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“So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself…” – President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, 1933The 10 Best Presidential Speeches
No. 3: President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address (1933)
In times of great crisis, America has always had a penchant for tapping men of great power and charisma to steer the country back to prosperity. The story of President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the 32nd chief executive of the United States, in no exception.
The presidential election of 1932 found the nation embroiled in a battle to secure the banks, as the U.S. fell into the Great Depression. As the economy and the general morale of the American people declined, so did the popularity of Republican President Herbert Hoover.
The nation was in the market for a new leader, who could carry the mantle of American progress and resolve and they found their leader in Roosevelt, then governor of New York.
After a promise of “a new deal for the American people,” Roosevelt was elected by 57 percent of the electorate and would help stir the promise of hope and a revival of the dreams he, a man of extreme privilege, championed alongside working class Americans.
The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit… Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort. The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow men.
In his first term, Roosevelt would go on to advocate job creation for the unemployed and focused on relief and reform to ensure Americans never had to suffer economic hardship, he said, at the hands of those driven by greed.
Roosevelt would become our nation’s longest serving president, elected four times from 1932-1945.
For more info: The 10 Best Presidential Speeches
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