Eleanor Roosevelt was an honest person who had responsibility and compassion towards her husband, family and her fellow man, whatever their social status. She used great citizenship and initiative actions in dealing with anyone who was fortunate enough to make her acquaintance. Eleanor Roosevelt was an outspoken advocate of social justice. During the years she has taken over a lot of responsibility. For someone who spent the first third of her life as shy and timid, she showed great courage once she was thrust into the presidential “spotlight”. Most Americans considered her a true “American Hero”.
Ladies and gentlemen, members of the press, I now announce the presence of our first lady of the United States, Eleanor Roosevelt”, is something similar to what you would hear when being addressed at a press conference or important meetings. She was a well respected human being, achieving great duties and responsibility in life. She was appointed by President John F. Kennedy to be on the first Peace Corps advisory board. She was such an active lady while her husband was in office that she was no longer willing to stay quietly in the background of her husband.
She took a job as an editor and advertising manager of a monthly publication ” The Women’s Democratic News” where she became more independent towards herself and work. Eleanor Roosevelt became very involved in women issues, being that she also joined the newly organized Women’s division of the New York State Democratic party and moved swiftly into positions of leadership. Not only was she responsible among organizations and people, she later became her husband, Franklin D. Roosevelt’s eyes and ears, dedicating her life to his purposes, and being a trusted and tireless reporter.
One of the reasons she did become so helpful towards her husbands career was besides the fact that she was the first lady; Franklin D. Roosevelt was stricken with a disease called polio and caused him to be permanently crippled in August of 1921. She then became even more loyal to him and our country having to deal with people from different nations, organizations and positions. While the President struggled to regain the use of his legs, Eleanor Roosevelt and Louis Howe joined forces to keep his political and business contacts alive.
She became a powerful voice for youth employment and civil rights for blacks and women. No first lady has been more visible and outspoken than Eleanor Roosevelt. Perseverance was another great quality of Eleanor Roosevelt. From the time she was a little girl she had to persevere. Both her parents were considered to be handsome and gay socialite among New York society. She was a very plain, shy insecure child, who knew that she was neither pretty nor graceful and that she was a disappointment to her beautiful mother.
Although she was the apple of her father’s eye, he disapproved of her being afraid and timid. Her father was an alcoholic and was away from the family a lot as he tried to straighten out his life. Her mother died when she was only eight years old of diphtheria, and her father died when she was ten. She was raised by her maternal grandmother who was very strict and most of her education was by tutors. (In accordance to her mother’s wishes, her grandmother sent her to a private school in England when she was fifteen.
It was here that Eleanor started to blossom and become a person in her own right. Upon her return to New York, she had her debut into New York Society in 1902. In 1903, Eleanor became reacquainted with her distant cousin, Franklin Delano Roosevelt whom she knew from childhood. Eleanor and Franklin fell in love and were married in 1905, despite his mother’s opposition. Sara Delano Roosevelt was a domineering person who ran Eleanor’s household as if it were her own. She always made Eleanor feel in adequate.
It wasn’t until Franklin was elected to the New York State Senate and they moved away to Washington, that Eleanor was free of Sara’s interference and meddling. When Eleanor was in her thirties, she finally began to emerge as her own person due to particular events in her life. Moving away from her mother-in-law, being exposed to the political scene in Washington, finding out about her husband’s affair with her social secretary, and Franklin contracting polio all forced her to come out into the public life.
Although she was shy, she learned to make public appearances and participate in New York politics because she knew Franklin’s career depended on it. She also went back to teaching, wrote articles, lectured and opened a furniture factory in upstate New York. She became further politically active and participated in several women’s organizations that were involved in social legislation. The plan had been for her involvement to reawaken her husband’s interest in the outside after he was crippled by polio. Once this was accomplished though, Eleanor had no intentions to just go back into the shadows.
While first lady of New York State, she was the legs and eyes for Franklin as she made inspections of state institutions. When Eleanor became first lady of the nation, she advised her husband, helped to foster legislation and spoke her mind on social issues. She fought for the improvement of housing, education, health and the status of minority groups. Even while doing all this, she did not surrender any of her other activities. She earned her own income and gave most of her money to various charities. She traveled throughout the country, visiting coalmines and impoverished Appalachian farms.
During World War II she continued to do inspections for her husband and made goodwill tours to England, the South Pacific and the Caribbean. She also visited American troops abroad to boost their morale. She also visited military camps inside the United States and reported her findings to the President. She was a critic of racial discrimination and even resigned from the Daughters of the American Revolution because of their racial policies. She pushed for better job opportunities for blacks. She was criticized harshly for her views, although she tempered herself for the sake of her husband’s re-election.
She was not afraid to passionately discuss her views on any policy or legislation with her husband. And although both denied that she had any real influence with the president, her views were always an important factor in the outcome of many of those decisions. Along with her many accomplishments Eleanor Roosevelt had a lot of compassion to her work. In 1946, she was elected chair of the United Nations eighteen-member Human Rights Commission, which had been instructed to draft an international bill of rights.
During the next two years Mrs. Roosevelt proved herself a skillful diplomat as she mediated among the clashing views of delegates from different nations and cultures. As you can read she was a very active lady who carried prominent compassion towards her work. During her years as a United Nations delegate, Eleanor Roosevelt continued to lecture, broadcast, and write. She delivered more than one hundred lectures a year, she broadcasted a daily radio commentary, and hosted a weekly television interview show, one of the first of it’s kind.
She was very loyal to herself and to the nation throughout the years. She served as a UN delegate throughout Truman’s two terms as president. She had one of the most wonderful and worthwhile experiences in her life when she served as one of five American delegates to the first meeting of the United Nations General Assembly; she first refused and later said yes. You would never think that such a person would have so many characteristics that showed so much about her and what she did. Eleanor Roosevelt continued a vigorous career until her strength began to wane in 1962.
She died in New York City in November, and was buried at Hyde Park beside her husband. She was so memorable that if you ever travel to the New York area, go to Hyde Park. People remodeled their house, the house of Eleanor and Franklin D. Roosevelt and made it a Historical place to see. Whenever you perceive the name Eleanor Roosevelt, you can remember how she showed great compassion to her work and life. How loyal she was to the people of our nation. What great responsibility’s she consummated and what respect she gave and received from and to so many.