Because I've got something else on my plate...
...right now, and don't know when I'll be able to sit down again and let my thoughts just flow, I offer you the following...
I managed to find time enough to transcribe Ms. Roosevelt's article; the one mentioned in my birthday post-- Please note, I'm using the 'Here's more' tag on this one. As I stated in my earlier post, reading her article shows how little things have changed in forty-six years. Oh, the faces of our enemies have surely changed. Situational politics have certainly changed, but not the scope and breadth of the battle we're still obviously fighting almost half a century later.
Something else that hasn't changed in forty-six years, fundamentally speaking, is the Democratic mindset. I find much to disagree with in Ms. Roosevelt's poorly punctuated Reflection. Ah, but, different times, different writing styles...
Reflections on the Next President
By Eleanor Roosevelt
Esquire Magazine – August 1960
Statement of principle by the First Lady of the Democratic Party.
During the summer, someone will be nominated by each of the political parties as its candidate for the presidency. In November, someone will be elected President of the United States. On what are we going to base our choice?
This man will be confronted by graver issues than have ever faced a Chief Executive. Because the sands are running out, most of these basic issues must be solved within a frighteningly short time, so we must weigh carefully the capacity and the record of the man who is to shoulder that great responsibility. For the kind of solutions he decides upon may well affect our future well-being as a nation.
This man in the White House will, first, have to meet the Soviet challenge and find a more satisfactory modus vivendi by a re-evaluation of our foreign policy. At some point in our long negotiations in the cold war, we will be striving to find an answer to the problem of disarmament. We must also be alert to the fact that the Soviets believe they can gain their objective of a Communist world not by military, but by economic and cultural means.
No plans to avoid the often-predicted economic disaster can be effective without a comprehensive knowledge of the world in which we live and its needs. How can the next President acquire this knowledge? The instrument lies waiting in the United Nations with its world contact and the valuable information it has gathered through its specialized committees and other activities.
So the new President will require a broad mind, a flexible mind, an unprejudiced mind, which can take a fresh and comprehensive look at people and nations in many stages of development and be able to plan for the future so as to integrate our interests with world interests.
This is essential because, second, this man, if we are to retain – and regain – our world leadership, must meet the challenge of the uncommitted nations of the world. While establishing a policy of benefit to ourselves, he must also be sure his policy is of benefit to others; that it will provide them with an equitable share of the material advantages of our kind of civilization. At the same time, it must provide the higher values which are essential to the well-being of mankind; not merely the opportunity for material development, but the opportunity to achieve justice and freedom, and to fan the spark of human dignity. This is the great gift we have to bestow upon the world, one with which the Soviets cannot compete. To lead the world of tomorrow we must have a spiritual as well as a material purpose.
We cannot afford to choose a President who will preach democracy abroad and deny it at home. The eyes of the world are on our own actions, on our solution to our domestic problems. These are indications of how we can be expected to deal with other nations and peoples.
Obviously, the dark-skinned peoples of many of the uncommitted nations are watching the way we cope with the problem of segregation in the south. If we fail to respect the human dignity of a segment of our population, these observers will say, "This is how the Americans feel about it. Until they practice democracy at home we cannot trust them to help us achieve democracy."
A truth we have been slow in recognizing is that where there is no equality for everyone there is no assurance of equality for anyone. I would like to see the next President of the United States call together the Southern and colored leaders and say to them something like this:
"Gentlemen, we are engaged in a great struggle. This country stands for democracy, freedom, equality and justice for all our people. We must make this theory become practice for all our people or it will be meaningless to the world.
"This problem is not so great in the North where the laws have already been changed. There we have only to change our hearts to end the ugly barriers of discrimination. But in the South you have to change a whole way of life. This is not an easy thing to do. The South, however, has responded magnificently in the past to its country’s needs. Great numbers of Southern men have died gallantly in our wars. We ask a new and a more difficult kind of patriotism; not to die but to live so that our way of life may have honor in the world.
"Too rapid integration, I realize, may well cause more difficulties than it corrects. I suggest that you integrate twenty per cent of your first grade the first year, thirty per cent the second year, fifty per cent the third year. Meantime, the federal government will provide the best available teachers to work with those you now have in your colored schools, where, often for economic reasons, the children sometimes have had a lower grade of education. In this way, by the time you have complete integration, the colored children will not be a drag on the whites.
"If you prefer, you may divide your schools, putting girls in one and boys in another, to meet one of the fears which has always been prevalent in your minds."
Of course, we would be in a stronger position today if this had been done long ago, but it is not too late to provide equal justice for all our people and give an example to those abroad who watch and weigh our actions.
The next president must meet the challenge of world hunger. Two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry every night. At the same time we pay our farmers to keep land out of production and quarrel with our neighbor over surpluses. We need a practical man who can meet practical issues. Between us, Canada and the United States can provide a vast amount of food. Because of our greater variety of climate, we can meet the challenge of hunger - if we re-evaluate our agricultural policy and attempt to solve the problem of the distribution of food, I cannot accept the fact that we here in the United States cannot find men with the brains capable of solving this basic problem.
Here again, we have the capacity to meet a need which is beyond the power of the Soviets. So far, they have been able to do no more than meet the needs of their own people for food. It is in our power to increase our leadership in the world and at the same time bring health and comfort to great numbers of people.
This is a practical problem of distribution and of varying our crops. Through co-operation with the United Nations, an economic burden could be transformed into an enormous asset. But it cannot be done without willingness to assume responsibility, without courage and imagination, without the ability to pick first-rate men with a strong sense of public service capable of carrying out such a plan. Indeed, the ability to pick first-rate men with a strong sense of public service is essential if a President is to implement his intentions. For good intentions, without intelligence and implementation, pave only the road to hell.
The new President must re-affirm the need for intelligent conservation of our national resources. Many years ago, Gifford Pinchot gave a lecture which I have never forgotten. He illustrated his talk with pictures of China. Gradually the trees were cut down. Then the floods came. The waters washed away the top soil. Then hunger grew among the people.
It was a terrific lesson for me in how interdependent we are: soil, forest, animals, men. We all need each other for survival. And we can survive only by facing situations, analyzing them, and then planning to meet them so that not one but all factions will benefit, for we know now that, without reasonable equity for all, none may survive.
The next President must meet the challenge of power politics by establishing a clear foreign policy and then letting the people know exactly what it is. Today, many of the men who represent us abroad are hampered by the fact that they do not know what our policy really is, and how they are expected to carry it out.
We cannot meet the threats of hydrogen warfare with vacillation or plans for bandaging the wounds of the injured. The Governor of New York urges people to build shelters and to lay in supplies against the bomb. But if we cannot forestall atomic warfare, I doubt if bomb shelters would provide an adequate answer to the situation. A large part of our civilization would be destroyed. The radiation would last for a long time. And, after all, there is no one who can live underground forever.
The next president must have unchallenged integrity and the proven ability to work with others and through others. He must have the courage to stand up and be counted on his opinions on major issues. A weak man cannot carry the burden of the responsibility of the presidency.
The next President must resume one of the chief functions of the office by assuming his role as educator of the people. Because he has available to him more information than any other man, he has the duty to keep the people informed on conditions, to explain his policies and why he has formulated them.
He should also reawaken the sense of adventure and confidence, and instill a desire in our people to make some contribution to their country and to their world.
The situation that faces us today is different from any we have ever met before. A handful of men can bring about the annihilation of our civilization. Nonetheless, we cannot face this condition with fear. We cannot, as citizens, narrow our responsibility and leave it blindly to the heads of two nations, saying, "It's up to them. It doesn't concern me." It concerns us all. It is the life and the future of each of us that is at stake.
The first and most immediate way of meeting this personal responsibility is by casting a vote for the man who, more than any other individual, will have to make decisions of overwhelming importance. We cannot perform this major duty casually, without thought, without awareness of the immensity of the result of our choice. Our judgment must take into account that the ways of the past are no longer relevant. Fearful as most people are of change, we must recognize the painful fact that we live in a world of change. And unknown world. Old answers will not serve for new questions.
The only new machinery we have for working our new solutions is the United Nations. Through it we can get the co-operation of other nations. These nations, who have as strong an interest in the peaceful settlement of world difficulties as the great powers can have - for their survival, too, depends on it - can provide the balance wheel to see to it that both the Soviets and the United States live up to their commitments.
It is not by exploring outer space and solving the problems of the moon that we can lay the groundwork for future security and plenty. It is by exploring the conditions we find around us and solving the problems first of this troubled world.
I managed to find time enough to transcribe Ms. Roosevelt's article; the one mentioned in my birthday post-- Please note, I'm using the 'Here's more' tag on this one. As I stated in my earlier post, reading her article shows how little things have changed in forty-six years. Oh, the faces of our enemies have surely changed. Situational politics have certainly changed, but not the scope and breadth of the battle we're still obviously fighting almost half a century later.
Something else that hasn't changed in forty-six years, fundamentally speaking, is the Democratic mindset. I find much to disagree with in Ms. Roosevelt's poorly punctuated Reflection. Ah, but, different times, different writing styles...
Reflections on the Next President
By Eleanor Roosevelt
Esquire Magazine – August 1960
Statement of principle by the First Lady of the Democratic Party.
During the summer, someone will be nominated by each of the political parties as its candidate for the presidency. In November, someone will be elected President of the United States. On what are we going to base our choice?
This man will be confronted by graver issues than have ever faced a Chief Executive. Because the sands are running out, most of these basic issues must be solved within a frighteningly short time, so we must weigh carefully the capacity and the record of the man who is to shoulder that great responsibility. For the kind of solutions he decides upon may well affect our future well-being as a nation.
This man in the White House will, first, have to meet the Soviet challenge and find a more satisfactory modus vivendi by a re-evaluation of our foreign policy. At some point in our long negotiations in the cold war, we will be striving to find an answer to the problem of disarmament. We must also be alert to the fact that the Soviets believe they can gain their objective of a Communist world not by military, but by economic and cultural means.
No plans to avoid the often-predicted economic disaster can be effective without a comprehensive knowledge of the world in which we live and its needs. How can the next President acquire this knowledge? The instrument lies waiting in the United Nations with its world contact and the valuable information it has gathered through its specialized committees and other activities.
So the new President will require a broad mind, a flexible mind, an unprejudiced mind, which can take a fresh and comprehensive look at people and nations in many stages of development and be able to plan for the future so as to integrate our interests with world interests.
This is essential because, second, this man, if we are to retain – and regain – our world leadership, must meet the challenge of the uncommitted nations of the world. While establishing a policy of benefit to ourselves, he must also be sure his policy is of benefit to others; that it will provide them with an equitable share of the material advantages of our kind of civilization. At the same time, it must provide the higher values which are essential to the well-being of mankind; not merely the opportunity for material development, but the opportunity to achieve justice and freedom, and to fan the spark of human dignity. This is the great gift we have to bestow upon the world, one with which the Soviets cannot compete. To lead the world of tomorrow we must have a spiritual as well as a material purpose.
We cannot afford to choose a President who will preach democracy abroad and deny it at home. The eyes of the world are on our own actions, on our solution to our domestic problems. These are indications of how we can be expected to deal with other nations and peoples.
Obviously, the dark-skinned peoples of many of the uncommitted nations are watching the way we cope with the problem of segregation in the south. If we fail to respect the human dignity of a segment of our population, these observers will say, "This is how the Americans feel about it. Until they practice democracy at home we cannot trust them to help us achieve democracy."
A truth we have been slow in recognizing is that where there is no equality for everyone there is no assurance of equality for anyone. I would like to see the next President of the United States call together the Southern and colored leaders and say to them something like this:
"Gentlemen, we are engaged in a great struggle. This country stands for democracy, freedom, equality and justice for all our people. We must make this theory become practice for all our people or it will be meaningless to the world.
"This problem is not so great in the North where the laws have already been changed. There we have only to change our hearts to end the ugly barriers of discrimination. But in the South you have to change a whole way of life. This is not an easy thing to do. The South, however, has responded magnificently in the past to its country’s needs. Great numbers of Southern men have died gallantly in our wars. We ask a new and a more difficult kind of patriotism; not to die but to live so that our way of life may have honor in the world.
"Too rapid integration, I realize, may well cause more difficulties than it corrects. I suggest that you integrate twenty per cent of your first grade the first year, thirty per cent the second year, fifty per cent the third year. Meantime, the federal government will provide the best available teachers to work with those you now have in your colored schools, where, often for economic reasons, the children sometimes have had a lower grade of education. In this way, by the time you have complete integration, the colored children will not be a drag on the whites.
"If you prefer, you may divide your schools, putting girls in one and boys in another, to meet one of the fears which has always been prevalent in your minds."
Of course, we would be in a stronger position today if this had been done long ago, but it is not too late to provide equal justice for all our people and give an example to those abroad who watch and weigh our actions.
The next president must meet the challenge of world hunger. Two-thirds of the peoples of the world go to bed hungry every night. At the same time we pay our farmers to keep land out of production and quarrel with our neighbor over surpluses. We need a practical man who can meet practical issues. Between us, Canada and the United States can provide a vast amount of food. Because of our greater variety of climate, we can meet the challenge of hunger - if we re-evaluate our agricultural policy and attempt to solve the problem of the distribution of food, I cannot accept the fact that we here in the United States cannot find men with the brains capable of solving this basic problem.
Here again, we have the capacity to meet a need which is beyond the power of the Soviets. So far, they have been able to do no more than meet the needs of their own people for food. It is in our power to increase our leadership in the world and at the same time bring health and comfort to great numbers of people.
This is a practical problem of distribution and of varying our crops. Through co-operation with the United Nations, an economic burden could be transformed into an enormous asset. But it cannot be done without willingness to assume responsibility, without courage and imagination, without the ability to pick first-rate men with a strong sense of public service capable of carrying out such a plan. Indeed, the ability to pick first-rate men with a strong sense of public service is essential if a President is to implement his intentions. For good intentions, without intelligence and implementation, pave only the road to hell.
The new President must re-affirm the need for intelligent conservation of our national resources. Many years ago, Gifford Pinchot gave a lecture which I have never forgotten. He illustrated his talk with pictures of China. Gradually the trees were cut down. Then the floods came. The waters washed away the top soil. Then hunger grew among the people.
It was a terrific lesson for me in how interdependent we are: soil, forest, animals, men. We all need each other for survival. And we can survive only by facing situations, analyzing them, and then planning to meet them so that not one but all factions will benefit, for we know now that, without reasonable equity for all, none may survive.
The next President must meet the challenge of power politics by establishing a clear foreign policy and then letting the people know exactly what it is. Today, many of the men who represent us abroad are hampered by the fact that they do not know what our policy really is, and how they are expected to carry it out.
We cannot meet the threats of hydrogen warfare with vacillation or plans for bandaging the wounds of the injured. The Governor of New York urges people to build shelters and to lay in supplies against the bomb. But if we cannot forestall atomic warfare, I doubt if bomb shelters would provide an adequate answer to the situation. A large part of our civilization would be destroyed. The radiation would last for a long time. And, after all, there is no one who can live underground forever.
The next president must have unchallenged integrity and the proven ability to work with others and through others. He must have the courage to stand up and be counted on his opinions on major issues. A weak man cannot carry the burden of the responsibility of the presidency.
The next President must resume one of the chief functions of the office by assuming his role as educator of the people. Because he has available to him more information than any other man, he has the duty to keep the people informed on conditions, to explain his policies and why he has formulated them.
He should also reawaken the sense of adventure and confidence, and instill a desire in our people to make some contribution to their country and to their world.
The situation that faces us today is different from any we have ever met before. A handful of men can bring about the annihilation of our civilization. Nonetheless, we cannot face this condition with fear. We cannot, as citizens, narrow our responsibility and leave it blindly to the heads of two nations, saying, "It's up to them. It doesn't concern me." It concerns us all. It is the life and the future of each of us that is at stake.
The first and most immediate way of meeting this personal responsibility is by casting a vote for the man who, more than any other individual, will have to make decisions of overwhelming importance. We cannot perform this major duty casually, without thought, without awareness of the immensity of the result of our choice. Our judgment must take into account that the ways of the past are no longer relevant. Fearful as most people are of change, we must recognize the painful fact that we live in a world of change. And unknown world. Old answers will not serve for new questions.
The only new machinery we have for working our new solutions is the United Nations. Through it we can get the co-operation of other nations. These nations, who have as strong an interest in the peaceful settlement of world difficulties as the great powers can have - for their survival, too, depends on it - can provide the balance wheel to see to it that both the Soviets and the United States live up to their commitments.
It is not by exploring outer space and solving the problems of the moon that we can lay the groundwork for future security and plenty. It is by exploring the conditions we find around us and solving the problems first of this troubled world.
from the mind of... Eric | 1:10 PM
10 Comments:
The antics of the modern left bode well for the legacy of those last few words, don't they?
Indeed.
There's a reason why Miss Eleanor is a hero to people around the world. Oh, that we'd heeded her words more closely.
Hero? What has she done to earn that honorific? What deeds have made her an heroic figure? And why would anyone have listened to an ex first-lady 46 years ago? Let alone today? What is it about being the wife of a world leader that makes some people think that that somehow makes her capable of utterances the world should disregard at it's own peril?
I'll admit her article is compelling, but certainly not for the reasons you obviously think.
You might ought to ask the millions that would so honor Eleanor. She routinely turns up at the top of lists of most influential women of all time. STILL, forty years after her death.
Some reasons for her popularity and the high esteem in which she's held:
"Eleanor Roosevelt was a champion for human rights.
She chaired the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which was responsible for drafting the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
She was a great leader who helped her husband Franklin Roosevelt, the country and the world work towards peace and tolerance.
Her humanitarian efforts on behalf of children, the oppressed and the poor earned her the love of millions throughout the world."
She was named woman of the century in at least one poll.
If she were alive today, I suspect she could be elected president in a landslide (assuming the Swift Boat people didn't do a hatchet job on her...and even then - people would see it for what it was).
"She was a great leader who helped her husband Franklin Roosevelt, the country and the world work towards peace and tolerance. "
How? By "targeting" civilians?
That comment would bear more weight, D, if you weren't advocating just that.
I'm talking about your obvious admiration for someone whose husband fire-bombed civilian populations on purpose!
Do you mean Clinton?
Can I admire Eleanor while I disagree with her husband's policies (ones which I imagine you support).
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