Fourth Inaugural Address

Summary

Franklin D. Roosevelt's fourth inaugural, on 20 January 1945, is among the shortest ever given, under six hundred words. Wartime austerity and the President's own failing health moved the ceremony from the Capitol to the South Portico of the White House, and Roosevelt opened by asking the small crowd to accept his wish "that the form of this inauguration be simple and its words brief." The argument fits in a handful of sentences. Americans and their allies are passing through "a period of supreme test" of courage, resolve, wisdom, and "our essential democracy." The nation that fights for total victory must also work for "a just and honorable peace, a durable peace." Mistakes will come, but they "must never be mistakes which result from faintness of heart or abandonment of moral principle." Roosevelt recalls his old schoolmaster, Dr. Endicott Peabody of Groton, on the peaks and valleys of history and the upward line drawn through them, and concedes that the Constitution of 1787 "was not a perfect instrument; it is not perfect yet." The middle of the speech lists lessons learned "at a fearful cost." Americans cannot live alone at peace; their own well-being depends on nations far away; they must live "as men, not as ostriches, nor as dogs in the manger." The isolationist debates of the 1930s stand behind every clause. Emerson supplies the moral: "The only way to have a friend is to be one." The address ends in prayer, thanking God for "stout hearts and strong arms" and asking for vision to see the way "to the achievement of His will to peace on earth." Within three weeks Roosevelt was at Yalta; within three months he was dead at Warm Springs, Georgia. The brief text has been read since as his last charge to the nation: finish the war, then build the peace without retreating into isolation.

Plot or Argument

• A request for brevity

  Roosevelt asks the Chief Justice, the Vice President, and his "friends" to accept a simple ceremony and brief words, setting the measured tone of a wartime inauguration.

• Four measures of the test

  The war is called a test of courage, resolve, wisdom, and essential democracy; meeting it "successfully and honorably" would be a service honored "throughout all time."

• Peace as a second labor

  Having sworn the oath "in the presence of our God," Roosevelt pledges to work for a just and durable peace with the same energy now spent on total victory, and allows for mistakes but not for faintness of heart.

• Peabody's upward line

  A remembered lesson from his Groton headmaster, that civilization trends upward through peaks and valleys, leads to the admission that the Constitution is still imperfect yet a firm base for "all manner of men."

• Lessons bought at fearful cost

  Americans have learned that they cannot live alone, that their welfare depends on distant nations, and that they must be "citizens of the world," approaching peace without suspicion or fear.

• Prayer for clear vision

  God is thanked for the nation's strength and faith, and asked for vision to see the way to a better life for all and to "His will to peace on earth."

Lessons

• Brevity as a wartime decision

  Roosevelt cut the ceremony to a few minutes on the White House portico, with no parade, while soldiers were still dying in Europe and the Pacific. The form itself argues that a nation at war should not celebrate its leaders lavishly.

  • What does Roosevelt gain by asking his hearers to "agree" with the wish for simplicity?
  • Which sentences would you cut if the speech had to be even shorter, and what would be lost?
  • Can a short speech carry as much moral weight as a long one? Use this text as evidence.

• Imperfection without faintness of heart

  Roosevelt twice admits imperfection: Americans will make mistakes, and the Constitution "is not perfect yet." What he refuses to excuse is the error that comes from timidity or from abandoning moral principle. The lesson separates honest failure from cowardice.

  • Why would a President admit, at his inauguration, that mistakes are coming?
  • How does Peabody's image of peaks and valleys support the call to "strive for perfection"?
  • What kinds of mistakes in making peace after 1945 might count as "faintness of heart"?

• Ostriches and dogs in the manger

  Two animal images name two kinds of isolation: the ostrich hides its head from danger, and the dog in Aesop's fable guards hay it cannot eat so that the ox cannot either. Roosevelt uses both to reject the policy of standing apart from the world after the war.

  • Which policies of the 1930s might Roosevelt have had in mind with each image?
  • How does Emerson's line about friendship turn a strategic argument into a moral one?
  • What does it mean to be "citizens of the world" without ceasing to be citizens of a nation?

Context

Roosevelt had won an unprecedented fourth term in November 1944, with Harry S. Truman replacing Henry Wallace as Vice President. The Battle of the Bulge was ending in the Ardennes, American forces were fighting in the Philippines, and plans for a postwar United Nations were under way. Roosevelt left for the Yalta Conference days after the inauguration and died on 12 April 1945.

Composition

Delivered 20 January 1945 from the South Portico of the White House, one of only a few inaugurals not given at the Capitol. The text stored here follows the Project Gutenberg transcription (#4938); spelling and punctuation follow that source.

Reception

Coming so soon before Roosevelt's death, the address is often read as his political farewell. Its rejection of isolation in favor of membership in "the human community" anticipated the American role in founding the United Nations later that year.

Comparisons

• Third Inaugural Address

  In 1941 Roosevelt asked Americans, still at peace, to save democracy "from disruption from without"; in 1945, with victory in sight, he asks them to build a durable peace. Read them as the opening and closing of his wartime argument.

• Second Inaugural Address

  Lincoln in March 1865 and Roosevelt in January 1945 both spoke briefly near the end of a great war and both died before it was fully over; set Lincoln's charity toward the defeated beside Roosevelt's call to approach peace without suspicion.

• Second Inaugural Address

  Washington's 1793 address of about 135 words is the only inaugural shorter than Roosevelt's 1945 text; compare what each man chose to leave unsaid, and why.

Quotes

For Students

A reading companion for classical Christian high school students. See the student guide.

Reading Guide

Watch for

• The opening request that the ceremony be simple and the words brief.
• The four things the war is said to test.
• The schoolmaster's image of peaks, valleys, and an upward line.
• The lessons Americans have "learned," including the ostriches and the dogs in the manger.
• The closing prayer, and what Roosevelt asks God to give.

Key terms and names

Fourth term

Roosevelt is the only President elected more than twice; the Twenty-second Amendment (1951) later limited Presidents to two elected terms.

Total victory

Defeat of the Axis powers without negotiated compromise, the war aim Roosevelt sets beside the aim of a durable peace.

Isolationism

The prewar policy of avoiding foreign commitments, which the speech rejects as living like "ostriches."

Dog in the manger

From Aesop: a dog that guards hay it cannot eat so others cannot have it; an image of selfish refusal to share.

Groton

The Massachusetts school where Roosevelt studied under its headmaster Endicott Peabody, the "old schoolmaster" quoted in the speech.

Seminar Questions

1. Comprehension Where was the 1945 inauguration held, and what reason does Roosevelt give for its simplicity?
2. Comprehension List the lessons Roosevelt says Americans have learned "at a fearful cost."
3. Interpretation Why does Roosevelt say a lasting peace cannot be gained "with suspicion and mistrust or with fear"?
4. Interpretation How does Peabody's remembered saying change the way Roosevelt asks his hearers to view setbacks?
5. Interpretation What does the admission that the Constitution "is not perfect yet" add to a speech about wartime resolve?
6. Big Question Is history really "forever upward," as Peabody claimed? What would a Christian account of history add to or correct in that view?
7. Big Question Should a nation that has won a war bind itself to the welfare of other nations, as Roosevelt urges?

Faith Connections

• Psalm 29:11 (Scripture)

  "The LORD will give strength unto his people; the LORD will bless his people with peace" joins the two gifts Roosevelt names in his closing: "stout hearts and strong arms" and "His will to peace on earth."

• Proverbs 18:24 (Scripture)

  "A man that hath friends must shew himself friendly" says in Scripture what Roosevelt borrows from Emerson as the rule for postwar relations among nations.

• Augustine, City of God XIX.12 (Church Fathers)

  Augustine observes that even war is waged for the sake of peace; Roosevelt's pairing of "total victory" with "a just and honorable peace" makes the same claim about the war's purpose.

Logic and Rhetoric

Central argument: Because the war is a test of national character and the nation has learned that its welfare depends on others, Roosevelt argues, Americans must finish the war honorably and then pursue a just, durable peace without fear, isolation, or abandonment of principle.

Rhetorical device: anaphora. Roosevelt repeats "We have learned" four times in succession, building the case against isolation lesson by lesson.

Debate: Resolved: that Roosevelt was right in 1945 that the United States could not "live alone, at peace" after the war.

Memory Work

We Americans of today, together with our allies, are passing through a period of supreme test

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

Writing Prompts

Essay: Explain how Roosevelt turns the end of a world war into a charge about peace, using his words on mistakes, on isolation, and on friendship.

Comparison with Third Inaugural Address: Compare Roosevelt's 1941 and 1945 inaugurals: how does his account of America's place in the world change between a nation threatened from without and a nation nearing victory?

Medical Lens

Presidential inaugurals concern constitutional politics and national crisis; they have no medical content for this library's lens.

Creative Prompts

• Classroom

  Rewrite Roosevelt's 1945 address as a 150-word telegram to the troops, keeping its four measures of the test and its closing prayer.

• Fiction

  Write a scene on the White House lawn on 20 January 1945, seen by a young aide who notices how tired the President looks and wonders what the brevity means.

• Essay

  Roosevelt says "The only way to have a friend is to be one." Is that sound advice for nations as well as for persons? Argue from the speech and from history.

Further Reading

• Inaugural Addresses of the Presidents of the United States, Avalon Project / GPO

  Parallel official texts for classroom comparison.

• The Rhetorical Presidency, Jeffrey K. Tulis

  A study of how inaugural and other presidential speech reshaped the office.