In 1943, Norman Rockwell painted Freedom of Speech, a visualization of the First Amendment and one of the most powerful images in the American collective memory and public consciousness.

Freedom of Speech was the first painting in the Four Freedoms series by Norman Rockwell. It was inspired by Franklin Delano Roosevelt's 1941 address to Congress which articulated the four basic freedoms that everyone in the world ought to enjoy. These ideas were issued into the Atlantic Charter by the United States and the United Kingdom as international ideals. In the midst of the Great Depression, these were the aspirational values of the U.S. government and FDR’s New Deal. Though the four freedoms were at the heart of FDR’s speech, it barely got any press coverage and the message was not connecting with the public. FDR, convinced that the U.S. needed to defend these values against Nazi Germany and the Japanese regime, intended for his speech to persuade Americans to join the war effort by producing arms for the Allies. This did not resonate with the public who still remembered the ravages of World War I, and the isolationist majority claimed he was promoting war. 

The speech was made just a year before the attack on Pearl Harbor and the U.S. entry into World War II, and after the attack, entering the war was inevitable. To create unity and spread the message of what the U.S. was fighting for to the American public, FDR instructed the Office on War Information to reach out to artists to convey his ideas in different mediums.

Rockwell, inspired by FDR’s words, wanted to create works that took those lofty ideals and bring them down into a personal experience. The idea came to Rockwell in a town meeting where a man stood up to voice an unpopular opinion. Freedom of Speech depicts that moment in Arlington, Vermont, through a working-class man addressing a crowd of finely dressed Americans.

Rockwell went on to pitch his ideas in Washington, but officials questioned the artistic value of his works, which were often equated to advertising illustrations. After he did not find success in Washington, Rockwell took his sketches to the Saturday Evening Post, where the editor, Ben Hibbs, immediately made arrangements for his works to be featured. The Post commissioned four writers to craft an essay to accompany each painting, representing America’s moral imperative. The essay that accompanied Freedom of Speech was written by Pulitzer Prize winner Booth Tarkington. In the essay, Tarkington imagines a scene between Adolf Hitler and Benito Mussolini in the Alps where they each describe their plans to secure a dictatorship and suppress the freedom of speech.

The paintings were an instant success, the Post receiving thousands of requests for reprints. In 1943, the Post and the U.S. Treasury began a joint campaign to sell war bonds and stamps and the Four Freedoms went on tour in an exhibition visited by over one million people and raised over $133 million.