Seventy-three years ago, “…December 7, 1941, a date which will live in infamy, the United States of America was suddenly and deliberately attacked by naval and air forces of the Empire of Japan.”
Eighty-one percent of American homes tuned in to the broadcast of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s speech the day after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, the largest audience in radio broadcast history.Thirty-three minutes after his seven-minute speech ended, Congress declared war on Japan. A single dissenter, a pacifist named Jeannette Rankin, the first woman in Congress, voted against the declaration of war. Though I think the declaration of war was unfortunately the right course to take, I admire Rankin’s fortitude in sticking to her pacifist beliefs.
Two thousand four hundred and three American military personnel and civilians died in the attack, which wounded one thousand one hundred seventy-eight others.
