| This thesis discusses how, since Franklin Roosevelt's presidency, progressive presidents' rhetoric has justified the expansion of the welfare state in a utopic effort to achieve "heaven on earth." Focusing on imagery of the family and the soldier, this thesis explores how Franklin Roosevelt, Lyndon Johnson, and Barack Obama attempted to create and concretize their policies as extensions of American identity. The three presidents that this thesis discusses are all progressive in that they believe in a continual evolution towards a perfection of American society, a perfection which the government is best equipped to facilitate. Overall, this thesis seeks to explain how Roosevelt, Johnson, and Obama all employ "religious" rhetoric because their policies proposed are dependent on the intervention of a benevolent power when government alone is inadequate to help American society realize perfection. |
