Quotes from Franklin D. Roosevelt

The hopes of the Republic cannot forever tolerate either undeserved poverty or self-serving wealth.

The moment a mere numerical superiority by either states or voters in this country proceeds to ignore the needs and desires of the minority, and for their own selfish purpose or advancement, hamper or oppress that minority, or debar them in any way from equal privileges and equal rights -- that moment will mark the failure of our constitutional system.

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

The true conservative is the man who has a real concern for injustices and takes thought against the day of reckoning.

These unhappy times call for the building of plans that build from the bottom up and not from the top down, that put their faith once more in the forgotten man at the bottom of the economic pyramid.

Those who have long enjoyed such privleges as we enjoy forget in time that men have died to win them.

to see a nigger you kill a nigger.

We have here a human as well as an economic problem. When humane considerations are concerned, Americans give them precedence. The lessons of history, confirmed by the evidence immediately before me, show conclusively that continued dependence upon relief induces a spiritual and moral disintegration fundamentally destructive to the national fibre. To dole out relief in this way is to administer a narcotic, a subtle destroyer of the human spirit.

Yesterday, December seventh, 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.

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

I ask you to judge me by the enemies I have made.

We cannot always build the future for our youth, but we can build our youth for the future.

A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.

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

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.

I'm not the smartest fellow in the world, but I can sure pick smart colleagues.

To reach a port we must set sail – Sail, not tie at anchor Sail, not drift.

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

Books can not be killed by fire. People die, but books never die. No man and no force can abolish memory... In this war, we know, books are weapons. And it is a part of your dedication always to make them weapons for man's freedom.

Happiness is not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.

A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor.

If you treat people right they will treat you right ... ninety percent of the time.

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

It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.