Timothy Wilken, MD writes: Long time reader, Dexter Graphic
recently forwarded me an article about Franklin Delanor Roosevelt’s proposal for
a Second Bill of Rights initially suggested during his campaign for the
American Presidency in 1932. The proposal was lost in the shuffle of
getting America out of The Great Depression and then successfully
through WWII.

Twelve
years later, President Roosevelt returned to his proposal for a Second
Bill of Rights. Those proposed rights were enumerated during his State of the Union address to the Congress on January 11, 1944:

It
is our duty now to begin to lay the plans and determine the strategy
for the winning of a lasting peace and the establishment of an American
standard of living higher than ever before known. We cannot be content,
no matter how high that general standard of living may be, if some
fraction of our people—whether it be one-third or one-fifth or
one-tenth—is ill-fed, ill-clothed, ill-housed, and insecure.

This
Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the
protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right
of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from
unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and
liberty.

As our nation has grown in size and stature, however—as
our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved
inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness.

We
have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual
freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence.
“Necessitous men are not free men.” People who are hungry and out of a
job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day
these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have
accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis
of security and prosperity can be established for all—regardless of
station, race, or creed. Among these are:

• The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;

• The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;
• The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;
• The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an
  atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by
  monopolies at home or abroad;

• The right of every family to a decent home;
• The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;
• The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;
• The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we
must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these
rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being.

America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon
how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for
our citizens.

As
you may recall, Roosevelt did not survive to see the end of World War
II. On March 30, 1945, he went to Warm Springs to rest before his
anticipated appearance at the founding conference of the United
Nations. On the afternoon of April 12, Roosevelt said, “I have a
terrific headache” and was carried into his bedroom. The doctor
diagnosed that he had suffered a massive cerebral hemorrhage. Later
that day, he died. As Allen Drury later said, “so ended an era, and so
began another.”

Harry
S. Truman succeeded Roosevelt, and when informed of the existence of
the Manhattan Project and nuclear weapons decided to end the war by
destroying Hiroshima on August 6th and Nagasaki on August 9th, 1945
with nuclear fire. This experiment in mass killing ended the lives of
over two hundred thousand men, women, and children.

Too bad. Where might we be today, if Roosevelt had lived a few more years. (03/06/09)
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