It’s really quite surprising that Franklin D. Roosevelt was only considered important enough for
the tiniest of American currency, because he was one hell of a President. Not only did he battle polio — POLIO — he also was a crusader for what he called “the forgotten man,” i.e. the poor.
Like waaaaaay before it was cool.
And get this — he didn’t even grow up poor! He just knew that poor people needed care and then talked about it and tried to help them.
As the Presidential race heats up (bye, Scott Walker! See you in Hell!) and New York City and other locations around the country fight for a higher minimum wage (with which
even the current President is on board), it’s important to remember that:
a.) the idea of raising up the poor is neither new nor radical, and
b.) there’s a lot of really respected leadership that spoke on it decades ago.
********************
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. [Source]
True individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made. [Source]
No comments:
Post a Comment