Franklin D. Roosevelt Quotes

Quotes about:

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Selfish, Men, Eagles

  The Four Freedoms, delivered 6 January, 1941 (photo of FDR in 1936)

  396 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  War, Race, Drug

  Campaign address, Brooklyn, New York, November 1, 1940.

  406 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Respect, Kindness, Character

  321 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Freedom, Power, Essence

  Roosevelt, Franklin D. (1941). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: F.D. Roosevelt, 1938, Volume 7”, p.305, Best Books on

  454 Copy quote

• Repetition does not transform a lie into a truth.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Peace, Truth, Integrity

  Roosevelt, Franklin D. (1941). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: F.D. Roosevelt, 1939, Volume 8”, p.557, Best Books on

  330 Copy quote

• Do Something.
  If it works, do more of it.
  If it doesn't,
  do something else.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Action, Ifs

  53 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Wrestling, People, Acting

  326 Copy quote

• It is better to swallow words than to have to eat them later.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Humorous

  32 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Inspirational, Life, Motivational

  75 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Money, Economic Inequality, History

  Second Inaugural Address, 20 Jan. 1937

  289 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  War, Political, Politics

  240 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Country, Witty, Patriotic

  Franklin D. Roosevelt's Address at Marietta, Ohio, July 8, 1938.

  315 Copy quote

• The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Inspirational, Leadership, Bullying

  First Inaugural Address, 4 Mar. 1933 See Francis Bacon 7; Montaigne 4; Thoreau 16; Wellington 3

  285 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Jobs, Freedom, People

  Franklin D. Roosevelt (1995). “The Essential Franklin Delano Roosevelt”, Gramercy

  344 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Xenophobia, Patriotic, Usa

  Remarks before Daughters of the American Revolution Convention, Washington, D.C., 21 Apr. 1938. Often paraphrased as Roosevelt's addressing the DAR as "my fellow immigrants."

  379 Copy quote

• Calm seas never made a good sailor

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Sea, Sailor, Calm

  58 Copy quote

• Never underestimate a man who overestimates himself.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Men, Vanity, Underestimate

  333 Copy quote

• Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Inspirational, Motivational, Success

  Roosevelt, Franklin D. (1941). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: F.D. Roosevelt, 1939, Volume 8”, p.242, Best Books on

  30 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Life, Perseverance, Teaching

  107 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Children, Educational, Future

  196 Copy quote

• I have seen war. I have seen war on land and sea. I have seen blood running from the wounded. I have seen men coughing out their gassed lungs. I have seen the dead in the mud. I have seen cities destroyed. I have seen 200 limping, exhausted men come out of line—the survivors of a regiment of 1,000 that went forward 48 hours before. I have seen children starving. I have seen the agony of mothers and wives. I hate war.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Mother, Running, Children

  Speech at Chautauqua, NY, 14 Aug. 1936, in Public Papers (1936) vol. 5, p. 289

  55 Copy quote

• 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.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  War, Hate, Struggle

  Franklin D. Roosevelt's Address at Madison Square Garden, New York City, October 31, 1936).

  249 Copy quote

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

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Success, Education, Real

  Roosevelt, Franklin D. (1941). “Public Papers of the Presidents of the United States: F.D. Roosevelt, 1938, Volume 7”, p.538, Best Books on

  235 Copy quote

• Freedom of the press is essential to the preservation of a democracy; but there is a difference between freedom and license. Editorialists who tell downright lies in order to advance their own agendas do more to discredit the press than all the censors in the world.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Lying, Order, Differences

  63 Copy quote

• We may make mistakes-but they must never be mistakes which result from faintness of heart or abandonment of moral principle.

  Franklin D. Roosevelt

  Mistake, Heart, Principles

  George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, James Madison, James Monroe, John Quincy Adams, Andrew Jackson, Martin Van Buren, William Henry Harrison, James Knox Polk, Zachary Taylor, Franklin Pierce, James Buchanan, Abraham Lincoln, Ulysses S. Grant, Rutherford B. Hayes, James A. Garfield, Grover Cleveland, Benjamin Harrison, William McKinley, Theodore Roosevelt, William Howard Taft, Woodrow Wilson, Warren G. Harding, Calvin Coolidge, Herbert Hoover, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Harry S. Truman, Dwight D. Eisenhower, John F. Kennedy, Lyndon Baines Johnson, Richard Milhous Nixon, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George Bush, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama (2017). “Inaugural Speeches from the Presidents of the United States - Complete Edition”, p.249, e-artnow sro

  26 Copy quote

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