WW II Memorial Censors FDR

UPDATE II This I have posted So Help Us God explaining that an on the ball reader pointed this out that this story has been debunked by Snopes.com. Thanks FAIR!

Today's Washington Times' Inside the Beltway column contains a story about President Roosevelt's "Day of Infamy" speech, the WWII Memorial, and censorship.

According to Inside The Beltway, while visiting the memorial Bob McEwan encountered a group had gathered to read the determined words of President Franklin D. Roosevelt when he announced the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor:

"Yesterday, December 7, 1941 — a date which will live in infamy — the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked."

One woman, says Mr. McEwan, read the words aloud: "With confidence in our armed forces — with the unbounding determination of our people — we will gain the inevitable triumph."

Suddenly, the woman became visibly angry: "Wait a minute," she told her husband. "They left out the end of the quote. They left out the most important part. Roosevelt said — 'so help us God.'... I know I'm right. I remember the speech."

The couple shook their heads and walked away.

As Mr. McEwan puts it, "The people who edited out that part of the speech when they engraved it on the memorial could have fooled me. I was born after the war. But they couldn't fool the people who were there. Roosevelt's words are engraved on their hearts."

Those exact words were: "With confidence in our armed forces, with the unbounded determination of our people, we will gain the inevitable triumph — so help us God."

This story piqued my interest. I found an interesting history of the drafting of Roosevelt's "day of Infamy speech here. "So help us God" was indeed part of Roosevelt's speech. How could the designers of the memorial censor Roosevelt. Why would they even consider doing so?

UPDATE: An intrepid reader points out that I incorrectly credited the story to the Washington Post when it was actually the Washington Times. That error has been corrected. I sincerely thank FAIR for bringing the mistake to my attention.

Comments

[Cecilia]

Gary or Ivan...I don't know who wrote that great, true indictment of the liberal agenda, but thanks!!!

Everything that you wrote was spot-on! The liberals want to re-write history in order to push their immoral agenda on the rest of us. It doesn't matter that this country was founded by Christians, on Christian principles, with no "separation of church and state". In fact, the founding fathers believed that only a moral, righteous society could govern itself.

The liberals want to forget the principles this country was founded upon. And unfortunately, too many people are too busy worrying about their lattes and SUV's to realize this country is going down the tubes!!!!

For instance, the ACLU threatened to sue Los Angeles County unless they take the little cross off of the county seal. Gee, that cross represents the actual, real HISTORY of this area and the state of California. But we are supposed to re-write history and ignore that fact.

I'm surprised that the ACLU hasn't sued to change the name of the county and the city...after all, Los Angeles means "the angels"!!!!!!

(By the way, the County board of supervisors agreed to spend millions of dollars to change that seal!)

[Dave Muzyka]

I agree - it wasn't part of the original sentence, so why get your panties all bunched up over a slight that's non-existent??

That being said, I just returned from DC tonight and the memorial is absolutely stunning....well done. I wish my dad, a WWII vet, was here to see it. Lots of tourists, and tons of respect for "The Greatest Generation".

[Ivan Fail]

I have lost my patience with both the religious crackpot extremists AND the "Christian BASHERS".
Both extremist groups are indeed crackpots.

However most Christians are NOT crackpot extremists who insist on having it ALL THEIR WAY BUT THEY DO HAVE SOME HIGH STANDARDS FOR COMMON DECENCY AND MORALITY. And THAT is the character of the GREAT ONES who gave birth to this country and made it great in spite of the fact that there WERE some "bigots and charlatons" peppering their ranks.

BUT FROM WHAT I'VE SEEN OF THE "Christian BASHERS" THEY ARE IN A PERSISTENT "attack mode" against the very "CHRISTIAN principles and philosophy that gave birth to this country and made it GREAT. THEY want "free love" with anyone at any time, they either insist on and DEMAND or
"tolerate" gay marriage and a lot of other societal time bomb philosophies.

One would have to be "blind, deaf and retarded" to not notice the absolute viciousness, degeneracy, contempt for the rights of OTHERS and the "HURRAY FOR ME TO HELL WITH YOU --, AND YOUR VALUES" attitide which has come to characterize much of American society today. THAT is largely "thanks" to the "in your face ACLU and the lunatic fringe" who "know everything about EVERYTHING ---, IN SPITE of the fact that MOST of them have never worn the uniform of our country or heard a shot fired in anger --, except in their "drug wars".

So yes maybe they CAN make the omission of Roosevelt's "So Help Us God" statement on the WWII Memorial SOUND "letitimate and appropriate" BUT their TRACK RECORD of trampling EVERY REFERENCE TO GOD UNDER THEIR ARROGANT, HURRAY FOR ME, TO HELL WITH YOU --, AND YOUR BELIEFS GAY MARRIAGE AGENDA "SPEAKS FOR ITSELF". So I have little doubt that the omission was NOT an
"oversight" or an "innocent abbreviation" of President Roosevelt's speech. In my view it WAS another INTENTIONAL, "in your face" insult by the SAME crowd who "thumbed their noses" at all those who served our country in WWII by disassembling The Enola Gay and leaving it laying "out of sight and out of mind" in the Smithsonian for YEARS. And if THEY had THEIR way that is exactly where it would STILL be!

Just one look at the latch key kids, spiraling divorce rate, escalating depression and suicide in our teens, rampant drug abuse, alcoholism and their "revolving door" excursion through our prison system shouts loud and clear that "THE NEW DEAL" that the "Christian Bashers" have created --, AND ARE FEEDING IS A SOCIETAL MONSTER that threatens to literally destroy our counry.

For 29 years I had an "insiders ring side seat" to that scenario via my career with the U. S. Department Of Justice. In other words I have SEEN the causes AND the fall out, I didn't just "read" the ACLU's SELF SERVING AND BIASED "diagnosis" of the causes.

Ivan Fail, Former Marine
Marshfield, Missouri

[Gary Adams]

National World War II Memorial Inscriptions

The following inscriptions will be inscribed in the National World War II Memorial on the Mall in Washington, D.C. The inscriptions are presented by location.

Eastern Corners

PEARL HARBOR
DECEMBER 7, 1941, A DATE WHICH WILL LIVE IN INFAMY…NO MATTER HOW LONG IT MAY TAKE US TO OVERCOME THIS PREMEDITATED INVASION, THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, IN THEIR RIGHTEOUS MIGHT, WILL WIN THROUGH TO ABSOLUTE VICTORY.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt

THEY HAVE GIVEN THEIR SONS TO THE MILITARY SERVICES. THEY HAVE STOKED THE FURNACES AND HURRIED THE FACTORY WHEELS. THEY HAVE MADE THE PLANES AND WELDED THE TANKS, RIVETED THE SHIPS AND ROLLED THE SHELLS.

President Franklin D. Roosevelt

[Gary Adams]

Read it for yourself. It is free to be informed. Why can't you be informed? How dumb was your Mother to not teach you to think for yourself? Maybe you are a Catholic and were taught to never question the Pope and Priest so therefore you cannot question nor research the truth.

http://www.history.navy.mil/branches/teach/pearl/infamy/infamy6.htm

Thanks!
[email protected]

[Keenan Wilkie]

Looks like Dan has gotten the word that the story is bunk. I take back any bad things that I might have ignorantly said about him, if I said anything.

[Keenan Wilkie]

Actually, the monument quote is thus:

DECEMBER 7, 1941, A DATE WHICH WILL LIVE IN INFAMY . . . NO MATTER HOW LONG IT MAY TAKE US TO OVERCOME THE PREDETERMINED INVASION, THE AMERICAN PEOPLE, IN THEIR RIGHTEOUS MIGHT, WILL WIN THROUGH TO ABSOLUTE VICTORY

An attribution is also given to Franklin Delano Roosevelt.

The phrase "so help us God" does not appear on the memorial because the sentence in which that phrase occurs is not one of the two sentences quoted. There was no malicious editing of the quote as claimed by a number of liars, it was merely not a part of the quoted text.

[Acey]

It's absolutely amazing how people can be on the internet and still write so-called quotes that are so far off. Roosevelt did not say "little yellow dastards" what he did say was "unprovoked and dastardly attack by Japan". The sentence that is quoted on the memorial is "With confidence in our armed forces - with the unbounded determination of our people - we will gain the inevitable triumph - so help us God.". Do they figure that no one will check these things out or do there prejudices blind them to the truth?

[Keenan Wilkie]

No one is disputing the presence of "so help us God" in the speech. The problem is that the claim that anything was "edited" from FDR's speech on the WWII memorial is DEMONSTRATABLY FALSE. The memorial quotes a single sentence taken near the MIDDLE of the speech. It does NOT quote the sentence that ends in "so help us God", it quotes only a sentence that occurs earlier in the speech that does NOT contain the phrase "so help us God". Therefore the claim that anything was "edited out" for the purposes of political correctness is a falsehood, at worst a lie and at best evidence that the original author of the claim is a gullible fool who can't be bothered tor esearch a single claim.

To make a comparison, the claim that FDR's words were "edited" is just as valid as whining about the phrase "our Creator" being edited out of a quote of the opening sentence of the Declaration of Independence (the word "Creator" does not occur nutil the second sentence.)

Now that Dan has been informed of this (in addition to these comments, I sent him an email with a link to the site that exposed the error made in the original Washington Times article), he should either remove this entry or post a retraction on the blog. He has done neither, meaning that he is knowingly hosting false information on his blog without any sign of a retraction.

Why is it that people feel the need to use lies to support claims that there is an attitude of anti-religious sentiment in this country?

[Don]

Fair is wrong. I have a tape of the entire speech. FDR certainly did close with "....so help us God."

[FAIR]

Sorry folks, but this story is NOT true. The "so help us God" quote was from another section of Roosevelt's speech. Check out www.snopes.com for the full story.

Also, the link in the story is to the Washington Times, not the Post. Another inaccuracy.

[Tim]

Sorry ... link didn't post properly. Here it is:
http://www.usswestvirginia.org/fdr_pearl_speech.htm

[Tim]

You can read & listen to the entire speech at this link.

[Eric Blair]

They also left out the end of the beginning statement: "...suddenly and deliberately attacked--by the Empire of Japan."

Which should have been left as an object lesson.

[Alec Brockmeier]

All they needed was to add "..." if they wanted to be honest in leaving out the words. Political correctness is not honest...that's what makes it political correctness.

[lgude]

I believe FDR also referred to the Nips as 'little yellow dastards' in that speech or one around that time. Times have changed, but I have heard WW2 vets nearing death, who had fought thier way through the Pacific, say that they could never forgive or forget. I am relatively young..born 42...but I can muster little respect for politically correct monumnets. Maybe they outght to get sued for leaving God out. :-)

[Myria]

Well, in doing so they did save us from the inevitable ACLU threat of lawsuit and the inevitable caving by politicians and the inevitable removal of the offending words.

Pretty sad, but true.

Myria