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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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dirty story. I rote in my book, which is true, that on the occasion when war broke out in early September of '39 and we were hastily summoned back from wherever we were, a Cabinet meeting was called almost as soon as we got to town. This was '39 and we had been in the Cabinet for six years. I had never heard profanity in that Cabinet until that day. I heard vulgar language and had heard “God damn it'” I don't mean to say I hadn't heard that, someone saying, “That was the Goddamndest story!” I heard people say that, but not too much. They were not profane or obscene men.

But on this occasion, when their emotions were all so deeply stirred by the breaking out of the war - every-one was upset with the invasion of Poland, the terrible was happening, the broken words and treaties - there was terrific profanity. They all broke into profanity. Hardly a person could express himself except in profane language and great variations of it. They were mad. They were stirred emotionally. When stirred emotionally men break into profanity. I just deduced that. I'd known I realized that I hadn't heard any such comments before.





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