Transcripts For CSPAN3 First Ladies Influence And Image 20150921

By tomorrow morning, the members of congress will have a report and be ready for action. Youve been listening to some of Eleanor Roosevelts address hours after the attack at pearl harbor. She gave that address before her husband even spoke to the nation. For the next two hours, we are going to get to know this transformational first lady. Shes consistently ranked first and first ladys polls. We will look at her life, her relationships and the time in the white house from 1933 to 1945. Welcome to first ladies influence and image series. Joining us tonight is allida black, the editor of the Eleanor Roosevelt papers project at George Washington university and an historian. Another historian, Doug Brinkley who is an author from rice university. Thank you for being here with us. Doug brickley, march 1933, inauguration and entered the white house. What are they walking into . Fdr did not get to walk in. He came in a wheelchair. The fact that somebody was crippled in the lower half said theres nothing to fear but fear itself. Thats perhaps the most famous phrase of the inauguration. What people was fearing was chaos, unemployment, agricultural angst. Dust bowls, october 1929 crash of the stock market. Our country was in tatters. That was friendly roosevelt, this man is over, such odds and his personal life, ushering in a new progressive era and offering 100 days of the new deal programs right off the bat where what people called the alphabet soup trying to get banks to run properly as starting a civilian conservation corps that would plant a billion trees. Create wpa get employment backup. Allida black him what was Eleanor Roosevelt to do and how she defining a role . She was struggling because she was active before she entered the white house. She added basically to the publications as well as the new york state publication. Shes on the board of labor unions and social reform. She told she taught civics and literature and girls school. She was a Major Political force in her all right. So much so that in the campaign, all of the major newspapers and the United States would run fullpage stories on her own political career and her own ambitions. When she comes in to the white house, fdr said you have to resign all of your positions and you have to stay and be the traditional first lady. She tells her friends and they filled her with the greatest sense of dread that the white house its women and that she fears a life of she is wearing her gloves. And so she says to fdr, let me help you with your mail. He says no. She said let me help you with your calendar. He said no. She said let me be your eyes and ears. He said no. She is in the white house desolate. Just saying she loves her husband and she wants him to be happy, but what has happened to my life . To my hardearned independence . From the first today she is in the white house, she is trying to figure out how to resurrect her own of voice in a way that will get her latitude that she needs to be herself while at the same time not undercut her husbands agenda. What were some the issues she got involved in . The first lady of the world. Civil rights, she got very involved in getting africanamericans more equal rights. Working in West Virginia with coal miners and the working people of america. The unforgotten and downtrodden people. Womens issues. Getting women into the forefront of american political life. She had no role model. She created of his role on her own. Theres nobody quite like her. But here she is in 1933 on the radio talking to women about their need to volunteer. At the women are willing if the women are willing because it is going to help their neighbors, we will win not even because of our leaders. But because as a people [indiscernible] we have seen it through. Allida, she spent a lot of time on the radio. She did. She had her own radio show. She would become her own syndicated columnist in 1935 and 1936. By the end of her life, she would write over 8000 columns. More than 27 books. Give 75 speeches a year. Writing 150 letters a day. If i could go back and piggybacked on doug, eleanor hit the ground running on policy in ways that we do not really think about. Eleanor does not hit the ground of race or education, she hits the ground on employment first. The second day of the roosevelt administration, i am sorry, the day after fdr closes the banks and sends the economy act to congress which will cut employment by 25 . People are freaking out. The official Unemployment Rate is 25 . Anybody with a brain will know it is about 40 . It is the first time we have started taking the Unemployment Rate and this is not take into account the 12 years a depression that hit the south and west. To take 25 of the federal payroll out in the middle of the depression and to say to federally employed women that you are going to use data lose your job if youre married to a federally employed man, eleanor is through the roof. She issues in this first week of her husbands presidency her own opinion piece saying this legislation is wrong. And so fdr and eleanor have dueling editorials in the paper in all of the Democratic Party press over the injustice of this act. She does win out. That is why she is so intense about women in that speech. True, but something fdr and the staff does not delight in. You are going to have to find Common Ground otherwise you are going to create a shambles of things. She did a marvelous job of holding her own and writing letters to the interior hopkins. In a way that was not a commandeering of trying to say will you look into this case for me. She handled, i think very well, the cross wire early out of the gate. I think we can give the public if we will examples of way good friends who respect each other and disagree. I will argue that fdr knew she was going to do this. Her correspondence shows this. Was they are trying to do is to bring this issue front and center and by support at her some of the backlash. Fdr sieges her information about 3. 2 beer right after prohibition. He asks her in her own press conferences to release his information. They coordinate. And when they go at each other, they go at each other deliberately to get the country engaged. Before we end the snapshot and go back and look at Eleanor Roosevelts life, at what point did fdr and his inner circle learned to use her as eyes and ears and as an asset . Not just one day, it depends on who it was. Smart people like Harry Hopkins knew she was important. What she said it mattered. Fdr had to win over southern democrats and conservatives. He was very scared on issues of race door his presidency because he was worried about things eleanor really pioneered and facilitated. She talked to American People. She helped fdr a lot. They are working in unity. She was a force to be reckoned with. Wherever she went, i think about world war ii when she went to europe and london and britain, everybody just love seeing her. She went to the pacific, they said we never had somebody so beloved like her before. She became a kind of ambassador for the president stopped short just walk in, there was a new yorker cartoon that was famous showing a coal miner saying what is Eleanor Roosevelt doing care . Putting up trial balloons and things of that nature. I would disagree. I would say that the reason that Roosevelt Eleanor went to the pacific is because she was arguing to go for several years because she wanted to cover the pacific the way of the fighting in the atlantic. They kept turning her down. He did not want her to go. He said it was the biggest mistake in the world. Henry wallace they turned her down and going to europe because she wanted to go with the red cross. If you kidnapped Eleanor Roosevelt, it is a disaster. We do not want to exaggerate. I do want to say the one thing that doug brought up. The trip to the pacific. She finally got to go to the pacific. She goes right after the race riots where she is blamed for those race riots. For our audience to really understand the progression, we need to look at eleanor. She really does not started racing until 1935. That is what were going to do. Well go back to the wars. We have two hours to talk about Eleanor Roosevelt and her influence and image. Well put the phone numbers on the screen. You know all of our programs are interactive programs. We want your participation. It is a put a comment on facebook and you can see the first ladies section right there. You can send us a tweet. Firstladies. Professor Doug Brinkley, what kind of world was eleanor born into . She was born in new york city. Part of that social swirl, societal stop the roosevelt name was as good as you could get. Her father was elliot roosevelt. The brother of theodore roosevelt. Elliott was a character. A great hunter. Somebody eleanor loved madly. Her mother, the key thing for Eleanor Roosevelt was they both died when she was quite young. She loses her mother and her father. That is quite dramatic. Beyond that as she moves up, the hudson is a great story in america. To the bay of new york, on the transpired along the river. Whether it is the new George Washington or the steamboat, the world along the hudson river. She grew up just down the road from springwood. The home of friendly roosevelt, her distant cousin. Did she have a happy childhood . No. She said the only time she felt safe was climbing on top of a cherry tree. Theres significant evidence that some of her uncles who were alcoholics took shots at her. Shes able to transcend that sadness. She writes a young boy in the 1950s when he was severely beaten a younger boy, six or seven years old, he went to a water fountain. He had a little plastic cup. He is beaten so badly that he bleeds on the cup. He writes her. He said basically i am in school and now i am terrified. What do i do . The only africanamerican boy. She writes him and he sent her the cup. I have held the cup. She writes him this extraordinary letter that says she can only imagine how violated he must feel because school is supposed to be a safe place. But she understands the painful childhood. She understands violence. And the only advice she can offer him is what she is told herself. And that is, courage is more exhilarating than fear. In the long run, it is easier. What she is doing, but she is expanding her circle of family and learns through a series of ups and downs that family is really what you construct for yourself. Who was Marie Souvestre . She was the headmistress of Allenwood Academy. She goes when she is 14. She is living, shes dividing her time between her maternal grandmother who loves her but was very strict and what not to let her play a lot. And really does not see to her education. So much so that eleanor becomes an embarrassment for lack of education through other members of the family. Her mothers sister says to her grandmother, we promised anna, eleanors mother was sent her to allenwood and she goes to Allenwood Academy where wimbledon is today. A school of 33 girls. She works with Marie Souvestre who she calls Marie Souvestre sees and eleanor this bunk and mind spunk and mind nobody has seen. She teaches her the only way to be sure of what you think is to argue both sides of an issue with people. Eleanor writes in her diary, she did not keep a diary but sometimes she would write notes to herself. She said i finally learned i have a brain. And so she does not want to go home. Who would want to go home when you have this . She stays in the summer with Marie Souvestre. She says to her you can stay with me but you have to learn to be independent. We can travel that you must set a budget. You have to learn to make reservations. When you go to places, remember you are a guest. You do not just shop, you were a settlement houses and you volunteer in hospitals. And you try to learn the language of the community you are in. When eleanor leads allenwood at the age of 18, Marie Souvestre write her a letter that eleanor will carry for her for the rest of her life that says of course she must go home and make a debut, you are a roosevelt. Teddy is president of the United States. First and foremost, you are my eleanor. I expected great things from you and your own right in this world. What was the relationship with the president . He loved her. He loved her. He was very hard on her. On the father, elliott. He got a woman pregnant that was working in a house. Angry and called him a philandering swine, my little brother, he is embarrassed the family. He beat up somebody was that he loved his brother tremendously. One of his greatest times early was going hunting in western iowa. When he commits suicide, i think theodore felt a kinship to eleanor. Eleanor had a great sparkle in her eye and intelligence. She developed her courage over a period of time. He was there to give them away when they got married on st. Patricks day. It sounds like at this point she has developed some sense of what social issues are important to her. She had exposure to them. She had an interest. She is caught between the world and london you love and want to stay in. She wants to teach. She does not want to come home. She is caught between the demand of being the daughter of the most beautiful debutante as the New York Times repeatedly called her mother and the social expectations of the needs of the president. Just trying to figure out of the dance. Theodore became bigger than life. She turned the name and relationship and the connections to a big influence. I found it very interesting, around 1936, she edited a volume of her fathers biggame hunting letters were she kept where she kept a tiger skin of her father. She had every reason to be angry at her dad. He was bit of a deadbeat father. She never had any angst against him. She had a forgiving nature. We are talking very early 20th century here. It was in 1905 that she met fdr. They become reacquainted. They had met apparently when there were young a little bit as springwood. They were cognizant of each other. A met on a train ride. They met on a train ride. It began a romantic interlude through letters and seeing each other. From 1905 through the 1920s, a very busy time in the roosevelts life. They went to live in springwood at hyde park with franklins mother. We visited a springwood. Heres a little video. [video clip] when she fell in love with friendly roosevelt in 1905 when they got married, they would move in with franklins mother, sarah. Sarah owned and operated this home referred to as springwood since the year 1900 when sarahs elderly father had passed away. Because this was sarahs home, she made the decisions here. She also handled the finances of the home and was the matriarch of the family. This is where the family gathered for the daily meals, the activities are important because they reflected the interaction of the family. Sarah roosevelt sat at the head of the table. Franklin at the other end. And eleanor would find whichever seat was comfortable for for her. This was a bad room they shared as adults. Up until 1918 when infidelity was discovered within the marriage. From that point on, mrs. Roosevelt insisted on not sharing the same bed with franklin roosevelt. At that time, mrs. Roosevelt chose a bedroom right next to this room. This was an area where she could be by herself. It was a bit of a private space for her. The furniture was used by mrs. Roosevelt. One of the few areas where she could get privacy. When mrs. Roosevelt was in hyde park and franklin was also here, it was a given they would both asleep here in the house. If for some reason franklin was not in hyde park, mrs. Roosevelt here on her own would choose to spend her time a couple of short miles away. In this direction, we have the entrance of Sarah Roosevelt. Her bed room is sandwiched between sarahs and her husbands just like in her life that she was sandwiched between them. A little bit of talk about her motherinlaw. What was Sarah Roosevelt alike . Franklin roosevelt was her only child. He had a half brother. Sarah could be very domineering. She was overly protective in a good way. He used to go play and birdwatching. He enjoyed the order the job ornithological society. There are even pictures of him wearing the dress and having long hair. I think she was a good mother and terms of loving and kept her i will and kept her eye on him. People felt bad about eleanor having to deal with her. She was very intensely loving and caring. Fdr cared the world a bar. He was seen sometimes to be happiest when she was around. In fact, she was opposed to their marriage. Very much so, hes you said youre going to put the family and shame. He was saying mother i have to marry eleanor. She came around to some degree with the wedding. Is it a love story . Yes. I would like to talk about eleanor and sarah. So much of that as doug has referenced put in little cookiecutter things. When eleanors mother died when she was six, she was so embarrassed by her daughter. When eleanor falls in love with fdr, she very much hopes that sarah will be a surrogate mother to her. And so you see lots of overtures to this. As doug said, sarah created this cocoon of love around fdr. Others have memorably reconstructed to say sarahs love for fdr gave him the cushion to take the risk that he needed to leave later on. When they come together, we do not know a lot because eleanor burned the letters when she found out about lucy. We really cannot reconstructe that. What we can do is supposed based on the best evidence that we have got and i think that the record is pretty clear that fdr confided in eleanor his ambitions. She did not laugh at him. She saw him as a very, handsome, charming hunk. Everybody same as a dapper pretty boy. He was a hunk. If our views get to see him walking and swimming. He made her laugh. He could see and those sparkling blue eyes something that was there that other people do not see. The level of trust is there. If they said together for a year despite my moms best interest to keep them apart and then they have this very teenage idyllic crush. They are too young to get married. They have hormones. And then they but they learned to love each other in different ways. Married in 1905. In 10 years, they have six children. And that is important. The first child died as an infant. She raised a lot of boys. Its a lot of work. Sometimes we lose sight of that stuff this remarkable life and also this remarkable, loving mother with her kids. She had one daughter. Fdr was an absentee father. Eleanor kept the rhythm together. When fdr would show up, the kids went crazy. Only because he was gone so much. He did not have to be the disciplinarian. He could be the fun playmate kind of father. Lets get our audience involved here. Our guests are allida black and Doug Brinkley. Go ahead with your question. Why is she viewed as the most disliked and loved first lady of all times . If she was here today, how would she deal the 24 7 media . I got that one. Eleanor took controversial stance on the issues of civil rights, women working, women traveling unescorted. She spoke out by the second term on legal and constitutional questions that made people a little nervous. And especially the daughters of the American Revolution who looked at her and called her an unfit woman and really did not want her in the white house. Her polling numbers throughout and the letters she received as well as the hate mail and the largest fbi file that we have in American History up until that time shows the extent to which the American Public really revered her. But the people dislike her disliked her intensely. She really was for what you thought about democracy and social upheaval at the time. If it was good for the government to be engaged or for people who disagreed with each other, who do not look like each other to get the table, if you thought women should have a strong voice, you stood with Eleanor Roosevelt. If the things made you uncomfortable, you really did not. I agree with all of that. The fact that she did so much with africanamericans we know that was jim crow in the south. Here is Eleanor Roosevelt meeting with africanamericans and it angered the right at that time. She wouldve done very well on the media. She wrote on my day, from 19361962. That is what blogging was today. She was doing almost daily. That is what i think. People liked her because she told people what she thought. And that she had a genius for that. If i can piggyback on doug, eleanor would write that the press got it wrong. She held her own press conference. In a great way, she was her own press secretary shaped her own image. It brought women as the first lady, i want women journalists. They were all being excluded. She started having regular press conference is for women and bring the journalist. Looking today at the great women in the correspondent, eleanor is there patron saint. We have a tweet here from jeremy. We will put up and use another name that was formative. Did louis howe he became the inhouse political advisor. My friend wrote a book about him. He was able to coach eleanor on some of the intricacies of american politics and was able to take her seriously and he said, you are an asset. Do not ever mistake that. Was in prior to the presidency . Once was struck with polio in 1921, louis howe believed in fdrs political future. Sarah said retire. You can run your property. Eleanor and louis doubleteam fdr said lets go. Allida, 2 important years and a lenore roosevelts life. 1918, lucy mercer and in 1921 with polio. Walk us through. Eleanor, when she discovers that franklin has fallen in love with lucy mercer and we do not know if it was an affair. What we do know without a doubt that they are in love with each other. Even emotionally and love. Eleanor reads the letters when she is unpacking and she leaves. She offers a divorce. She takes the children. And he considers it. And louis howe says to him, there has never been a divorced president. That lucy is catholic and the pope will never bless the marriage. His mother said to him, if you do this, i will cut you off and you would never have a penny. The roosevelts come back together and today learn to develop a new relationship which gives them space. Space that goes beyond the sort of infatuation, high school, Julia Roberts crush love story. Two adults finding ways to love each other and trust each other in different ways. What the lift to independent but overlapping lives but living 2 independent but overlapping lives. Polio changes that. By that point, eleanor has become exceedingly political. This is before louis howe bond on the railroad car. Fdr is in the state senate right now . Eleanor louis and howe are on the Campaign Train together. Eleanor is very political before that. And so she is working with the International Workers union. She is working with the natural women in trade union. She is working with immigrant roots. She is understanding how to lobby, petition, build coalitions. What she does not know how to do is speak in public. Howe first tutelage is how to speak without that modulated voice. As doug has said, they form a team for fdr. They say to him and this man is so disabled to talk about the intimacy in their marriage, polio is so debilitating to him that eleanor has to give enemas. She has to insert a glass catheter into his penis. This man who was so virile. In her mind, she is thinking i love this man. What is happening to him . We have to keep his spirits up. She is thinking, oh my god, ive finally gotten my life. And now my life is gone. And i could be here doing this for the rest of my life. They figure out how to navigate that. That is a remarkable testament to both of them. And i added to that can i add to that . He went to the state senate in 1910. A lot of different efforts issues, conservation. After being in albany, he is assistant secretary of the navy for the wilson administration. He gets to do an inspection in europe and canada in 1920, he teams up with james cox of ohio. He is a progressive. Fdr is like a banshee. They go down. It ushers in the republican presidency of harding, coolidge, and hoover. Fdr is sad that he lost in 1920 and 1921 he gives polio. What was just intimated out of the antebellum moment when you think he could contract polio from a boy scout pool where he picked up the virus and was taken to maine. He had terrible chills and count out and went to bed with the shakes and woke up and cannot fill his lower half. Alumina roosevelt was there for him like nobody else Eleanor Roosevelt was there for him like nobody else. She showed her true colors of love and loyalty. Thats real mind their marriage. After that, he adored her for more reasons. Somebody who took care of him. Before we move into the white house i want to introduce one more character. It is hard to overestimate the impact that hick as eleanor and fdr called her. She was the leading political journalist of the era. She was the only woman who was on the front page of newspapers and did her own bylines. Ship assigned to cover eleanor and fell in love with eleanor. There is an intimate trust that developed between the two and the love that develops between the two. Emotional or physical . We do not know. There is no doubt in my mind that hickok was in love with eleanor. We know that eleanor will help hickok later when she falls in love with marion. They will build a home together. When mary and dies, she struggles with diabetes. Eleanor will support. You cannot put this in a box. What we can say about hick is that she taught eleanor how to deal with the press in a way where eleanor could define her own message. When eleanor becomes first lady, hickok resigned her position and moves into the white house. She has fallen in love with eleanor and she cannot be objective. Eleanor went to fdr and he said i want to you to investigate whether the new deal is doing and not doing. I want you to get the hopes and fears and put your craft on paper in very private reports to us. What we get is the most incredibly honest and powerful assessment of how the depression is affecting individual people. Hick is involved in that. Eleanor would never make a major career decision without talking to hick. One statement we do not mention. The Associated Press and that why she was able to get the stories. She was very good. She was not a lesbian. Eleanor was married. She had responsibilities of all of her children. And she was becoming first lady. She had all these lives. Eleanor roosevelt had other responsibilities. Lenore was not taking care of them and then. Eleanor very much has her own life. They vacation together. Eleanor and hickok traveled together. They told three and four times together on the phone. They write voluminously. A lot of the letters were burned. We do not know. What we do know is hick is in the white house and she is a person that is respected by fdr. Respected by hopkins, respected and trusted by eleanor. Hicks idea that eleanor should have women of the press conferences because they will lose their jobs. Hickok suggested to hopkins some of the components for what would be wpa. Franklin got elected. And hickok moved into the white house. We have a map of the second floor of the white house. If you can walk us through. Eleanor roosevelt and you can see in the far left lorean hickok has a room across. Frequencies have a monopoly. Thats a nice map. Franklin has a monopoly. And he has much easier access. This is a man in his wheelchair and all of that. It has to do with his life. You can see how important they were to franklin roosevelt. He was doing more speeches and traveling and his fireside addresses affecting the country greatly ray was communicating by radio. It was franklin who beings into to people, during the Great Depression and world war ii. Several roosevelt is fdrs mother of the far right. Is that where she would stay . It is important for your viewers to know this is not a static map. Where the roosevelts are and Winston Churchill and sarah are, it will be filled with guests. The boys were only there when they were home from school. Our visiting over holidays. Churchill only comes in 1940, 1941. And hopkins moves into the white house in 1937. It is not like everybody is in the rooms all of the time. More importantly than that is they spent a quarter of their time cruising all over fdr and not just going to conferences but down to florida and fishing. He would have his home in georgia with the therapeutic pools were actual spent a lot of time and a little white house and down there. He would get to spring with as he could. Not a president stuck in the white house. He moves around an awful lot. We want to show you some inauguration video. As we take this next call from kathy in colorado. Hello. Thank you so much. Ive enjoyed so many of the first ladies. I wanted to say thank you. My question has already been answered in regards to lucy mercer. I had a couple more other questions. Did eleanor know about all of the other arrangements made for franklin and lucy to be together . Was lucy married . Did she have any children . What year did she pass away . Did she have any books that she wrote . Thank you. I will do it briefly. No disrespect intended. Eleanor did not know about the arrangements that some of the staff had made for lucy to return to fdrs life. She does marry, a wealthy South Carolina businessman. Eleanor Anna Roosevelt the daughter brings lucy back into her fathers life. At her fathers request during the war. Lucy is with fdr in warm springs with another cousin the day that fdr dies of a cerebral hemorrhage. It created embarrassment for eleanor that lucy was there. If we go back to the map of the white house. How much did the public know about the living arrangements . They knew the people coming and going. She put it in my day. Did Lorena Hickok have a permanent room . It was not permanent. She was traveling. This is sort of a historical analogy. When you come in the white house after watergate, betty and gerald ford opened the white house up and it becomes the home of the American People again. It is no longer the siege or the bunker. The same thing is true during the Roosevelt White house in the sense it is not the hoover bunker. It was very clear who was coming and going especially when my day started getting published. Eleanor says who was there as was spending the night at what they talked about and what they had for dinner. She would also have our own press conferences where she would tell people who the guests were and who was living there. Yes, people know. It was a different time with the media and press. People would not take photographs of fdr and his wheelchair. Well have a couple. Can you imagine in our youtube area era . They did not cover Peoples Affairs and dalliances. Things will percolate but they do not take on a cast of somebody watching like the clintons had to deal with during their presidency when the media was reading all of this and gossip columns. People left them somewhat alone. And dennis. A tweet from dennis. Wow. She came from a famous family. She had theodore into the white house. She had a lot of scrutiny. She shared about the new deal programs that franklin started as governor. I have been looking at the conservation aspect and the models that is happening during the government ship is governorship that he adopts when he becomes president. She is very equipped policy wise for the difficulties you might find as being of the first lady under all of that scrutiny. They also learned to live separately. The roosevelts are never together. From the time he gets polio until he dies. What she learns is specifically how to develop her own voice and her own alliances and support policies and ways that will get fdr to pay attention. In many ways, the 1920s with her on political laboratory. She used the media. Some of the first of Eleanor Roosevelt. Here are some of her first. She rightly held press conferences. She had a syndicated column called my day. She had a radio show. She had an official government position which we will talk about a little bit later. She addressed the convention in 1940. She earned money. She chaired a white house conference. She traveled solo overseas. She had quite a few firsts. Heres the radio address. If you remember at the beginning, we showed you a bit right after the bombing of pearl harbor. Here is the entirety. [video clip] good evening. I am speaking at a very serious moment in our history. The cabinet is convening and the members of comes our meeting with the president. The state department and Navy Officials have been meeting with the president all afternoon. A japanese ambassador was talking to the president at the very time that japan airships were bombing our citizens in hawaii and the philippines and the sinking one of our transport noted with the lumber on its way. By tomorrow morning, the members of congress will have report and be ready for action. In the meantime, we as a people are already prepared for action. For months now, the knowledge that something of this kind might happen has been hanging over our heads. And yet it seems impossible to believe, and possible to drop that every aims of life as the there was one thing that was important preparation to meet an enemy no matter where he struck. That is all over now. There is no more uncertainty. We know what we have to do and we know we are ready to face it. I should like to say just a word to the women in the country tonight. For all i know, he may be on his way to the pacific. Two of my children are on the pacific. Many of you all over this country have a voice in the services who will be called upon to go into action. You have friends and families and all of a sudden they become a danger zone. You cannot escape, the clutch of fear at your heart. Yet i hope the certainty of what we have to meet will make the rise above these fierce. We must go about our daily business more determined than ever to do the ordinary things as well as we can. And when we find a way to do anything more and our communities to help others to build morale, give a feeling of security, we must to do it. What ever is asked of us, i am sure we can accomplish it. We are the free and on comparable people of the United States of america. To the young people of the nation, i wanted to speak a word tonight. You are going to have a great opportunity. There will be high moments and durability ability will be tested. I have faith in you. I feel as though i was standing up on a rock and that rock is my faith in my fellow citizens. Now, we will go back to the program. Allida black, i want to ask you. Her voice changed from the 1933 radio address that we heard to a much more modulated. She is in her own element. She is saying what she wants to say. She very much appreciates the gravity of pearl harbor. She says the boys in the pacific. She had to battle front in world war i. She saw hundreds of soldiers piled up with their stomachs exploded because they had not been buried yet. She was her much involved in the effort for the league of nations was dubbed in fact, fdr center to the radio to debate over over the world court win the student begins to vote on the legislation. For her, this is a defining moment. She is telling fdr and has told fdr for at least two years prior to that because they both understood that war was inevitable. They were trying to stay out of it. She says to him, we must remember that to the lesson of world war i is that we won the war but we lost what she is trying to do here is not only calm the nation but to set the stage for what she will say the following day which this is no time for hyphens we are all americans. Back to your calls. Rene. It is very wonderful. Thank you for doing it. Completely educational. I would like to know what role eleanor played during the womens Suffrage Movement. She was opposed well, she did not get involved in the Suffrage Movement until fdr came out. She was involved in of the Womens Movement in the sense of the living wage, maximum hours, minimum wages, sanitation, and to really get involved in temperance. She was not a suffragist until fdr came out for it. Ironically, by 1920 she is very much involved in organizing womens votes. She develops schools and canvassing clinics for women to become involved. By 1921, she would begin to help him build the Democratic Party in new york state. Doug brinkley, if i could. What about criticism of eleanor throughout her 12 years . Were people critical of her . Or a bit of a love affair . Of course. Because people do not like fdr. He killed the opposition in 1932 and 1936 and 1940 and 1944. Some people thought her issue of pushing labor unions and supporting of coal miners, you would not have liked it. The africanamerican issue was very controversial. There is one letter she wrote to an africanamerican person i believe in chicago and the , anon wrote her africanamerican person asked how she could use the word d arkie and she said it was a fond old word from my childhood. The language of what it meant wasnt even really know you. With womens issues, the speech , it say we are all in this together speech. Liberal versus conservative speech. The tuskegeerts in a plane flying with one of them. She supports women working in including the first aid care for women working in factories who have children