Eleanor Roosevelt Was a Very Different First Lady (The Literary Digest, 1933)Written not too long after she assumed the title "First Lady"; Eleanor Roosevelt (1906 – 1975) was causing a dust-up in Washington:
"With the Constitution making no provision whatever for the duties of President's wives, they have heretofore confined their activities largely to the social side of the white House."
"Mrs. Roosevelt's governmental activities are approved by those who see in them altruism, sympathy for the downtrodden, and a great desire to serve others. Her activities are opposed by those who feel that she is not properly a public servant because she is not responsible to the American electorate or directly accountable to it at election time."
Eleanor Roosevelt on Japanese-American Internment (Collier's, 1943)In this article, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt (1884 – 1962) attempted (very politically) to play both sides of the street, implying on the one hand that the creation of the Japanese-American internment camps seemed a reasonable measure in wartime; but the reader doesn't have to have a degree in psychology to recognize that she believed otherwise:
"'A Japanese is always a Japanese' is an easily accepted phrase and it has taken hold quite naturally on the West Coast because of some reasonable or unreasonable fear back of it, but it leads nowhere and solves nothing. Japanese-Americans may be no more Japanese than a German-American is German...All of these people, including the Japanese-Americans, have men who are fighting today for the preservation of the democratic way of life and the ideas around which our nation was built."
Bad Press Day for Eleanor Roosevelt (Ken Magazine, 1938)During a 1936 visit to a research facility devoted to finding a cure for children's lung ailments, First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt was remembered by a reporter for having blurted out a highly insensitive question:
"What is the use of saving babies, if they can't earn a decent living when they grow up?"
With two years to think about her impulsive inquiry, the reporter responded with outrage in formulating an answer.
Eleanor Roosevelt on the Death of FDR (Yank Magazine, 1945)This column, by First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt, was an articulate effort at make some sense of her husband's death, which took place during one of the most critical periods in world history:
"Perhaps in His wisdom, the Almighty is trying to show us that a leader may chart a way, may point out the road to lasting peace, but that many leaders and many peoples must do the building. It cannot be the work of one man, nor can the responsibility be laid upon his shoulders, and so when the time comes for peoples to assume the burden more fully, he is given rest."
Her Life Since Leaving the White House ('47 Magazine, 1947)Attached is a 1947 article that reported on the post-FDR life of "The Widow Roosevelt" since assuming the position of the United States delegate to the newly established United Nations:
"Mrs Roosevelt's performance during the first session of the U.N. General Assembly in London during the winter of 1946 surprised and pleased even those who had once been her husband's most bitter foes."
Tolerance is an Ugly Word (Coronet Magazine, 1945)In 1947 former First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt penned this nifty essay about her least favorite word:
"I do not like the word tolerance.
If you tolerate something, you do not like it very much."
"I believe that what we have to do in this country is to stop disliking things and like them...We must cease to be afraid of our neighbors at home and take the word 'tolerance' out of our vocabulary and substitute for it the precept, live and let live, cooperate in work and play and like our neighbors."
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