The inauguration took place in the wake of Democrat Roosevelt's landslide victory over Republican incumbent Herbert Hoover in the 1932 presidential election.

Broadcast nationwide on several radio networks, the speech was heard by tens of millions of Americans, and set the stage for Roosevelt's urgent efforts to respond to the crisis.

Roosevelt wore a morning coat and striped trousers for the inauguration, and took the oath with his hand on his family Bible, open to I Corinthians 13.

In every dark hour of our national life, a leadership of frankness and of vigor has met with that understanding and support of the people themselves which is essential to victory.

[4] America, at the time that Roosevelt was inaugurated, was facing an unemployment rate of over twenty-five percent, which put more than twelve million Americans out of work.

Roosevelt stated, "The task can be helped by definite efforts to raise the values of agricultural products and with this the power to purchase the output of our cities.

He stated, "Finally, in our progress toward a resumption of work we require two safeguards against a return of the evils of the old order: there must be a strict supervision of all banking and credits and investments so that there will be an end to speculation with other people's money, and there must be provision for an adequate but sound currency".

Roosevelt stated, "It is to be hoped that the normal balance of executive and legislative authority may be wholly adequate to meet the unprecedented task before us.

[9] Addressing himself to the causes of the economic crisis and its moral dimensions, Roosevelt placed the blame squarely on the greed and shortsightedness of bankers and businessmen, as seen in the following excerpts: ...rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence, have admitted their failure, and have abdicated.

Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men.

Recognition of the falsity of material wealth as the standard of success goes hand in hand with the abandonment of the false belief that public office and high political position are to be valued only by the standards of pride of place and personal profit; and there must be an end to a conduct in banking and in business which too often has given to a sacred trust the likeness of callous and selfish wrongdoing.

More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great number toil with little return.

He said, "Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for their produce; the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone".

[7] Roosevelt hoped to use the idea of patriotism to convince the American people, that despite their distrust for sweeping government action, the steps he planned to take were necessary for America.

[11] Roosevelt's wife Eleanor wore a light blue dress designed by Sally Milgrim to the inaugural ball.