Franklin D Roosevelt's Inaugural Address

Language plays a crucial role in the development of power. Famous personalities in the United States use rhetorical devices to emphasize a specific point and make it clear to the audience. President Thomas Jefferson is a Democratic-Republican and won the election of 1800. In 1801 he presented his inauguration speech and was significant because it was the first time in the history when the power shifted from one party to the other. Martin Luther King, Jr. served as an American minister and played an active role in the civil rights movement. John F. Kennedy delivered his speech during his inauguration in order to develop relations with the Soviet Union and end Cold War. All the speeches were delivered by most known personalities and made use of rhetorical devices such as allusion and repetition to make their message memorable in the hearts of the citizens of America.

It was ran very militaristically and was considered one the most popular New Deal programs. According to one employee through the CCC, Delbert Apetz, “Nobody seemed to complain down there because you had a place to sleep, a place to eat – which is pretty skimpy a lot of times at home.” FDR knew that it would be one of the most successful programs America’s recovery process. The night of the Fireside Chat he describe to America the CCC was to start, “Enhancing the value of our natural resources and second, we were relieving an amount of natural distress.” The program lasted until 1941; having planted over 2.5 billion trees, 40 million acres were protected from erosion, 125,000 miles of road was built and 800 state parks were created.

In February 1933, “the Senate passed a resolution calling for the newly elected president, Franklin Roosevelt to assume unlimited power” (Bailey, Beth, et al. “Chapter 22: The Great Depression and the New Deal.” A People and A Nation: Brief Tenth Edition. Vol. 2. Stamford: Cengage Learning, 2015. 632-667. Book. [Further: Bailey, Blight, and Chudacoff]). Through the New Deal, Roosevelt sought to “revive the economy through economic planning and relief programs” (Bailey, Blight and Chudacoff). These relief programs helped many Americans find jobs and ultimately restore the economy.

In his inaugural address, President Franklin D. Roosevelt set the tone for the upcoming half century when he confidently said, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”. In response to the economic collapse of the Great Depression, a bold and highly experimental fleet of government bureaus and agencies known as Roosevelt’s Alphabet Soup were created to service the programs of the New Deal and to provide recovery to the American people. The New Deal was one of the most ambitious programs in American history, with implications and government programs that can still be seen to this day. Through its enactment of social reform and conservation programs, the New Deal mounted radical policies that gave the federal government unprecedented power in the nation’s economy and society, however, the New Deal did not bring America out of the Great Depression and could be considered conservative in the context of the era, ultimately saving capitalism from collapsing in America.

George Washington had to borrow money to relocate to New York, then the center of American government. His presidential inauguration was held near New York 's Wall Street in late April 1789. A tremendous crowd showed up to see the man now known as "the Father of His Country." Borrowing a custom from English monarchs, who by tradition address Parliament when its sessions open, Washington gave a brief speech. It was the first inaugural address and the first of many contributions that Washington would make to the office of the presidency. But this would be no monarch; the new leader wore a plain brown suit.

In his presidential acceptance speech in 1932, Franklin D. Roosevelt addressed to the citizens of the United States, “I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people.” The New Deal, beginning in 1933, was a series of federal programs designed to provide relief, recovery, and reform to the fragile nation. The U.S. had been both economically and psychologically buffeted by the Great Depression. Many citizens looked up to FDR and his New Deal for help. However, there is much skepticism and controversy on whether these work projects significantly abated the dangerously high employment rates and pulled the U.S. out of the Great Depression. The New Deal was a bad deal

The New Deal was a set of federal programs with the principle of social-welfare liberalism. President Roosevelt was deeply compromised to help the most vulnerable in the ongoing crisis. In second inaugural address he outlines the progress of the New Deal “We have always known that heedless self-interest was bed morals…. Out of the collapse of a prosperity whose builders boasted their practicality has come to the conviction that in the long run economy morality pays.” At some extend President Roosevelt proudly tell the Nation that he was heading to the right direction to progress. Some of the New Deal successful programs that brought relief and dignify living to many Americans were Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) a direct governmental regulation of farm economy to resolve the overproduction problem. In the unemployment relief, the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) that provided federal funds for state relief programs. Public Works Administration (PWA) a construction program that lead to Civil Works Administration (CWA) that provide work for more than 4 million Americans repairing, building, and constructing America's infrastructure. The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) that mobilized young men to do reforestation and conservation work helping their family’s income and the country reservation. In 1935 in housing issues Works Progress Administration (WPA) Home Owners Loan Corporation (HOLC) that help many Americans keep their

“The pattern of the prodigal is: rebellion, ruin, repentance, reconciliation, restoration” (Edwin Louis Cole). Abraham Lincoln’s “Second Inaugural Address” is a speech that highlights every point in Cole’s quote. He, Lincoln, talks about how the south manages to rebel, how their economy will be left in ruin, how they will repent and be forgiven by both God and the North, how the North and the South will reconcile, and finally he talks of how the nation will move on to restoration. Abraham Lincoln’s “Second Inaugural Address” emphasizes the reconciliation of a torn apart nation by appealing to pathos, logos, and ethos and by using diction to appeal to the listener’s emotion.

Americans, during the 1930s, clearly needed help. Too many were unemployed, struggling, starving, and/or homeless. One of the biggest legacies of the New Deal is that it combated unemployment with jobs in infrastructure. Many agencies and programs were set up to help increase America’s infrastructure and provide many needy people with jobs. One of those organizations was the Works Progress Administration. Incredibly, the WPA employed an average of 2.1 million people annually for a total of almost 8 million people. It had become largest New Deal program and required almost 11 billion dollars to fund it (Friedrich). The WPA was made with one goal in mind: to get people back to work so they can get money in their pockets to survive. The WPA built highways, airfields, public buildings, and did rural rehabilitation such as planting trees. In total, it had built around 110,000 public buildings, 600 airports, 500,000 miles of roads, and 100,000 bridges (“New Deal”). Like the WPA, the Civilian Conservation Corps, had been created to provide jobs, but it was mainly for younger Americans. This program had employed and put 3

Many places such as banks, movie theatres, religious activities, and small neighborhood stores failed. These palces failed not because the population had a decrease in desire to go there, but because they realized these places could no longer give them comfort and maintain stability. Workers were forced to move their families and property elsewhere, seeking jobs. The citizens looked to the government, not because they had lost hope and had given up, but because they viewed the government as their protector and provider when in dire need (Nawsaw 348). Employees expected many benefits from their employer, but was disappointed when they failed to provide it to them (Nawsaw 348). As citizens, the people believed they had every right to ask for government assistance (Nawsaw 348). President Roosevelt gave hope to the American People by staying positive. “The only thing we have to fear, is fear itself.” This quote by President Roosevelt during his inaugural speech reached many Americans and gained him support. He managed to rally the people by promising a program to help the financial crisis called “The New Deal.” Roosevelt tried many different things to improve the nation's economic status but nothing was working. He then created the “Second New Deal.” “This created the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to provide jobs for unemployed people. “From 1933 until 1941, President Roosevelt’s

In his acceptance speech to the Democratic National Convention on June 27, 1936, President Franklin Roosevelt mentioned many challenges and concerns facing the United States during that time period. In his speech the President used short-hand phrases, brief references, and pejorative naming to make his larger, political and ideological points. FDR used terms like ‘economic royalists’, along with phrases like ‘new despotism wrapped in the robes of legal sanctions’, to identify the large corporations, investors and employers, who according to him are trying to influence policies and control the government for their own personal benefits. The President also uses phrases like ‘Necessitous men are not free men’, to reiterate his concerns and to point out how the working people of America are being deprived from their rights by these very same privileged employers. FDR compares 1936 to 1776, referring to the American Revolution and its significance in putting the power back in the hands of the average Americans, and how it is necessary to check the power of the corporations in order to protect the interests of the American people and restore the power back in the hands of the people.

After a time of malnutrition, high unemployment rates, homelessness, economic instability, and a president too cold and stubborn for his people, the citizens of America desperately looked for a sign of hope. The ultimate end to the Great Depression was undoubtedly World War II. However, it was FDR’s New Deal that shed the light of hope on America’s citizens. The programs of the New Deal transformed the role of the government by the implication of numerous laws in order to stop the economy from getting any worse. The New Deal came with three new main themes: relief, recovery and reform. Roosevelt himself acknowledges the importance of them in his Address in 1934, “In the consistent development of our previous efforts toward the saving and safeguarding of our national life, I have continued to recognize three related steps. The first was relief…”(Doc 3). Relief being an immediate response in order to stop the problem from getting worse. Recovery was to bring the situation back to normalcy and Reform was to put things in place to make sure the problem never arises again. These new ideas transformed the role of the government and its impact on American citizens. Before the New Deal, the government had essentially no influence on the economy or providing for the people.

“Robust and vibrant with an intense aftertaste,” that’s the phrase I would use to describe President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s speeches. In his series of fireside chats, Roosevelt’s amicable yet forceful tone communicated hope and self-assurance to millions of Americans during times of despair and uncertainty. “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” When the plague of poverty swept the entire western hemisphere, Roosevelt persuaded the Americans to remain optimistic and take action under his leadership. “No realistic American can expect from a dictator’s peace international generosity.”

In 9 years, a grand total of 3 million men had been employed under the CCC, giving millions of families a monthly paycheck. Although the pay wasn’t much, it was money, which at the time most Americans could only dream of. Along with the CCC came the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The WPA was the most ambitious New Deal program to take action. It employed millions of unemployed Americans who carried out work such as constructing buildings and making roads. Shortly after the WPA took actions almost every community within the U.S. had a park, school, road, building, or bridge made by the WPA. In 1938 the WPA reached an all-time high, employing around 3 million unemployed men and women at once. Both the CCC and the WPA provided millions of jobs for Americans. This portion of The New Deal had an outstanding effect on the U.S., creating jobs that would have been non-existent if Roosevelt had not established The New Deal. It is safe to conclude that these programs repaired not only the poverty and the employment in America, but also created a ray of hope for Americans, reassuring them that the hard times were soon coming to a halt.

John F. Kennedy, the 35th president of the United States, has become one of the most famous presidents in the nation's history due to his oratory skills and eloquence (Biane,2011). In this paper, we present an analysis the inaugural speech that he delivered in January 1961. Even though his Inaugural speech lasted less than fifteen minutes, the message that he saliently delivered was one that has continued to resonate in the very hearts of American citizens.