LAD # 29 Truman Doctrine

President Harry Truman addresses a joint session of Congress on March 12, 1947. He wanted to express his concerns with the issues of Greece and Turkey. Greece was asking for financial assistance, Truman didn’t was America to turn a deaf ear on this situation. The president wanted to offer the means to make food, clothing, and all necessary tools for reconstruction to rebuild the shattered country. Greece was threatened by communism; we cannot let democratic Greece be taken over by communism. Every dollar given to Greece will help benefit democracy. Turkey also needs our help, they are experiencing many of the same issues that Greece is having. America is able to help and it is our job to aid when we can. We must provide financial aid to ensure that Turkey can live freely and to make sure that we follow our own principals and allow other countries the opportunity to follow our lead. If we fail to help out these countries, and they fall, it will spread and more and more countries will see the same fate. It is our job to do what we can. Truman wants financial aid given, troops stationed there, and supplies plentiful. If we falter in leadership we may endanger world peace, and that would surely endanger our own nation.

LAD #28 FDR First Inaugural

Franklin D. Roosevelt held his first inaugural address on Saturday, March 4, 1933. The newly elected president opened his speech with one of the most famous quotes of all time…”the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” He then acknowledged many things that the country has to work on, such as taxes, trade, ability to pay, and other things. He stated, referring to the current conditions of the country that only the fooling optimist can deny the dark reality of the current state. It is up to us to carry ourselves out of this and to start to creep out of depression. His primary task would be to put the people to work. Also he called for there to be supervision of banking credit and that there must be provisions for an adequate and sound currency. Also improvements in trade and in the general morale of the country need to be strengthened. Roosevelt strongly believed that the American people had the capability to accomplish what he was asking and that we would overcome all of these atrocities together.

LAD #27 Kellogg-Briand Peace Pact

The Kellogg-Briand Peace Pact was signed by 62 nations on August 27 1928. The countries signed included, but were not limited to, the United States of America, France, Australia, Belgium, Canada, Czechoslovakia, Germany, India, Italy, Japan, New Zealand, Poland, South Africa, and the United Kingdom. Originally it was designed to just be for the United States and France but it was opened up to many other countries. Its overall purpose was to keep the nations from going to war with each other, and also to create an alliance between the countries. It was signed in Paris and it eventually went into effect on April 24 of the next year. Frank B. Kellogg was the U.S Secretary of State he eventually agreed to the proposal by Aristide Briand, the French foreign minister.

LAD #26 Schenck v. United States

The case Schenck v. United States was set to determine whether Charles Schenck possessed a First Amendment freedom of speech against the draft during World War I. Schenck was a Socialist and he circulated an anti-draft flyer to recently drafted men. The flyer also discussed the morally wrong capitalist system. Schenck was charged with conspiracy to violate the Espionage Act of 1917 by attempting to cause insubordination in the military and to obstruct recruitment. The court, in a unanimous opinion written by held that Schenck's criminal conviction was constitutional. The First Amendment did not protect speech encouraging insubordination, since the circumstances of wartime permit greater restrictions on free speech than would be allowable during peacetime.