Welcome to DU! The truly grassroots left-of-center political community where regular people, not algorithms, drive the discussions and set the standards. Join the community: Create a free account Support DU (and get rid of ads!): Become a Star Member All Forums Issue Forums Culture Forums Alliance Forums Region Forums Support Forums Help & Search

kpete

(71,901 posts)
Sat Jun 28, 2014, 11:16 AM Jun 2014

A Liberal’s Call to Real Liberty - How FDR redefined freedom and changed America.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt introduced the concept of the Four Freedoms several weeks after he won an unprecedented third term as president. In a speech on January 6, 1941, he declared,

In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression… . The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way… . The third is freedom from want… . The fourth is freedom from fear… . That is no vision of a distant millennium. It is a definite basis for a kind of world attainable in our own time and generation.


By balancing the civil liberties contained in the nation’s founding documents with a new vision of economic security, Roosevelt invited another reconstruction of our democracy—one no less radical than the upheaval that took place after the Civil War. He declared that the “right to life” described in the Declaration of Independence means that everyone “has also a right to make a comfortable living… . Our Government … owes to everyone an avenue to possess himself of a portion of [America’s] plenty sufficient for his needs, through his own work.” Roosevelt challenged the notion that economic laws were products of nature, and instead argued that the rights of each individual trump the rights of business. While signing a minimum-wage bill Roosevelt, in a statement that bears repeating today, stated that “no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages has any right to continue in this country.”

If these ideas sound radical, it is because they were. They were also wildly popular: a May 1942 survey found that the Four Freedoms had “a powerful and genuine appeal to seven persons in ten.” Throughout his book, Kaye does a masterful job of showing how the American ideal, captured succinctly in the Four Freedoms, was one of the animating forces of the generation.

the rest:
http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/junejulyaugust_2014/on_political_books/a_liberals_call_to_real_libert050666.php
3 replies = new reply since forum marked as read
Highlight: NoneDon't highlight anything 5 newestHighlight 5 most recent replies
A Liberal’s Call to Real Liberty - How FDR redefined freedom and changed America. (Original Post) kpete Jun 2014 OP
We need more FDRs! MannyGoldstein Jun 2014 #1
+10000 n/t whathehell Jun 2014 #2
while getting nothing but Clevelands we're TOLD noisily are really just FDRs, but that we're just MisterP Jun 2014 #3

MisterP

(23,730 posts)
3. while getting nothing but Clevelands we're TOLD noisily are really just FDRs, but that we're just
Sat Jun 28, 2014, 03:39 PM
Jun 2014

not grateful enough and that's why we simply can't see how FDR they are

Latest Discussions»General Discussion»A Liberal’s Call to Real ...