Sunday, January 20, 2013

Historical Inauguration Speeches

C-Span has a You Tube channel focused on historical inauguration speeches. It includes footage of FDR's 1933 speech which contains his "the only thing we have to fears is ...." line - one of the more famous in history.

Here's a link to that speech:

There's a debate going on now about the importance of a good inauguration speech. Obama didn't get good marks for his first one - we'll find out tomorrow if he does better this time, and if that even matters.

FDR's speech is noteworthy for his explicit request that he be granted additonal executive powers to handle the Great Depression. We will cover this when we discuss the expansion of executive power that happened durign hiw presidency.

The Washington Post has an interactive site with info on all past addresses.