abstract:Forgotten man is a phrase with several meanings, some of which are polar opposites. It was first used by William Graham Sumner in his article The Forgotten Man to refer to the person compelled to pay for reformist programs; however, since Franklin Roosevelt appropriated the phrase in a 1932 speech, it has more often been used to refer to those at the bottom of the economic government whom the state (in Roosevelt's view and in the general social humanitarian approach) needed to help.