February 1934 Atlantic: The Roosevelt Experiment

[babylonsister]

February 1934 Atlantic

"The Roosevelt experiment, in a word, is a systematic effort to put capitalism into leading strings of principle. It is to be the servant, and not the master, of the American people."

by Harold J. Laski
The Roosevelt Experiment



I.

Russia apart, no modern state has undertaken an experiment which even approaches in magnitude or significance the adventure upon which President Roosevelt has embarked. There have been attempts to regulate the hours and wages of particular persons in particular industries. There have been important schemes of social legislation, like the British system of unemployment insurance. War-time necessity has induced the limitation of profit for a special period, and certain vital industries have sometimes, either permanently or for a period, come under the direct ownership and control of a public authority. There has even, as in the Germany of the post-war epoch, been a partnership, though indirect, between industry and the state.

But President Roosevelt is the first statesman in a great capitalist society who has sought deliberately and systematically to use the power of the state to subordinate the primary assumptions of that society to certain vital social purposes. He is the first statesman deliberately to experiment on a wholesale scale with the limitation of the profit-making motive. He is the first statesman, again in a wholesale way, to attack not the secondary but the primary manifestations of the doctrine of laissez faire. He is the first statesman who, of his own volition, and without coercion, either direct or indirect, has placed in the hands of organized labor a weapon which, if it be used successfully, is bound to result in a vital readjustment of the relative bargaining power of Capital and Labor. He is also the first statesman who, the taxing power apart, has sought to use the political authority of the state to compel, over the whole area of economic effort, a significant readjustment of the national income.

No unbiased spectator of the adventure involved can withhold his admiration for the courage such an effort has implied. Success or failure, it bears upon its face the hallmarks of great leadership. Improvised in haste, devised under the grim pressure of crisis, imposed, as no doubt it has been imposed, in an atmosphere of panic and bewilderment, it stands out in remarkable, even significant, contrast to the economic policy of any other capitalist government in the world. Compared, for example, with the unimaginative activity of the British Government, -which rode to power on a wave of kindred enthusiasm,—it is an exhilarating spectacle. Great Britain has simply sought to lend the aid of government to the ancient technique of capitalist enterprise; it has had no sense that what is in question is the very foundations of that system. President Roosevelt has, in effect, challenged American capitalism to cooperate with him in transforming itself into a social experiment. And in doing so he has displayed, granted the conditions he confronts, a creative audacity, a sense of psychological essentials, an eye for the pivotal matters involved, which deserve well of the commonwealth he seeks to serve. Russia again apart, there has been no adventure of comparable range or intensity in modern times.

II.

But it is one thing to plan boldly; it is another, and a very different thing, to plan successfully. Before we can judge the effort upon which Mr. Roosevelt is engaged, it is necessary to know what the implications of his adventure actually are, and the relation of these to the total social situation in which he finds himself involved. For it is dangerous to experiment with the foundations of a society unless the experiment be built upon doctrinal assumptions the conclusions of which follow with irresistible logic from the premises it is legitimate to use.

Mr. Roosevelt is not, as it were, merely in the position of an engineer who is erecting bulwarks against a temporary and unexpected flood. His experiment, no doubt, happens to coincide with the onset of economic disaster; but he is driven, by its profundity, not only to dissipate its effects, but also to lay the foundations of a new social order from which, so far as human prescience can avail, such disasters have been banished. What, therefore, is important in the estimate of his effort is not merely the objectives he has set before himself, but the spirit and temper of the setting those objectives encounter. He is attempting a revolution by consent; and it is the latter term in his equation that is fundamental to the formation of a judgment.

more...

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/193402/roosevelt-experiment

[Liberal Jesus Freak]

1. What a great find.

I scanned the article rather quickly and then printed it out for later reading. Love the line "He is attempting a revolution by consent." It sounds so polite, and so similar to what Obama is doing, that I had to smile. Thanks for posting this!

[jkshaw]

2. Thank you for this Sister.

At the time, I was four years old. My father, a shipyard worker, was still waiting to be taken back on by the New York Shipyard for which he was a machine shop foreman. We lived in a house in Gloucester City that costs $7 a month rent, collected groceries at the Relief Store ten blocks away. Thinking back, it was a wonderful time for me because I had both my parents and I didn't know the difficulties of making a meal out of very little.

[Igel]

3. Interesting.

But, of course, you can no more put a leash on an -ism than you can declare war against it.

[Jackpine Radical]

4. What a lovely phrase--

"He is attempting a revolution by consent."

[BrklynLiberal]

5. Wow...just Wow....

[starroute]

6. I have grave objections to the general stance of the piece, though

I'm reminded of the Dylan lyric, "Something is happening here but you don't know what it is, do you, Mr. Jones."

The Atlantic knew something was happening, and even had a few hints as to its nature, but was fundamentally more clueless than not.

This sentence reads particularly oddly: "For it is dangerous to experiment with the foundations of a society unless the experiment be built upon doctrinal assumptions the conclusions of which follow with irresistible logic from the premises it is legitimate to use."

Even leaving aside the stuffiness and condescension of writing "be built" instead of "is built," that description sounds exactly like what was always the problem with communism -- not to mention what conservatives have been accusing liberals of for decades -- namely the impulse to "experiment with the foundations of a society" on the basis of "doctrinal assumptions" which grow out of "irresistible logic."

I've run into that phrase, "irresistible logic" in early 20th century writing before -- but usually it describes the mental processes of either robots or mad scientists who are so impressed by their own innate superiority that they are convinced it is their duty to wipe out humanity and take over the world.

The title of the article, "The Roosevelt Experiment" suggests that same cold-blooded willingness to carry out laboratory procedures on living victims just to see what happens.

And as for "doctrinal assumptions" -- no, the less said about that the better.

What Roosevelt was actually doing was none of that. Rather, he was improvising brilliantly. He would try one thing, and if that didn't work he would try something else. He was probably as non-doctrinaire and even non-logical a president as we have ever had -- and he was always primarily attuned to the human effects of what he did. And because he proceeded in just that manner, the work he did grew organically out of the nature of American society and has endured, as the far more cold-blooded "experiments" of both the Communists and the Nazis did not.

[ms liberty]

7. Great FDR articles on DU tonight...excellent ammo! Thanks, babylonsister ... KR&B, n/t

[Cato the Younger]

8. Can we worship FDR?

Seriously, can we? Can the Episcopalian church make him a saint? (Do they even make people saints?) Well, anyway they should canonize FDR. God, we need him now instead of all these damn centrist Democrats that seem to be everywhere.