Confirmed word for word in Roosevelt’s Address to the Governing Board of the Pan American Union, Washington, D.C., April 14, 1939, printed in The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt (1939 volume, War and Neutrality). He was talking about nations, not personal self-help: the Old World, he said, was not doomed to another war.
“Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds” Franklin D. Roosevelt, Address to the Governing Board of the Pan American Union, Washington, D.C., April 14, 1939
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Evoking the world of Franklin D. Roosevelt — 32nd President of the United States (1933–1945). Theme: "Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds". Atmospheric and restrained, cinematic directional light, a muted period-appropriate palette, fine grain and texture. Compose with generous empty space for the quote and a small credit line. No lettering in the image itself.
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Provenance
The source
Work
Address to the Governing Board of the Pan American Union
Delivered
Washington, D.C., April 14, 1939 (Pan American Day)
Printed in
The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1939 vol., War and Neutrality, pp. 195–199
Online text
The American Presidency Project (UC Santa Barbara)
I still have that confidence. There is no fatality which forces the Old World towards new catastrophe. Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds. They have within themselves the power to become free at any moment.
“That confidence” looks back to the lines Roosevelt had just quoted from his 1936 greeting to the Buenos Aires conference: “Can we, the Republics of the New World, help the Old World to avert the catastrophe which impends? Yes, I am confident that we can.” The next paragraph begins: “Only a few days ago the head of a great Nation referred to his country as a ‘prisoner’ in the Mediterranean.”
The American Presidency Project ↗ publishes the full address, dated April 14, 1939, with the exact sentence “Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.”
Wikiquote ↗ lists the line among Roosevelt’s sourced quotes, under “Address to the Governing Board of the Pan American Union (1939)”, dated 14 April 1939.
The line now circulates on its own as a motivational quote, for example as item 8 in the Christian Science Monitor’s 2012 list ↗ under the heading “Self-limitation,” with no source given.
✓Public domain
This is an official address by a sitting U.S. President, which makes it a work of the United States Government. 17 U.S.C. § 105 ↗ says copyright protection “is not available for any work of the United States Government,” so the speech text is public domain, even though it dates from 1939. Editorial matter added by later compilers is a separate question.
Rights status is our research, not legal advice — and copyright varies by country and edition. For commercial or published use, confirm with the rightsholder. See terms.
Context
What Roosevelt meant
Roosevelt spoke these words to the Governing Board of the Pan American Union on April 14, 1939, which he called “our Pan American forty-ninth birthday.” Europe was moving toward war. His argument was that the Americas had avoided the Old World’s wars by choice, through open conferences and agreements. Nothing forced Europe into a new catastrophe either. The “prisoners” were leaders and nations who believed they had no choice.
Right after the line, he answered the leaders of other countries without naming them. One “head of a great Nation” had called his country a “prisoner” in the Mediterranean, and another “chief of state” had called a neighbor’s defense agreement an “encirclement.” Roosevelt replied: “there is no such thing as encircling or threatening, or imprisoning any peaceful Nation by other peaceful nations.” The popular self-help reading keeps his words but drops that geopolitical point.
They have within themselves the power to become free at any moment.
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Filed under
More provenance-checked quotes on the same theme, each with its reuse status.
1882–1945 · 32nd President of the United States (1933–1945)
Franklin Delano Roosevelt (January 30, 1882 – April 12, 1945) was President of the United States from 1933 until his death in 1945, leading the country through the Great Depression and most of the Second World War. His speeches and press statements were collected in The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, which is where this line is preserved.
For writers & researchers
Cite this
Chicago
Roosevelt, Franklin D. “Address to the Governing Board of the Pan American Union,” Washington, D.C., April 14, 1939. In The Public Papers and Addresses of Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1939 vol., War and Neutrality, 195–199. Online by Gerhard Peters and John T. Woolley, The American Presidency Project, https://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/node/209509.
This verification page
Quotle.info. “Who really said ‘Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds’?” Last verified 2 Nov 2026. https://quotle.info/who-said/men-are-not-prisoners-of-fate-but-only-prisoners-of-their/