Franklin D. Roosevelt
Franklin Delano Roosevelt, often referred to by his initials FDR, was the thirty-second President of the United States. Elected to four terms in office, he served from 1933 to 1945, and is the only U.S. president to have served more than two terms of office. He was a central figure of the 20th century during a time of worldwide economic crisis and world war.
During the Great Depression of the 1930s, Roosevelt created the New Deal to provide relief for the unemployed, recovery of the economy, and reform of the economic and banking systems. Although recovery of the economy was incomplete until almost 1940, many programs initiated continue to have instrumental roles in the nation's commerce, such as the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC), Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), and the United States Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). One of his most important legacies is the Social Security system.
Roosevelt won four presidential elections in a row, causing a realignment political scientists call the Fifth Party System. His aggressive use of the federal government re-energized the Democratic Party, creating a New Deal Coalition which dominated American politics until the late 1960s. He and his wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, remain touchstones for modern American liberalism. Conservatives vehemently fought back, but Roosevelt usually prevailed until he tried to pack the Supreme Court in 1937. Thereafter, the new Conservative coalition successfully ended New Deal expansion; during the war it closed most relief programs like the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and Civilian Conservation Corps, arguing unemployment had disappeared.
After 1938, Roosevelt championed re-armament and led the nation away from isolationism as the world headed into World War II. He provided extensive support to Winston Churchill and the British war effort before the attack on Pearl Harbor pulled the U.S. into the fighting. During the war, Roosevelt, working closely with his aide Harry Hopkins, provided decisive leadership against Nazi Germany and made the United States the principal arms supplier and financier of the Allies who later, alongside the United States, defeated Germany, Italy and Japan. Roosevelt led the United States as it became the Arsenal of Democracy, putting sixteen million American men into uniform.
On the homefront his term saw the vast expansion of industry, the achievement of full employment, restoration of prosperity and new opportunities opened for African-Americans and women. With his term came new taxes that affected all income groups, price controls and rationing, and relocation camps for 120,000 Japanese and Japanese-Americans as well as thousands of Italian and German-Americans. As the Allies neared victory, Roosevelt played a critical role in shaping the post-war world, particularly through the Yalta Conference and the creation of the United Nations. Roosevelt's administration redefined American liberalism and realigned the Democratic Party based on his New Deal coalition of labor unions; farmers; ethnic, religious and racial minorities; intellectuals; the South; big city machines; and the poor and workers on relief.
“In these days of difficulty, we Americans everywhere must and shall choose the path of social justice…, the path of faith, the path of hope, and the path of love toward our fellow man.”
“The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerated the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That in its essence is fascism: ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power.”
“We cannot always build a future for our youth, but we can always build our youth for the future.”
“Organized money hates me--and I welcome their hatred!”
“I'm not the smartest fellow in the world, but I can sure pick smart colleagues.”
“Today we are faced with the pre-eminent fact that if civilization is to survive, we must cultivate the science of human relationships, the ability of all peoples of all kins to live together and to work together in the same world at peace.”
“In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved.”
“Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.”
“You are only an extra in everyone else's play.”
“To reach a port we must set sail –Sail, not tie at anchorSail, not drift.”
“I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made.”
“There are many ways of going forward, but only one way of standing still.”
“The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much; it is whether we provide enough for those who have too little.”
“Books can not be killed by fire. People die, but books never die. No man and no force can abolish memory... In this war, we know, books are weapons. And it is a part of your dedication always to make them weapons for man's freedom.”
“If you treat people right they will treat you right ... ninety percent of the time.”
“When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.”
“A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned to walk forward.”
“Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.”
“Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort.”
“We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.”
“Remember, remember always, that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.”
“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”
“The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Let us move forward with strong and active faith.”