THE UNIQUE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICAN

PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND THE “TANZANIA TOWARDS THE NEW GENERATION OF AN INCLUSIVE SOCIETY” STRUGGLES: 

Franklin D. Roosevelt (1882-1945) was the 32nd President of the United States and the only chief executive to be elected to more than two terms in office. Roosevelt held the presidency from 1934-1945, leading the United States through the Great Depression and World War II. His legislative program, the New Deal, greatly expanded the role of the federal government in American society.

In his four terms in office, Roosevelt virtually reinvented the presidency, transforming the office into something much more powerful than it had ever been before. Roosevelt's New Deal dramatically expanded the federal government's role in shaping American society, permanently altering the relationship between the economy, the people, and the government.

Snellgrove (1988:123) in his book titled “The Modern World Since 1870” narrates the causes of FDR disability as resulting from polio. In 1921 Franklin Delano Roosevelt went swimming with his family at a holiday resort, and that it was warm so he did not bother to get dressed immediately. It is reported that suddenly he began to sneeze and ache all over. Next morning he was feverish and the following day he lost the use of his legs.

This was his letter which Franklin Delano Roosevelt wrote Dr. William Egleston in a 1924 narrating how he got paralyzed:

“First symptoms of the illness appeared in August, 1921 when I was thoroughly tired from overwork. I first had a chill in the evening which lasted practically all night. The following morning the muscles of the right knee appeared weak and by afternoon I was unable to support my weight on my right leg. That evening the left knee began to weaken also and by the following morning I was unable to stand up. This was accompanied by a continuing temperature of about 102 and I felt thoroughly achy all over. By the end of the third day practically all muscles from the chest down were involved. Above the chest the only symptom was a weakening of the two large thumb muscles making it impossible to write. There was no special pain along the spine and no rigidity of the neck.”

Polio is a virus that invades the body through the mouth and nose. It then multiplies in the digestive system. From there, it spreads through the blood and lymph nodes to the nervous system. There are three different types of polio. The first, called non-paralytic polio, causes symptoms such as nausea, vomiting, fever, and muscle spasms. Patients usually recover their full health after having this type of the virus. The second type of polio, paralytic polio, struck FDR. After going to bed with a fever and general weakness, he found himself paralyzed. Paralytic polio attacks the spinal column and most often causes paralysis in the legs. Some patients recover; others remain paralyzed for life. The third type of polio can cause death. It is called bulbar polio. This type of polio attacks the brain stem. This disrupts the signals for breathing and swallowing. Many of those who survive this type of polio spend their life in an iron lung or on a respirator to help them breathe.

Although polio had left FDR paralyzed from the waist down, he would not allow it to stop him. He worked energetically to regain the use of his body. He built himself a wheelchair to gain mobility. He was a very ambitious man with high political aspirations. The polio was a minor setback to him. Although his mother wanted him to put aside his political ambitions, Eleanor encouraged him to get better and continue. FDR did not let his paralysis stop him from achieving his dreams. In 1929, he became governor of New York. He also had his eye on the presidency. This achievement was reached on March 4, 1933, when he took office as America's thirty-second president.

UNIQUENESS OF FRANKLIN DELANO AS THE US PRESIDENT

Roosevelt being supported by brace to stand

Franklin Delano Roosevelt entered the White House in 1932 at the darkest hour of the Great Depression, promising "the New Deal for the American people." The package of legislative reforms that came to be known as the New Deal permanently and dramatically transformed the politics and economy of the United States. Shortly after taking office, Roosevelt explained to the American people that his New Deal program would seek to deliver relief, recovery, and reform.

In the field of relief, the New Deal proved to be highly successful. Millions of Americans, unable to find work in an economy that was still badly broken four years into the Great Depression, might have literally starved to death if not for the government checks they earned by working for new agencies like the Civilian Conservation Corps and Works Progress Administration.

In terms of reform, the New Deal legacy may have been unmatched in American history. For better or worse, Roosevelt's program drastically altered the relationship between the capitalist market, the people, and their government, creating for the first time in this country's history an activist state committed to providing individual citizens with a measure of security against the unpredictable turns of the market. Whether this vast enlargement of the government's role in American society helped or hurt the country's long-run prospects remains a question of great political controversy to this day, but there can be no denying the magnitude of change wrought by FDR's presidency.

When it came to recovery, however, the New Deal's performance lagged. It was certainly successful in both short-term relief, and in implementing long-term structural reform. However, the New Deal failed to end the Great Depression. Throughout the decade of the 1930s, unemployment remained brutally high, while economic growth remained painfully slow. Recovery only came about, at last, in Roosevelt's third term, when the heavy demands of mobilization for World War II finally restored the country to full employment.

HIS STRONG SLOGANS

“The only thing we have to fear is fear itself”.

“I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a New Deal for the American people”.

His Extra Ordinary Creativeness

Snellgrove (1988:124) shows how a man was creative in convincing the Congress to pass different laws that could combat problems. It reached a point where FDR set 100 days to evaluate his speed and efficient in tasks accomplishment. The Congress allowed him to be a “democratic dictator” by passing laws at breakneck speed, and that what followed the world astonished to witness the American progress.

About inclusive setting for all people

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the man, said: “We are trying to construct a more inclusive society. We are going to make a country in which no one is left out”.

In this statement, the dream came true when almost all people who were able and ready to participate in all activities were benefited.

EIGHT FACTS TANZANIANS NEED TO LEARN FROM FDR

Optimism

This is the strong belief in success for the future betterment of people. People must be assisted to see the hope desired for ahead. Franklin Delano Roosevelt used different words for the purpose of optimizing his fellow citizens. “The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today. Let us move forward with strong and active faith”. The same way, we, people of Tanzania-of all abilities, must encourage each other to fulfill our needs. People with disabilities here in Tanzania are of great concern. They should, in jointly efforts be encouraged to revive their lost life dreams of success.

Personal powers of excellence

Mark of his idea, 'the New Deal'

This is the ability of person’s being creative and is goal oriented in solving problems related to individuals and their nation. Although FDR had all his presidential post spend in wheel chair but he did extremely memorial events throughout the American history. Here a lesson to Tanzanians is met on assessing the people with disabilities who are performing their daily duties extraordinarily. The few educated personnels who have disabilities have varieties of unutilized talents. FDR used the words "Happiness lies in the joy of achievement and the thrill of creative effort" to mean that in every success there must be personal efforts conducted creatively which is in turn is the results of “personal powers of excellence”.

Nationalhood

This is the notion which stands for to explain how people are well united within their given country. It shows how people perform their daily activities cooperatively. They jointly decide and implement those decided mutual agreements. In a nation like Tanzania, which is composed of many races, many religions and varying abilities and personalities-that is, those with and without disabilities are within the same country; they must be bounded together by a single unity, the unity of freedom and equality. Whoever seeks to set one personality against another, seeks to degrade the national civilization. FDR, the man, used these words: "If civilization is to survive, we must cultivate the science of human relationships- the ability of all peoples, of all kinds, to live together, in the same world at peace.

Dare

To dare is to decide to do something. To overcome the worrying obstacles and take steps towards something.

When FDR entered White House, the US was already badly affected by the Great Depression, and it was on its way to even worst conditions. FDR dared to enter presidential candidate, and the Americans also dared to vote for him. At the first time the Americans had doubt about the man who had already suffering from the polio effects. When he tried to use different words accompanied with promissive moments, it is when he was eventually elected the US president. FDR was the only and the last solution to the problems. The man served White House for three terms. He used the words…"it is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something" to encourage his fellow Americans that he knew he was standing for. Let us, as a nation of Tanzania, keep trying something.

People with disabilities have to dare to every opportunity that comes on their way, government and NGOs have the task to trust people with disabilities in daily activities.

One of the posters showing how people needed FDR

Disability not necessarily being inability

Disability can be defined as the limitations that an individual shows in functioning within a social context or setting resulted from the luck/absence and/or malfunctioning of body organ. Handicap on the other hand, is the disadvantage an individual encountered which is the result of disability or social-emotional constructed phenomenon. FDR used powerful words precisely like, "Physical strength can never permanently withstand the impact of spiritual force"…and that, "It means people on crutches and in a wheelchairs can do anything", thus, "We must scrupulously guard the civil rights and civil liberties of all citizens, whatever their background”. The history of FDR must enable the present and the future generations of Tanzania to understand the whole man and the events and experiences that help to shape the human personalities. The process of creating an inclusive society in Tanzania cannot be accomplished without a commitment to a permanent, meaningful portrayal and the practical-oriented involvement of people with disabilities and educate other people on how the process of adjusting to living along together with their fellows with disabilities.

Words as powerful tools

Wheel chair support

FDR used strong and powerful words which were practically implemented in actions. He frequently used aspiratory words to American people. Words like: “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself” and “I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a New Deal for the American people”.

He also promised to create happiness and fertile grounds under which every individual could commemorate prosperity as he said; “I tell the American people solemnly that the United States will never survive as a happy and fertile oasis of liberty surrounded by a cruel desert of dictatorship”.

Persistent

This is the state of action done vehemently. This in turn, tells the people with disabilities and other national and international activists that are found in Tanzania and around the global that, apart from forming several strategies to help and include people with disabilities, there should also be consistence in those plans and stated strategies. There should be the endless efforts until a man is liberated holistically. It is like the failure of today is the set bomb of tomorrow. This concept is well understood when FDR said: “We must remember that any oppression, any injustice, any hatred, is a wedge designed to attack our civilization’ and that…“the only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today”.

FDR in wheel chair support moments

Power of communication

A nation is a large group of people with strong bonds of identity. Its members share common interests that make them appear as single person. A nation, like a person, has a mind--a mind that must be kept informed and alert, that must know itself, that understands the hopes and needs of its neighbors--all the other nations that live within the narrowing circle of the world. In Tanzania, there should be the communication subject to facilitate the dissemination of different information to all people- the “Human Diversities”, specifically for visually impaired persons, Hearing impaired ones, deaf-blind and other communities inhabited by people with different disabilities.

Conclusion
To me and many of the followers of INCLUSIVE NATION regard FDR as the important figure in liberating people with disabilities and the marginalized ones. How many individuals of FDR type are killed, stigmatized, oppressed, left out of the system, seen unfit to the contemporary society, being ignored and many other evil deeds acted over them? By this concept then, our presidents, ministers, governors, members of parliaments and many important figures are being vanished through our own wicked hands. Let us stop from harming them so that they can serve and bring us the desired developments in our countries.

sokime2012@gmail.com

"THINK INCLUSIVELY~~~ ACT INCLUSIVELY ~~~ CREATE AN INCLUSIVE NATION"