Unseen passage for Class 9 - Passage 07

Unseen passage - Eleanor Roosevelt is remembered as the wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Known for her political activism, she was an outspoken first lady who made frequent public appearances. During World War II, Eleanor supported the rights of black Americans to serve in a visible way in the military, and she supported civil rights generally. When her husband died in the final months of World War II, she was appointed as his successor to be a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly. Eleanor helped draft the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which was adopted by the General Assembly on December 10, 1948, an act which she considered her greatest achievement.

What was behind her amazing successes? In Eleanor’s own words, it was fear, and her determination to overcome it: “Fear is the most devastating emotion on earth. I fought it and conquered it by helping people who were worse off than I was. I believe that anyone can conquer fear by doing the things he fears to do, provided he keeps doing them until he gets a record of successful experiences behind him.”

Eleanor grew up believing herself to be an “ugly duckling.” She was ashamed of her clothes, her shyness, and her looks. She began to come out of her shell in 1910 when Franklin was a member of the New York State Senate. As Eleanor describes it: “He and eighteen other Assemblymen were waging a war against Tammany Hall. These Assemblymen spent much of their time holding conferences in our home in Albany both day and night. So I visited the wives of these men. I was shocked to find that many of them were spending their days and nights in lonely hotel rooms. They knew no one in Albany except their husbands. I found that by trying to cheer them up and by trying to give them courage, I developed my own courage and self-confidence.”