I am certain that the people of this country understand and approve the broad purposes behind these new governmental policies relating to agriculture and industry and transportation.
FDR
The Public Record
Franklin Delano Roosevelt was the 32nd President of the United States, serving from March 4, 1933, until his death on April 12, 1945. A member of the Democratic Party, he was born in New York and is best known for his leadership during two of the most significant crises in American history: the Great Depression and World War II. Roosevelt implemented the New Deal, a series of programs and reforms aimed at economic recovery and social welfare, which fundamentally reshaped the role of the federal government in American life.
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All of this has been caused in large part by a complete lack of planning and a complete failure to understand the danger signals that have been flying ever since the close of the World War.
The people of this country have been erroneously encouraged to believe that they could keep on increasing the output of farm and factory indefinitely and that some magician would find ways and means for that increased output to be consumed…
Industry has picked up, railroads are carrying more freight, farm prices are better, but I am not going to indulge in issuing proclamations of overenthusiastic assurance.
I am going to be honest at all times with the people of the country.
I do not want the people of this country to take the foolish course of letting this improvement come back on another speculative wave.
I do not want the people to believe that because of unjustified optimism we can resume the ruinous practice of increasing our crop output and our factory output in the hope that a kind Providence will find buyers at high prices.
Such a course may bring us immediate and false prosperity but it will be the kind of prosperity that will lead us into another tailspin.
It is wholly wrong to call the measure that we have taken government control of farming, control of industry, and control of transportation.
It is rather a partnership between government and farming and industry and transportation, not partnership in profits, for the profits still go to the citizens, but rather a partnership in planning and partnership to see that the plans are…
It is probably true that ninety percent of the cotton manufacturers would agree to eliminate starvation wages, would agree to stop long hours of employment, would agree to stop child labor, would agree to prevent an overproduction that…
But, what good is such an agreement if the other ten percent of cotton manufacturers pay starvation wages, require long hours, employ children in their mills and turn out burdensome surpluses?
The unfair ten percent could produce goods so cheaply that the fair ninety percent would be compelled to meet the unfair conditions.
That purpose of the anti-trust laws must be continued, but these laws were never intended to encourage the kind of unfair competition that results in long hours, starvation wages and overproduction.
We are working toward a definite goal, which is to prevent the return of conditions which came very close to destroying what we call modern civilization.
What I seek is the highest possible batting average, not only for myself but for the team.
Let me make the facts very simple and my policy very clear.
Nevertheless, gold, and to a partial extent silver, are perfectly good bases for currency and that is why I decided not to let any of the gold now in the country go out of it.
It is not exaggerating the possibility to tell you that such an occurrence might well have taken from us the major part of our gold reserve and resulted in such a further weakening of our government and private credit as to bring on actual…
The administration has the definite objective of raising commodity prices to such an extent that those who have borrowed money will, on the average, be able to repay that money in the same kind of dollar which they borrowed.
In other words, we seek to correct a wrong and not to create another wrong in the opposite direction.
Hand in hand with the domestic situation which, of course, is our first concern, is the world situation, and I want to emphasize to you that the domestic situation is inevitably and deeply tied in with the conditions in all of the other…
In other words, we can get, in all probability, a fair measure of prosperity to return in the United States, but it will not be permanent unless we get a return to prosperity all over the world.
They have all reached the conclusion that each can best be helped by the common action of all.
The international conference that lies before us must succeed.
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