224d) 4Cm The US-System

6) Stood its test under Franklin D. Roosevelt

  a) FDRs second state of the union address proclaims

"We have undertaken a new order of things, yet we progress to it under the framework and in the spirit and intent of the American Constitution. We have proceeded throughout the Nation a measurable distance on the road toward this new order. I hope that calm counsel and constructive leadership will provide the steadying influence and the time necessary for the coming of new and more practical forms of representative government throughout the world wherein privilege and power will occupy a lesser place and world welfare a greater."

  b) FDRs third state of the union addresses the believe

"Because all of us believe that our democratic form of government can cope adequately with modern problems as they arise, it is patriotic as well as logical for us to prove that we can meet new national needs with new laws consistent with a historic constitutional framework clearly intended to receive liberal and not narrow interpretation… From such reading (of the Constitution), I obtain the very definite thought that the members of that Convention were fully aware that civilization would raise problems for the proposed new Federal Government, which they themselves could not even surmise ; and that it was their definite intent and expectation that a liberal interpretation in the years to come would give the Congress the same relative powers over new national problems as they themselves gave Congress over the national problems of their day."

  c) His third inaugural address turns it into a mission
     against evil powers

"The democratic aspiration is no mere recent phase in human history . It is human history . It permeated the ancient life of early peoples. It blazed anew in the middle ages. It was written in Magna Charta. America has been the New World in all tongues, to all peoples, not because this continent was a new found land, but because all those that came here believed that they could create upon this continent a new life --a life that should be new in freedom…"

  d) FDR forth inauguration speech proclaims victory

"This new year of 1945 can be the greatest year of achievement in human history. Nineteen forty-five can see the final ending of the Nazi-Fascist reign of terror in Europe. Nineteen forty-five can see the closing in of the forces of retribution about the center of the malignant power of imperialistic Japan. Most important of all--1945 can and must see the substantial beginning of the organization of world peace. This organization must be the fulfillment of the promise for which men have fought and died in this war. It must be the justification of all the sacrifices that have been made--of all the dreadful misery that this world has endured. We Americans of today, together with our allies, are making history --and I hope it will be better history than ever has been made before.

  e) Reminisces from an FDR fireside chat

"…I described the American form of Government as a three horse team provided by the Constitution to the American people so that their field might be ploughed. The three horses are, of course, the three branches of government - the Congress, the Executive and the Courts . Two of the horses are pulling in unison today; the third is not . Those who have intimated that the President of the United States is trying to drive that team, overlook the simple fact that the President, as Chief Executive, is himself one of the three horses . It is the American people themselves who are in the driver's seat. It is the American people themselves who want the furrow ploughed. It is the American people themselves who expect the third horse to pull in unison with the other two. I hope that you have re-read the Constitution of the United States in these past few weeks. Like the Bible, it ought to be read again and again. It is an easy document to understand when you remember that it was called into being because the Articles of Confederation under which the original thirteen States tried to operate after the Revolution showed the need of a National Government with power enough to handle national problems. In its Preamble, the Constitution states that it was intended to form a more perfect Union and promote the general welfare ; and the powers given to the Congress to carry out those purposes can be best described by saying that they were all the powers needed to meet each and every problem which then had a national character and which could not be met by merely local action. But the framers went further. Having in mind that in succeeding generations many other problems then undreamed of would become national problems, they gave to the Congress the ample broad powers "to levy taxes ... and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States." That, my friends, is what I honestly believe to have been the clear and underlying purpose of the patriots who wrote a Federal Constitution to create a National Government with national power, intended as they said," to form a more perfect union ... for ourselves and our posterity."

American History background continued

The corresponding American Rhetoric in Bush's address

back to the TOP Bush's inauguration continued