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1932 › Franklin D. Roosevelt (Democratic) › Public works as employment policy
'Employment for all surplus labor at all times' through self-liquidating public works (the Shearon letter, as Hoover read it)
pledge_forwardspecific_pledgeopponent_characterizationevidence B Infrastructure & Public WorksLabor & EmploymentRelief, Welfare & Social Insurance⚡ The Great Depression similar solutions · similar reasoning
Solution
A letter over Roosevelt's signature to Lowe Shearon, circulated among the unemployed, pledged support for self-liquidating public works — water resources, flood control, land reclamation — 'to provide employment for all surplus labor at all times' and asserted 'the inherent right of every citizen to employment at a living wage.'
Rationale
Hoover read it as a promise that government would give jobs, directly or indirectly, to ten million unemployed; Roosevelt's Baltimore reply (Oct 25) reaffirmed 'the responsibility of Government to see to it that workers should be kept on their jobs wherever possible' without repeating the 'all surplus labor' language.
Recorded as opponent_characterization because the only archived text is Hoover's reading of the letter at Detroit; Hoover states the New York Times printed it Oct 13–15 with Roosevelt calling it 'substantially correct.' Roosevelt never repudiated it and never repeated it. A textbook imputed-uncorrected case; upgrade to candidate_direct if the letter's original text is archived.
Statements (2)
I believe in the inherent right of every citizen to employment at a living wage and pledge my support to whatever measures I may deem necessary for inaugurating self-liquidating public works, such as utilization of our water resources, flood control and land reclamation, to provide employment for all surplus labor at all times.
Text of the Shearon letter as read by Hoover.
In his speech at Detroit he quarrels with the statement which I made to the effect that it was the responsibility of Government to see to it that workers should be kept on their jobs wherever possible and that when they were out of jobs they should be restored. I have no apology for that statement. It means precisely what it says.
Follow-through
partialcontested among sources
The CWA employed four million in the winter of 1933–34 and the WPA two to three million a year from 1935 — the largest direct government employment in peacetime — but never 'all surplus labor at all times'; unemployment stayed above 14 percent through 1940.
Mechanisms
| Date | Type | Name | Effect | Consistent? | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1933-11-09 | executive_order | Civil Works Administration charted on: Unemployment rate (NBER series, 1929–1942) | partly | Franklin D. Roosevelt: Domestic Affairs | Miller Center | |
| 1935-04-08 | statute | Emergency Relief Appropriation Act (WPA) | partly | Statement on Signing the Work Relief Bill. |
Assessments
Massive but incomplete: the WPA reached three million while millions remained jobless.
By 1937, three million Americans were receiving WPA checks for building schools, hospitals, and airports.
Reception (1)
Roosevelt has promised government employment for all ten million unemployed — a cruel and impossible promise.
I especially emphasize that promise to promote "employment for all surplus labor at all times"--by the Government.
Other positions on this issue
- Public works spending is only a stopgap, not a cure for unemployment — Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1932 directional_stance
- Expand self-sustaining public works and temporary federal work (forests, flood control, waterways), with advance planning — Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1932 specific_pledge
- Federal construction at three times normal and $1.5 billion of RFC loans for self-liquidating works — but no pork-barrel or non-productive projects — Herbert Hoover, 1932 specific_pledge
- Ratify the St. Lawrence seaway treaty and complete the inland waterway system — Herbert Hoover, 1932 specific_pledge
- The Garner-Rainey $1.2 billion public-works bill — and a pledge to reintroduce it — John Nance Garner, 1932 specific_pledge
- A $5 billion federal public-works program — roads, reforestation, slum clearance, workers' housing — and idle factories and land turned over to the unemployed — Norman Thomas, 1932 specific_pledge
1932-fdr-employment-for-all-surplus-labor-shearon-letter · created by claude-fable-5-1 · review: unreviewed