[Federal Register Volume 61, Number 198 (Thursday, October 10, 1996)]
[Presidential Documents]
[Pages 53289-53290]
From the Federal Register Online via the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]
[FR Doc No: 96-26222]


     

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Part IV





The President





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Proclamation 6928--Roosevelt History Month, 1996

Proclamation 6929--National Disabliity Employment Month, 1996

Proclamation 6930--Fire Prevention Week, 1996

Proclamation 6931--German-American Day, 1996

Proclamation 6932--National Wildlife Refuge Week, 1996
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  Federal Register / Vol. 61, No. 198 / Thursday, October 10, 1996 / 
Presidential Documents  

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 Title 3--
 The President

[[Page 53289]]

                Proclamation 6928 of October 4, 1996

                
Roosevelt History Month, 1996

                By the President of the United States of America

                A Proclamation

                The Roosevelt family has uniquely influenced the 
                direction and quality of life in America for the last 
                century. With two enormously successful Presidents, 
                Teddy and FDR, and a precedent-setting First Lady, 
                Eleanor, the Roosevelt family has left a lasting legacy 
                of exemplary leadership and public service to our 
                Nation.

                In 1903, President Theodore Roosevelt established our 
                country's first National Wildlife Refuge. Thanks to his 
                vision and determination, America today enjoys the 
                natural treasures preserved in the largest and most 
                varied conservation system in the world. From 1933 to 
                1945, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt, with the 
                support of his wife, Anna Eleanor Roosevelt, guided the 
                United States through two of the gravest crises of the 
                20th century: the Great Depression and World War II. 
                Universally recognized as one of the greatest American 
                Presidents, FDR stands as a symbol of the greatness of 
                our Nation itself. Eleanor Roosevelt, his lifelong 
                companion and dearest friend, transformed the role of 
                the First Lady, traveling the country as an advocate 
                for the poor, the disenfranchised, and the 
                disadvantaged.

                Together, their partnership redefined the modern First 
                Family, combining a broad concern for all Americans 
                with a strong sense of the dignity and history of the 
                Presidency. In a time of acute national anxiety, FDR 
                promised Americans ``a leadership of frankness and 
                vigor.'' He recognized that government had to be 
                responsive to the needs of its people and that the 
                Presidency is not merely an executive office but also a 
                position of moral leadership. President Roosevelt moved 
                Americans toward hope, through perseverance and faith 
                in themselves. He spoke directly to average Americans, 
                not only through his fireside chats on radio, but also 
                through his insistence on honesty and justice.

                He fought for fairness in government, working to 
                establish Federal programs that met the needs of his 
                time: a welcome job for an idle but eager worker; a 
                government loan to help a family avoid foreclosure; and 
                a retirement income system that still serves working 
                Americans nearly 60 years later. These achievements 
                were steps on the road to FDR's dream of establishing a 
                government that would serve as a model for the world.

                In Franklin Roosevelt's view, government should be the 
                perfect public system for fostering and protecting the 
                ``Four Freedoms'' he enumerated when he addressed the 
                Congress in January 1941. Intended as a rallying cry 
                against the economic and military specters that had 
                swept the globe during the previous decade, this speech 
                recognized four essential freedoms: freedom of speech 
                and expression; freedom of every person to worship God 
                in his own way; freedom from want; and freedom from 
                fear. Roosevelt made it clear that he enumerated these 
                freedoms not as abstract ideals but as goals toward 
                which Americans--and caring people everywhere--could 
                direct their most strenuous public efforts.

                Millions of people around the world remember with 
                gratitude his determined leadership as the successful 
                Commander in Chief of America's Armed Forces during 
                this century's most terrible war. It is difficult to 
                imagine any individual other than Franklin Roosevelt 
                who would have been able to oversee

[[Page 53290]]

                the war effort--not only beating back the spreading 
                stain of totalitarianism by achieving decisive military 
                victories, but also adroitly maintaining unity among 
                our allies. As the world moved under a deepening shadow 
                of violence and terror, FDR displayed an unwavering 
                personal character and resolve that inspired faith 
                among the American people.

                And even though FDR did not survive to witness the end 
                of the war he helped so much to win, he nonetheless 
                knew he had set our country's sights in the right 
                direction by dedicating his public career to a safer, 
                stronger America--citizens living and working together 
                in a community of fairness, harmony, and peace. As the 
                final words of his Four Freedoms speech expressed: ``To 
                that high concept there can be no end save victory.''

                After her husband's death, Eleanor Roosevelt continued 
                the vigorous advocacy work she and FDR had begun in the 
                White House, serving on the United States Delegation to 
                the United Nations, acting as Chairperson of the Human 
                Rights Commission during the drafting of the Universal 
                Declaration of Human Rights adopted by the U.N. in 
                1948, working as a member of the National Advisory 
                Committee of the Peace Corps for President Kennedy, and 
                finally serving as Chair of President Kennedy's 
                Commission on the Status of Women. By the time of her 
                death in 1962, she had earned the unofficial title of 
                First Lady of the World, reaffirming the virtues to 
                which she and her husband had dedicated their lives.

                NOW, THEREFORE, I, WILLIAM J. CLINTON, President of the 
                United States of America, by virtue of the authority 
                vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United 
                States, do hereby proclaim October 1996 as Roosevelt 
                History Month. I call upon government officials, 
                educators, labor leaders, employers, and the people of 
                the United States to observe this month with 
                appropriate programs and activities.

                IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this 
                fourth day of October, in the year of our Lord nineteen 
                hundred and ninety-six, and of the Independence of the 
                United States of America the two hundred and twenty-
                first.

                    (Presidential Sig.)

[FR Doc. 96-26222
Filed 10-9-96; 8:45 am]
Billing code 3195-01-P