FDR Calls for a Second Bill of Rights
In his 1944 State of the Union address on this day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt called for a Second Bill of Rights, guaranteeing a broad range of social and economic rights, including jobs, decent pay, decent homes, medical care, a good education and freedom from hunger.
FDR did not push the issue, however, never proposing any specific legislation that make possible the rights that he discussed. And as a result the idea quickly vanished.
In 2004, law professor Cass Sunstein published a book (see below) arguing that the failure to pursue FDR’s call for a second Bill of Rights was a great missed opportunity in American social and economic history. The evidence of FDR’s program and public statements both before and after this speech, however, do not support Sunstein’s argument.
The President: “We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. ‘Necessitous men are not free men.’ People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made. In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all regardless of station, race, or creed. Among these are:
The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the Nation; The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation; The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living; The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad; The right of every family to a decent home; The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health; The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment; The right to a good education.”
Read FDR’s complete speech: http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/print.php?pid=16518
Read: Cass Sunstein, The Second Bill of Rights: FDR’s Unfinished Revolution and Why We Need it More Than Ever (2004)
Listen to FDR Reading the Speech: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5iHKtrirjlY\
Read: Akhil Reed Amar, The Bill of Rights: Creation and Reconstruction (2000)
Learn more about FDR and civil liberties, including his Second Bill of Rights speech: Samuel Walker, Presidents and Civil Liberties From Wilson to Obama (2012)