© Copyrighted Material © Copyrighted Material www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com www.ashgate.com Chapter 11 “The Country We Carry in Our Hearts is Waiting”: Bruce Springsteen, Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and the Search for Human Rights in America David Thurmaier In his 1941 State of the Union address, known as the “Four Freedoms” speech, President Franklin D. Roosevelt envisioned what kind of nation the United States would be as it watched world events unfolding in World War II. The irst two “essential human freedoms,” speech and religion, were drawn from the First Amendment to the Constitution, to which he added two additional freedoms to his list—freedom from want and from fear. Roosevelt ended his speech with a irm declaration about these freedoms: “Freedom means the supremacy of human rights everywhere … Our support goes to those who struggle to gain those rights or keep them” ([1941] 1968, p. 449). At the height of World War II on January 11, 1944, Roosevelt again presented his State of the Union address to Congress. This time, he spoke more pointedly and directly to citizens of his own country and elucidated some of the themes from his “Four Freedoms” speech in more detail. His message was serious and relective. He was not worried about whether the United States would win the war militarily, but rather his concern was to begin shaping the way Americans re-imagined the country in the coming peacetime. In order to accomplish a “new basis of security and prosperity [which] can be established for all, regardless of station, race or creed” ([1944] 1968, p. 484), Roosevelt presented his “Second Bill of Rights” that focused on economic fairness, equality, and opportunity. In 2004, 60 years after the “Second Bill of Rights,” Bruce Springsteen wrote an opinion piece for The New York Times endorsing John Kerry for president. This essay was notable because it marked the irst time Springsteen explicitly endorsed a candidate and addressed politics in print instead of music, and what he wrote serves as an encapsulation of his political and social beliefs forged over nearly 40 years of creative output. In the piece, he emphasizes themes that fans of his songs will recognize: American identity, racial conlict, war and peace, class