[Congressional Record Volume 145, Number 130 (Thursday, September 30, 1999)]
[Senate]
[Pages S11752-S11753]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




         AMBASSADOR VANDEN HEUVEL'S TRIBUTE TO SENATOR KENNEDY

 Mr. FEINGOLD. Mr. President, I rise today to congratulate the 
Honorable Edward Kennedy, who received the Franklin Delano Roosevelt 
Freedom Medal in early May of this year. I ask that Ambassador William 
J. vanden Heuvel's remarks honoring Senator Kennedy be printed in the 
Record following this statement.
  The remarks follow.

           The Four Freedoms: A Gateway to the New Millennium

  An Address by William J. vanden Heuvel, President of the Franklin & 
     Eleanor Roosevelt Institute--Hyde Park, New York--May 7, 1999

       Today, midst the renewal of life that Spring represents, we 
     come to the valley of the Hudson River that Franklin Delano 
     Roosevelt loved so very much. The President parents and four 
     children of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt are buried in this 
     country churchyard. We remember that three sovereigns of the 
     Netherlands--Wilhelmina, Juliana and Beatrix came to this 
     church to worship accompanied by it Senior Warden who was 
     also the President of the United States. We welcome the 
     Queen's High Commissioner. Wim van Gelder, and the delegation 
     from Zeeland where the Roosevelt Study Center has established 
     itself as a pre-eminent place of study of the American 
     presidency.
       Winston Churchill described Franklin Roosevelt as the 
     greatest man he had ever known. President Roosevelt's life, 
     Churchill said, ``must be regarded as one of the commanding 
     events in human destiny.'' We listen once more to the words 
     the President spoke to the Congress on January 6, 1941, as he 
     defined the fundamental charter of democracy: [The voice of 
     President Roosevelt as he spoke to the Congress of the United 
     States on January 6, 1941]
       ``In the future days, which we seek to make secure we look 
     forward to a world founded upon four essential freedoms. The 
     first is Freedom of Speech and Expression--everywhere in the 
     world. The second is Freedom of every person to worship God 
     in his own way--everywhere in the world. The third is Freedom 
     from Want--which, translated into world terms, means economic 
     understanding which will secure to every nation a healthy 
     peacetime life for its inhabitants--everywhere in the world. 
     The fourth is Freedom from Fear--which, translated into world 
     terms, means a worldwide reduction of armaments to such a 
     point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will 
     be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression 
     against any neighbor--anywhere in the world.''
     Freedom of Speech and Expression
     Freedom of Worship
     Freedom from Want
     Freedom from Fear
       For ourselves, for our nations, for our world. Those are 
     the reasons why we fought the most terrible war in human 
     history--to secure those freedoms for our children and 
     generations to come, to make possible for them the well-
     ordered society that only Democracy can assure, a community 
     established by the consent of the governed, where the rule of 
     law prevails, where freedom means respect for each other, and 
     where fairness and decency and tolerance are the cherished 
     values, where government protects the powerless while 
     encouraging everyone to nourish the spirit and substance of 
     our land.
       Franklin Roosevelt was the voice of the people of the 
     United States during the most difficult crises of the 
     century. He led America out of the despair of the Great 
     Depression. He led us to victory in the Great War. Four times 
     he was elected President of the United States. By temperament 
     and talent, by energy and instinct, Franklin Roosevelt came 
     to the presidency, ready for the challenges that confronted 
     him. He was a breath of fresh air in our political life--so 
     vital, so confident and optimistic, so warm and good humored. 
     He was a man of incomparable personal courage. At the age of 
     39, he was stricken with infantile paralysis. He would never 
     walk or stand again unassisted. We can feel the pain of his 
     struggle--learning to move again, to stand, to rely upon the 
     physical support of others--never giving into despair, to 
     self-pity, to discouragement. Just twelve years after he was 
     stricken, he was elected President of a country itself 
     paralyzed by the most fearful economic depression of its 
     history. He lifted America from its knees and led us to our 
     fateful rendezvous with history. The majesty of that triumph 
     can never be dimmed.
       He transformed our government into an active instrument of 
     social justice. He made America the arsenal of democracy. He 
     was Commander-in-Chief of the greatest military force in 
     history. He crafted the victorious alliance that won the war. 
     He was the father of the nuclear age. He inspired and guided 
     the blueprint for the world that was to follow. The vision of 
     the United Nations, the commitment to collective security, 
     the determination to end colonialism, the opportunity of 
     peace and prosperity for all people--everywhere in the world. 
     Such was the legacy of Franklin Roosevelt.
       President Roosevelt spoke in simple terms that everyone 
     understood. Civilization needs a police force, he said, just 
     as every one of our communities look to their local police 
     for security and protection against the lawless. Adolf Hitler 
     and his Nazi hoodlums brought the world to the precipice of 
     destruction. Franklin Roosevelt was the first among the 
     world's leaders to denounce and confront the savagery of the 
     Nazis. The tin horn dictators who trample democratic values 
     today when they carry out ethnic cleansing and murder 
     innocent people, destroying their children and their hopes, 
     are in the same gangster tradition. It is Franklin 
     Roosevelt's legacy to nullify their power by collective 
     action. If the freedoms, which are the essence of 
     civilization, are only rhetoric unworthy of defense and 
     sacrifice, they will not prosper. They will perish.
       The America that President Roosevelt left us was prepared 
     for the challenge of the New Frontier. Despite the trouble 
     and turbulence of the 20th century, there is much of which we 
     can be proud. We have a nation based upon the consent of the 
     governed. We must cause it once again to be respectful of the 
     opinions of Mankind. We have amassed wealth that has never 
     been equaled. We have brought together all of the world's 
     races and creeds and shown that we can live together in peace 
     and common purpose. We have spent our treasure and spilled 
     our blood to prevent tyrants from destroying the 
     possibilities of freedom and liberty.
       Neither President Roosevelt nor we who share his vision are 
     projecting a Utopia, a place liberated of all human trouble, 
     where no one shall want for anything. No, the Four Freedoms 
     are not a vision of a distant millennium, but rather the 
     basis of a world attainable in our own time and generation.
       It is the purpose of this day to honor five laureates whose 
     lives and achievements give us hope that our cherished 
     freedoms will endure as our Republic will endure.
       It is my privilege and honor to bestow the Franklin Delano 
     Roosevelt Four Freedoms Medals.
                                  ____


 Award of the Franklin Delano Roosevelt Freedom Medal to Edward Moore 
                                Kennedy

       ``We look forward,'' President Roosevelt told Congress and 
     an embattled world on January 6, 1941, ``to a world founded 
     upon four essential freedoms''--Freedom of Speech and 
     Expression, Freedom of Worship, Freedom from Want, Freedom 
     from Fear.
       On this 7th day of May, 1999, the Franklin Delano Roosevelt 
     Freedom Medal is awarded to Edward Moore Kennedy whose 
     commitment to peace and social justice and whose brilliant 
     command of the parliamentary process have made him the most 
     influential Senator of his era, esteemed by his colleagues, 
     and respected and admired throughout the world.
       Six times the voters of Massachusetts have elected you to 
     the Senate of the United States. Like the great leaders of 
     this century, you have been the target of doubt, derision, 
     ridicule and hatred, but to your enemies' everlasting 
     disappointment, you have endured and prevailed, fortified by 
     an inner strength that caused each fateful assault to leave 
     you stronger, more determined, and more effective.
       You have been much more than the heir to a great political 
     dynasty. You have been the executor of its legacy, a pioneer 
     forever advancing the new frontiers of equal opportunity and 
     American purpose. Born into a

[[Page S11753]]

     family of wealth and influence, you created an independent 
     career that has profoundly enriched the Kennedy saga and 
     given voice and power precisely to those who, lacking wealth 
     and influence, have been denied the opportunity of the 
     American dream.
       In the struggle for civil rights, your eloquence has been 
     the trumpet of our leadership. You are the inexhaustible 
     champion of racial justice and minority rights, of better 
     schools, of the protection of the environment, of care and 
     concern for the casualties of a market society--of those left 
     out of America's historic prosperity. No one has done more to 
     provide healthcare for all Americans. You have built 
     extraordinary coalitions--and when necessary you have stood 
     alone--in extending insurance coverage, in controlling costs, 
     in protecting the vulnerable, in advancing medical research. 
     You have fought for a social security system that truly 
     assures security. You have led the fight for the minimum wage 
     and the rights of labor, for equal opportunity for women, for 
     the protection of children and for all those caught in the 
     web of poverty. What the New Deal established, you advanced. 
     You are the defender of past social gains and the designer of 
     new social opportunities. Your capacity for friendship, your 
     graciousness and good humor, your willingness to do the 
     tedious homework that makes you a master of legislative 
     detail has enabled you to overcome partisan divisions. You 
     have achieved extraordinary results without compromising 
     principle.
       In world affairs, you are a champion of peace and 
     international understanding. Northern Ireland has the hope of 
     peace today in large part because of your outspoken 
     opposition to violence and terrorism and your untiring 
     support of those on the front line working for justice and 
     reconciliation. The developing nations of the world know you 
     as their friend, and the United Nations esteems you as an 
     American leader who is determined to see our country fulfill 
     its responsibilities of leadership.
       Your life has not been absent adversity and pain but that 
     has not lessened your determination to strive, to seek, to 
     find and never yield in the quest for a better world. In 1980 
     bringing your campaign to an end, you said: ``. . . But for 
     all those whose cares have been our concern, the work goes 
     on, the cause endures, the hope still lives, and the dream 
     shall never die.'' You have been faithful to that promise. 
     Those words define our purpose with this award. You have 
     understood and enhanced the great message of the Four 
     freedoms as Franklin Delano Roosevelt meant them. Therefore, 
     in his name, we honor--and we thank you.

                          ____________________