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Line 115: − − =Fascism and the New Deal= − "Both Stalin's Russia and Mussolini's Italy influenced the New Deal enormously,"<ref>Amity Shlaes, "[http://www.aei.org/article/26390 The Real Deal]," ''The Wall Street Journal'', June 25, 2007</ref> writes Amity Schlaes, author of ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=7fZ6AAAACAAJ The Forgotten Man]''. "[T]he New Deal was often compared with Fascism," according to cultural historian Wolfgang Schivelbusch.<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, p. 22</ref> “The slogan into which the Nazis condensed their economic philosophy, ''Gemeinnutz geht vor Eigennutz'' (i.e., the commonweal ranks above private profit) is likewise the idea underlying the American New Deal,” wrote Ludwig von Mises.<ref>Ludwig von Mises, ''[http://mises.org/books/socialism.pdf Socialism: An Economic and Sociological Analysis]'' (Yale University Press, 1951), pp. 578-579</ref> − − =="Dictatorial powers"== − Roosevelt presented the New Deal in militaristic terms of "discipline," sacrificing individual rights for "leadership" promising a greater good. His first inaugural address contained an exhortation that could have been made by Mussolini or Hitler: − {{cquote|If we are to go forward we must move as a trained and loyal army willing to sacrifice for the good of a common discipline, because, without such discipline, no progress is made, no leadership becomes effective. We are, I know, ready and willing to submit our lives and property to such discipline because it makes possible a leadership which aims at a larger good.<ref>William Safire, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=EKkO4JBxtVkC Lend Me Your Ears: Great Speeches in History]'' (W. W. Norton & Company, 2004) ISBN 0393059316, p. 940</ref>}} − Meanwhile, [[First Lady]] [[Eleanor Roosevelt]] “lamented that the nation lacked a benevolent dictator to force through reforms."<ref>Christopher Caldwell, “[http://www.slate.com/id/2000099/entry/1003296/ ER: Authoritarian and Aristocratic], Slate.com, July 28, 1999</ref> Soviet intelligence source<ref>[http://www.nsa.gov/public_info/_files/venona/1944/9sep_lippman_views_churchill_roosevelt.pdf 1289 KGB New York to Moscow, 9 September 1944]</ref> [[Walter Lippmann]] told Roosevelt, "The situation is critical, Franklin. You may have no alternative but to assume dictatorial powers";<ref>Thomas Griffith, “[http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,924464,00.html NEWSWATCH: Comrade of the Powerful],” ''Time'', September 15, 1980</ref> in his influential<ref>Lippmann is widely regarded as “the most influential journalist in American history.” Jacqueline Foertsch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=mao9DJoAlhAC American Culture in the 1940s]'' (Edinburgh University Press, 2008) ISBN 0748624139, p. 56</ref> column, Lippmann added that the use of "'dictatorial powers,' if that is the name for it—is essential."<ref>Russell Baker, “[http://www.nybooks.com/articles/22273 A Revolutionary President], ''The New York Review of Books'', Vol. 56, No. 2 (February 12, 2009)</ref> The ''New York Herald Tribune'' approved the inauguration with the headline "FOR DICTATORSHIP IF NECESSARY."<ref>“[http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5525748 Author Reconstructs FDR's 'Defining Moment'],” National Public Radio</ref> A [[Hollywood]] movie was released about a President of the United States who "revokes the Constitution, becomes a reigning dictator," and employs "brown-shirted storm troopers,"<ref>"[http://allmovie.com/work/gabriel-over-the-white-house-19092 Gabriel Over the White House]," allmovie.com</ref>—by means of whom he not only "declares martial law,"<ref>Glenn Erickson, "[http://www.dvdsavant.com/s3054gabr.html Gabriel Over the White House]," dvdsavant.com</ref> but “dissolves Congress, creates an army of the unemployed, and lines up his enemies before a firing squad.”<ref>Jonathan Alter, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=ASmlaOHQNawC The Defining Moment: FDR's Hundred Days and the Triumph of Hope]'' (Simon and Schuster, 2007) ISBN 0743246012, p. 6</ref> This movie was made not by a conservative such as Frank Capra, but by Walter Wanger, a "liberal Hollywood mogul";<ref>Saverio Giovacchini, "[http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/109.2/br_89.html Benjamin L. Alpers, ''Dictators, Democracy, & American Public Culture: Envisioning the Totalitarian Enemy, 1920s-1950s]," ''The American Historical Review'', Vol. 109, No. 2 (April 2004), p. 553</ref> in the film, the dictator ("an FDR lookalike")<ref>Saverio Giovacchini, "[http://www.historycooperative.org/journals/ahr/109.2/br_89.html Benjamin L. Alpers, ''Dictators, Democracy, & American Public Culture: Envisioning the Totalitarian Enemy, 1920s-1950s]," ''The American Historical Review'', Vol. 109, No. 2 (April 2004), p. 553</ref> is not the villain, but ''the hero'', who by such dictatorial means "solves all of the nation's problems."<ref>"[http://allmovie.com/work/gabriel-over-the-white-house-19092 Gabriel Over the White House]," allmovie.com</ref> Roosevelt enjoyed the movie and saw it several times.<ref>Terry Christensen, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=HnSFQgAACAAJ Reel Politics: American Political Movies from Birth of a Nation to Platoon]'' (Blackwell, 1987) ISBN 0631158448, p. 34. Cf. Peter C. Rollins and John E. O'Connor, eds., ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=eyTFPMFOskkC Hollywood's White House: The American Presidency in Film and History]'' (University Press of Kentucky, 2005) ISBN 0813191262, p. 153</ref> Most chilling, FDR wrote that he thought this film “would help the country.”<ref>Jonathan Alter, “[http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/07/books/chapters/0507-1st-alter.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all The Defining Moment],” ''The New York Times'', May 7, 2006</ref> − − ==Contemporary reporting and commentary== − The mood in Washington at FDR's inauguration was “strangely reminiscent of Rome in the first weeks after the march of the Blackshirts, of Moscow at the beginning of the Five-Year Plan” reported ''The New York Times''. “America today literally asks for orders.” The Roosevelt administration, reported the ''Times,'' “envisages a federation of industry, labor and government after the fashion of the corporative State as it exists in Italy.”<ref>Anne O'Hare McCormick, "[http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F60A1FFF3E5C16738DDDAE0894DD405B838FF1D3 VAST TIDES THAT STIR THE CAPITAL; Behind the Tremendous Activity and the Revolutionary Experiments in Washington]," ''The New York Times'' Sunday Magazine, May 7, 1933, p. SM1</ref> Progressive writer Roger Shaw described the New Deal as “Fascist means to gain liberal ends.”<ref>David Boaz, "[http://reason.com/archives/2007/09/28/hitler-mussolini-roosevelt Hitler, Mussolini, Roosevelt]," ''Reason'', October 2007</ref> George Soule, editor of the pro-Roosevelt ''New Republic'' magazine, wrote, "We are trying out the economics of Fascism without having suffered all its social or political ravages."<ref>George Henry Soule, ''[http://books.google.com/books?ei=R4CcSoqXK6SCywSm9tzwDg&id=I89fAAAAIAAJ The Coming American Revolution]'' (The Macmillan Company, 1934), p. 294</ref> "We in America,” wrote liberal journalist Mauritz Hallgren, “are being forced rapidly and definitely into Fascism..."<ref>''[http://www.spectator.co.uk/ Spectator]'', August 18, 1933, p. 211</ref> − − ==Fascists on the New Deal== − Mussolini was convinced that the New Deal was copying Fascist economic policies.<ref>Stanley G. Payne, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=NLiFIEdI1V4C A History of Fascism, 1914-1945]'' (University of Wisconsin Press, 1996) ISBN 0299148742, p. 230</ref> "Reminiscent of Fascism is the principle that the state no longer leaves the economy to its own devices," wrote Mussolini in a review of FDR's book ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=OOiQlusINSUC Looking Forward]''. "Without question, the mood accompanying this sea-change is reminiscent of Fascism." Mussolini wrote that the book ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=nqUCAAAAMAAJ New Frontiers]'', by FDR's Secretary of Agriculture [[Henry Wallace]], was "just as 'corporativistic' as the individual solutions put forth in it... The book leaves no doubt that it is on the road to corporatism..."<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, pp. 23-24</ref> On a visit to New York, Mussolini said to Grover Whalen, Chairman of Mayor Fiorello La Guardia's Committee on Receptions to Distinguished Guests, "You want to know what Fascism is? It is like your New Deal."<ref>Grover Aloysius Whalen, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=t5MsAAAAMAAJ Mr. New York: the autobiography of Grover A. Whalen]'' (Putnam, 1955), p. 188</ref> − − Nazi Minister of Economics Hjalmar Schacht declared that Roosevelt had the same economic idea as Hitler and Mussolini;<ref>William E. Leuchtenburg, ''[http://ia311511.us.archive.org/3/items/franklindrooseve006302mbp/franklindrooseve006302mbp.pdf Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal]'' (Harper & Row, 1963), p. 203</ref> the official Nazi Party organ, ''Völkischer Beobachter'', applauded “Roosevelt’s adoption of National Socialist strains of thought in his economic and social policies,” commenting, "Many passages in [Roosevelt's] book ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=OOiQlusINSUC Looking Forward]'' could have been written by a National Socialist."<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, p. 19</ref> − − Hitler himself admired FDR’s approach, saying, “I have sympathy with President Roosevelt because he marches straight toward his objective over Congress, over lobbies, over stubborn bureaucracies.”<ref>Anne O'Hare McCormick, "[http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F20716F839591A728DDDA90994DF405B838FF1D3 HITLER SEEKS JOBS FOR ALL GERMANS; 'Does Anything Else Matter?' He Asks, Stressing Efforts to End Unemployment. CROMWELL IS HIS HERO Chancellor Admires Roosevelt for Marching to Objectives Over Congress and Lobbies]," ''The New York Times'', July 10, 1933</ref> Hitler likewise congratulated Roosevelt for "his heroic effort in the interest of the American People." He added: − {{cquote|The President's successful struggle against economic distress is being followed by the entire German People with interest and admiration. The Reich Chancellor is in accord with the President that the virtues of sense of duty, readiness for sacrifice, and discipline must be the supreme rule of the whole Nation. This moral demand, which the President is addressing to every single citizen, is also the quintessence of German philosophy of the State, expressed in its motto "The public weal before private gain."<ref>[http://www.cdojerusalem.org/icons-multimedia/ClientsArea/HoH/LIBARC/ARCHIVE/Chapters/Forging/Foreign/Message.html A Message from Hitler to Roosevelt], history-of-the-holocaust.org</ref>}} − − But Hitler's admiration for Roosevelt gave way to contempt upon the opening of hostilities. With the German declaration of war against the United States, Hitler would deprecate Roosevelt, not as a tool of the socialists or Bolsheviks, but as "the candidate of a Capitalist Party."<ref>[http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/hitler_declares_war.html Hitler Declares War on the United States] (December 11, 1941). Jewish Virtual Library (American-Israeli Cooperative Enterprise)</ref> − − ==New Dealers on fascism== − Roosevelt’s economic adviser, Rexford Tugwell, the “most prominent of the Brain Trusters and the man often considered the chief ideologist of the 'first New Deal' (roughly, 1933–34),”<ref>Ralph Raico, "[http://www.fff.org/freedom/0201e.asp FDR — The Man, the Leader, the Legacy, Part 11]," ''Freedom Daily'', February 2001</ref> was "open in his respect for Mussolini's economic policies." Of the Fascist system he wrote, "It's the cleanest, neatnest [sic], most efficiently operating piece of social machinery I've ever seen. It makes me envious." Tugwell, "the most left-wing member of Roosevelt's brain trust,"<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, p. 31-32</ref> said, “I find Italy doing many of the things which seem to me necessary... Mussolini certainly has the same people opposed to him as FDR has. But he has the press controlled so that they cannot scream lies at him daily.”<ref>Jonah Goldberg, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=wHihWKJE3asC Liberal Fascism: the Secret History of the American Left, from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning]'' (Random House, Inc., 2008) ISBN 0385511841, p.156</ref> − − Roosevelt was also a secret admirer of Mussolini, writing to his friend John Lawrence, "I don't mind telling you in confidence, that I am keeping in fairly close touch with that admirable Italian gentleman."<ref>David F. Schmitz, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Pzt2AAAAMAAJ The United States and Fascist Italy, 1922-1940]'' (University of North Carolina Press, 1988) ISBN 080781766X, p. 139</ref> FDR also wrote to U.S. Ambassador to Italy Breckinridge Long about Mussolini, "I am much interested and deeply impressed by what he has accomplished and by his evidenced honest purpose of restoring Italy and seeking to prevent general European trouble."<ref>Elliott Roosevelt, Ed., [http://books.google.com/books?id=aHEbAAAAIAAJ ''F.D.R., His Personal Letters'', Vol. 3] (Duell, Sloan and Pearce, 1947), p. 352</ref> FDR privately acknowledged that “what we were doing in this country were some of the things that were being done in Russia and even some of the things that were being done under Hitler in Germany. But we were doing them in an orderly way.”<ref>Jonah Goldberg, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=wHihWKJE3asC Liberal Fascism: the Secret History of the American Left, from Mussolini to the Politics of Meaning]'' (Random House, Inc., 2008) ISBN 0385511841, p.122</ref> − − ==Fabian socialism== − Tugwell was deeply interested in the ideas of the Fabian Society (which "set up the banner of Socialism militant"),<ref>G. Bernard Shaw, "[http://walterschafer.com/fabiansocietyhistory.htm Fabian Tract No. 41: The Fabian Society, Its Early History]," (Fabian Society Reprint, 1899)</ref> particularly those of [[George Bernard Shaw]] and [[H.G. Wells]]. Referring to Roosevelt's Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins, Tugwell commented, “Miss Perkins was literate in the Fabian tradition, and so were some of the rest of us.” Roosevelt himself, observed Tugwell, “had a good Harvard education when Fabianism was developing, and he probably knew quite well the work of Wells and Shaw.<ref>Anne Jackson Fremantle, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=IRQdAAAAIAAJ This Little Band of Prophets: The British Fabians]'' (New American Library, 1960), p. 233</ref> But as John T. Flynn, who had supported Roosevelt in the 1932 election, observed, "the line between fascism and Fabian socialism is very thin. Fabian socialism is the dream. Fascism is Fabian socialism plus the inevitable dictator."<ref>John T. Flynn, "The Road Ahead," ''Reader's Digest'', February 1950, reprinted in Gregory P. Pavlik. ''[http://mises.org/books/forgotten_lessons_flynn.pdf Forgotten Lessons: Selected Essays of John T. Flynn]'' (The Foundation for Economic Education, Inc., 1995) p. 189</ref> One Fabian socialist from the 1920s and '30s, Oswald Mosley,<ref>Rose L. Martin, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=9_vvAAAAMAAJ Fabian Freeway: High Road to Socialism in the U.S.A., 1884-1966]'' (Fidelis, 1968), p. 62</ref> went on to found and lead the British Union of Fascists, in which role he was lauded by Shaw,<ref>Gareth Griffith, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=aGAEWDI3SR4C Socialism and Superior Brains: The Political Thought of Bernard Shaw]'' (CRC Press, 2002) ISBN 0203210832, p. 263</ref> who also admired both [[Mussolini]] and [[Hitler]].<ref>"[http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=F70810FA3C5513738DDDA90994DA415B838FF1D3 Shaw Heaps Praise Upon the Dictators: While Parliaments Get Nowhere, He Says, Hitler, Mussolini and Stalin Do Things]," From an Address By George Bernard Shaw, ''The New York Times'', December 10, 1933</ref> − − Shaw had contempt for freedom. Mussolini, Hitler and other dictators, he wrote, "can depend on me to judge them by their ability to deliver the goods," rather than by what Shaw dismissed as "comfortable notions of freedom."<ref>[[#refHollander98|Hollander 1998]]: 169</ref> Shaw thoroughly endorsed<ref>Edvins Snore, ''[http://www.sovietstory.com/ The Soviet Story]'' ([http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hQvsf2MUKRQ Clip])</ref> the [[Nazi]] doctrine of "life unworthy of life" (''Lebensunwertes Leben'').<ref>Dr. Stuart D. Stein, [http://www.ess.uwe.ac.uk/genocide/mord.htm "Life Unworthy of Life" and other Medical Killing Programmes], University of the West of England</ref> In the [[BBC]]'s weekly magazine, he made a 1933 "appeal to the chemists to discover a humane gas that will kill instantly and painlessly. Deadly by all means, but humane not cruel..."<ref>''The Listener'' (London), February 7, 1934</ref> His appeal would shortly come to fruition in [[Nazi]] Germany.<ref>"The use of poison gas—first carbon monoxide and then Zyklon B—was the technological achievement permitting 'humane killing'." Robert Jay Lifton, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=bv8IAqVh8EAC The Nazi Doctors: Medical Killing and the Psychology of Genocide]'' (Basic Books, 1986) ISBN 0465049052, p. 453</ref> Asked what [[Briton]]s should do if the [[Nazi]]s crossed the channel into [[Britain]], Shaw replied, "Welcome them as tourists."<ref>Thomas Sowell, "[http://www.jewishworldreview.com/cols/sowell092401.asp Pacifism and war]," ''Jewish World Review'', September 24, 2001 (7 Tishrei, 5762)</ref> − − H.G. Wells expressed similar opinions. In a 1932 speech at Oxford University, Wells exhorted his audience, “I am asking for a Liberal Fascisti, for enlightened Nazis.”<ref>H.G. Wells, “Liberalism and the Revolutionary Spirit,” ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=NxzTAAAAMAAJ After Democracy: Addresses and Papers on the Present World Situation]'' (London: Watts, 1932), p. 24</ref> Two years later Roosevelt and key members of his “Brains Trust” met with Wells, who judged FDR “the most effective transmitting instrument possible for the coming of the new world order... He is continually revolutionary in the new way without ever provoking a stark revolutionary crisis.”<ref>Arthur Meier Schlesinger, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=mj3VmJ38tHIC The Coming of the New Deal, 1933-1935]'' (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2003) ISBN 0618340866, p. 588</ref> − − ==Keynesian economics== − Perkins commented that, "Combined with the relief program and with public works," the the National Recovery Administration (NRA), the centerpiece of the New Deal, "constituted an effective demonstration of the theories which John Maynard Keynes had been preaching and urging upon the English government," adding: − {{cquote|[Keynes] pointed out that the combination of relief, public works, raising wages by NRA codes, distributing moneys to farmers under agricultural adjustment, was doing exactly what his theory would indicate as correct procedure. He was full of faith that we in the United States would prove to the world that this was the answer.<ref>Frances Perkins, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=AIEhAAAAMAAJ The Roosevelt I Knew]'' (The Viking press, 1946) p. 225</ref>}} − Keynes had been involved with Fabian socialism since at least his student days at Cambridge.<ref>Michael Holroyd, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=hL1GPQAACAAJ Lytton Strachey: A Critical Biography, Vol.1: The Unknown Years,1880-1910]'' (Heinemann, 1967), p. 250; Anne Jackson Fremantle, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=IRQdAAAAIAAJ This Little Band of Prophets: The British Fabians]'' (New American Library, 1960), p. 230</ref> Mosley had been a Fabian socialist in 1930, when Keynesian economics was the "officially accepted Fabian line," notes Zygmund Dobbs. Mosely went on to found the British Union of Fascists, which "at first was modeled after Mussolini’s example but later became patterned after Hitler. Through all these tergiversations, Mosley never had to abandon his Keynesist principles."<ref>Zygmund Dobbs, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=N-g1AQAAIAAJ Keynes at Harvard: economic deception as a political credo],'' (New York: Veritas Foundation, 1960), pp. 88-90</ref> As a leading Fascist propagandist<ref>James Strachey Barnes led a "major group" established "to promote ... fascism," and circulate "fascist propaganda," emphasizing "the positive nature of fascism." Roger Griffin with Matthew Feldman, eds., ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=xeHuSpHzqGUC Fascism: The 'Fascist Epoch']'' (Taylor & Francis, 2004) ISBN 0415290198, p. 255</ref> noted (in a book with a preface by Mussolini):<ref>Gaetano Salvemini, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=CaONx1VLelsC Under the Axe of Fascism]'' (Read Books, 2008) ISBN 1443736708, p. 115</ref> − ::"Fascism entirely agrees with Mr. Maynard Keynes, despite the latter’s prominent position as a Liberal. In fact, Mr. Keynes’ excellent little book, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=pKBdAAAAIAAJ The End of Laissez-Faire]'' (l926) might, so far as it goes, serve as a useful introduction to fascist economics. There is scarcely anything to object to in it and there is much to applaud.... All this is pure fascist premises."<ref>James Strachey Barnes, ''[http://books.google.com/books?cd=1&id=N_jSAAAAMAAJ Universal Aspects of Fascism]'' (London: Williams and Norgate, 1929), pp. 113-115</ref> − − As [[Communist Party]] General Secretary [[William Z. Foster]] commented, "The Nazi fascists were especially enthusiastic supporters of Keynes."<ref>William Z. Foster, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=0AdnAAAAMAAJ Outline Political History of the Americas]'' (International Publishers, 1951), p. 597.</ref> Former Trotskyite<ref>Joel T. LeFevre, [http://www.keynesatharvard.org/site.html About the Author], keynesatharvard.org</ref> Dobbs recounted that Harvard economist Joseph Schumpeter observed that in Nazi Germany, "A work like Keynes’ ''General Theory'' could have appeared unmolested—and did." In the introduction to the 1935 German edition of his treatise, Keynes himself suggested that the total state that the National Socialists were then building was perfectly suited for the implementation of his investment schemes.<ref>Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr., − "[http://mises.org/freemarket_detail.aspx?control=536 The Problem of Fascism]," ''The Free Market'', Vol. 26, No. 5 (May 2005)</ref> Moreover, Keynes was at least an ambivalent anti-Semite. He called Albert Einstein "a naughty Jew boy... that kind of Jew... who have not sublimated immortality into compound interest." This he contrasted with − {{cquote|the other kind of Jews, the ones who are... serving devils, with small horns, pitch forks, and oily tails. It is not agreeable to see civilization so under the ugly thumbs of its impure Jews who have all the money and the power and brains.<ref>Charles Henry Hession, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=S1BqF0GpL3UC John Maynard Keynes: a personal biography of the man who revolutionized capitalism and the way we live]'' (Macmillan, 1984) ISBN 0025513109, pp. 225-226, as cited in Nina Paulovicova, "[http://ejournals.library.ualberta.ca/index.php/pi/article/viewFile/1591/1117 The Immoral Moral Scientist. John Maynard Keynes]," ''Past Imperfect'', Vol. 13 (2007), pp. 43-44 (PDF 20-21)</ref>}} − − ==New Deal programs== − ===National Recovery Administration=== − Just as Roosevelt expressed to Ambassador Long his admiration of Mussolini, Long in turn reported to Tugwell regarding Fascist economics, “Your mind runs along these lines.... It may have some bearing on the code work under N.R.A.”<ref>Long to Tugwell, May 16, 1934, [http://lccn.loc.gov/mm%2078030502 Breckinridge Long Papers], Box 111, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress</ref> The NRA—“the New Deal’s attempt to bring to America the substance of Mussolini’s corporativism”<ref>Leonard Peikoff, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=2_xpAAAAIAAJ The Ominous Parallels]'' (Stein and Day, 1982) ISBN 081282850X, p. 293</ref>—was established by the National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933, which was “similar to experiments being carried out by the fascist dictator Benito Mussolini in Italy and by the Nazis in Adolf Hitler's Germany,” according to John A. Garraty,<ref>John Arthur Garraty, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=DGRuAAAAMAAJ The American Nation]'', 4th ed., vol. 2 (Harper & Row, 1979) ISBN 0060422696, p. 656</ref> president of the Society of American Historians.<ref>[http://sah.columbia.edu/content/history History], The Society of American Historians</ref> As one NRA study concluded, “The Fascist principles are very similar to those which have been evolving in America and so are of particular interest at this time.”<ref>Janet C. Wright, "Capital and Labor Under Fascism," National Archives, Record Group 9, Records of the National Recovery Administration, [http://www.archives.gov/research/guide-fed-records/groups/009.html#9.2.4 Special Research and Planning Reports and Memoranda, 1933-35], Entry 31, Box 3</ref> − − "There was hardly a commentator who failed to see elements of Italian corporatism in Roosevelt's managed economy under the National Recovery Administration, the institution formed in 1933 to maintain mandatory production and price 'codes' for American industry," wrote Schivelbusch. Even "intellectual observers of economics and social policies who were otherwise Roosevelt allies... saw a Fascist element at the core of the New Deal."<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, pp. 23, 27</ref> − − The Italian Fascist Party journal of political theory ''Gerarchia'' (Leadership) characterized the NRA as "bearing a Fascist signature" and as "corporatism without the corporations." Progressive journalist Robert Shaw agreed, "The NRA... was plainly an American adaptation of the Italian corporate state." When Roosevelt referred to the industrial cartels established by the NRA as "modern guilds," writes Schivelbusch, he was making "reference to the corporatist system associated with Fascism."<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, pp. 24, 27, 30</ref> FDR's own economics instructor at Harvard<ref>[http://www.montaguemillennium.com/familyresearch/h_1961_gilbert.htm Gilbert Holland Montague, 1880-1961], montaguemillennium.com</ref> concurred, identifying the NRA as "essentially fascistic."<ref>Gilbert H. Montague, "[http://www.jstor.org/pss/1019193 Is NRA Fascistic?]" ''The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences,'' July, 1935, pp. 149-161</ref> − − Just as Mussolini “organized each trade or industrial group or professional group into a state supervised trade association” that “operated under state supervision and could plan production, quality, prices, distribution, labor standards, etc.,”<ref>John T. Flynn, ''[http://mises.org/books/rooseveltmyth.pdf The Roosevelt Myth]'' (The Devin-Adair Company, 1948) pp. 42-43</ref> the NRA “forced virtually all American industry, manufacturing, and retail business into cartels possessing the power to set prices and wages, and to dictate the levels of production.”<ref>Richard M. Ebeling, "[http://www.fee.org/pdf/the-freeman/1005RMEColumn.pdf When the Supreme Court Stopped Economic Fascism in America]," ''The Freeman'', Vol. 55, No. 8 (October 2005), p. 3</ref> − − ====Hugh Johnson==== − As head of the NRA and thus “FDR’s leading bureaucrat,”<ref>[http://www.arlingtoncemetery.net/hsjohnson.htm Hugh Samuel Johnson], arlingtoncemetary.net</ref> the President appointed<ref>[http://www.condenaststore.com/Politicians/General-Hugh-Johnson/invt/103630 General Hugh Johnson], Condé Nast store</ref> General Hugh Johnson, who was granted “almost unlimited powers over industry.”<ref>Associated Press, "[http://select.nytimes.com/gst/abstract.html?res=FB0716FC3E5F1A7A93CBA8178ED85F478385F9 Johnson Chosen Industry Chief]," ''The New York Times'', May 19, 1933, p. 1</ref> According to economist Thayer Watkins (who teaches economic history at California’s San José State University),<ref>[http://www.sjsu.edu/depts/economics/faculty/thayer.htm Thayer Watkins, Ph.D.], Faculty & Staff, Economics, San José State University</ref> Johnson was “an admirer of Mussolini’s National Corporatist system in Italy and he drew upon the Italian experience in formulating the New Deal.”<ref>Thayer Watkins, "[http://www.sjsu.edu/faculty/watkins/corporatism.htm The Economic System of Corporatism]," Department of Economics, San José State University</ref> Walker F. Todd, research fellow at the American Institute for Economic Research, agrees that Johnson “did admire greatly what Mussolini appeared to have done,” identifying the NRA as a “thoroughly corporativist” idea.<ref>Walker F. Todd, "[http://www.aei.org/docLib/Todd%20-%20The%20Federal%20Reserve%20Board%20and%20the%20Rise%20of%20the%20Corporate%20State.pdf The Federal Reserve Board and the Rise of the Corporate State, 1931-1934]," ''Economic Education Bulletin'', Vol. XXXV No. 9 (September 1995) pp. 6, 34</ref> − − According to Jonah Goldberg, Johnson displayed a portrait of ''Il Duce'' in his NRA office and actually “distributed a memo at the Democratic Convention proposing that FDR become a Mussolini-like dictator.”<ref>Jonah Goldberg, [http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=Mjc0ZmFlMDFiNDJkODdjYjE3NDY5OGVlY2JiZWRmNjM= Hendrick Hertzberg & The F-Word], The Corner (National Review Online), March 5, 2009</ref> In his retirement speech, Johnson invoked what he called the “shining name” of Mussolini.<ref>Arthur Meier Schlesinger, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=mj3VmJ38tHIC The Coming of the New Deal, 1933-1935]'' (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2003) ISBN 0618340866, p. 153</ref> Johnson was said to carry around with him a copy of Raffaello Viglione’s pro-Mussolini book,<ref>Sheldon Richman, "[http://www.econlib.org/library/Enc/Fascism.html Fascism]," ''The Concise Encyclopedia of Economics'', econlib.org</ref> ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=vIJQHAAACAAJ The Corporate State]'', and presented a copy to Perkins.<ref>Frances Perkins, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=AIEhAAAAMAAJ The Roosevelt I Knew]'' (The Viking press, 1946) p. 206. Socialist (Kent Worcester, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=TwTTArAPWswC C.L.R. James: A Political Biography]'' [SUNY Press, 1995] ISBN 079142751X, p. 175) George Rawich wrote that Perkins told him Johnson gave each member of the Cabinet a book by [http://www.marxists.org/archive/rawick/1969/xx/self.html Fascist theoretician Giovanni Gentile], “and we all read it with great care.” Schivelbusch suggests the book was actually [http://www.lewrockwell.com/dilorenzo/dilorenzo172.html Mussolini advisor] Fausto Pitigliani’s ''The Italian Corporativist State.'' (Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' [Macmillan, 2006] ISBN 080507452X, p. 203, n. 28)</ref> − − ===Agricultural Adjustment Administration=== − Roosevelt appointed Johnson’s former business partner George Peek to head the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA). Both men had “worked with the War Industries Board, the agency that regulated American production during World War I, and they believed their experience of managing an economy almost totally sealed off from the world market would suit the country now.”<ref>Eric Rauchway, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=BtSU6ZaCbzMC The Great Depression & the New Deal: A Very Short Introduction]'' (Oxford University Press, 2008) ISBN 0195326342, p. 76</ref> They had long advocated a policy of expanding tariffs to keep foreign agricultural products out of the United States,<ref>William J. Barber, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Nks8pTPnsVYC From New Era to New Deal: Herbert Hoover, the Economists, and American Economic Policy, 1921-1933]'' (Cambridge University Press, 1989) ISBN 0521367379, p. 50</ref> a policy that would have again rendered the U.S. economy “almost totally sealed off from the world market”<ref> Neil Vousden, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=uabXBMnp7XgC The Economics of Trade Protection]'' (Cambridge University Press, 1990) ISBN 052134669X, p. 91</ref>—a fair approximation of “[http://www.economist.com/research/economics/alphabetic.cfm?letter=A#autarky autarky],” an economic policy particularly but not exclusively “associated with Nazi economic organization.”<ref>Gilbert Pleuger, "[http://www.history-ontheweb.co.uk/concepts/autarky.htm Economic autarky]," ''new perspective'' Vol 6, No 3</ref> Indeed, the AAA was analogous to the Reich Food Estate, which had been established in Germany by the Nazis to similarly dictate agricultural production quotas and prices.<ref>Matthew S. Seligmann, John Davison and John McDonald, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=g13k9CMYTbsC Daily life in Hitler's Germany]'' (Macmillan, 2004), ISBN 0312328117, p. 110</ref> Like the AAA (and Mussolini's "Battle for Grain")<ref>John Francis Pollard, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=UpzyGA3PKqcC The Fascist experience in Italy]'' (Psychology Press, 1998), ISBN 0415116325, p. 88</ref> the Reich Food Estate promoted agricultural protectionism<ref>Shelley Baranowski, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=iA-NZ_RgP5kC Nazi Empire: German Colonialism and Imperialism from Bismarck to Hitler]'' (Cambridge University Press, 2010) ISBN 0521674085, p. 195</ref> in pursuit of autarky.<ref>Richard J. Evans, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=iG4ud0PxeDMC The Third Reich in Power]'' (Penguin, 2006), ISBN 0143037900, p. 346</ref> − − ===Civilian Conservation Corps=== − "The German Labor Service (''Reichsarbeitsdienst''—RAD) arose from a party organization set up in 1931 and known as the ''NS-Arbeitsdienst'' for the purpose of easing unemployment,"<ref>United States War Department, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=b3W1tiuHzcoC Handbook on German Military Forces]'' (Washington: GPO, 1945) p. 203</ref> "like its New Deal equivalent, the Civilian Conservation Corps [CCC],"<ref>David Schoenbaum, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=1wNCSxrUlyMC Hitler's Social Revolution: Class and Status in Nazi Germany, 1933-1939]'' (W. W. Norton & Company, 1997) ISBN 0393315541, p. 78</ref> which would be established two years later.<ref>[http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid=14609 Executive Order 6101 Starting The Civilian Conservation Corps], The American Presidency Project, University of California - Santa Barbara</ref> According to Garraty, both − {{cquote|were essentially designed to keep young men out of the labor market. Roosevelt described work camps as a means for getting youth ‘off the city street corners,’ Hitler as a way of keeping them from ‘rotting helplessly in the streets.' In both countries much was made of the beneficial social results of mixing thousands of young people from different walks of life in the camps. Furthermore, both were organized on semimilitary lines with the subsidiary purposes of improving the physical fitness of potential soldiers and stimulating public commitment to national service in an emergency.<ref>John A. Garraty, "[http://www.jstor.org/pss/1858346 The New Deal, National Socialism, and the Great Depression]," ''The American Historical Review'', Vol. 78, No. 4 (October, 1973), pp. 907-944</ref>}} − − As early as 1933, the manifesto of the first United States Congress Against War and Fascism "pointed to the NRA, the CCC, and the other policies of the Roosevelt administration as indications of America's preparedness for war and Fascism," according to FDR's Attorney General Francis Biddle.<ref>Attorney General's list of Subversive Organizations, 1942, page photographically reproduced in M. Stanton Evans, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=vz42rDYmf3wC Blacklisted by History: The Untold Story of Senator Joe McCarthy and His Fight Against America's Enemys]'' (Crown Forum, 2007), p. 56</ref> − − ===National Youth Administration=== − The National Youth Administration (NYA) was conceived as a New Deal “alternative to the Hitler Youth,” designed to hold young people “to their patriotic loyalties.”<ref>Richard A. Reiman , ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=wRNiQgAACAAJ The New Deal & American Youth: Ideas & Ideals in a Depression],” (University of Georgia Press, 1992) ISBN 0820314072. Cf. Herbert Mitgang, “[http://www.nytimes.com/1993/01/13/books/books-of-the-times-on-the-new-deal-s-effort-to-put-youth-to-work.html On the New Deal's Effort to Put Youth to Work],” ''The New York Times'', January 13, 1993</ref> Harry Hopkins told the the NYA's Advisory Committee, “we have a lawyer who will declare anything you want to do legal.”<ref>Barton J. Bernstein and Allen J. Matusow (eds.), ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=W-U5AAAAMAAJ Twentieth-Century America: Recent Interpretations]'' (Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1972) ISBN 0155923919, p. 234</ref> Hopkins had hired the Communist<ref>[[#refHUAC50.2|HUAC 1950, pt. 2]]: 2850 [PDF 16]</ref> lawyer [[Lee Pressman]] back into the government immediately after he was "purged" from AAA.<ref>[[#refHUAC50.2|HUAC 1950, pt. 2]]: 2849 [PDF 15]</ref> According to Pressman, Hopkins told him, “The first time you tell me I can’t do what I want to do, you’re fired. I’m going to decide what I think has to be done and it’s up to you to see to it that it’s legal.”<ref>[[#refGall99|Gall 1999]]: 32)</ref> Among his other hires was [[Eleanor Roosevelt]]'s [http://www.sappho.com/letters/e_roosevelt.html close friend] Lorena Hickok, whom Hopkins brought into the government on [http://www.nps.gov/archive/elro/glossary/hickok-lorena.htm Mrs. Roosevelt's recommendation]. Hickok wrote, "If I were 20 years younger and weighed 75 pounds less, I think I'd start out to be the Joan of Arc of the Fascist Movement of the United States."<ref>Lorena A. Hickok, et al., ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=nstfz85S4ccC One Third of a Nation: Lorena Hickok Reports on the Great Depression]'' (University of Illinois Press, 1983) ISBN 0252010965, p. 218</ref> − − =="Friendly Fascism"== − Even some New Dealers have come to see the essential similarities between their ideology and fascism. For example, according to ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=KLmyw-p7IwUC Friendly Fascism]'', by left-wing political science professor Bertram Gross, a leading architect of liberal social policy under presidents Roosevelt, Truman and Carter:<ref>Richard Poe , “[http://97.74.65.51/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=22062 Third Way or Third Reich?]” FrontPageMagazine, June 22, 2000</ref> − {{cquote|I sought solutions for America's ills... through more power in the hands of central government.... In this I was not alone. Almost all my fellow planners, reformers, social scientists, and urbanists presumed the benevolence of more concentrated government power. − Big Business-Big Government partnerships ..., were the central facts behind the power structures of old fascism in the days of Mussolini, Hitler and the Japanese empire builders.... I see Big Business and Big Government as a joint danger.... Anyone looking for black shirts, mass parties or men on horseback will miss the telltale clues of this creeping fascism.... In America, it would be supermodern and multiethnic—as American as Madison Avenue, executive luncheons, credit cards and apple pie. It would be fascism with a smile.}} − While writing his book, Gross dreamed that he was searching through a huge, empty house for "friendly fascists." − {{cquote|I flung open one of the doors," Gross writes. "And there sitting at a typewriter and smiling back at me, I saw myself."<ref>Bertram Myron Gross, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=KLmyw-p7IwUC Friendly Fascism: The New Face of Power in America]'' (South End Press, 1980) ISBN 0896081494, pp. 3-5</ref>}} − − ==Myths== − Several myths have formed around the Great Depression. Among these are the myth that the Depression was brought to an end by the New Deal, or by the "wartime prosperity" of World War II. Neither of these is true. One study found that New Deal policies actually prolonged the depression by about seven years.<ref>Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian, "[http://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/pdf/10.1086/421169 New Deal Policies and the Persistence of the Great Depression: A General Equilibrium Analysis]," ''Journal of Political Economy'', Vol. 112, No. 4 (August 2004), pp. 779-816; Harold L. Cole and Lee E. Ohanian, "[http://www.economics.hawaii.edu/research/seminars/02-03/02-21.pdf New Deal Policies and the Persistence of the Great Depression: A General Equilibrium Analysis]," Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis Research Department Staff Report XXX, February 2003. Cf. Meg Sullivan, "[http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/FDR-s-Policies-Prolonged-Depression-5409.aspx FDR's policies prolonged Depression by 7 years, UCLA economists calculate], UCLA Newsroom, August 10, 2004</ref> In fact, Americans' personal consumption did not rebound to 1929 levels until 1941.<ref>[http://www.census.gov/statab/hist/02HS0034.xls No. HS--34. Personal Consumption Expenditures in Current and Real (1996) Dollars, 1929 to 2001], The 2009 Statistical Abstract: Historical Statistics, U.S. Census Bureau</ref> "[T]he consensus among historians today," writes Schivelbusch, is "that the United States completely emerged from the Depression only with its entry into World War II."<ref>Wolfgang Schivelbusch, ''[http://books.google.com/books?id=Z3GV5_n1h04C Three New Deals: Reflections on Roosevelt's America, Mussolini's Italy, and Hitler's Germany, 1933-1939]'' (Macmillan, 2006) ISBN 080507452X, p. 26</ref> Although the conscription of some 20 million young men into the armed forces reduced the civilian unemployment rate during World War II, the standard of living in the U.S. actually declined during the war. Using the Friedman-Schwartz price index, economist Robert Higgs found that real personal consumption per capita declined by more than 6 percent during 1941-1943, and did not recover to the 1941 level until 1946.<ref>Robert Higgs, "[http://www.independent.org/newsroom/article.asp?id=138 Wartime Prosperity? A Reassessment of the U.S. Economy in the 1940s]," ''The Journal of Economic History'', March 1, 1992</ref> − − ===References=== − <references/>
→Fascism and the New Deal
===Notes===
===Notes===
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=Joe McCarthy=
=Joe McCarthy=