F. D. Roosevelt and the cooperative federalism

Political Philosophy

Viriato Soromenho-Marques

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Some bio data about FDR (1882-1945)

1918- Under Secretary of Navy in Wilson’s Cabinet. Voyage to Azores.

1921- Polio strike, followed by 3 terrible years of physical and moral pain.

1928- Elected Governor od the State of New York.

1932-Wins the elections for the USA Presidency.

1936, 1940, 1944: 3 more victories por the Presidency.

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USA Population 1920-1940

• The Fifteenth United States Census, conducted by the Census Bureau one month from April 1, 1930, determined the resident population of the United States to be 122,775,046, an increase of 13.7 percent over the 106,021,537 persons enumerated during the 1920 Census.

• 132,164,569 1940 United States Census. The Sixteenth United States Census, conducted by the Census Bureau, determined the resident population of the United States to be 132,164,569, an increase of 7.3 percent over the 1930 population of 123,202,624 people.

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Two periods

Progressive Era:

Theodore Roosevelt, Taft e Wilson,

Laissez-faire and Roaring Years

Harding, Coolidge e Hoover

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USA GDP

Year Nominal GDP (trillions) Real GDP (trillions) GDP Growth Rate Events Affecting GDP

1929 $0.105 $1.109 NA Depression began.

1930 $0.092 $1.015 -8.5% Smoot-Hawley.

1931 $0.077 $0.950 -6.4% Dust Bowl.

1932 $0.060 $0.828 -12.9% Hoover tax hikes.

1933 $0.057 $0.817 -1.2% New Deal.

1934 $0.067 $0.906 10.8% U.S. debt rose.

1935 $0.074 $0.986 8.9% Social Security.

1936 $0.085 $1.113 12.9% FDR tax hikes.

1937 $0.093 $1.170 5.1% Depression returned.

1938 $0.087 $1.132 -3.3% Depression ended.

1939 $0.093 $1.222 8.0% WWII. Dust Bowl ended.

1940 $0.103 $1.330 8.8% Defense increased.

1941 $0.129 $1.566 17.7% Pearl Harbor.

1942 $0.166 $1.862 18.9%

1943 $0.203 $2.178 17.0% Defense spending tripled.

1944 $0.224 $2.352 8.0% Bretton Woods.

1945 $0.228 $2.329 -1.0% WWII ended. Recession.

U.S. GDP by Year Since 1929 Compared to Major Events

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Unemployment 1930-1945

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FDR Candidate in 1932

It showed that our economic life was dominated by some six hundred odd corporations who controlled two-thirds of American industry. Ten million small business men divided the other third. More striking still, it appeared that if the process of concentration goes on at the same rate, at the end of another century we shall have all American industry controlled by a dozen corporations, and run by perhaps a hundred men. Put plainly, we are steering a steady course toward economic oligarchy, if we are not there already.

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An economic declaration of Rights

As I see it, the task of Government in its

relation to business is to assist the

development of an economic declaration

of rights, an economic constitutional

order. This is the common task of

statesman and business man. It is the

minimum requirement of a more

permanently safe order of things…

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The danger of financial capitalism

Just as in older times the central Government was first a haven of refuge, and then a threat, so now in a closer economic system the central and ambitious financial unit is no longer a servant of national desire, but a danger.

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FDR new federal agencies Initialism Year Agency

AAA 1933 Agricultural Adjustment Administration

CCC 1933 Civilian Conservation Corps

CWA 1933 Civil Works Administration

DRS 1935 Drought Relief Service

DSH 1933 Subsistence Homesteads Division

EBA 1933 Emergency Banking Act

FAA 1933 Federal Aviation Administration

FAP 1935 Federal Art Project

FCA 1933 Farm Credit Administration

FCC 1934 Federal Communications Commission

FDIC 1933 Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

FERA 1933 Federal Emergency Relief Administration

FHA 1934 Federal Housing Administration

FLSA 1938 Fair Labor Standards Act

FMP 1935 Federal Music Project (part of WPA)

FSA 1935 Farm Security Administration

FSRC 1933 Federal Surplus Relief Corporation

FTP 1935 Federal Theatre Project (part of WPA)

FWA 1939 Federal Works Agency

FWP 1935 Federal Writers' Project (part of WPA)

HOLC 1933 Home Owners' Loan Corporation

NIRA 1933 National Industrial Recovery Act

NLRA 1935 National Labor Relations Act

NLRB 1934 National Labor Relations Board/The Wagner

Act

NRA 1933 National Recovery Administration

NYA 1935 National Youth Administration

PRRA 1933 Puerto Rico Reconstruction Administration

PWA 1933 Public Works Administration

RA 1935 Resettlement Administration

REA 1935 Rural Electrification Administration (now

Rural Utilities Service)

SEC 1934 Securities and Exchange Commission

SSA 1935 Social Security Administration

SSB 1935 Social Security Board (now Social Security

Administration)

TVA 1933 Tennessee Valley Authority

USHA 1937 United States Housing Authority

USMC 1936 United States Maritime Commission

WPA 1935 Works Progress Administration

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American Isolationism 1934-36: Report by Senator Gerald P. Nye, a

Republican from North Dakota, fed this belief by claiming that American bankers and arms manufacturers had pushed for U.S. involvement for their own profit.

The 1934 publication of the book Merchants of Death by H.C. Engelbrecht and F. C. Hanighen.

The 1935 tract “War Is a Racket” by decorated Marine Corps General Smedley D. Butler.

1940: Charles Lindbergh, America First

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USA Big War Spikes

• There have been four major spikes in US defense spending since the 1790s.

• Viewed across the two centuries of US power, defense spending shows four spikes. It spiked at nearly 12 percent of GDP in the Civil War of the 1860s (not including spending by the rebels). It spiked at 22 percent in World War I. It spiked at 41 percent in World War. Source: https://www.usgovernmentspending.com/defense_spending

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4 Freedoms for global peace

• [82] In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.

• [83] The first is freedom of speech and expression–everywhere in the world.

• [84] The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way–everywhere in the world.

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State of the Union Address, 06 01 1941.

[85] The third is freedom from want–which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants-everywhere in the world.

[86] The fourth is freedom from fear–which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor–anywhere in the world.

Source: https://voicesofdemocracy.umd.edu/fdr-the-four-freedoms-speech-text/

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4th Inaugural Address, 20 01 1945

“And so today, in this year of war, 1945, we have learned lessons-- at a fearful cost--and we shall profit by them.

We have learned that we cannot live alone, at peace; that our own well-being is dependent on the well-being of other nations far away. We have learned that we must live as men, not as ostriches, nor as dogs in the manger.

We have learned to be citizens of the world, members of the human community.

We have learned the simple truth, as Emerson said, that "The only way to have a friend is to be one." We can gain no lasting peace if we approach it with suspicion and mistrust or with fear. Source: https://avalon.law.yale.edu/20th_century/froos4.asp

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Unity also in foreign policy

The foreign policy that we have been

following — the policy that guided us at

Moscow, Cairo, and Tehran — is based on

the common sense principle which was best

expressed by Benjamin Franklin on July 4,

1776: “We must all hang together, or

assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

FDR, SUA, 11 01 2019

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Soldiers right to vote, and cooperative federalism

“The Army and Navy have reported that it

will be impossible effectively to

administer forty-eight different soldier

voting laws. It is the duty of the Congress

to remove this unjustifiable discrimination

against the men and women in our armed

forces — and to do it as quickly as possible.”

FDR, SUA, 11 01 1944

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A second (economic) Bill of Rights

“We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not freemen.” People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made.

In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all — regardless of station, race, or creed.” FDR, SUA, 11 01 1944

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The risk of returning to laissez-faire capitalism

One of the great American industrialists of our day — a man who has rendered yeoman service to his country in this crisis — recently emphasized the grave dangers of “rightist reaction” in this Nation. All clear-thinking businessmen share his concern. Indeed, if such reaction should develop — if history were to repeat itself and we were to return to the so-called “normalcy” of the 1920s — then it is certain that even though we shall have conquered our enemies on the battlefields abroad, we shall have yielded to the spirit of Fascism here at home.

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The risk of repeating (2) mistakes

We are united in determination that this war shall not be followed by another interim which leads to new disaster — that we shall not repeat the tragic errors of ostrich isolationism — that we shall not repeat the excesses of the wild twenties when this Nation went for a joy ride on a roller coaster which ended in a tragic crash.

FDR, SUA, 11 01 1944

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