State of the Union AddressesRoosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano)
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State of the Union Addresses
Roosevelt, Franklin D. (Franklin Delano)
Presidents -- United States -- Messages; United States -- Politics and government -- Sources
To say that the domestic well-being of one hundred and thirty million
Americans is deeply affected by the well-being or the ill-being of the
populations of other nations is only to recognize in world affairs the
truth that we all accept in home affairs.
If in any local unit--a city, county, State or region--low standards of
living are permitted to continue, the level of the civilization of the
entire nation will be pulled downward.
The identical principle extends to the rest of the civilized world. But
there are those who wishfully insist, in innocence or ignorance or both,
that the United States of America as a self-contained unit can live happily
and prosperously, its future secure, inside a high wall of isolation while,
outside, the rest of Civilization and the commerce and culture of mankind
are shattered.
I can understand the feelings of those who warn the nation that they will
never again consent to the sending of American youth to fight on the soil
of Europe. But, as I remember, nobody has asked them to consent--for nobody
expects such an undertaking.
The overwhelming majority of our fellow citizens do not abandon in the
slightest their hope and their expectation that the United States will not
become involved in military participation in these wars.
I can also understand the wishfulness of those who oversimplify the whole
situation by repeating that all we have to do is to mind our own business
and keep the nation out of war. But there is a vast difference between
keeping out of war and pretending that this war is none of our business.
We do not have to go to war with other nations, but at least we can strive
with other nations to encourage the kind of peace that will lighten the
troubles of the world, and by so doing help our own nation as well.
I ask that all of us everywhere think things through with the single aim of
how best to serve the future of our own nation. I do not mean merely its
future relationship with the outside world. I mean its domestic future as
well--the work, the security, the prosperity, the happiness, the life of all
the boys and girls in the United States, as they are inevitably affected by
such world relationships. For it becomes clearer and clearer that the
future world will be a shabby and dangerous place to live in--yes, even for
Americans to live in--if it is ruled by force in the hands of a few.
Already the crash of swiftly moving events over the earth has made us all
think with a longer view. Fortunately, that thinking cannot be controlled
by partisanship. The time is long past when any political party or any
particular group can curry or capture public favor by labeling itself the
"peace party" or the "peace bloc." That label belongs to the whole United
States and to every right thinking man, woman and child within it.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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