| 1.
MESSAGE TO CONGRESS REVIEWING THE BROAD OBJECTIVES AND
ACCOMPLISHMENTS OF THE ADMINISTRATION. JUNE 8, 1934.
You are completing a work begun in March
1933, which will be regarded for a long time as a splendid
justification of the vitality of representative government.
I greet you and express once more my appreciation of the
cooperation which has proved so effective. Only a small
number of the items of our program remain to be enacted
and I am confident that you will pass on them before adjournment.
Many other pending measures are sound in conception, but
must, for lack of time or of adequate information, be
deferred to the session of the next Congress. In the meantime,
we can well seek to adjust many of these measures into
certain larger plans of governmental policy for the future
of the Nation.
You and I, as the responsible directors
of these policies and actions, may, with good reason,
look to the future with confidence, just as we may look
to the past fifteen months with reasonable satisfaction.
On the side of relief we have extended material
aid to millions of our fellow citizens.
On the side of recovery we have helped to
lift agriculture and industry from a condition of utter
Prostration.
But, in addition to these immediate tasks
of relief and of recovery we have properly, necessarily
and with overwhelming approval determined to safeguard
these tasks by rebuilding many of the structures of our
economic life and reorganizing it in order to prevent
a recurrence of collapse.
It is childish to speak of recovery first
and reconstruction afterward. In the very nature of the
processes of recovery we must avoid the destructive influences
of the past. We have shown the world that democracy has
within it the elements necessary to its own salvation.
Less hopeful countries where the ways of
democracy are very new may revert to the autocracy of
yesterday. The American people can be trusted to decide
wisely upon the measures taken by the Government to eliminate
the abuses of the past and to proceed in the direction
of the greater good for the greater number.
Our task of reconstruction does not require
the creation of new and strange values. It is rather the
finding of the way once more to known, but to some degree
forgotten, ideals and values. If the means and details
are in some instances new, the objectives are as permanent
as human nature.
Among our objectives I place the security
of the men, women and children of the Nation first.
This security for the individual and for
the family concerns itself primarily with three factors.
People want decent homes to live in; they want to locate
them where they can engage in productive work; and they
want some safeguard against misfortunes which cannot be
wholly eliminated in this man-made world of ours.
In a simple and primitive civilization homes
were to be had for the building. The bounties of nature
in a new land provided crude but adequate food and shelter.
When land failed, our ancestors moved on to better land.
It was always possible to push back the frontier, but
the frontier has now disappeared. Our task involves the
making of a better living out of the lands that we have.
So, also, security was attained in the earlier
days through the interdependence of members of families
upon each other and of the families within a small community
upon each other. The complexities of great communities
and of organized industry make less real these simple
means of security. Therefore, we are compelled to employ
the active interest of the Nation as a whole through government
in order to encourage a greater security for each individual
who composes it.
With the full cooperation of the Congress
we have already made a serious attack upon the problem
of housing in our great cities. Millions of dollars have
been appropriated for housing projects by Federal and
local authorities, often with the generous assistance
of private owners. The task thus begun must be pursued
for many years to come. There is ample private money for
sound housing projects; and the Congress, in a measure
now before you, can stimulate the lending of money for
the modernization of existing homes and the building of
new homes. In pursuing this policy we are working toward
the ultimate objective of making it possible for American
families to live as Americans should.
In regard to the second factor, economic
circumstances and the forces of nature themselves dictate
the need of constant thought as the means by which a wise
Government may help the necessary readjustment of the
population. We cannot fail to act when hundreds of thousands
of families live where there is no reasonable prospect
of a living in the years to come. This is especially a
national problem. Unlike most of the leading Nations of
the world, we have so far failed to create a national
policy for the development of our land and water resources
and for their better use by those people who cannot make
a living in their present positions. Only thus can we
permanently eliminate many millions of people from the
relief rolls on which their names are now found.
The extent of the usefulness of our great
natural inheritance of land and water depends on our mastery
of it. We are now so organized that science and invention
have given us the means of more extensive and effective
attacks upon the problems of nature than ever before.
We have learned to utilize water power, to reclaim deserts,
to recreate forests and to redirect the flow of population.
Until recently we have proceeded almost it random, making
mistakes.
These are many illustrations of the necessity
for such planning. Some sections of the Northwest and
Southwest which formerly existed as grazing land, were
spread over with a fair crop of grass. On this land the
water table lay a dozen or twenty feet below the surface,
and newly arrived settlers put this land under the plow.
Wheat was grown by dry farming methods. But in many of
these places today the water table under the land has
dropped to fifty or sixty feet below the surface and the
top soil in dry seasons is blown away like driven snow.
Falling rain, in the absence of grass roots, filters through
the soil, runs off the surface, or is quickly reabsorbed
into the atmosphere. Many million acres of such land must
be restored to grass or trees if we are to prevent a new
and man-made Sahara.
At the other extreme, there are regions
originally arid, which have been generously irrigated
by human engineering. But in some of these places the
hungry soil has not only absorbed the water necessary
to produce magnificent crops, but so much more water that
the water table has now risen to the point of saturation,
thereby threatening the future crops upon which many families
depend.
Human knowledge is great enough today to
give us assurance of success in carrying through the abandonment
of many millions of acres for agricultural use and the
replacing of these acres with others on which at least
a living can be earned.
The rate of speed that we can usefully employ
in this attack on impossible social and economic conditions
must be determined by business-like procedure. It would
be absurd to undertake too many projects at once or to
do a patch of work here and another there without finishing
the whole of an individual project. Obviously, the Government
cannot undertake national projects in every one of the
435 Congressional districts, or even in every one of the
48 States. The magnificent conception of national realism
and national needs that this Congress has built up has
not only set an example of large vision for all time,
but has almost consigned to oblivion our ancient habit
of pork-barrel legislation; to that we cannot and must
not revert. When the next Congress convenes I hope to
be able to present to it a carefully considered national
plan, covering the development and the human use of our
natural resources of land and water over a long period
of years.
In considering the cost of such a program
it must be clear to all of us that for many years to come
we shall be engaged in the task of rehabilitating many
hundreds of thousands of our American families. In so
doing we shall be decreasing future costs for the direct
relief of destitution. I hope that it will be possible
for the Government to adopt as a clear policy to be carried
out over a long period, the appropriation of a large,
definite, annual sum so that work may proceed year after
year not under the urge of temporary expediency, but in
pursuance of the well-considered rounded objective.
The third factor relates to security against
the hazards and vicissitudes of life. Fear and worry based
on unknown danger contribute to social unrest and economic
demoralization. If, as our Constitution tells us, our
Federal Government was established among other things,
"to promote the general welfare," it is our
plain duty to provide for that security upon which welfare
depends.
Next winter we may well undertake the great
task of furthering the security of the citizen and his
family through social insurance.
This is not an untried experiment. Lessons
of experience are available from States, from industries
and from many Nations of the civilized world. The various
types of social insurance are interrelated; and I think
it is difficult to attempt to solve them piecemeal. Hence,
I am looking for a sound means which I can recommend to
provide at once security against several of the great
disturbing factors in life--especially those which relate
to unemployment and old age. I believe there should be
a maximum of cooperation between States and the Federal
Government. I believe that the funds necessary to provide
this insurance should be raised by contribution rather
than by an increase in general taxation. Above all, I
am convinced that social insurance should be national
in scope, although the several States should meet at least
a large portion of the cost of management, leaving to
the Federal Government the responsibility of investing,
maintaining and safeguarding the funds constituting the
necessary insurance reserves. I have commenced to make,
with the greatest of care, the necessary actuarial and
other studies for the formulation of plans for the consideration
of the 74th Congress.
These three great objectives the security
of the home, the security of livelihood, and the security
of social insurance--are, it seems to me, a minimum of
the promise that we can offer to the American people.
They constitute a right which belongs to every individual
and every family willing to work. They are the essential
fulfillment of measures already taken toward relief, recovery
and reconstruction.
This seeking for a greater measure of welfare
and happiness does not indicate a change in values. It
is rather a return to values lost in the course of our
economic development and expansion.
Ample scope is left for the exercise of
private initiative. In fact, in the process of recovery,
I am greatly hoping that repeated promises of private
investment and private initiative to relieve the Government
in the immediate future of much of the burden it has assumed,
will be fulfilled. We have not imposed undue restrictions
upon business. We have not opposed the incentive of reasonable
and legitimate private profit. We have sought rather to
enable certain aspects of business to regain the confidence
of the public. We have sought to put forward the rule
of fair play in finance and industry.
It is true that there are a few among us
who would still go back. These few offer no substitute
for the gains already made, nor any hope for making future
gains for human happiness. They loudly assert that individual
liberty is being restricted by Government, but when they
are asked what individual liberties they have lost, they
are put to it to answer.
We must dedicate ourselves anew to a recovery
of the old and sacred possessive rights for which mankind
has constantly struggled homes, livelihood, and individual
security. The road to these values is the way of progress.
Neither you nor I will rest content until we have done
our utmost to move further on that road.
2. FIRESIDE CHAT -- June
28, 1934
It has been several months since I have
talked with you concerning the problems of government.
Since January, those of us in whom you have vested responsibility
have been engaged in the fulfillment of plans and policies
which had been widely discussed in previous months. It
seemed to us our duty not only to make the right path
clear but also to tread that path.
As we review the achievements of this session
of the Seventy-third Congress, it is made increasingly
clear that its task was essentially that of completing
and fortifying the work it had begun in March, l933. That
was no easy task, but the Congress was equal to it. It
has been well said that while there were a few exceptions,
this Congress displayed a greater freedom from mere partisanship
than any other peace-time Congress since the Administration
of President Washington himself. The session was distinguished
by the extent and variety of legislation enacted and by
the intelligence and good will of debate upon these measures.
I mention only a few of the major enactments.
It provided for the readjustment of the debt burden through
the corporate and municipal bankruptcy acts and the farm
relief act. It lent a hand to industry by encouraging
loans to solvent industries unable to secure adequate
help from banking institutions. It strengthened the integrity
of finance through the regulation of securities exchanges.
It provided a rational method of increasing our volume
of foreign trade through reciprocal trading agreements.
It strengthened our naval forces to conform with the intentions
and permission of existing treaty rights. It made further
advances towards peace in industry through the labor adjustment
act. It supplemented our agricultural policy through measures
widely demanded by farmers themselves and intended to
avert price destroying surpluses. It strengthened the
hand of the Federal Government in its attempts to suppress
gangster crime. It took definite steps towards a national
housing program through an act which I signed today designed
to encourage private capital in the rebuilding of the
homes of the Nation. It created a permanent Federal body
for the just regulation of all forms of communication,
including the telephone, the telegraph and the radio.
Finally, and I believe most important, it reorganized,
simplified and made more fair and just our monetary system,
setting up standards and policies adequate to meet the
necessities of modern economic life, doing justice to
both gold and silver as the metal bases behind the currency
of the United States. In the consistent development of
our previous efforts toward the saving and safeguarding
of our national life, I have continued to recognize three
related steps. The first was relief, because the primary
concern of any Government dominated by the humane ideals
of democracy is the simple principle that in a land of
vast resources no one should be permitted to starve. Relief
was and continues to be our first consideration. It calls
for large expenditures and will continue in modified form
to do so for a long time to come. We may as well recognize
that fact. It comes from the paralysis that arose as the
after-effect of that unfortunate decade characterized
by a mad chase for unearned riches and an unwillingness
of leaders in almost every walk of life to look beyond
their own schemes and speculations. In our administration
of relief we follow two principles: First, that direct
giving shall, wherever possible, be supplemented by provision
for useful and remunerative work and, second, that where
families in their existing surroundings will in all human
probability never find an opportunity for full self-maintenance,
happiness and enjoyment, we will try to give them a new
chance in new surroundings.
The second step was recovery, and it is
sufficient for me to ask each and every one of you to
compare the situation in agriculture and in industry today
with what it was fifteen months ago.
At the same time we have recognized the
necessity of reform and reconstruction --reform because
much of our trouble today and in the past few years has
been due to a lack of understanding of the elementary
principles of justice and fairness by those in whom leadership
in business and finance was placed -- reconstruction because
new conditions in our economic life as well as old but
neglected conditions had to be corrected. Substantial
gains well known to all of you have justified our course.
I could cite statistics to you as unanswerable measures
of our national progress -- statistics to show the gain
in the average weekly pay envelope of workers in the great
majority of industries --statistics to show hundreds of
thousands reemployed in private industries and other hundreds
of thousands given new employment through the expansion
of direct and indirect government assistance of many kinds,
although, of course, there are those exceptions in professional
pursuits whose economic improvement, of necessity, will
be delayed. I also could cite statistics to show the great
rise in the value of farm products -- statistics to prove
the demand for consumers' goods, ranging all the way from
food and clothing to automobiles and of late to prove
the rise in the demand for durable goods -- statistics
to cover the great increase in bank deposits and to show
the scores of thousands of homes and of farms which have
been saved from foreclosure.
But the simplest way for each of you to
judge recovery lies in the plain facts of your own individual
situation. Are you better off than you were last year?
Are your debts less burdensome? Is your bank account more
secure? Are your working conditions better? Is your faith
in your own individual future more firmly grounded?
Also, let me put to you another simple question:
Have you as an individual paid too high a price for these
gains? Plausible self-seekers and theoretical die-hards
will tell you of the loss of individual liberty. Answer
this question also out of the facts of your own life.
Have you lost any of your rights or liberty or constitutional
freedom of action and choice? Turn to the Bill of Rights
of the Constitution, which I have solemnly sworn to maintain
and under which your freedom rests secure. Read each provision
of that Bill of Rights and ask yourself whether you personally
have suffered the impairment of a single jot of these
great assurances. I have no question in my mind as to
what your answer will be. The record is written in the
experiences of your own personal lives.
In other words, it is not the overwhelming
majority of the farmers or manufacturers or workers who
deny the substantial gains of the past year. The most
vociferous of the doubting Thomases may be divided roughly
into two groups: First, those who seek special political
privilege and, second, those who seek special financial
privilege. About a year ago I used as an illustration
the 90% of the cotton manufacturers of the United States
who wanted to do the right thing by their employees and
by the public but were prevented from doing so by the
10% who undercut them by unfair practices and un-American
standards. It is well for us to remember that humanity
is a long way from being perfect and that a selfish minority
in every walk of life -- farming, business, finance and
even Government service itself -- will always continue
to think of themselves first and their fellow-being second.
In the working out of a great national program
which seeks the primary good of the greater number, it
is true that the toes of some people are being stepped
on and are going to be stepped on. But these toes belong
to the comparative few who seek to retain or to gain position
or riches or both by some short cut which is harmful to
the greater good. In the execution of the powers conferred
on it by Congress, the Administration needs and will tirelessly
seek the best ability that the country affords. Public
service offers better rewards in the opportunity for service
than ever before in our history -- not great salaries,
but enough to live on. In the building of this service
there are coming to us men and women with ability and
courage from every part of the Union.The days of the
seeking of mere party advantage through the misuse of
public power are drawing to a close. We are increasingly
demanding and getting devotion to the public service on
the part of every member of the Administration, high and
low.
The program of the past year is definitely
in operation and that operation month by month is being
made to fit into the web of old and new conditions. This
process of evolution is well illustrated by the constant
changes in detailed organization and method going on in
the National Recovery Administration. With every passing
month we are making strides in the orderly handling of
the relationship between employees and employers. Conditions
differ, of course, in almost every part of the country
and in almost every industry. Temporary methods of adjustment
are being replaced by more permanent machinery and, I
am glad to say, by a growing recognition on the part of
employers and employees of the desirability of maintaining
fair relationships all around.
So also, while almost everybody has recognized
the tremendous strides in the elimination of child labor,
in the payment of not less than fair minimum wages and
in the shortening of hours, we are still feeling our way
in solving problems which relate to self-government in
industry, especially where such self-government tends
to eliminate the fair operation of competition.
In this same process of evolution we are
keeping before us the objectives of protecting on the
one hand industry against chiselers within its own ranks,
and on the other hand the consumer through the maintenance
of reasonable competition for the prevention of the unfair
sky-rocketing of retail prices.
But, in addition to this our immediate task,
we must still look to the larger future. I have pointed
out to the Congress that we are seeking to find the way
once more to well-known, long-established but to some
degree forgotten ideals and values. We seek the security
of the men, women and children of the Nation.
That security involves added means of providing
better homes for the people of the Nation. That is the
first principle of our future program.
The second is to plan the use of land and
water resources of this country to the end that the means
of livelihood of our citizens may be more adequate to
meet their daily needs. And, finally, the third principle
is to use the agencies of government to assist in the
establishment of means to provide sound and adequate protection
against the vicissitudes of modern life -- in other words,
social insurance.
Later in the year I hope to talk with you
more fully about these plans. A few timid people, who
fear progress, will try to give you new and strange names
for what we are doing. Sometimes they will call it "Fascism",
sometimes "Communism", sometimes "Regimentation",
sometimes "Socialism". But, in so doing, they
are trying to make very complex and theoretical something
that is really very simple and very practical.
I believe in practical explanations and
in practical policies. I believe that what we are doing
today is a necessary fulfillment of what Americans have
always been doing -- a fulfillment of old and tested American
ideals.
Let me give you a simple illustration:
While I am away from Washington this summer,
a long needed renovation of and addition to our White
House office building is to be started. The architects
have planned a few new rooms built into the present all
too small one-story structure. We are going to include
in this addition and in this renovation modern electric
wiring and modern plumbing and modern means of keeping
the offices cool in the hot Washington summers. But the
structural lines of the old Executive Office Building
will remain. The artistic lines of the White House buildings
were the creation of master builders when our Republic
was young. The simplicity and the strength of the structure
remain in the face of every modern test. But within this
magnificent pattern, the necessities of modern government
business require constant reorganization and rebuilding.
If I were to listen to the arguments of
some prophets of calamity who are talking these days,
I should hesitate to make these alterations. I should
fear that while I am away for a few weeks the architects
might build some strange new Gothic tower or a factory
building or perhaps a replica of the Kremlin or of the
Potsdam Palace. But I have no such fears. The architects
and builders are men of common sense and of artistic American
tastes. They know that the principles of harmony and of
necessity itself require that the building of the new
structure shall blend with the essential lines of the
old. It is this combination of the old and the new that
marks orderly peaceful progress -- not only in building
buildings but in building government itself.
Our new structure is a part of and a fulfillment
of the old.
All that we do seeks to fulfill the historic
traditions of the American people. Other nations may sacrifice
democracy for the transitory stimulation of old and discredited
autocracies. We are restoring confidence and well-being
under the rule of the people themselves. We remain, as
John Marshall said a century ago, "emphatically and
truly, a government of the people." Our government
"in form and in substance ... emanates from them.
Its powers are granted by them, and are to be exercised
directly on them, and for their benefits."
Before I close, I want to tell you of the
interest and pleasure with which I look forward to the
trip on which I hope to start in a few days. It is a good
thing for everyone who can possibly do so to get away
at least once a year for a change of scene. I do not want
to get into the position of not being able to see the
forest because of the thickness of the trees.
I hope to visit our fellow Americans in
Puerto Rico, in the Virgin Islands, in the Canal Zone
and in Hawaii. And, incidentally, it will give me an opportunity
to exchange a friendly word of greeting to the Presidents
of our sister Republics: Haiti, Colombia and Panama.
After four weeks on board ship, I plan to
land at a port in our Pacific northwest, and then will
come the best part of the whole trip, for I am hoping
to inspect a number of our new great national projects
on the Columbia, Missouri and Mississippi Rivers, to see
some of our national parks and, incidentally, to learn
much of actual conditions during the trip across the continent
back to Washington.
While I was in France during the War our
boys used to call the United States "God's country".
Let us make it and keep it "God's country".
3.
THE INITIATION OF STUDIES TO ACHIEVE A PROGRAM OF NATIONAL
SOCIAL AND ECONOMIC SECURITY. EXECUTIVE ORDER NO. 6757.
JUNE 29, 1934
By virtue of and pursuant to the authority
vested in me by the National Industrial Recovery Act (ch.
90, 48 Stat. 195), I hereby establish (1) the Committee
on Economic Security (hereinafter referred to as the Committee)
consisting of the Secretary of Labor, Chairman, the Secretary
of the Treasury, the Attorney General, the Secretary of
Agriculture, mid the Federal Emergency Relief Administrator,
and (2) the Advisory Council on Economic Security (hereinafter
referred to as the Advisory Council), the original members
of which shall be appointed by the President and additional
members of which may be appointed from time to time by
the Committee.
The Committee shall study problems relating
to the economic security of individuals and shall report
to the President not later than December 1, 1934, its
recommendations concerning proposals which in its judgment
will promote greater economic security.
The Advisory Council shall assist the Committee
in the consideration of all matters coming within the
scope of its investigations.
The Committee shall appoint (1) a Technical
Board on Economic Security consisting of qualified representatives
selected from various departments and agencies of the
Federal Government, and (2) an executive director who
shall have immediate charge of studies and investigations
to be carried out under the general direction of the Technical
Board, and who shall, with the approval of the Technical
Board, appoint such additional staff as may be necessity
to carry out the provisions of this order.
4. FIRESIDE CHAT-- SUNDAY,
SEPTEMBER 30, 1934
Three months have passed since I talked
with you shortly after the adjournment of the Congress.
Tonight I continue that report, though, because of the
shortness of time, I must defer a number of subjects to
a later date.
Recently the most notable public questions
that have concerned us all have had to do with industry
and labor and with respect to these, certain developments
have taken place which I consider of importance. I am
happy to report that after years of uncertainty, culminating
in the collapse of the spring of 1933, we are bringing
order out of the old chaos with a greater certainty of
the employment of labor at a reasonable wage and of more
business at a fair profit. These governmental and industrial
developments hold promise of new achievements for the
nation.
Men may differ as to the particular form
of governmental activity with respect to industry and
business, but nearly all are agreed that private enterprise
in times such as these cannot be left without assistance
and without reasonable safeguards lest it destroy not
only itself but also our processes of civilization. The
underlying necessity for such activity is indeed as strong
now as it was years ago when Elihu Root said the following
very significant words:
"Instead of the give and take of free
individual contract, the tremendous power of organization
has combined great aggregations of capital in enormous
industrial establishments working through vast agencies
of commerce and employing great masses of men in movements
of production and transportation and trade, so great in
the mass that each individual concerned in them is quite
helpless by himself. The relations between the employer
and the employed, between the owners of aggregated capital
and the units of organized labor, between the small producer,
the small trader, the consumer, and the great transporting
and manufacturing and distributing agencies, all present
new questions for the solution of which the old reliance
upon the free action of individual wills appear quite
inadequate. And in many directions, the intervention of
that organized control which we call government seems
necessary to produce the same result of justice and right
conduct which obtained through the attrition of individuals
before the new conditions arose."
It was in this spirit thus described by
Secretary Root that we approached our task of reviving
private enterprise in March, 1933. Our first problem was,
of course, the banking situation because, as you know,
the banks had collapsed. Some banks could not be saved
but the great majority of them, either through their own
resources or with government aid, have been restored to
complete public confidence. This has given safety to millions
of depositors in these banks. Closely following this great
constructive effort we have, through various Federal agencies,
saved debtors and creditors alike in many other fields
of enterprise, such as loans on farm mortgages and home
mortgages; loans to the railroads and insurance companies
and, finally, help for home owners and industry itself.
In all of these efforts the government has come to the
assistance of business and with the full expectation that
the money used to assist these enterprises will eventually
be repaid. I believe it will be.
The second step we have taken in the restoration
of normal business enterprise has been to clean up thoroughly
unwholesome conditions in the field of investment. In
this we have had assistance from many bankers and businessmen,
most of whom recognize the past evils in the banking system,
in the sale of securities, in the deliberate encouragement
of stock gambling, in the sale of unsound mortgages and
in many other ways in which the public lost billions of
dollars. They saw that without changes in the policies
and methods of investment there could be no recovery of
public confidence in the security of savings.The country
now enjoys the safety of bank savings under the new banking
laws, the careful checking of new securities under the
Securities Act and the curtailment of rank stock speculation
through the Securities Exchange Act. I sincerely hope
that as a result people will be discouraged in unhappy
efforts to get rich quick by speculating in securities.
The average person almost always loses. Only a very small
minority of the people of this country believe in gambling
as a substitute for the old philosophy of Benjamin Franklin
that the way to wealth is through work.
In meeting the problems of industrial recovery
the chief agency of the government has been the National
Recovery Administration. Under its guidance, trades and
industries covering over ninety percent of all industrial
employees have adopted codes of fair competition, which
have been approved by the President. Under these codes,
in the industries covered, child labor has been eliminated.
The work day and the work week have been shortened. Minimum
wages have been established and other wages adjusted toward
a rising standard of living. The emergency purpose of
the N. R. A. was to put men to work and since its creation
more than four million persons have been re-employed,
in great part through the cooperation of American business
brought about under the codes.
Benefits of the Industrial Recovery Program
have come, not only to labor in the form of new jobs,
in relief from over-work and in relief from under-pay,
but also to the owners and managers of industry because,
together with a great increase in the payrolls, there
has come a substantial rise in the total of industrial
profits - a rise from a deficit figure in the first quarter
of 1933 to a level of sustained profits within one year
from the inauguration of N. R. A.
Now it should not be expected that even
employed labor and capital would be completely satisfied
with present conditions. Employed workers have not by
any means all enjoyed a return to the earnings of prosperous
times; although millions of hitherto under- privileged
workers are today far better paid than ever before. Also,
billions of dollars of invested capital have today a greater
security of present and future earning power than before.
This is because of the establishment of fair, competitive
standards and because of relief from unfair competition
in wage cutting which depresses markets and destroys purchasing
power. But it is an undeniable fact that the restoration
of other billions of sound investments to a reasonable
earning power could not be brought about in one year.
There is no magic formula, no economic panacea, which
could simply revive over-night the heavy industries and
the trades dependent upon them.
Nevertheless the gains of trade and industry,
as a whole, have been substantial. In these gains and
in the policies of the Administration there are assurances
that hearten all forward-looking men and women with the
confidence that we are definitely rebuilding our political
and economic system on the lines laid down by the New
Deal - lines which as I have so often made clear, are
in complete accord with the underlying principles of orderly
popular government which Americans have demanded since
the white man first came to these shores. We count, in
the future as in the past, on the driving power of individual
initiative and the incentive of fair private profit, strengthened
with the acceptance of those obligations to the public
interest which rest upon us all. We have the right to
expect that this driving power will be given patriotically
and whole-heartedly to our nation.
We have passed through the formative period
of code making in the National Recovery Administration
and have effected a reorganization of the N. R. A. suited
to the needs of the next phase, which is, in turn, a period
of preparation for legislation which will determine its
permanent form.
In this recent reorganization we have recognized
three distinct functions. First, the legislative or policy
making function. Second, the administrative function of
code making and revision and, third, the judicial function,
which includes enforcement, consumer complaints and the
settlement of disputes between employers and employees
and between one employer and another.
We are now prepared to move into this second
phase, on the basis of our experience in the first phase
under the able and energetic leadership of General Johnson.
We shall watch carefully the working of
this new machinery for the second phase of N. R. A., modifying
it where it needs modification and finally making recommendations
to the Congress, in order that the functions of N. R.
A. which have proved their worth may be made a part of
the permanent machinery of government.
Let me call your attention to the fact that
the National Industrial Recovery Act gave businessmen
the opportunity they had sought for years to improve business
conditions through what has been called self-government
in industry. If the codes which have been written have
been too complicated, if they have gone too far in such
matters as price fixing and limitation of production,
let it be remembered that so far as possible, consistent
with the immediate public interest of this past year and
the vital necessity of improving labor conditions, the
representatives of trade and industry were permitted to
write their ideas into the codes. It is now time to review
these actions as a whole to determine through deliberative
means in the light of experience, from the standpoint
of the good of the industries themselves, as well as the
general public interest, whether the methods and policies
adopted in the emergency have been best calculated to
promote industrial recovery and a permanent improvement
of business and labor conditions. There may be a serious
question as to the wisdom of many of those devices to
control production, or to prevent destructive price cutting
which many business organizations have insisted were necessary,
or whether their effect may have been to prevent that
volume of production which would make possible lower prices
and increased employment. Another question arises as to
whether in fixing minimum wages on the basis of an hourly
or weekly wage we have reached into the heart of the problem
which is to provide such annual earnings for the lowest
paid worker as will meet his minimum needs. We also question
the wisdom of extending code requirements suited to the
great industrial centers and to large employers, to the
great number of small employers in the smaller communities.
During the last twelve months our industrial
recovery has been to some extent retarded by strikes,
including a few of major importance. I would not minimize
the inevitable losses to employers and employees and to
the general public through such conflicts. But I would
point out that the extent and severity of labor disputes
during this period has been far less than in any previous,
comparable period.
When the businessmen of the country were
demanding the right to organize themselves adequately
to promote their legitimate interests; when the farmers
were demanding legislation which would give them opportunities
and incentives to organize themselves for a common advance,
it was natural that the workers should seek and obtain
a statutory declaration of their constitutional right
to organize themselves for collective bargaining as embodied
in Section 7 (a) of the National Industrial Recovery Act.
Machinery set up by the Federal government has provided
some new methods of adjustment. Both employers and employees
mast share the blame of not using them as fully as they
should. The employer who turns away from impartial agencies
of peace, who denies freedom of organization to his employees,
or fails to make every reasonable effort at a peaceful
solution of their differences, is not fully supporting
the recovery effort of his government. The workers who
turn away from these same impartial agencies and decline
to use their good offices to gain their ends are likewise
not fully cooperating with their government.
It is time that we made a clean-cut effort
to bring about that united action of management and labor,
which is one of the high purposes of the Recovery Act.
We have passed through more than a year of education.
Step by step we have created all the government agencies
necessary to insure, as a general rule, industrial peace,
with justice for all those willing to use these agencies
whenever their voluntary bargaining fails to produce a
necessary agreement.
There should be at least a full and fair
trial given to these means of ending industrial warfare;
and in such an effort we should be able to secure for
employers and employees and consumers the benefits that
all derive from the continuous, peaceful operation of
our essential enterprises.
Accordingly, I propose to confer within
the coming month with small groups of those truly representative
of large employers of labor and of large groups of organized
labor, in order to seek their cooperation in establishing
what I may describe as a specific trial period of industrial
peace.
From those willing to join in establishing
this hoped-for period of peace, I shall seek assurances
of the making and maintenance of agreements, which can
be mutually relied upon, under which wages, hours and
working conditions may be determined and any later adjustments
shall be made either by agreement or, in case of disagreement,
through the mediation or arbitration of state or federal
agencies. I shall not ask either employers or employees
permanently to lay aside the weapons common to industrial
war. But I shall ask both groups to give a fair trial
to peaceful methods of adjusting their conflicts of opinion
and interest, and to experiment for a reasonable time
with measures suitable to civilize our industrial civilization.
Closely allied to the N. R. A. is the program
of Public Works provided for in the same Act and designed
to put more men back to work, both directly on the public
works themselves, and indirectly in the industries supplying
the materials for these public works.To those who say
that our expenditures for Public Works and other means
for recovery are a waste that we cannot afford, I answer
that no country, however rich, can afford the waste of
its human resources. Demoralization caused by vast unemployment
is our greatest extravagance. Morally, it is the greatest
menace to our social order. Some people try to tell me
that we must make up our minds that for the future we
shall permanently have millions of unemployed just as
other countries have had them for over a decade. What
may be necessary for those countries is not my responsibility
to determine. But as for this country, I stand or fall
by my refusal to accept as a necessary condition of our
future a permanent army of unemployed. On the contrary,
we must make it a national principle that we will not
tolerate a large army of unemployed and that we will arrange
our national economy to end our present unemployment as
soon as we can and then to take wise measures against
its return. I do not want to think that it is the destiny
of any American to remain permanently on relief rolls.
Those, fortunately few in number, who are
frightened by boldness and cowed by the necessity for
making decisions, complain that all we have done is unnecessary
and subject to great risks. Now that these people are
coming out of their storm cellars, they forget that there
ever was a storm. They point to England. They would have
you believe that England has made progress out of her
depression by a do-nothing policy, by letting nature take
her course. England has her pecularities and we have ours
but I do not believe any intelligent observer can accuse
England of undue orthodoxy in the present emergency.
Did England let nature take her course?
No. Did England hold to the gold standard when her reserves
were threatened? No. Has England gone back to the gold
standard today? No. Did England hesitate to call in ten
billion dollars of her war bonds bearing 5% interest,
to issue new bonds therefore bearing only 3 1/2% interest,
thereby saving the British Treasury one hundred and fifty
million dollars a year in interest alone? No. And let
it be recorded that the British bankers helped. Is it
not a fact that ever since the year 1909, Great Britain
in many ways has advanced further along lines of social
security than the United States? Is it not a fact that
relations between capital and labor on the basis of collective
bargaining are much further advanced in Great Britain
than in the United States? It is perhaps not strange that
the conservative British press has told us with pardonable
irony that much of our New Deal program is only an attempt
to catch up with English reforms that go back ten years
or more.
Nearly all Americans are sensible and calm
people. We do not get greatly excited nor is our peace
of mind disturbed, whether we be businessmen or workers
or farmers, by awesome pronouncements concerning the unconstitutionality
of some of our measures of recovery and relief and reform.
We are not frightened by reactionary lawyers or political
editors. All of these cries have been heard before. More
than twenty years ago, when Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow
Wilson were attempting to correct abuses in our national
life, the great Chief Justice White said:
"There is great danger it seems to
me to arise from the constant habit which prevails where
anything is opposed or objected to, of referring without
rhyme or reason to the Constitution as a means of preventing
its accomplishment, thus creating the general impression
that the Constitution is but a barrier to progress instead
of being the broad highway through which alone true progress
may be enjoyed."
In our efforts for recovery we have avoided
on the one hand the theory that business should and must
be taken over into an all-embracing Government. We have
avoided on the other hand the equally untenable theory
that it is an interference with liberty to offer reasonable
help when private enterprise is in need of help. The course
we have followed fits the American practice of Government
- a practice of taking action step by step, of regulating
only to meet concrete needs - a practice of courageous
recognition of change. I believe with Abraham Lincoln,
that "The legitimate object of Government is to do
for a community of people whatever they need to have done
but cannot do at all or cannot do so well for themselves
in their separate and individual capacities."
I still believe in ideals. I am not for
a return to that definition of Liberty under which for
many years a free people were being gradually regimented
into the service of the privileged few. I prefer and I
am sure you prefer that broader definition of Liberty
under which we are moving forward to greater freedom,
to greater security for the average man than he has ever
known before in the history of America.
5.
ADDRESS TO ADVISORY COUNCIL OF THE COMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC
SECURITY ON THE PROBLEMS OF ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL SECURITY.
NOVEMBER 14, 1934.
I am glad to welcome you to the White House
and tell you that I am happy that there is so much interest
in the problem of economic security. Last June I said
that this winter we might well make a beginning in the
great task of providing social insurance for the citizen
and his family. I have not changed my opinion. I shall
have recommendations on this subject to present to the
incoming Congress.
Many details are still to be settled. The
Committee on Economic Security was created to advise me
on this matter. It will bring to me, not any preconceived
views, but a mature judgment after careful study of the
problem and after consultation with the Advisory Conference
and the cooperating committees.
On some points it is possible to be definite.
Unemployment insurance will be in the program. I am still
of the opinion expressed in my message of June eighth
that this part of social insurance should be a cooperative
Federal-State undertaking. It is important that the Federal
Government encourage States which are ready to take this
progressive step. It is no less important that all unemployment
insurance reserve funds be held and invested by the Federal
Government, so that the use of these funds as a means
of stabilization may be maintained in central management
and employed on a national basis. Unemployment insurance
must be set up with the purpose of decreasing rather than
increasing unemployment. It is, of course, clear that
because of their magnitude the investment and liquidation
of reserve funds must be within control of the Government
itself.
For the administration of insurance benefits,
the States are the most logical units. At this stage,
while unemployment insurance is still untried in this
country and there is such a great diversity of opinion
on many details, there is room for some degree of difference
in methods, though not in principles. That would be impossible
under an exclusively national system. And so I can say
to you who have come from all parts of the country that
not only will there have to be a Federal law on unemployment
insurance, but State laws will also be needed. In January
the great majority of the State Legislatures will convene,
as well as Congress. You who are interested in seeing
that unemployment insurance is established on a nationwide
basis should make your plans accordingly.
We must not allow this type of insurance
to become a dole through the mingling of insurance and
relief. It is not charity. It must be financed by contributions,
not taxes.
What I have said must not be understood
as implying that we should do nothing further for the
people now on relief. On the contrary, they must be our
first concern. We must get them back into productive employment
and as we do so we can bring them under the protection
of the insurance system. Let us profit by the mistakes
of foreign countries and keep out of unemployment insurance
every element which is actuarially unsound.
There are other matters with which we must
deal before we shall give adequate protection to the individual
against the many economic hazards. Old age is at once
the most certain, and for many people the most tragic
of all hazards.There is no tragedy in growing old, but
there is tragedy in growing old without means of support.
As Governor of New York, it was my pleasure
to recommend passage of the Old-Age Pension Act which,
I am told, is still generally regarded as the most liberal
in the country. In approving the bill, I expressed my
opinion that full solution of this problem is possible
only on insurance principles. It takes so very much money
to provide even a moderate pension for everybody, that
when the funds are raised from taxation only a "means
test" must necessarily be made a condition of the
grant of pensions.
I do not know whether this is the time for
any Federal legislation on old-age security. Organizations
promoting fantastic schemes have aroused hopes which cannot
possibly be fulfilled. Through their activities they have
increased the difficulties of getting sound legislation;
but I hope that in time we may be able to provide security
for the aged--a sound and a uniform system which will
provide true security.
There is also the problem of economic loss
due to sickness--a very serious matter for many families
with and without incomes, and therefore, an unfair burden
upon the medical profession. Whether we come to this form
of insurance soon or later on, I am confident that we
can devise a system which will enhance and not hinder
the remarkable progress which has been made and is being
made in the practice of the professions of medicine and
surgery in the United States.
In developing each component part of the
broad program for economic security, we must not lose
sight of the fact that there can be no security for the
individual in the midst of general insecurity. Our first
task is to get the economic system to function so that
there will be a greater general security. Everything that
we do with intent to increase the security of the individual
will, I am confident, be a stimulus to recovery.
At this time, we are deciding on long-time
objectives. We are developing a plan of administration
into which can be fitted the various parts of the security
program when it is timely to do so. We cannot work miracles
or solve all our problems at once. What we can do is to
lay a sound foundation on which we can build a structure
to give a greater measure of safety and happiness to the
individual than any we have ever known. In this task,
you can greatly help.
6.
MESSAGE TO CONGRESS ON SOCIAL SECURITY. JANUARY
17,1935
In addressing you on June eighth, 1934, I summarized the main objectives of our American program. Among these was, and is, the security of the men, women, and children of the Nation against certain hazards and vicissitudes of life. This purpose is an essential part of our task. In my annual message to you I promised to submit a definite program of action. This I do in the form of a report to me by a Committee on Economic Security, appointed by me for the purpose of surveying the field and of recommending the basis of legislation.
I am gratified with the work of this Committee and of those who have helped it: The Technical Board on Economic Security drawn from various departments of the Government, the Advisory Council on Economic Security, consisting of informed and public spirited private citizens and a number of other advisory groups, including a committee on actuarial consultants, a medical advisory board, a dental advisory committee, a hospital advisory committee, a public health advisory committee, a child welfare committee and an advisory committee on employment relief. All of those who participated in this notable task of planning this major legislative proposal are ready and willing, at any time, to consult with and assist in any way the appropriate Congressional committees and members, with respect to detailed aspects.
It is my best judgment that this legislation should be brought forward with a minimum of delay. Federal action is necessary to, and conditioned upon, the action of States. Forty-four legislatures are meeting or will meet soon. In order that the necessary State action may be taken promptly it is important that the Federal Government proceed speedily.
The detailed report of the Committee sets forth a series of proposals that will appeal to the sound sense of the American people. It has not attempted the impossible, nor has it failed to exercise sound caution and consideration of all of the factors concerned: the national credit, the rights and responsibilities of States, the capacity of industry to assume financial responsibilities and the fundamental necessity of proceeding in a manner that will merit the enthusiastic support of citizens of all sorts.
It is overwhelmingly important to avoid any danger of permanently discrediting the sound and necessary policy of Federal legislation for economic security by attempting to apply it on too ambitious a scale before actual experience has provided guidance for the permanently safe direction of such efforts. The place of such a fundamental in our future civilization is too precious to be jeopardized now by extravagant action. It is a sound idea--a sound ideal. Most of the other advanced countries of the world have already adopted it and their experience affords the knowledge that social insurance can be made a sound and workable project.
Three principles should be observed in legislation on this subject. First, the system adopted, except for the money necessary to initiate it, should be self-sustaining in the sense that funds for the payment of insurance benefits should not come from the proceeds of general taxation. Second, excepting in old-age insurance, actual management should be left to the States subject to standards established by the Federal Government. Third, sound financial management of the funds and the reserves, and protection of the credit structure of the Nation should be assured by retaining Federal control over all funds through trustees in the Treasury of the United States.
At this time, I recommend the following types of legislation looking to economic security:
1. Unemployment compensation.
2. Old-age benefits, including compulsory and voluntary annuities.
3. Federal aid to dependent children through grants to States for the support of existing mothers' pension systems and for services for the protection and care of homeless, neglected, dependent, and crippled children.
4. Additional Federal aid to State and local public health agencies and the strengthening of the Federal Public Health Service. I am not at this time recommending the adoption of so called “health insurance,” although groups representing the medical profession are cooperating with the Federal Government in the further study of the subject and definite progress is being made.
With respect to unemployment compensation, I have concluded that the most practical proposal is the levy of a uniform Federal payroll tax, ninety per cent of which should be allowed as an offset to employers contributing under a compulsory State unemployment compensation act. The purpose of this is to afford a requirement of a reasonably uniform character for all States cooperating with the Federal Government and to promote and encourage the passage of unemployment compensation laws in the States. The ten per cent not thus offset should be used to cover the costs of Federal and State administration of this broad system. Thus, States will largely administer unemployment compensation, assisted and guided by the Federal Government. An unemployment compensation system should be constructed in such a way as to afford every practicable aid and incentive toward the larger purpose of employment stabilization. This can be helped by the intelligent planning of both public and private employment. It also can be helped by correlating the system with public employment so that a person who has exhausted his benefits may be eligible for some form of public work as is recommended in this report. Moreover, in order to encourage the stabilization of private employment, Federal legislation should not foreclose the States from establishing means for inducing industries to afford an even greater stabilization of employment.
In the important field of security for our old people, it seems necessary to adopt three principles: First, non-contributory old-age pensions for those who are now too old to build up their own insurance. It is, of course, clear that for perhaps thirty years to come funds will have to be provided by the States and the Federal Government to meet these pensions. Second, compulsory contributory annuities which in time will establish a self-supporting system for those now young and for future generations. Third, voluntary contributory annuities by which individual initiative can increase the annual amounts received in old age. It is proposed that the Federal Government assume one-half of the cost of the old-age pension plan, which ought ultimately to be supplanted by self-supporting annuity plans.
The amount necessary at this time for the initiation of unemployment compensation, old-age security, children's aid, and the promotion of public health, as outlined in the report of the Committee on Economic Security, is approximately one hundred million dollars.
The establishment of sound means toward a greater future economic security of the American people is dictated by a prudent consideration of the hazards involved in our national life. No one can guarantee this country against the dangers of future depressions but we can reduce these dangers. We can eliminate many of the factors that cause economic depressions, and we can provide the means of mitigating their results. This plan for economic security is at once a measure of prevention and a method of alleviation.
We pay now for the dreadful consequence of economic insecurity—and dearly. This plan presents a more equitable and infinitely less expensive means of meeting these costs. We cannot afford to neglect the plain duty before us. I strongly recommend action to attain the objectives sought in this report.
7.
PRESIDENTIAL STATEMENT SIGNING THE SOCIAL SECURITY ACT.
AUGUST 14,1935
Today a hope of many years' standing is
in large part fulfilled. The civilization of the past
hundred years, with its startling industrial changes,
has tended more and more to make life insecure. Young
people have come to wonder what would be their lot when
they came to old age. The man with a job has wondered
how long the job would last.
This social security measure gives at least
some protection to thirty millions of our citizens who
will reap direct benefits through unemployment compensation,
through old-age pensions and through increased services
for the protection of children and the prevention of ill
health.
We can never insure one hundred percent
of the population against one hundred percent of the hazards
and vicissitudes of life, but we have tried to frame a
law which will give some measure of protection to the
average citizen and to his family against the loss of
a job and against poverty-ridden old age.
This law, too, represents a cornerstone
in a structure which is being built but is by no means
complete. It is a structure intended to lessen the force
of possible future depressions. It will act as a protection
to future Administrations against the necessity of going
deeply into debt to furnish relief to the needy. The law
will flatten out the peaks and valleys of deflation and
of inflation. It is, in short, a law that will take care
of human needs and at the same time provide the United
States an economic structure of vastly greater soundness.
I congratulate all of you ladies and gentlemen,
all of you in the Congress, in the executive departments
and all of you who come from private life, and I thank
you for your splendid efforts in behalf of this sound,
needed and patriotic legislation.
If the Senate and the House of Representatives
in this long and arduous session had done nothing more
than pass this Bill, the session would be regarded as
historic for all time.
8.
A RECOMMENDATION FOR LEGISLATION AMENDING THE SOCIAL SECURITY
ACT- DECEMBER 14, 1937.
My Dear Senator:
Mr. Altmeyer, Chairman of the Social Security
Board, has submitted to me some non-controversial amendments
to the Social Security Act. In brief, they cover the points
listed in the attached memorandum. I feel they are of
sufficient importance to warrant their passage at the
earliest possible date.
As these amendments will considerably improve
the effectiveness of this important Act, I have asked
Chairman Altmeyer to discuss this matter with you personally.
Best wishes to you.
Very Sincerely yours,
Honorable Pat Harrison,
United States Senate,
Washington, D.C.
(A similar letter was sent to Congressman Robert L. Doughton.)
Summary of Amendments to the Social Security
Act, forwarded with the foregoing letter.
1. To pay death claims direct to the wife
or dependent children and save expense of probating estates--as
in veterans' laws. This would save real money to the widow
and to the Board.
2. To change "wages payable" in
unemployment compensation to "wages paid" as
in old-age insurance and permit a duplicate list of wage
payments and so complete our efforts greatly to simplify
employers' wage reports.
3. To enable "merit rating" to
work by making technical changes. It becomes effective
in Wisconsin, January 1, 1938.
4. To permit earlier payment of unemployment
compensation in states that passed their laws late. For
two years funds have been built up in these states. With
increasing unemployment this will get money earlier to
those laid off.
5. To permit persons now 60 and over to
continue working through 1941 to qualify upon retirement
for monthly old-age annuities instead of receiving small
lump sum payments. A great gain all around.
6. To increase coverage.
a. To seamen on American vessels. Approved by Maritime
Commission and the International Seamen's Union and the
National Maritime Union.
b. To employees of national banks, state banks that are
members of the Federal Reserve System, institutions that
are members of the Home Loan Bank system, and the like.
The American Bankers Association approves.
NOTE: In signing the Social Security Act on August
14, 1935, I stated that it "represents a cornerstone
in a structure which is being built but is by no means
complete" (see Item 107, 1935 volume). The Act constituted
a pioneer effort on the part of the Federal Government,
but although it was comprehensive in scope we recognized
that it would have to be developed with experience.
After over two years of operation of
the Social Security Act, we concluded that it should be
expanded in certain directions. Accordingly, I urged Senator
Harrison, the Chairman of the Finance Committee of the
Senate, and Representative Doughton, the Chairman of the
Ways and Means Committee of the House of Representatives,
to consider the changes in the Act outlined by Chairman
Altmeyer of the Social Security Board in the foregoing
summary.
During 1938, Senator Harrison and Representative
Doughton held frequent conferences with Chairman Altmeyer.
Meanwhile, several new amendments to the Act seemed advisable
and on April 28, 1938, I wrote to Chairman Altmeyer advocating
that the old-age insurance system be revised and extended
to provide for earlier payments. I also recommended that
further liberalizing changes be made in the old-age insurance
provisions of the Act (see Item 56, 1938 volume).
Inasmuch as several additional substantive
amendments were being developed by the Social Security
Board, it was decided to postpone congressional hearings
upon all amendments until the final report of the Board
was submitted. By the close of 1938, this report had been
completed, and I transmitted it to the Congress on January
16, 1939 (see Item 11, 1939 volume).
After the report was submitted, hearings
were held upon the amendments outlined in the foregoing
letter and also upon the later suggestions of the Social
Security Board. Many of these recommendations were enacted
and approved by me on August 10, 1939 (Public No. 379,
76th Congress; 53 Stat. 1360).
(For a discussion of the nature of these
amendments, see Item 109 and note, 1939 volume.)
9.
A RECOMMENDATION FOR LIBERALIZING THE OLD-AGE INSURANCE
SYSTEM -- APRIL 28, 1938.
My Dear Mr. Chairman:
I am very anxious that in the press of administrative
duties the Social Security Board will not lose sight of
the necessity of studying ways and means of improving
and extending the provisions of the Social Security Act.
The enactment of the Social Security Act
marked a great advance in affording more equitable and
effective protection to the people of this country against
widespread and growing economic hazards. The successful
operation of the Act is the best proof that it was soundly
conceived. However, it would be unfortunate if we assumed
that it was complete and final. Rather, we should be constantly
seeking to perfect and strengthen it in the light of our
accumulating experience and growing appreciation of social
needs.
I am particularly anxious that the Board
give attention to the development of a sound plan for
liberalizing the old-age insurance system. In the development
of such a plan I should like to have the Board give consideration
to the feasibility of extending its coverage, commencing
the payment of old-age insurance annuities at an earlier
date than January 1, 1942, paying larger benefits than
now provided in the Act for those retiring during the
earlier years of the system, providing benefits for aged
wives and widows, and providing benefits for young children
of insured persons dying before reaching retirement age.
It is my hope that the Board will be prepared to submit
its recommendations before Congress reconvenes in January.
Very truly yours,
(The President)
Mr. Arthur J. Altmeyer,
Chairman,
Social Security Board,
Washington, D.C.
NOTE: The Social Security Act (Public
No. 271, 74th Congress; 49 Stat. 620) expressly provides
that the Social Security Board shall conduct studies and
make recommendations related to the most effective methods
of providing economic security through social insurance.
Pursuant to the foregoing request, the
Board made a thorough survey of those proposals which
I suggested in my letter to Chairman Altmeyer, along with
various other changes which it appeared advisable to make.
The Board submitted its report and recommendations; and
I transmitted it to the Congress on January 16, 1939 (see
Item 11, 1939 volume).
The report of the Board advocated the
adoption of all the suggestions which I had asked in the
above letter to be considered. Subsequently, these recommendations
were written into law when the amendments to the Social
Security Act were adopted on August 11, 1939 (see Item
109, 1939 volume).
For example:
1. Extending the coverage of the old-age
insurance system. Under the 1939 amendments, the old-age
insurance provisions of the Social Security Act were extended
to include about 1,100,000 additional persons. The additional
groups covered were seamen, bank employees, and employed
persons, age sixty-five and over.
2. Commencing the payment of old-age
insurance annuities at an earlier date than January 1,
1942. The 1939 amendments advanced the date for beginning
monthly old-age insurance benefit payments to January
1, 1940.
3. Paying larger benefits than now provided
in the Act for those retiring during the earlier years
of the system. Under the original Act, the basic amount
paid in old-age retirement benefits was computed from
the total accumulated wages of the person retiring. Thus,
an individual who reached sixty-five within a short time
after the passage of the Act would not have a very large
annuity because the wages accumulated would be small.
Under the amendments adopted in 1939, the basis for paying
benefits was changed from accumulated wages to average
wages. In this way, a person retiring in the early years
of the system would receive more than a paltry amount.
4. Providing benefits for aged wives
and widows. The 1939 amendments to the Act granted supplemental
benefits to the wife, age sixty-five or over, of an insured
individual. The total amount of the wife's benefit equals
one half of the husband's.
Additional provision was made for widows'
old-age insurance benefits. Since the adoption of the
1939 amendments, when the widow of a fully insured individual
reaches 65 she is eligible for a total benefit of three-fourths
of that of her late husband. Regardless of age, a widow
with one or more children now also receives a total benefit
equal to three-fourths of that of her late husband.
5. Providing benefits for young children
of insured persons dying before reaching retirement age.
Under the 1939 amendments, monthly insurance benefits
equal to one-half of the amount due to the parent are
made available to unmarried dependent orphans who have
not yet reached eighteen years of age.
10.
"A Social Security Program Must Include All Those
Who Need Its Protection." RADIO ADDRESS ON THE THIRD
ANNIVERSARY OF THE SOCIAL SECURITY ACT. AUGUST
15, 1938
You, my friends, in every walk of life and
in every part of the Nation, who are active believers
in Social Security:
The Social Security Act is three years old
today. This is a good vantage point from which to take
a long look backward to its beginnings, to cast an appraising
eye over what it has accomplished so far, and to survey
its possibilities of future growth.
Five years ago the term "social security"
was new to American ears. Today it has significance for
more than forty million men and women workers whose applications
for old-age insurance accounts have been received; this
system is designed to assure them an income for life after
old age retires them from their jobs.
It has significance for more than twenty-seven
and a half million men and women wage earners who have
earned credits under State unemployment insurance laws
which provide half wages to help bridge the gap between
jobs.
It has significance for the needy men, women
and children receiving assistance and for their families--at
least two million three hundred thousand all told; with
this cash assistance one million seven hundred thousand
old folks are spending their last years in surroundings
they know and with people they love; more than six hundred
thousand dependent children are being taken care of by
their own families; and about forty thousand blind people
are assured of peace and security among familiar voices.
It has significance for the families and
communities to whom expanded public health and child welfare
services have brought added protection. And it has significance
for all of us who, as citizens, have at heart the Security
and the well-being of this great democracy.
These accomplishments of three years are
impressive, yet we should not be unduly proud of them.
Our Government in fulfilling an obvious obligation to
the citizens of the country has been doing so only because
the citizens require action from their Representatives.
If the people, during these years, had chosen a reactionary
Administration or a "do nothing" Congress, Social
Security would still be in the conversational stage--a
beautiful dream which might come true in the dim distant
future.
But the underlying desire for personal and
family security was nothing new. In the early days of
colonization and through the long years following, the
worker, the farmer, the merchant, the man of property,
the preacher and the idealist came here to build, each
for himself, a stronghold for the things he loved. The
stronghold was his home; the things he loved and wished
to protect were his family, his material and spiritual
possessions.
His security, then as now, was bound to
that of his friends and his neighbors.
But as the Nation has developed, as invention,
industry and commerce have grown more complex, the hazards
of life have become more complex. Among an increasing
host of fellow citizens, among the often intangible forces
of giant industry, man has discovered that his individual
strength and wits were no longer enough. This was true
not only of the worker at shop bench or ledger; it was
true also of the merchant or manufacturer who employed
him. Where heretofore men had turned to neighbors for
help and advice, they now turned to Government.
Now this is interesting to consider. The
first to turn to Government, the first to receive protection
from Government, were not the poor and the lowly--those
who had no resources other than their daily earnings--but
the rich and the strong. Beginning in the nineteenth century,
the United States passed protective laws designed, in
the main, to give security to property owners, to industrialists,
to merchants and to bankers. True, the little man often
profited by this type of legislation; but that was a by-product
rather than a motive.
Taking a generous view of the situation,
I think it was not that Government deliberately ignored
the working man but that the working man was not sufficiently
articulate to make his needs and his problems known. The
powerful in industry and commerce had powerful voices,
both individually and as a group. And whenever they saw
their possessions threatened, they raised their voices
in appeals for government protection.
It was not until workers became more articulate
through organization that protective labor legislation
was passed. While such laws raised the standards of life,
they still gave no assurance of economic security. Strength
or skill of arm or brain did not guarantee a man a job;
it did not guarantee him a roof; it did not guarantee
him the ability to provide for those dependent upon him
or to take care of himself when he was too old to work.
Long before the economic blight of the depression
descended on the Nation, millions of our people were living
in wastelands of want and fear. Men and women too old
and infirm to work either depended on those who had but
little to share, or spent their remaining years within
the walls of a poorhouse. Fatherless children early learned
the meaning of being a burden to relatives or to the community.
Men and women, still strong, still young, but discarded
as gainful workers, were drained of self-confidence and
self-respect.
The millions of today want, and have a right
to, the same security their forefathers sought--the assurance
that with health and the willingness to work they will
find a place for themselves in the social and economic
system of the time.
Because it has become increasingly difficult
for individuals to build their own security single-handed,
Government must now step in and help them lay the foundation
stones, just as Government in the past has helped lay
the foundation of business and industry. We must face
the fact that in this country we have a rich man's security
and a poor man's security and that the Government owes
equal obligations to both. National security is not a
half and half manner: it is all or none.
The Social Security Act offers to all our
citizens a workable and working method of meeting urgent
present needs and of forestalling future need. It utilizes
the familiar machinery of our Federal-State government
to promote the common welfare and the economic stability
of the Nation.
The Act does not offer anyone, either individually
or collectively, an easy life--nor was it ever intended
so to do. None of the sums of money paid out to individuals
in assistance or in insurance will spell anything approaching
abundance. But they will furnish that minimum necessity
to keep a foothold; and that is the kind of protection
Americans want.
What we are doing is good. But it is not
good enough. To be truly national, a social security program
must include all those who need its protection. Today
many of our citizens are still excluded from old-age insurance
and unemployment compensation because of the nature of
their employment. This must be set aright; and it will
be.
Some time ago I directed the Social Security
Board to give attention to the development of a plan for
liberalizing and extending the old-age insurance system
to provide benefits for wives, widows and orphans. More
recently, a National Health Conference was held at my
suggestion to consider ways and means of extending to
the people of this country more adequate health and medical
services and also to afford the people of this country
some protection against the economic losses arising out
of ill health.
I am hopeful that on the basis of studies
and investigations now under way, the Congress will improve
and extend the law. I am also confident that each year
will bring further development in Federal and State social
security legislation--and that is as it should be. One
word of warning, however. In our efforts to provide security
for all of the American people, let us not allow ourselves
to be misled by those who advocate short cuts to Utopia
of fantastic financial schemes.
We have come a long way. But we still have
a long way to go. There is still today a frontier that
remains unconquered--an America unclaimed. This is the
great, the nationwide frontier of insecurity, of human
want and fear. This is the frontier--the America--we have
set ourselves to reclaim.
This Third Anniversary would not be complete
if I did not express the gratitude of the Nation to those
splendid citizens who so greatly helped me in making social
security legislation possible and to those patriotic men
and women, both employers and employees, who in their
daily activities are today hearing social security work.
First of all, to the first woman who has
ever sat in the Cabinet of the United States--Miss Frances
Perkins--then and now the Secretary of Labor. Then to
the unselfish Commission of men and women who, in 1934,
devoted themselves to the almost superhuman task of studying
all manner of American problems, of examining legislation
already attempted in other nations, and of coordinating
the whole into practical recommendations for legislative
action.
Finally, I thank publicly, as I have so
often thanked them | 
