Franklin D. Roosevelt Quotes

The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerated the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than the democratic state itself. That in its essence is fascism: ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or any controlling private power.

We are a nation of many nationalities, many races, many religions-bound together by a single unity, the unity of freedom and equality. Whoever seeks to set one nationality against another, seeks to degrade all nationalities.

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.

Remember, remember always, that all of us, and you and I especially, are descended from immigrants and revolutionists.

We look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms. The first is freedom of speech and expression. The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way. The third is freedom from want. The fourth is freedom from fear.

True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

Never underestimate a man who overestimates himself.

People acting together as a group can accomplish things which no individual acting alone could ever hope to bring about.

Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth.

Let us never forget that government is ourselves and not an alien power over us. The ultimate rulers of our democracy are not a President and Senators and Congressmen and Government officials but the voters of this country.

Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.

The test of our progress is not whether we add more to the abundance of those who have much it is whether we provide enough for those who have little.

The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

We had to struggle with the old enemies of peace - business and financial monopoly, speculation, reckless banking, class antagonism, sectionalism, war profiteering. They had begun to consider the Government of the United States as a mere appendage to their own affairs. We know now that Government by organized money is just as dangerous as Government by organized mob. Never before in all our history have these forces been so united against one candidate as they stand today. They are unanimous in their hate for me - and I welcome their hatred.

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

Democracy cannot succeed unless those who express their choice are prepared to choose wisely. The real safeguard of democracy, therefore, is education.

When you see a rattlesnake poised to strike, you do not wait until he has struck to crush him.

The value of love will always be stronger than the value of hate. Any nation or group of nations which employs hatred eventually is torn to pieces by hatred.

We may not be able to prepare the future for our children, but we can at least prepare our children for the future.

What America needs now is a drink.

Nobody will ever deprive the American people of the right to vote except the American people themselves and the only way they could do this is by not voting.

Freedom of conscience, of education, of speech, of assembly are among the very fundamentals of democracy and all of them would be nullified should freedom of the press ever be successfully challenged.

The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.

There are many ways of going forward, but only one way of standing still.

We are trying to construct a more inclusive society. We are going to make a country in which no one is left out.

We have always held to the hope, the belief, the conviction that there is a better life, a better world, beyond the horizon.

No business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country... By living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level - I mean the wages of decent living.

Go for the moon. If you don't get it, you'll still be heading for a star. Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of the creative effort.

We, and all others who believe in freedom as deeply as we do, would rather die on our feet than live on our knees.

We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization.

I sometimes think we consider too much the good luck of the early bird and not enough the bad luck of the early worm.

Competition has been shown to be useful up to a certain point and no further, but cooperation, which is the thing we must strive for today, begins where competition leaves off.

In our democracy officers of the government are the servants, and never the masters of the people.

I am neither bitter nor cynical but I do wish there was less immaturity in political thinking.

This generation of Americans has a rendezvous with destiny.

Those (who) seek to establish systems of Government based on the regimentation of all Human Beings by a handful of individual rulers...call this a new order. It is not new and it is not order.

...Since 1775 the United States Marines have upheld a fine tradition of service to their country. They are doing so today. I am confident they will continue to do so.

No democracy can long survive which does not accept as fundamental to its very existence the recognition of the rights of minorities.

Those who have long enjoyed such privileges as we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them." - Franklin D. Roosevelt

If civilization is to survive, we must cultivate the science of human relationships - the ability of all peoples, of all kinds, to live together, in the same world at peace.

Presidents are selected, not elected.

A conservative is a man with two perfectly good legs who, however, has never learned how to walk forward.

The Social Security Act offers to all our citizens a workable and working method of meeting urgent present needs and of forestalling future need. It utilizes the familiar machinery of our Federal-State government to promote the common welfare and the economic stability of the Nation.

Yesterday, December 7, 1941 a date which will live in infamy the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan... We will gain the inevitable triumph so help us God.

In these days of difficulty, we Americans everywhere must and shall choose the path of social justice…, the path of faith, the path of hope, and the path of love toward our fellow man.

Physical strength can never permanently withstand the impact of spiritual force.

Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the assessment that something else is more important than fear.

That, in its essence, is Fascism — ownership of Government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power.

The principle on which this country was founded and by which it has always been governed is that Americanism is a matter of the mind and heart; Americanism is not, and never was, a matter of race or ancestry.

First of all, let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself - nameless, unreasoning, unjustified terror which paralyzes needed efforts to convert retreat into advance.