I follow the principle of first things first; and this war comes first.

Delays in the performance of our job at home mean prolonging the war.

I do not propose to answer in kind.

This election will not be decided on a basis of malignant murmurings—or shouts.

In winning this war there is just one sure way to guarantee the minimum of casualties—by seeing to it that, in every action, we have overwhelming material superiority.

The record that we have established in this war is one of which every American has a right to be proud—today and for all time.

Our success has been the result of planning and organization and building.

The women of America are also most profoundly concerned.

I suggest a nationwide reading of the Holy Scriptures during the period from Thanksgiving Day to Christmas

I call upon the people of the United States to observe it by bending every effort to hasten the day of final victory

we should lift up our hearts in thanksgiving

it is fitting that we give thanks with special fervor to our Heavenly Father for the mercies we have received individually and as a nation

I do hereby proclaim Thursday the twenty-third day of November 1944 a day of national thanksgiving

I hereby extend the provisions of Executive Order No. 9177 of May 30, 1942, to the United States Maritime Commission and the Administrator of the War Shipping Administration.

It doesn't amount to very much, this cost of planting trees, and yet the hillsides of West Virginia of our grandparents' day were much more wonderful than they are now.

This generation, and especially the previous generation, have been thinking of themselves and not of the future.

We have to think not just of an annual crop, not just something that we can eat the next year.

And just as an experiment, I started planting a few acres each year on run-down land.