Franklin Delano Roosevelt Zitate

seite 5

„In der Politik passiert nichts zufällig. Wenn etwas passiert, können Sie wetten, dass es so geplant wurde.“

„Unternehmen, deren Existenz lediglich davon abhängt, ihren Beschäftigten weniger als einen zum Leben ausreichenden Lohn zu zahlen, sollen in diesem Land kein Recht mehr haben, weiter ihre Geschäfte zu betreiben. (…) Mit einem zum Leben ausreichenden Lohn meine ich mehr als das bloße Existenzminimum – ich meine Löhne, die ein anständiges Leben ermöglichen.“

„Wenn Sie Menschen richtig behandeln, werden sie Sie in neunzig Prozent der Fälle richtig behandeln.“

„Als Nation können wir stolz darauf sein, dass wir weichherzig sind; aber wir können es uns nicht leisten, weich im Kopf zu sein.“

„Das Einzige, was wir zu fürchten haben, ist die Furcht selbst.“

„Menschen sind keine Gefangenen des Schicksals, sondern nur Gefangene ihres eigenen Geistes.“

„Wir wissen es, weil die Demokratie allein von allen Regierungsformen, die volle Macht des aufgeklärten Willens der Menschen einsetzt.“

„Wiederholung verwandelt eine Lüge nicht in eine Wahrheit.“

„Wir werden nach Perfektion streben. Wir werden es nicht sofort erreichen - aber wir werden uns ständig bemühen.“

„Vom organisierten Geld regiert zu werden, ist genauso schlimm, wie vom organisierten Verbrechen regiert zu werden.“

„Philosophie? Ich bin Christ und Demokrat. Das ist alles.“

„Gestern, 7. Dezember 1941 - ein Datum, das in Schande leben wird.“

„Sie hassen mich einstimmig - und ich begrüße ihren Hass.“

„Der Liberalismus wird zum Schutz des weitsichtigen Konservativen.“

„Dies ist vor allem die Zeit, die Wahrheit zu sagen, die ganze Wahrheit, offen und kühn.“

„Unter uns wächst heute eine Konzentration privater Macht an, die historisch ihresgleichen sucht.“

„Wälder sind die Lungen unseres Landes, reinigen die Luft und geben unserem Volk neue Kraft.“

„Ich beschuldige die gegenwärtige Regierung, die größte Ausgabenverwaltung in Friedenszeiten in der gesamten amerikanischen Geschichte zu sein.“

„Eine amerikanische Regierung kann nicht zulassen, dass Amerikaner verhungern.“

„Ich möchte nicht einen einzigen Kriegsmillionär in den USA als Ergebnis dieser Weltkatastrophe sehen.“

„Wir müssen das große Arsenal der Demokratie sein.“

„Eine Nation, die ihre Böden zerstört, zerstört sich selbst.“

„Kein Mann kann das Amt des Präsidenten besetzen, ohne zu merken, dass er Präsident des ganzen Volkes ist.“

„Sind Sie tätig unter dem Eindruck, dass ich diese Memoranden von Ihnen gelesen habe? Ich kann sie nicht einmal anheben.“

„Überall auf der Welt ist Veränderung an der Tagesordnung.“

„Das Leben einer Nation misst sich an der Fülle ihres Lebenswillens.“

„Wir verteidigen und entwickeln eine Lebensweise nicht nur für Amerika, sondern für die ganze Menschheit.“

„Seien Sie aufrichtig, seien Sie kurz, seien Sie bodenständig.“

„Alle freien Völker sind tief beeindruckt vom Mut und der Standhaftigkeit der griechischen Nation.“

„Die Hoffnungsträger der Republik können weder unverdiente Armut noch selbstsüchtigen Wohlstand jemals tolerieren.“

„Die Verfassung der Vereinigten Staaten hat sich als die wunderbarste elastische Zusammenstellung von Regierungsregeln erwiesen, die jemals geschrieben wurde.“

„Diese Überlegenheit ist verschwunden - für immer.“

„Das demokratische Streben ist keine weitere Phase in der Geschichte der Menschheit. Es ist menschliche Geschichte.“

„Propheten des Niedergangs der amerikanischen Demokratie haben gesehen, dass ihre schrecklichen Vorhersagen gescheitert sind.“

„Ich werde Deutschland zermalmen“

„Ein Radikaler ist ein Mann, der mit beiden Beinen fest in der Luft steht.
(A radical is a man with both feet firmly planted – in the air.)“

“Be sincere, be brief, be seated.”

“The brave and clear platform adopted by this convention, to which I heartily subscribe, sets forth that government in a modern civilization has certain inescapable obligations to its citizens, among which are protection of the family and the home, the establishment of a democracy of opportunity, and aid to those overtaken by disaster.”

“I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded. I have seen men coughing out their gassed lungs. I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed. I have seen two hundred limping exhausted men come out of line-the survivors of a regiment of one thousand that went forward forty-eight hours before. I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war.”

“I do not believe in communism any more than you do but there is nothing wrong with the Communists in this country; several of the best friends I have got are Communists.”

“The very employers and politicians and publishers who talk most loudly of class antagonism and the destruction of the American system now undermine that system by this attempt to coerce the votes of the wage earners of this country. It is the 1936 version of the old threat to close down the factory or the office if a particular candidate does not win. It is an old strategy of tyrants to delude their victims into fighting their battles for them. Every message in a pay envelope, even if it is the truth, is a command to vote according to the will of the employer. But this propaganda is worse — it is deceit.”

“Let us first examine that nightmare to many Americans, especially our friends in California, the growing population of Japanese on the Pacific slope. It is undoubtedly true that in the past many thousands of Japanese have legally or otherwise got into the United States, settled here and raised up children who became American citizens. Californians have properly objected on the sound basic ground that Japanese immigrants are not capable of assimilation into the American population. If this had throughout the discussion been made the sole ground for the American attitude all would have been well, and the people of Japan would today understand and accept our decision.

Anyone who has traveled in the Far East knows that the mingling of Asiatic blood with European or American blood produces, in nine cases out of ten, the most unfortunate results. There are throughout the East many thousands of so-called Eurasians—men and women and children partly of Asiatic blood and partly of European or American blood. These Eurasians are, as a common thing, looked down on and despised, both by the European and American who reside there, and by the pure Asiatic who lives there.”

“In my Inaugural I laid down the simple proposition that nobody is going to starve in this country. It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country. By "business" I mean the whole of commerce as well as the whole of industry; by workers I mean all workers, the white collar class as well as the men in overalls; and by living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level-I mean the wages of decent living.”

“In politics, nothing happens by accident. If it happens you can bet it was planned that way.”

“Philosophy? I am a Christian and a Democrat. That's all.”

“A radical is a man with both feet firmly planted — in the air. A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned to walk forward. A reactionary is a somnambulist walking backwards. A liberal is a man who uses his legs and his hands at the behest — at the command — of his head.”

“All work undertaken should be useful — not just for a day, or a year, but useful in the sense that it affords permanent improvement in living conditions or that it creates future new wealth for the Nation.”

“In the days and in the years that are to come we shall work for a just and honorable peace, a durable peace, as today we work and fight for total victory in war. We can and we will achieve such a peace.”

“The work itself will cover a wide field including clearance of slums, which for adequate reasons cannot be undertaken by private capital; in rural housing of several kinds, where, again, private capital is unable to function; in rural electrification; in the reforestation of the great watersheds of the Nation; in an intensified program to prevent soil erosion and to reclaim blighted areas; in improving existing road systems and in constructing national highways designed to handle modern traffic; in the elimination of grade crossings; in the extension and enlargement of the successful work of the Civilian Conservation Corps; in non-Federal works, mostly self-liquidating and highly useful to local divisions of Government; and on many other projects which the Nation needs and cannot afford to neglect.”

“There is a mysterious cycle in human events. To some generations much is given. Of other generations much is expected. This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.”

“We have always known that heedless self-interest was bad morals; we know now that it is bad economics.”

“We are not isolationists except in so far as we seek to isolate ourselves completely from war. Yet we must remember that so long as war exists on earth there will be some danger that even the Nation which most ardently desires peace may be drawn into war.”

“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.”

“We know that we still have far to go; that we must more greatly build the security and the opportunity and the knowledge of every citizen, in the measure justified by the resources and the capacity of the land.”

“There seems to be no question that [Mussolini] is really interested in what we are doing and I am much interested and deeply impressed by what he has accomplished and by his evidenced honest purpose of restoring Italy.”

“They will be sore tried, by night and by day, without rest-until the victory is won. The darkness will be rent by noise and flame. Men's souls will be shaken with the violences of war. For these men are lately drawn from the ways of peace. They fight not for the lust of conquest. They fight to end conquest. They fight to liberate. They fight to let justice arise, and tolerance and good will among all Thy people. They yearn but for the end of battle, for their return to the haven of home. Some will never return. Embrace these, Father, and receive them, Thy heroic servants, into Thy kingdom. And for us at home - fathers, mothers, children, wives, sisters, and brothers of brave men overseas - whose thoughts and prayers are ever with them - help us, Almighty God, to rededicate ourselves in renewed faith in Thee in this hour of great sacrifice.”

“We must scrupulously guard the civil rights and civil liberties of all our citizens, whatever their background. We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization.”

“If there is anyone who still wonders why this war is being fought, let him look to Norway. If there is anyone who has any delusions that this war could have been averted, let him look to Norway; and if there is anyone who doubts the democratic will to win, again I say, let him look to Norway.”

“We know it because, if we look below the surface, we sense it still spreading on every continent — for it is the most humane, the most advanced, and in the end the most unconquerable of all forms of human society.”

“It is true that the moral consciousness of the world must recognize the importance of removing injustices and well-founded grievances; but at the same time it must be aroused to the cardinal necessity of honoring sanctity of treaties, of respecting the rights and liberties of others, and of putting an end to acts of international aggression.”

“We must especially beware of that small group of selfish men who would clip the wings of the American Eagle in order to feather their own nests.”

“No man can occupy the office of President without realizing that he is President of all the people.”

“If I prove a bad president, I will also likely to prove the last president.”

“On each national day of inauguration since 1789, the people have renewed their sense of dedication to the United States.”

“If the country is to flourish, capital must be invested in enterprise. But those who seek to draw upon other people's money must be wholly candid regarding the facts on which the investor's judgment is asked.”