this great nation will
endure as it has endured
will revive, prosper
This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper. So, first of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself–nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance. In every dark hour of our national life a leadership of frankness and vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory.
Yet our distress comes from no failure of substance. We are stricken by no plague of locusts. Compared with the perils which our forefathers conquered because they believed and were not afraid, we have still much to be thankful for. Nature still offers her bounty and human efforts have multiplied it. Plenty is at our doorstep, but a generous use of it languishes in the very sight of the supply. Primarily this is because the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and abdicated. Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.
True they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit they have proposed only the lending of more money. Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.
The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths. 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.
Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be valued only by the standards of pride of place and personal profit; and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing. Small wonder that confidence languishes, for it thrives only on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection, on unselfish performance; without them it cannot live.
Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone. This Nation asks for action, and action now.
From the 1st inaugural address of Franklin Roosevelt, March 4, 1933.
Please allow me to hit some of those points again.
This great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper.
Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.
They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers. They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.
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.
Small wonder that confidence languishes, for it thrives only on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection, on unselfish performance; without them it cannot live.
Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone. This Nation asks for action, and action now.
As an aside, my wife and I marvel when faced with people in elected office who can speak in complete sentences.
And such sentences.
I do long for that day of newspapers and reporting and not the 140 character sound bite.
But I digress.
It was Franklin Roosevelt who had a hand in designing and building what became known as the Oval Office.
The West Wing had been built by his 5th cousin, Theodore Roosevelt and the President’s office was centrally located and windowless near what is now known as the Roosevelt Room.
President Theodore Roosevelt liked to have his work space distractions limited.
In other words he was so A.D.D. that anything like a window made it impossible to concentrate on any one thing for long. (Maybe A.D.D. is too strong a word and I should say that he was so intellectually stimulated, author of 40 books, spoke 5 languages and a near photographic memory that he was easily bored but I digress again).
It was President Taft who moved the Presidents office to a room on the outside wall and added bay windows that looked out on the south lawn.
This office was still center aligned and used by all the President’s from Taft to Hoover.
Late in the Hoover years, a fire broke out in the West Wing and reconstruction was in progress when FDR moved in and he had the office moved to the corner of the West Wing and fashioned into an oval.
The room took its power from the person in the office.
It became known as the most powerful room in the western or free (non-Soviet-aligned) world.
In the 1995 movie, “The American President”, President Andrew Shephard, played by Michael Douglas has the line, The White House is the single greatest home court advantage in the modern world.
It wasn’t until today, 82 years after FDR built it, the any one felt that folks needed a sign to let them know where they where when they had reason to be in that office.
That says something about insufficient or inadequate stature felt by the current occupant.
Small wonder that confidence languishes …
for it thrives only on honesty …
on honor …
on the sacredness of obligations …
on faithful protection …
on unselfish performance …
without them it cannot live.
Reading over this speech I ask, why can’t THOSE folks read this and feel some conviction?
But then I am reminded of a quote of President Warren Harding when he said, “Somewhere there must be a book that tells all about it, where I could go to straighten it out in my mind. But I don’t know where the book is, and maybe I couldn’t read it if I found it.”
They just don’t get it.
Deep down, though, I think THEY DO GET IT and they know it and they know that they know it and I know that they know that they know it.
And what do I know.
They have sold out.
I also know that this great Nation will endure as it has endured, will revive and will prosper.
We need restoration.
Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone.
This Nation asks for action, and action now.
No Haiku For You 