Roosevelt's Inaugural Address Rhetorical Analysis Essay

Franklin Delano Roosevelt gave his first inaugural address to the citizens of the United States. He gave this address during his first inauguration which took place during the Great Depression. Roosevelt used rhetorical devices to tell the United States about changes that were going to happen to end the Great Depression and ease the fears of people suffering because of the Great Depression. Roosevelt starts off by saying “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” The purpose of this is to declare that there is nothing to be fearful about. Roosevelt does this by repeating the word fear twice. This is effective because it shows that people's fear is not helping the situation. He is also emphasizing that without the fear citizens have the

Roosevelt does this by comparing the struggles ing the Great Depression to their forefathers causing people to see how they are lucky because they do not to put their life at risk like their forefathers. Furthermore, by comparing their struggles to the struggles of their forefathers he makes their problems seem minor compared to their forefathers who had to fight and risk their lives for their freedom. By mentioning their forefathers in such an honorable way he shows he loves the United States and wants to help the United States overcome this struggle. By mentioning their forefathers Roosevelt would most likely cause the American public to see that in comparison to their forefathers their problems and struggles during the Great Depression were insignificant. This would ease the fears of the citizens because they would most likely think how if those who had come before them with harder problems had endured the so could

Furthermore Roosevelt shows how citizens rely on each other so they can not be at odds if they want to succeed. By portraying his ideas with images of neighbors and an army he is able to more easily portray to the reader how unified they should be and how much they rely on each other. This would most likely cause the citizens to be more unified because everyone wants to advance themselves so they will be more likely to unite with others if it will improve their lives. Furthermore this would cause it to be easier for Roosevelt to get people to agree with his new policies because if people are unified it is easier to appease people because people would want the same thing instead of many contradicting