Since It's President's Day . . . Franklin D. Roosevelt - 1941


( . . .and it just wouldn't be President's Day without FDR)

Continuing our look back at President's past on this Presidents Day 2010. Here is Franklin D. Roosevelt delivering an address on the occasion of Jefferson-Jackson Day 1941.

The war in Europe was a little less than six months old and it was becoming more and more clear we would be involved in some way at some point, sooner rather than later.

But in his address, FDR was quick to point out that the decision of the American people to get involved, even if it was via Lend-Lease, was still a big-partisan one (there's that word again). I suspect bi-partisanship meant something completely different in 1941 than it does now, almost seventy years later.

Pres. Roosevelt: “We Americans have announced our determination that with all our resources and all our power, we shall help those who block the dictators in their march toward domination of the world. The decision we have reached is not a partisan decision. The leader of the Republican party himself, Mister Wendell Willkie in word and in action is showing what patriotic Americans mean by rising above partisanship and rallying to the common cause.”

How the meaning of words change.

