Legal Research

Hey, hip kids!  Wanna discourse in real time with the President?  Well, now you can!   President Obama's first Online Town Hall meeting took place today.  Read the transcript of the trial run of Open For Questions and savor the historical nuances, baby,  'cause this is the 21st Century version of President Frankin D. Roosevelt's fireside chats.

History buffs -- or your grandparents -- can tell you that on Sunday, March 12, 1933 President Roosevelt used a technology known as 'radio' to kick off the first of his fireside chats series.  The topic?  The banking crisis.  And here I thought that the saying 'everything old is new again' only pertained to polyester and bell-bottoms.  I stand corrected.  Listen to the audio here; read the transcript here.

FDR's calm, smooth voice emanated over the airwaves for 13 minutes and 42 seconds during that first fateful broadcast.  He effectively reassured and persuaded a frightened public that the Great Depression would pass, that the collective confidence and courage of the American people would get the country through an unprecedented economic nightmare. 

From 1933 to 1944 FDR hosted a total of thirty fireside chats, each dedicated to a different topic pertinent to the rejuvenation of the United States.  All thirty transcripts are available c/o the Franklin D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and Museum.  The Museum of Broadcast Communications archives contains the entire series of audiorecordings.  Free registration is required but soooo worth it!

Plans for future Open For Questions sessions with President Obama are already underway.  In the meantime, everyone is encouraged to submit questions for review via the Open For Questions web site.  Registration is free but your input is priceless (with apologies to Mastercard). 

Whatever our individual differences -- be they political, social, economic, or religious -- I, for one, fervently hope that all of us will heed FDR's concluding statement of his initial chat: "It is your problem no less than it is mine.  Together we cannot fail."