In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.
The first is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the world.
The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world.
The third is freedom from want -- which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the world.
The fourth is freedom from fear -- which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor-- anywhere in the world.
On this day in 1941, Franklin Delano Roosevelt delivered those words to a joint session of the U. S. Congress as his State of the Union message.
There are more words, and you can read the complete speech here
I want to reflect on these four freedoms as they apply to our nation today.
The first is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the world. Yes, we can offer criticisms of those nations that suppress speech which those in power do not like. And yet these words are still unfortunately too applicable in our own nation. We have too many instances of those seeking to suppress speech with which they disagree. They may seek to shout down those to whose words they object, they may seek to deny them access to public airwaves, they may argue that to allow such speech undercuts national will at a time of crisis.
Whatever those objections, they are wrong and pale when compared to the vitality of a liberal democracy which encourages the free exchange of ideas in a public fashion.
The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way -- everywhere in the world. We look at other nations that impose one religion or ban others, yet on this our own hands are not so clean as we might think. Whether it attempting to ban the building of houses of worship for religions to which we object or attempting to impose by force of law one's own religious values upon those of others, the track record of religious discrimination in this country is unfortunately an ongoing violation of the principles of the First Amendment. We do not pay attention to our own history, going back to Colonial times. After all, the Puritans in Massachusetts Bay may have resented their not being able to practice their religion in England but they expelled dissenters from Massachusetts Bay Colony and hung Mary Dyer and others merely for being Quakers. In Maryland where I taught for many years they like to brag about their Act of Toleration but in theory it only tolerated trinitarian Christianity, prescribing death for those who denied the Holy Trinity. Roosevelt's words are also too limited, because by their silence on those who choose not to worship or who do not believe in a God they imply a license for discrimination against those who do not ascribe to a religion based on a belief in one supreme deity.
The first two of these Four Freedoms are clearly delineated in our First Amendment. The last two are different, not spelled out in our Constitutional language, but clearly implied as the part of any moral society.
The third is freedom from want—which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants—everywhere in the world. Everywhere in the world should include everywhere in the United States. And yet even 72 years after these words were delivered we have a higher degree of poverty and want than any other industrialized democracy. We see increasing inequality, diminishment of the social safety net, and too many willing to rationalize why this is so and why we cannot afford to address the want of the many, even as we destroy economic hope by moving jobs overseas, refuse to require those getting obscenely wealthy to contribute to the larger society that makes their wealth possible.
The fourth is freedom from fear—which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor—anywhere in the world. Here we need to look in the mirror, because there is one nation in a position to commit acts that others will view as physical aggression against almost any country it chooses, and that is the United States of America. Our massive military machine and our extensive "intelligence" apparatus is not there merely to enable us to act as policeman of the world, but rather to advance our own economic, political, and - yes - military interests. We do not reduce our armaments, we increase them - and we remain the world's largest purveyor of instruments of destruction to other nations, because it profits our armament industries and gives us influence over the militaries of other nations.
Fear is, however, about more than military threats. It also involves economic threats. It becomes involved with freedom from want. One can argue that the use of economic sanctions to punish a regime unfairly falls upon the residents in a nation led by a totalitarian government over which they have little control. That leads to justification such as Madeline Albright saying that the death of half a million children in Iraq was justified in our attempts to overthrow the regime of Saddam Hussein by imposing harsh sanctions felt neither by him personally nor by those who propped up his regime.
We often point with pride to great moral statements by people in our nation. We may look at the words of a Washington, a Jefferson, a Lincoln, an FDR, or others.
Perhaps we should take those words and apply them to ourselves, our own nation, our own personal actions.
We should remember that there was much more in the speech than the delineation of the Four Freedoms. The speech was Roosevelt's call for the nation to rearm and be prepared to confront what was already happening elsewhere, in a war officially begun in Europe on September 1, 1939, when Germany and the USSR invaded Poland, but which had precursors in Spain earlier in the 1930s, in Italy's actions in Africa, in Japan's actions on the Asian mainland.
Roosevelt was in part justifying a military role for the United States, even though we were not "officially" involved in that war, at least not yet, although by the end of that calendar year we would after Pearl Harbor officially enter it. We were already serving as a source of war materiel for one side of the conflict, we clearly tilted against those nations we viewed as dictatorial, that is, against the major powers of the AXIS.
But if Roosevelt's words are to have lasting meaning, they should be applicable in our own time, perhaps in ways he did not anticipate.
They should be a challenge to how we view ourselves today, how we act towards our own and others.
I was not yet born when FDR spoke those words.
I learned them at a very early age. They were taught to us in school, reinforced with paintings by Norman Rockwell.
They were intended to inspire us.
For me, that inspiration should require that we be honest at our continued failure to live up to their moral sweep.
Which is why I chose to revisit them today, on the 72 anniversary of when they were first delivered.
Peace?