Assignment # 11 Due 12-10-13

“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.”

Franklin D. Roosevelt

“The Economic Bill of Rights”

Message to the Congress of the United States on the State of the Union

In this passage Franklin D Roosevelt is discussing what true individual freedom really means. In order to truly be individual freely one must have some form of “economic security and independence.” Economic security is some time of financial income such as job. Men that are not economically secure are not free for as Franklin stated, “Necessitous men are not free men.”  Individuals that are impoverished, which can be defined by their unemployment status and need for food is the basis for what a society ran by a dictatorship is comprised of.

I chose this passage because the very basis of American civil liberty is individual freedom. As Franklin stated, individual freedom is marked by economic and financial security. In our society so many people are economically and financially unstable making it contradicting for one to say or believe that Americans have complete and total individual freedom.

   

Unemployment

“By 1933 millions of Americans were out of work. Bread lines were a common sight in most cities. Hundreds of thousands roamed the country in search of food, work and shelter. "Brother, can you spare a dime?" went the refrain of a popular song.”

Excerpt from the link The Great Depression

The Great Depression, which began in the United States in 1933, marked a time of immense economic despair for Americans. Millions of Americans were unemployed resulting in severe levels of poverty. Many people had no food, a job, or a place to live. Many were in search of those things. Many went unfed and were out of work for a long period of time.

I chose this passage because although the United States in not currently in a state of depression, many Americans are unemployed, homeless, and hungry. The number of homeless people living in New York City alone is astounding. The fact that so many years later many Americans are still facing the problems that Americans decades ago faced is astounding. 

The picture above is of people that were living in poverty during the Great Depression. As I stated before, due to unemployment many people were forced to live in poverty with no food or shelter. This picture relates to the class as it depicts The Great Depression, a time of harsh economic despair for millions of Americans.