QUOTES
"I
came to Washington to work for God, FDR, and the millions of forgotten, plain
common workingmen."
"Whenever
I see that picture which is becoming so familiar of the great mechanical man who
does things automatically and can perform almost anything that a human being can
perform, I confess to chills of horror lest we become like him. We are committed
to the belief that the human race is not destined for that kind of efficiency,
but for an efficiency of the spirit and of the mind. If this robot-man can release
us from chores like turning off switches -- all right, but let him release us
to be human beings and let us not develop a race who are going to be patterned
after him."
"I
promise to use what brains I have to meet problems with intelligence and courage.
I promise that I will be candid about what I know. I promise to all of you who
have the right to know, the whole truth so far as I can speak it. If I have been
wrong, you may tell me so, for I really have no pride in judgment. I know all
judgment is relative. It may be right today and wrong tomorrow. The only thing
that makes it truly right is the desire to have it constantly moving in the right
direction."
"What
was the New Deal anyhow? Was it a political plot? Was it just a name for a period
in history? Was it a revolution? To all of these questions I answer "No." It was
something quite different... It was, I think, basically an attitude. An attitude
that found voice in expressions like "the people are what matter to government,"
and "a government should aim to give all the people under its jurisdiction the
best possible life."
"It
is not the nature of man, as I see it, ever to be quite satisfied with what he
has in life.... Contentment tends to breed laxity, but a healthy discontent keeps
us alert to the changing needs of our time."
"This
leads to a question -- if a great many people are for a certain project, is it
necessarily right? If the vast majority is for it, is it even more certainly right?
This, to be sure, is one of the tricky points of democracy. The minority often
turns out to be right, and though one believes in the efficacy of the democratic
process, one has also to recognize that the demand of the many for a particular
project at a particular time may mean only disaster."
"Our
idea of what constitutes social good has advanced with the procession of the ages,
from those desperate times when just to keep body and soul together was an achievement,
to the great present when "good" includes an agreeable, stable civilization accessible
to all, the opportunity of each to develop his particular genius and the privilege
of mutual usefulness."
"Out
of our first century of national life we evolved the ethical principle that it
was not right or just that an honest and industrious man should live and die in
misery. He was entitled to some degree of sympathy and security. Our conscience
declared against the honest workman's becoming a pauper, but our eyes told us
that he very often did."
To
one who believes that really good industrial conditions are the hope for a machine
civilization, nothing is more heartening than to watch conference methods and
education replacing police methods.
In
America, public opinion is the leader.
“Most
of man's problems upon this planet, in the long history of the race, have been
met and solved either partially or as a whole by experiment based on common sense
and carried out with courage.”
