Leadership Quote by Franklin D. Roosevelt

It is a dare disguised as a modest request: don’t weigh me by my friends, weigh me by my fights. Roosevelt’s line turns political opposition into a résumé, reframing conflict as proof of purpose. Instead of pleading for approval, he invites voters to treat backlash as evidence that power has been aimed in the right direction - at entrenched interests with something to lose.

The intent is strategic. FDR governed during collapse and emergency, when normal rules felt both inadequate and fiercely defended. The New Deal didn’t just expand government; it reordered who got protection and who paid for it. Banks were regulated, monopolies scrutinized, labor empowered, the social contract rewritten. Those changes manufactured enemies: financiers, conservative industrialists, parts of the press, and a Republican establishment that saw him as a class traitor to his own upbringing. By asking to be judged by those enemies, Roosevelt flips their moral indictment into a badge.

The subtext is a lesson in coalition politics. Friends can be accidental - shared geography, party habit, social ties. Enemies are chosen. They reveal where the line is drawn. It’s also a subtle inoculation against smear campaigns: if the “wrong” people hate him, the listener is nudged to ask whether that hatred is actually a compliment.

Rhetorically, the sentence is clean and combative. “Judge me” sounds civic, almost humble; “by the enemies I have made” is pure muscle. It’s leadership as consequence: if you’re serious about changing anything, someone powerful will take it personally.