. We have proceeded throughout the Nation a measurable distance on the road toward this new order. ”

“ It is the task of our generation, yours and mine. But we build and defend not for our generation alone. We defend the foundations laid down by our fathers. We build a life for generations yet unborn. We defend and we build a way of life, not for America alone, but for all mankind. Ours is a high duty, a noble task.
Day and night I pray for the restoration of peace in this mad world of ours. It is not necessary that I, the President, ask the American people to pray in behalf of such a cause—for I know you are praying with me. ”

“ More striking still, it appeared that, if the process of concentration goes on at the same rate, at the end of another century we shall have all American industry controlled by a dozen corporations and run by perhaps a hundred men. ”

“ We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. "Necessitous men are not free men." ”

“ I want to talk with you very simply about the need for present action in this crisis—the need to meet the unanswered challenge of one-third of a Nation ill-nourished, ill-clad, ill-housed. ”

“ Not only our future economic soundness but the very soundness of our democratic institutions depends on the determination of our government to give employment to idle men. ”

“ But in a democratic world, as in a democratic Nation, power must be linked with responsibility, and obliged to defend and justify itself within the framework of the general good. ”

“ Tonight, on Christmas Eve, all men and women everywhere who love Christmas are thinking of that ancient town and of the star of faith that shone there more than nineteen centuries ago.
American boys are fighting today in snow-covered mountains, in malarial jungles, on blazing deserts; they are fighting on the far stretches of the sea and above the clouds, and fighting for the thing for which they struggle. ”

“ Yet most of all grant us brotherhood, not only for this day but for all our years-a brotherhood not of words but of acts and deeds. We are all of us children of earth-grant us that simple knowledge. If our brothers are oppressed, then we are oppressed. If they hunger, we hunger. If their freedom is taken away, our freedom is not secure. Grant us a common faith that man shall know bread and peace-that he shall know justice and righteousness, freedom and security, an equal opportunity and an equal chance to do his best, not only in our own lands, but throughout the world. ”

“ America has been the New World in all tongues, to all peoples, not because this continent was a new-found land, but because all those who came here believed they could create upon this continent a new life—a life that should be new in freedom. ”

“ I shall never forget the fields of wheat so blasted by heat that they cannot be harvested. I Shall never forget field after field of corn stunted, earless and stripped of leaves, for what the sun left the grasshoppers took. ”

“ What great crises teach all men whom the example and counsel of the brave inspire is the lesson: Fear not, view all the tasks of life as sacred, have faith in the triumph of the ideal, give daily all that you have to give, be loyal and rejoice whenever you find yourselves part of a great ideal enterprise. You, at this moment, have the honor to belong to a generation whose lips are touched by fire. You live in a land that now enjoys the blessings of peace. But let nothing human be wholly alien to you. The human race now passes through one of its great crises. ”

“ Give us faith in Thee; faith in our sons; faith in each other; faith in our united crusade. Let not the keeness of our spirit ever be dulled. Let not the impacts of temporary events, of temporal matters of but fleeting moment -- let not these deter us in our unconquerable purpose. ”

“ Very few men make an effective State reputation in their first year in the lower branch of the State legislature. I never happened to hear of one who made a national reputation in such a body. Roosevelt did both. When he left the assembly after three years' service he was a national figure, well known, and of real importance, and also a delegate at large from the great State of New York to the Republican national convention of 1884, where he played a leading part. Energy, ability, and the most entire courage were the secret of his extraordinary success. ”

“ He had everything to lose and nothing to gain, but entered the struggle with a spirit of heroism and patriotic duty that all men must respect, whatever they think of his political ideas. When the time came again for the Presidential struggle, Roosevelt, who disliked the way things had been going since his term of office, once more became a candidate, and as he was repudiated by the Republicans he formed a party of his own which he called the Progressive Party and ran for President against Taft and Woodrow Wilson. ”

“ By dint of a good deal of adroitness he has succeeded in keeping his diplomatic end up in Europe and particularly in England, and nobody between Tipperary and the Great Wall of China has hard words for him. The world recognises in him a great genius—unparalleled in modern times.
If ever an American had sound reason to look back with satisfaction on a well-spent life, Mr. Roosevelt is the man. And if ever republic had just cause to thank Providence for its luck in the matter of a President, the United States is that Republic. ”

“ Roosevelt is that he may be reckoned to stand for the finest expression and exemplar of the American people. A nation that can manufacture such a President must be possessed of national characteristics altogether out of the common. He is the absolute personification of the United States. ”

“ As a matter of fact, what Theodore Roosevelt was trying to do was to strengthen American society and American Government by demonstrating to the American people that he was aiming at a larger economic equality and a more generous industrial opportunity for all men, and that any combination of capital or of business, which threatened the control of the Government by the people who made it, was to be curbed and resisted, just as he would have resisted an enemy who tried to take possession of the city of Washington. ”

“ He is on the threshold of his life work, so full of the high faith that if his feet stumble, as human feet are prone to do, no man may gainsay the purpose that guided them. During the three sad, dumb minutes following Roosevelt's repeated oath to the Presidential office, youth, which he has clung to so fondly, left him, and maturity came. ”