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Welcome to U.S. history!
Franklin D. Roosevelt's Fourth Inaugural Address:
| MR. Chief Justice, Mr. Vice President, my
friends, you will understand and, I believe, agree with my wish that the form of this
inauguration be simple and its words brief. |
| We Americans of today, together with our allies, are
passing through a period of supreme test. It is a test of our courage—of our
resolve—of our wisdom—our essential democracy. |
| If we meet that test—successfully and
honorably—we shall perform a service of historic importance which men and women and
children will honor throughout all time. |
| As I stand here today, having taken the solemn oath
of office in the presence of my fellow countrymen—in the presence of our God—I
know that it is America's purpose that we shall not fail. |
| In the days and in the years that are to come we
shall work for a just and honorable peace, a durable peace, as today we work and fight for
total victory in war. |
| We can and we will achieve such a peace. |
| We shall strive for perfection. We shall not achieve
it immediately—but we still shall strive. We may make mistakes—but they must
never be mistakes which result from faintness of heart or abandonment of moral principle. |
| I remember that my old schoolmaster, Dr. Peabody,
said, in days that seemed to us then to be secure and untroubled: "Things in life
will not always run smoothly. Sometimes we will be rising toward the heights—then all
will seem to reverse itself and start downward. The great fact to remember is that the
trend of civilization itself is forever upward; that a line drawn through the middle of
the peaks and the valleys of the centuries always has an upward trend." |
| Our Constitution of 1787 was not a perfect
instrument; it is not perfect yet. But it provided a firm base upon which all manner of
men, of all races and colors and creeds, could build our solid structure of democracy. |
| And so today, in this year of war, 1945, we have
learned lessons—at a fearful cost—and we shall profit by them. |
| We have learned that we cannot live alone, at peace;
that our own well-being is dependent on the well-being of other nations far away. We have
learned that we must live as men, not as ostriches, nor as dogs in the manger. |
| We have learned to be citizens of the world, members
of the human community. |
| We have learned the simple truth, as Emerson said,
that "The only way to have a friend is to be one." |
| We can gain no lasting peace if we approach it with
suspicion and mistrust or with fear. We can gain it only if we proceed with the
understanding, the confidence, and the courage which flow from conviction. |
| The Almighty God has blessed our land in many ways.
He has given our people stout hearts and strong arms with which to strike mighty blows for
freedom and truth. He has given to our country a faith which has become the hope of all
peoples in an anguished world. |
| So we pray to Him now for the vision to see our way
clearly—to see the way that leads to a better life for ourselves and for all our
fellow men—to the achievement of His will to peace on earth. |
Back
to Franklin D. Roosevelt
Executive Oath of Office
"I do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will faithfully execute the Office of
President of the United States, and will to the best of my ability, preserve, protect and
defend the Constitution of the United States."
United States Constitution, Article II,
Section 1, Clause 8
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1George Washington, 2John
Adamsl, 3Thomas Jefferson, 4James Madison, 5James
Monroe, 6John Quincy Adams, 7Andrew Jackson, 8Martin
Van Buren,9William H Harrison,10John Tyler,11James K
Polk, 12Zachary Taylor, 13Millard Fillmore,14Franklin
Pierce,15James Buchanan,16Abraham Lincoln, 17Andrew
Johnson, 18Ulysses S Grant,19Rutherford B Hayes, 20James A Garfield, 21Chester
A. Arthur, 22Grover
Cleveland,23Benjamin Harrison, 24Grover Cleveland, 25William
McKinley,26Theodore Roosevelt, 27William H. Taft,28Woodrow Wilson, 29Warren
G. Harding,30Calvin Coolidge,31Herbert Hoover,32Franklin
D Roosevelt,33Harry S.
Truman, 34Dwight D Eisenhower,35John F Kennedy, 36Lyndon
B Johnson, 37RichardN. Nixon, 38Gerald R Ford, 39James E
Carter,40Ronald
W. Reagan, 41George
HerbertW. Bush, 42Bill Clinton,
43George Walker Bush 44
Barack H. Obama
last updated
07/14/09
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