Eleanor Roosevelt
Anna Eleanor Roosevelt (October 11 1884 - November 7 1962) was a human rights activist, diplomat and as the wife of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, was First Lady of the United States. President Harry S Truman called her the First Lady of the World, in honor of her role in forming the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights and extensive foreign tavels in promoting human rights.
The was the eldest child of Elliot Roosevelt and Anna Hall Roosevelt and was a favorite niece of Theodore Roosevelt. On St. Patrick's Day, 1905, she married Franklin Delano Roosevelt, a fifth cousin.
In 1939, the singer Marian Anderson was refused permission to perform at Constitution Hall in Washington because of her skin color. Eleanor Roosevelt arranged for Anderson to perform from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, to a live audience of 70,000, and a nationwide radio audience.
Mrs. Roosevelt opposed her husband's decision to sign Executive Order 9066 which resulted in the internment in concentration camps of 110,000 Japanese nationals and American citizens of Japanese descent on the U.S. West Coast. In 1943 Mrs. Roosevelt with Wendell Willkie and other Americans concerned about the mounting threats to peace and democracy established Freedom House.
Eleanor Roosevelt and Mme Chiang Kai-shek, 1943
After World War II, she was instrumental along with John Peters Humphrey in formulating the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights On the night of December 10, 1948, Mrs. Roosevelt spoke on behalf of the Declaration calling it the "the international Magna Carta of all mankind," and the Declaration was unanimously adopted by the General Assembly later that night.
In 1954 Tammany Hall boss Carmine DeSapio campaigned against her son, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Jr., in the New York Attorney General election and successfully defeated him. Mrs. Roosevelt held DeSapio responsible for her son's defeat and grew increasingly disgusted with his political conduct through the rest of the 1950s. Eventually, she would join with her old friends Herbert Lehman and Thomas Finletter to form the New York Committee for Democratic Voters, a group dedicated to enhancing the democratic process by opposing DeSapio's reincarnated Tammany. Eventually their efforts were successful, and in 1961 DeSapio was removed from power.
Mrs. Roosevelt was a close friend of Adlai Stevenson and was a strong supporter of his candidacies in the 1952 and 1956 presidential elections. When President Truman backed New York GovernorW. Averell Harriman, who was a close associate of Carmine DeSapio, for the Democratic presidential nomination, Mrs. Roosevelt was disapointed but continued to support Stevesnon who ultimatley won the nomination. She backed Stevenson once again in 1960 but ultimately John F. Kennedy received the presidential nomination.
She was responsible for the establishment of the 2,800 acre Roosevelt Campobello International Park on Campobello Island, New Brunswick in 1964 following a gift of the Roosevelt summer estate to the Canadian and American governments.
After her death, her son Elliot Roosevelt wrote a series of best-selling fictional murder mysteries wherein she acted as a detective, helping the police solve the crime, while she was First Lady. They feature actual places and celebrities of the time.
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