Franklin D. Roosevelt, "The only thing to fear is fear itself", Washington DC, March 4, 1933, Twentieth-Century Speeches, 1992, 126.
Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.
True, they have tried, but their efforts have been cast in the pattern of an outworn tradition. Faced by failure of credit, they have proposed only the lending of more money.
Stripped of the lure of profit by which to induce our people to follow their false leadership, they have resorted to exhortations, pleading tearfully for restored confidence. They know only the rules of a generation of self-seekers.
They have no vision, and when there is no vision the people perish.
The money changers have fled from their high seats in the temple of our civilization. We may now restore that temple to the ancient truths.
The measure of the restoration lies in the extent to which we apply social values more noble than mere monetary profit.
Happiness lies not in the mere possession of money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the thrill of creative effort.
The joy and moral stimulation of work no longer must be forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent profits. These dark days will be worth all they cost us if they teach us that our true destiny is not to be ministered unto but to minister to ourselves and to our fellow-men.
Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be valued only by the standards of price of place and personal profit; and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing.
Small wonder that confidence languishes, for it thrives only on honesty, on honor, on the sacredness of obligations, on faithful protection, on unselfish performance. Without them it cannot live.
Restoration calls, however, not for changes in ethics alone. This nation asks for action, and action now.
1.01.1992
Woodrow Wilson
Woodrow Wilson, "The world must be made safe for democracy", Washington DC, April 2, 1917, Twentieth-Century Speeches, 1992, 58.
It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be in the balance. But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts - for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own government, for the dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.
It is a fearful thing to lead this great peaceful people into war, into the most terrible and disastrous of all wars, civilization itself seeming to be in the balance. But the right is more precious than peace, and we shall fight for the things which we have always carried nearest our hearts - for democracy, for the right of those who submit to authority to have a voice in their own government, for the dominion of right by such a concert of free peoples as shall bring peace and safety to all nations and make the world itself at last free.
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt, "The new nationalism", Osawatomie, KS, 1910, Twentieth-Century Speeches, 1992, 20-23.
The 'New Nationalism' he now preached not only embraced most of the political and social reforms of the moment but also accepted as both 'inevitable and necessary' the concentration of economic power in big corporations. Roosevelt would regulate rather than dissolve them, maintaining instead of destroying their contributions to America's wealth. Big business would be matched by big government.
...
National efficiency has to do, not only with natural resources and with men, but it is equally concerned with institutions. The State must be made efficient for the work which concerns only the people of the State; and the Nation for that which concerns all the people. There must remain no neutral ground to serve as a refuge for lawbreakers, and especially for lawbreakers of great wealth, who can hire the vulpine legal cunning which will teach them how to avoid both jurisdictions. It is a misfortune when the national legislature fails to do its duty in providing a national remedy, so that the only national activity is the purely negative activity of the judiciary in forbidding the state to exercise power in the premises.
...
The American people are right in demanding that New Nationalism, without which we cannot hope to deal with new problems. The New Nationalism puts the national need before sectional or personal advantage. It is impatient of the utter confusion that results from local legislatures attempting to treat national issues as local issues. It is still more impatient of the impotence which springs from overdivision of governmental powers, the impotence which makes it possible for local selfishness or for legal cunning hired by wealthy special interests, to bring national activities to a deadlock. This New Nationalism regards the executive power as the steward of the public welfare. It demands of the judiciary that it shall be interested primarily in human welfare rather than in property, just as it demands that the representative body shall represent all the people rather than any one class or section of the people.
...
The object of government is the welfare of the people. The material progress and prosperity of a nation are desirable chiefly so far as they lead to the moral and material welfare of all citizens.
...
In the last analysis, the most important elements in any man's career must be the sum of those qualities which, n the aggregate, we speak of as character. If he has not got it, then no law that the writ of man can devise, no administration of the law by the boldest and strongest executive, will avail to help him. We must have the right kind of character - character that makes a man, first of all, a good man in the home, a good father, a good husband - that makes a man a good neighbor. You must have that, and, then, in addition, you must have the kind of law and the kind of administration of the law which will give to those qualities in the private citizen the best possible chance for development.
The 'New Nationalism' he now preached not only embraced most of the political and social reforms of the moment but also accepted as both 'inevitable and necessary' the concentration of economic power in big corporations. Roosevelt would regulate rather than dissolve them, maintaining instead of destroying their contributions to America's wealth. Big business would be matched by big government.
...
National efficiency has to do, not only with natural resources and with men, but it is equally concerned with institutions. The State must be made efficient for the work which concerns only the people of the State; and the Nation for that which concerns all the people. There must remain no neutral ground to serve as a refuge for lawbreakers, and especially for lawbreakers of great wealth, who can hire the vulpine legal cunning which will teach them how to avoid both jurisdictions. It is a misfortune when the national legislature fails to do its duty in providing a national remedy, so that the only national activity is the purely negative activity of the judiciary in forbidding the state to exercise power in the premises.
...
The American people are right in demanding that New Nationalism, without which we cannot hope to deal with new problems. The New Nationalism puts the national need before sectional or personal advantage. It is impatient of the utter confusion that results from local legislatures attempting to treat national issues as local issues. It is still more impatient of the impotence which springs from overdivision of governmental powers, the impotence which makes it possible for local selfishness or for legal cunning hired by wealthy special interests, to bring national activities to a deadlock. This New Nationalism regards the executive power as the steward of the public welfare. It demands of the judiciary that it shall be interested primarily in human welfare rather than in property, just as it demands that the representative body shall represent all the people rather than any one class or section of the people.
...
The object of government is the welfare of the people. The material progress and prosperity of a nation are desirable chiefly so far as they lead to the moral and material welfare of all citizens.
...
In the last analysis, the most important elements in any man's career must be the sum of those qualities which, n the aggregate, we speak of as character. If he has not got it, then no law that the writ of man can devise, no administration of the law by the boldest and strongest executive, will avail to help him. We must have the right kind of character - character that makes a man, first of all, a good man in the home, a good father, a good husband - that makes a man a good neighbor. You must have that, and, then, in addition, you must have the kind of law and the kind of administration of the law which will give to those qualities in the private citizen the best possible chance for development.
Theodore Roosevelt
Theodore Roosevelt, "The men with the muck-rakes", Washington DC, April 14, 1906, Twentieth-Century Speeches, 1992, 10.
The men with the muck-rakes are often indispensable to the well-being of society; but only if they know when to stop raking the muck, and to look upward to the celestial crown above them, to the crown of worthy endeavor. There are beautiful things above and round about them; and if they gradually grow to feel that the whole world is nothing but muck, their power of usefulness is gone. If the whole picture is painted black there remains no hue whereby to single out the rascals for distinction from their fellows. Such painting finally induces a kind of moral colour-blindness; and people affected by it cometo the conclusion that no man is really black, and no man really white, but they are all gray. In other words, they neither believe in the truth of the attack, nor in the honesty of the man who is attacked; they grow as suspicious of the accusation as of the offence; it becomes well-nigh hopeless to stir them either to wrath against wrong-doing or to enthusiasm for what is right; and such a mental attitude in the public gives hope to every knave, and is the despair of honest men.
The men with the muck-rakes are often indispensable to the well-being of society; but only if they know when to stop raking the muck, and to look upward to the celestial crown above them, to the crown of worthy endeavor. There are beautiful things above and round about them; and if they gradually grow to feel that the whole world is nothing but muck, their power of usefulness is gone. If the whole picture is painted black there remains no hue whereby to single out the rascals for distinction from their fellows. Such painting finally induces a kind of moral colour-blindness; and people affected by it cometo the conclusion that no man is really black, and no man really white, but they are all gray. In other words, they neither believe in the truth of the attack, nor in the honesty of the man who is attacked; they grow as suspicious of the accusation as of the offence; it becomes well-nigh hopeless to stir them either to wrath against wrong-doing or to enthusiasm for what is right; and such a mental attitude in the public gives hope to every knave, and is the despair of honest men.
1.01.1991
Jaan Whitehead
Jaan W. Whitehead, "The Forgotten Limits: Reason and Regulation in Economic Theory", ed. Kristen Renwick Monroe, The Economic Approach to Politics: A Critical Reassessment of the Theory of Rational Action, New York, HarperCollins Publishers, 1991.
The problem is that, by extracting the rational actor model from its economic context, the factors in the marginalist model which appeared to support the changes in how individual behavior was viewed - namely the presence of the competitive market system as a harmonizing force and the clear definition of the desirable collective goal of maximizing output - were no longer present. Political life does not have such a clearly defined collective goal or a dependable natural regulatory force. [55]
[Self-regulating dynamic]
[Adam] Smith's concern in all of his work was to examine the relationship between the individual and society. He saw humankind as an emotional being, and he tried to analyze the types and intensities of the various emotions that motivated human behavior. As a result of his analysis, he determined that, left on its own, emotionally driven behavior would result in conflict. From this he concluded that, in order for people to live together in society, their behavior needed to be constrained or regulated. Such constraint could take place through self-regulation, but his study of human beings deemed this an unrealistic basis on which to establish social interaction. Selfish and destructive emotions were too powerful to be reliably tamed by voluntary self-regulation. A second alternative was coercive regulation by government, but, since human beings also make up government and are prone to both mistaken judgment and infringements of personal freedom, this became, for Smith, a last resort if other types of regulation failed.
A third alternative, and the one that Smith favored, was regulation through natural forces that were impersonal but could be relied upon. ... Since self-regulation was undependable and government regulation uncertain and potentially coercive, his analysis of moral, political and economic behavior became a search for such natural regulatory forces which could produce harmony between the individual and society. [56]
[Naturally regulating forces]
We cannot know what further analysis Smith might have made of political life if he had lived or if we had a fuller record of his thought, but it is clear that he believed that a strong regulatory force was necessary in political life. Since he did not identify such a natural regulatory force, he recognized law or government coercion as taking its place. [58]
His central proposition was that people basically want to better their economic condition. In part, this comes from the need to sustain themselves and their dependents. But in larger part it comes from the desire to achieve status and the approval of other people. Although Smith did no necessarily approve of economic achievement as the basis for status, he found it to be an extensive and commanding factor of the society he was investigating. This desire to achieve status produced vigor in economic activity that prudence alone would not produce. [59]
[Strive for status]
By observing how people acted if left free to follow the strong emotions of self-interest, Smith discovered that there was, indeed, a natural mechanism that regulated behavior which was the mechanism of the competitive market. In the market process, although people tried to buy at the lowest price and sell at the highest price in order to maximize their goods and income, the market process, in fact, forced the curtailment of these objectives for each individual through the competition of all individuals. This competition led to the most efficient utilization of resources which maximized total output. Although each individual acted in only a self-interested way, the competitive regulation of self-interested behavior led to public benefit in the form of increased total output. [59]
[Competition creates constraint]
Under the influence of the marginalists... not only did Smith's concern with the emotional bases of behavior and the need to regulate that behavior become obscured but many of the wider political and social concerns of the classical economists became excluded from consideration. [63]
Smith's view of humans as emotional beings in need of regulation was replaced with a view of them as self-contained and rational actors. [65]
The problem is that, by extracting the rational actor model from its economic context, the factors in the marginalist model which appeared to support the changes in how individual behavior was viewed - namely the presence of the competitive market system as a harmonizing force and the clear definition of the desirable collective goal of maximizing output - were no longer present. Political life does not have such a clearly defined collective goal or a dependable natural regulatory force. [55]
[Self-regulating dynamic]
[Adam] Smith's concern in all of his work was to examine the relationship between the individual and society. He saw humankind as an emotional being, and he tried to analyze the types and intensities of the various emotions that motivated human behavior. As a result of his analysis, he determined that, left on its own, emotionally driven behavior would result in conflict. From this he concluded that, in order for people to live together in society, their behavior needed to be constrained or regulated. Such constraint could take place through self-regulation, but his study of human beings deemed this an unrealistic basis on which to establish social interaction. Selfish and destructive emotions were too powerful to be reliably tamed by voluntary self-regulation. A second alternative was coercive regulation by government, but, since human beings also make up government and are prone to both mistaken judgment and infringements of personal freedom, this became, for Smith, a last resort if other types of regulation failed.
A third alternative, and the one that Smith favored, was regulation through natural forces that were impersonal but could be relied upon. ... Since self-regulation was undependable and government regulation uncertain and potentially coercive, his analysis of moral, political and economic behavior became a search for such natural regulatory forces which could produce harmony between the individual and society. [56]
[Naturally regulating forces]
We cannot know what further analysis Smith might have made of political life if he had lived or if we had a fuller record of his thought, but it is clear that he believed that a strong regulatory force was necessary in political life. Since he did not identify such a natural regulatory force, he recognized law or government coercion as taking its place. [58]
His central proposition was that people basically want to better their economic condition. In part, this comes from the need to sustain themselves and their dependents. But in larger part it comes from the desire to achieve status and the approval of other people. Although Smith did no necessarily approve of economic achievement as the basis for status, he found it to be an extensive and commanding factor of the society he was investigating. This desire to achieve status produced vigor in economic activity that prudence alone would not produce. [59]
[Strive for status]
By observing how people acted if left free to follow the strong emotions of self-interest, Smith discovered that there was, indeed, a natural mechanism that regulated behavior which was the mechanism of the competitive market. In the market process, although people tried to buy at the lowest price and sell at the highest price in order to maximize their goods and income, the market process, in fact, forced the curtailment of these objectives for each individual through the competition of all individuals. This competition led to the most efficient utilization of resources which maximized total output. Although each individual acted in only a self-interested way, the competitive regulation of self-interested behavior led to public benefit in the form of increased total output. [59]
[Competition creates constraint]
Under the influence of the marginalists... not only did Smith's concern with the emotional bases of behavior and the need to regulate that behavior become obscured but many of the wider political and social concerns of the classical economists became excluded from consideration. [63]
Smith's view of humans as emotional beings in need of regulation was replaced with a view of them as self-contained and rational actors. [65]
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