rounds perpetuated racial discrimination and shortchange black families. some even widen the gulf between white and black workers. when black leaders urged fdr to speak out against a wave of lynchings across the south and in the west he resisted almost every time, and he refused to press for an anti lynching bill giving its sponsor of the naacp a boldly political rationale. he said that the bill would cylinders of and congressional conservatives that the threatened filibuster would jeopardize the rest of this program, and he thought the country could not afford that. he enjoyed it democratic majority in congress throughout the new deal, but that doesn't mean it was a new deal majority. the harshest opposition to his program often came from conservatives in his own party, while some of his most dependable supporters were progressive republicans. fdr's delicate triangulation

between liberal and conservative blocks out raised progresses in his era, just as barack obama's political compromises outrage his progressive followers today. think about this. the securities act of 1934, which give us the securities and exchange commission and upgraded the disclosure requirements for all corporations was considered by progressives to amount to a total giveaway to wall street. the new republic greeted the final draft with these words, the stock exchange should remember franklin roosevelt with gratitude. now, this leads us into a question that, of course, is hotly debated today of whether the new deal in the depression or prolonged depression. the facts of these. by the estimation amazed and economist the great depression

ended serve and -- some time to an early to mid 1935. it grew at a blistering pace. 1933 and 1937, four times the economic growth rate that we have right now. the unemployment rate fell sharply from about 23% in 1932, hoover's last year in office to 9% in 1937. the nation's employment roll grew by nearly 10 million workers, and that was an increase of 25% in the labour force. the stock market reacted positively from roosevelt's inauguration until early 1937. the dow jones average nearly quadrupled, a record unmatched in any other for your time for a ministry. liberal economists love to see all this as a triumph of keynesian deficit funded fiscal stimulus, but the truth is for

the most part the new deal achieve this record without explicitly keynesian. in fact, the renowned economist made a famous remark in the 1960's that fiscal stimulus was unsuccessful during the 30's up because it doesn't work, but because it was not tried. in the for most of the new deals stimulus the programs are almost always appeared the counter stimulus programs. in those times inflationary program of repaired with deflationary programs. work release was paired with the economy act. public works was higher excise tax. measures to push up prices for farm commodities were pared by -- paired with industrial price fixing by general johnson's nra which made the crisis on the farm, as it happens to much worse. the unemployment assistance provisions of the social security act or balanced -- may

be overbalanced by the new social security tax that went into effect on january 1st 1937, a working class tax. in fact a man was not until 1938 when fdr had to address the sudden sharp recession that the new deal and planted an explicit stimulus program of a large-scale public works and unemployment relief of the sort familiar to us today. that program stop the recession in its tracks and set the stage for an even sharper recovery, one of the strongest in american history. that's not to say that the new deal didn't boost federal spending. the budgetary out flow rose from 7% of gross domestic product in 1932 to 10% and 39. and the federal deficit, which had been about half a percent of gdp in 1931 rose to nearly 6% in 1934. the notion that the depression did not end until 19 -- until will work to derive from the

fact that spending and the deficit both soared between 1941 and 1945. the trend of increased and really started much earlier. the new dealers did not really think of their spending a stimulus. there were new dealers who were the inherent and pressed for much more, but there were largely ignored. roosevelt and his inner circle thought of their spending programs, especially work release and government construction as a way to keep the unemployed fed and housed and spending money to buy time while they try everything else and incidently while the economy tried to cure its own disease. but all of this summit did have a stimulative effect, even if they didn't think of it that way. thus far we'll talk about the economic context and some of the specific initiatives that were put into place. what about the political context mac i would like to spend some time on this because i think

roosevelts approached his political opposition has much to teach barack obama and maybe the rest of us. i already alluded to in major distinction between the political environment of the new deal and today. in the 30's the line up in congress was very different from what you see today. both parties, a democrat and republican and very strong progressive wings. in fact one of the strong this progresses, let's say liberal in the senate and the 1930's was california's own senior senator hiram johnson, the very man who as governor had given as the initiative process. johnson was a republican. in fact, he ran for vice president in 1912 with teddy roosevelt on the progressive or bull moose ticket. now, both parties also have very strong conservative wings. among the democrats it was that block of senators and congressman from the solid south, some of whom would splinter off from the party into

the dixiecrats and ron strom thurmond for president in 1948. roosevelt also faced impeccable antagonism from big business which complained that he was creating uncertainty in the industrial economy from all his regulating and showed labor and stock and bond trading, food and drug safety, and everything else i think we have heard lately this same crime of uncertainty from regulation which goes to show that some things in politics never change. today liberals complain about the conservative back a chamber, the influence of fox news and what have you. of course there wasn't a fox is in the 1930's, but the very same role was played by the newspaper industry, which was almost entirely controlled by conservative businessmen. i can tell you from reading their editorial that some of them would make fox news blessed today. [laughter]

but fdr was a master of freeing the fight to his opponents, especially those in big business and on wall street. his speeches are filled with blistering comebacks against attacks on him by the businessmen. consider how he responded to the formation of the american liberty league by several conservative democratic finance years, including the dupont family. the league announced as its two founding principles one to teach the necessity of respect the rights of property and to teach the duty of government to encourage and protect free enterprise. well, roosevelts opinion was withering. he described it as, and i quote, an organization that only advocates to out of the ten commandments. [laughter] he continued, the two particular attendance of this new organization say you shall love god and then forget your

neighbor. the concerns of government to decide these two points are about people who want to keep themselves free from starvation, keep a roof over their head, lead decent lives, have proper educational standards, and the concern of government is the protection of the life and liberty of the individual against elements in the community that seek to enrich and advance themselves at the expense of their fellow citizens . in public fdr never ceased challenging the money interests. perhaps his most famous speech in this plane and a pre-election rally in madison square garden just before election day 1936. he said, and i quote again, tonight i call the roll of millions in never had a chance, starvation wages, women in sweat shops and children had limbs. written on the of the names of farmers whose acres yielded only bitterness, businessmen his books were portions of disaster,

homeowners who were faced with eviction. we will continue to seek to improve working conditions for the workers of america to reduce hours over a long to increase wages and to end the labor of children and wipe out sweatshops for all these we have only just begun to fight. never before in our history of these forces include so united, unanimous in their heat for me, and i welcome their hatred. [laughter] now, i think we can all imagine what the response would be on cable news if those very same words were uttered by barack obama. for all that i don't think it's right to criticize president obama for not being franklin delano roosevelt. roosevelt was a unique political figure with the unique talent for reaching out with his voice from the previous speakers and millions of home and holding his

audiences. plus obviously times have changed and we changed with them . the great depression and the crash of 1929 on the wrong and. the crash of 2008 and the great recession on the other. there are important differences. for one thing, let's not forget that by that time fdr was inaugurated the depression had been going on for nearly four years. the farm belt more than ten years. so long and deep skepticism, even hatred for wall street have become profoundly ingrained in the american psyche. that was reinforced by a very aggressive investigations dazed by the senate finance committee under his chief counsel for men to form. that laid out the nation's biggest bankers connive and conspired to cheat the little man out of his life savings of the biggest banks have more

profitable and, by the way, got away without paying income tax. well, quite frankly the recession of 2008 did not last long enough to create the same effect. more to the point, government was not stuck without its strategy as it had been in 1929. the strategy in 2008 came mostly from the new deal playbook, spend to keep people from starving, stimulate the economy with public works, and rely on the social safety net, unemployment, social security, work release that was created under the new deal. so bankers and businessmen who had every bit as much to do with the crash of 2008 as they did the crash of 1929 have been able to evade regulations of the stringency that they were faced with in the 1930's. maybe it is that the public has become so used to bankers making outrageous salaries and bonuses that it is hard to get people stood up in more. maybe it is that president obama does not have the gift that fdr

has a putting his positions into words and images that the average american can easily understand. i might say that progress is today don't seem to have the hard to defend their own record, something fdr never stopped doing during the new deal. even when he had to tell voters that the job of reversing the misery of the depression was an unfinished job, roosevelt continually reminded them of everything the new deal had achieved, record that resemble in terms of challenging the status quo, president obama's passage of the stimulus bill and health care reform. the achievements which, by the way, he and his democratic colleagues seem unaccountably shy about. by contrast to 1938 when fdr proposed his most sweeping stimulus program yet to stem a new recession he observed in a fireside chat that although unemployment was still too high and economic growth still too

slow the real despair of the depression was a thing of the past. in other words, the new deal worked. he reminded them, this recession has not returned us to the disasters of suffering. your money in the bank is safe. farmers are no longer in deep distress and have greater purchasing power. dangers of security speculation had been minimized, national income is almost 50 percent higher than it was in 1932 demand government has an established and accepted responsibility for relief. that last point is another one that fdr never ceased making. the importance and the responsibility of government to act. here has only put it in another fireside chat in 1937. i've never had some of the but the point of view that a session of congress is an unfortunate intrusion of what they call

politics into our national affairs. democratic government can never be considered an intruder into the affair of a democratic nation. but i think we all know too well the necessity of preserving the principles of american government that were introduced during roosevelt new deal and have remained under attack virtually ever since. nonstop for nearly 80 years. i want to spend the last few minutes of my time putting those in perspective. let's tell the story through social security, which was the cornerstone of the new deal and to the state stands as the jewel in its crown. we keep hearing today that social security is going bankrupt, that it does not really have any money, that it is a ponzi scheme in which today's workers simply put in cash to that today's retirees in taken out. to "rick perry, a monstrous lie. well, i am here to tell you that none of that is true. what is true is that there is no getting away from our shared

responsibility for one another, the shared responsibility that was the beating heart of the new deal. the principle that the drafters of social security understood very, very well, and here is what the chief draftsman of the social security act told congress when it began debating his work. whether they are supported by children or society, the economic crime has to be paid. the money expended by families in support of their elders is money available to the new generation in support or for investment and growth. with the union act pension laws are not, that cost is there. the growing number of all people will have to be supported by the generation that living. but you do it in the form of pensions or some other way there is no way of escaping my call. and i think that reinforces the great virtue of security, which is that it made the older generation, have real

degeneration independent. that is important not only for the older generation, but for the younger generation who was free, to a great extent, not completely, nor does anyone want to be, from responsibility for his or her own elders, was free to a certain extent from the financial burden of supporting the older generation, and that is important for economic growth when you hear social security is a ponzi scheme, keep in mind that is what it's all about, that's what its critics want to take away from you, and that is independence. i only hope that democrats and congress keep that thought front and center as they beat down yet more attempts to get social security. so, once again, ever since its very first provision was enacted in march 1933 the new deal has been under attack. as my book points out, there was plenty about it that deserve to be attacked. most of the critics of the new

deal just want to turn back the clock, to recreate an american system of economic policy that had been born in the 19th century and that had been shown by the great depression to be unequal to the needs of the '20s, much less the 21st. well, that phase of american government died in 1929 and went to the great depression and ultimately to the new deal. what we discovered then is that society does not state any money by moving the bill from government to the individual and that by doing so you could actually cost lives. the lesson we learned then was that we are all in this together and that a policy based on telling people you are on your own really benefits only a very small portion of the population. the elements in the community to seek to enrich and entrench themselves at the expense of their fellow citizens. the question i will leave with you right now is, why do we keep having to learn that lesson over and over?

since it is a question i may not be able to answer, will open the floor to questions that you may have that i hope i can answer. thank you. [applause] [applause] question in the back. >> the ideal time that the new deal save capitalism. >> well, the question is do i concur with the idea that fdr said capitalism. that is a very interesting question. because demand back to my think that's what he had in mind. there were new dealers in his administration, people in his brain trust which preceded the new deal who wanted a much more radical approach to the bank. they wanted to nationalize the bank. it was never something that was really on fdr's reader screen.

he really wanted to address the crisis by focusing on the abuses of capitalism, not by remaking the entire structure. [inaudible] >> the legislation passed that led to the goal confiscation in 1934 also established exchange stabilization fund. can you address that? >> well, 1934, i think what you're talking about was the aberration of the gold bond and contracts. >> the stabilization fund. >> right. >> i am doing research right now for a sequel to inside job, and this is one of the things that has come up, and it is quite touching. >> i don't know as much about it as i do about the aggregation of the gold bond, which was a controversial thing, as i'm sure you know. essentially the outflow of gold from the united states and the

movement of the old was a big problem for economic policy makers during the new deal. in part because roosevelt really wanted to remove and take america off of the gold standard . so in 1933 are 1944 congress passed a law that aggregated in all contracts amid including federal contracts that said those contracts to be sold in gold. low, the case went up to the u.s. supreme court, and there was so much tension about how the supreme court would rule that there was an open line between the white house and joe kennedy's office, the chairman of the sec. roosevelt actually had an executive order drafted in which if the supreme court ruled against him he was going to aggravate the supreme court decision. and if that was to happen joe kennedy was the closest. well, the supreme court, this

was just before it really started returning all of the new deal initiatives it could get its hand on. the supreme court said it is wrong and illegal for the government to have aggravated the gold clause in the contract, but the people who were before us, the individuals who brought the lawsuit that we are really on today did not have standing to bring the lawsuit. we are upholding the goal lawns. we don't have it. so it was a great moment, but that was the contents. yes ma'am. >> you mentioned that before. a very important figure throughout this entire administration. you present him in the context of the building of the hoover dam. is his behavior throughout the

new deal consistent with that? was that just an aberration of his behavior? >> which behavior in connection with the hoover dam you talking about? >> things like demanding that it be called boulder damage to the hoover dam and that kind of stuff. >> well, he was franklin roosevelt's interior secretary, and he was the man who took hoover's name of river dam, renamed it boulder dam and was eventually overruled in 1947 by republican congress, which is why we once again college hoover dam. very characteristic. as i said, he was a republican who was known as a curmudgeon and worse. he was a devoted progressive, and he detested herbert hoover. pat, not only did he hate hoover. he was very suspicious of hoover. he was convinced that hoover was out there insinuating himself trying to undermine the new deal , which wasn't entirely wrong.

now very important figure in part because he was one of only one of two cabinet members in the roosevelt administration his serve franklin roosevelt for all 12 years that roosevelt was in office, the other one being frances perkins. he was a very important aide and adviser to roosevelt. roosevelt did not always taken very seriously. he was the curio, a curmudgeon, would try to get his weight by threatening to resign, but he was also known, the reason that roosevelt put him in charge of the public works ministration which ended up with jurisdiction over a river dam was that he was convinced that it would be so careful with the public's money that he would always disperse it very slowly, which could result. and he did. never a scandal at the public

works and ministration commanded give us some truly enduring public works. this gentleman right here. >> i don't know if you have done any reading on patrick moynihan discussion and studies of security. if he was alive today some of the things that he can say about the condition of social security. if i remember correctly, he looked at it more as a mathematical equation, in other words, the mortality, the age at which -- and the birth rate, is that not still -- >> well, a lot of complexities about social security. in fact a member of the commission in 1982, the greenspan commission that save

social security when it truly was in crisis, which i would say is in distinction to today when it is not in crisis. moynihan actually was -- he did have those views that you talked about. he thought that social security was not in its form then a sustainable program, but that was a minority view, even on that commission, and that commission included a conservative like bob dole and greenspan who was by no means. i think his view that social security at the time, the majority view and even if they would have been the majority view, some of the things that he pointed out actually have been rectified, rectified but in 1982, 1983 reforms, which put social security on a much stronger fiscal standing. i think you have a question.

>> the influence of the supreme court during the administration of fdr's. one of the more interesting things today has been the supreme court decision to characterize corporations with the same free-speech rights as individuals and doing away with some of the reform in terms of contributions. it is going to have a fairly dramatic effect. >> i agree. >> the influences will be significant. can you expand on your thoughts where that is going to go forward? >> well, the gentleman is talking about the citizens united ruling and maybe some others that really overturned restrictions on corporate spending. i think the current administration probably is getting a lot of heartburn from the thought about the makeup of the supreme court, especially if health care reform is up before

this court as it looks almost certain to do. just to focus a little bit more on the supreme court new deal age, as i think many of you know, starting in 19 -- the supreme court starting in 1935 embarked on a concerted campaign to overturn major new deal initiatives. it ruled unconstitutional the agricultural administration -- the adjustment administration, which was designed to save the farm belt. the overturned the nra which was the industrial and along. you an overturned minimum wage laws. the court then was controlled really by a group of four very, very conservative justices, the four horsemen, there were called .

justice on their side. some of the most stunning rulings about the supreme court overturning the new deal were actually 9-0 rulings because justices like louis brandeis who was a progressive hero actually was very suspicious of big government. there were suspicious of big business, but there were suspicious of big this in all. now, that whole time friend ended in 1937 after franklin roosevelt tried to pad the court, which is a subject is treated in my book immobile have not talked about it tonight. the supreme court eventually came around. most important ruling is upheld, for example, social security to the 1937. so we know the social security is constitutional the matter what you may hear. but the court, you know, is always a joker in the deck for administrations that a try to address the status quo.

yes. >> mine is anecdotal of my experience in the new deal and before. okay? born in 1926. we did very well. my father was a manager at a department store in canton ohio. we lived on which road which overlooks the railroad tracks, and i would see the road cars covered with a young man who were dirty, bearded, and looking quite desperate. in 1934 my father lost his job. we had to move to california. @booktv will go out there in the

sunlight. fortunately we did not start, but i'm sure glad we came here. then the new deal took 11 million people, including these young men come off the road cars and put them to useful work, magnificent work along with the w. teeeight which hired writers and playwrights and all sorts of people. >> a sense in my book about what was known of federal one. >> right. now, 20 years later i was a physician working in harlan county, kentucky, bloody harland i had to go up the three see road. it was built by the civilian conservation corps. i went up that road to a minor in his bed lying in his shack

with his whole family around him. he was diagnosed as terminal tuberculosis, even though he had had streptomycin for two years of that time. the miners were on strike for one year because of the terrible health care conditions they were on strike for. health care system. i called the hospital of the you northwest system, and that day and ambulance was sent out and carry that man to the hospital. >> as you pointed out, it was the ccc that actually brought that road. one of the great achievements of that particular program. >> yes. >> have i read emmy's his review of your book? >> do you have any comments?

>> i thought -- of course i was familiar with her book. a conservative writer is book on the great depression is called the forgotten man. it is basically a critique of the new deal. i have some critiques of her book in my book. [laughter] though i kept them to the footnotes. i thought it was under the circumstances very generous and quite gracious. i told her that i appreciated that she had actually perceived what i was trying to achieve with my book. i would be happy to debate the political and economic context of the new deal with her any time, though i assume that we would end up agreeing to disagree. yes. >> tell long did it take you to

research and write the book? what you planning to do next? >> it took me -- the whole project took a little bit more than three years. my next project is going to be something very different, which is going to be a look at nuclear science and politics from the 1940's to the 1950's. >> i spent most of july in the national parks of the western states. what is really amazing about the national parks is the tremendous amount of work that was done that is the result of the new deal. what's also interesting is very little has been done since then. and some of these pro rims that come about as a result of the need to stimulate the economy by things that would never have otherwise been done. at the national park system. i'm not sure how much time you spent on the national parks.

the new deal on the national parks, but very little has been done to the national parks since then. the did not focus on them personally, but as you said, they were the product of a lot. has been pointed out, product of a lot of the work-release programs that were part of the new deal, including the triple c and the wpa which focused on smaller scale projects in which more money went into labor then went in to material in contrast to new york or the bay bridge or what have you. the point that you raise about how little has been done since then is a very important point and really is it reproached us today. these new deal programs that the public for some restoration and the works progress, the cwa which was the wpa, always the of bed.

take advantage of the availability of labor and the need to keep money flowing in the economy, to do things, first of all, for projects that states and localities wanted, but also for projects that were visionary , the states, localities, the federal government did not even know they wanted or needed until the system being built. well, we have let all of this essentially go to hell, i think. we have not spent money on upkeep. we have not expanded. a lot of these researchers and monuments to building. certainly of the last 90 years we have really stopped spending, and i think that the newest plans of 2009, there was an idea that it should address some of that, but it's obviously been slow. there has not been enough money. more should be done because

stimulus, public works of that nature are actually investments in the economy. as i said, we drive on the structures. we get water and electricity from them. we fly out of them. laguardia airport was the single largest construction project of the new deal. and they have been oil in the gears of the u.s. economy ever since. we have let it turn to stand. yes, sir. >> i am wondering if you might be allowed to speak to the political comparison between then and now. you made some of the observations, things that were different. one key being that roosevelt came into office three years after the collapse of the economy when there was already kind of a huge head of steam and

anger directed at some of the big financial institutions. obama took office kind of a around the time or the beginning of a collapse. what, if anything, you could prognosticate about his chances because of those political differences. >> well, as i said, there were political similarities and differences. roosevelt by no means had an easy time of it, even though he came and treaty did have a head of steam, this desire on all sides to get something done. you really saw that during the hundred days when he proposed 16 separate pieces of legislation, they all got enacted. yes, there was a majority of democratic congress, but it was not by any means an exclusively progress of congress keeps. but there was real fear, real desperation among politicians and, of course, among taxpayers

and the public. politicians really felt that. so suddenly at the beginning there were not inclined to stand in his wake. opposition, both on the republican and democratic side began to emerge very quickly. roosevelt had to -- he had to try and do it. he had to do a lot of compromising all the way through the new deal starting in late 1933 right through 19373839 of mark is the end of the new deal. it was not very long before you started to your conservative congressman and senator standing up and sang that spending is insane. we are spending ourselves into bankruptcy. very close to what you hear today. and they did go into withdrawing stimulus in 1937 and the result

was a rose of recession. so that is the lesson that we have if we just listen to a. sometimes you need more stimulus, but the real danger is removing it before it's time. now, in terms of prognosticating , i am always of two minds of making political predictions. on the one hand i try to avoid them because every political prediction you here today is stored to be wrong. whether it is for me or anybody else, and some fundamental way. on the other hand i'm not unwilling to make predictions because when they do or don't come true no one will remember that. [laughter] despite the record the bear going to have on c-span. it is all about what is the alternative and articulating an alternative. what policies are out there. i think the election is going to

be a debate about politics. thus far i have heard proposals from the democrats. i have not heard anything that sounds to me like it will work from the other side, especially not in light of what we know about how the new deal works. >> ronald reagan famously or infamously said that government is not the solution to the problem, government is the problem. i wonder if you might comment on the notion that the ronald reagan era had a significant role in crystallizing some of these forces and not incidentally lay some of the tough groundwork the barack obama faces in terms of moving the stone up till.

>> well, i don't have any doubt. don't think there is any doubt among historians or historians of the recent past that it is correct that it was reagan who did crystallize this notion that was not a new notion when he came into office that government interferes. i think the notion really started as a republican tennant undergo water, but it was reagan who picked up the ball and ran with it and of course had the personal popularity to turn it into a more popular or more broadly accepted idea or ideology. this goes to the "that i've read you from roosevelt. roosevelt never -- fundamental to the new deal that there was

nothing wrong and there was nothing evil and there was everything right about the government stepping in when private enterprise with true. now, that is an economic sense a case in point of view, but the new dealers to my would say it were a pro keynesian because they were not actually familiar with john maynard keynes. perry widely known in the u.s. they did understand that when private enterprise and the private sector was withdrawn from the economy that it was really the governments to the the government had naturalist but to step in, and that the present was very explicit about this. he did not apologize for it. he thought, in fact, that was his role. that was the role of government. that was the major flaw of the hoover urbanization. they shared some fundamental economic police, but where there really differed was in their

willingness to use the powers that they could find in law and in the constitution to get things done. >> okay. the gentleman in the back. >> i'm just curious why you think fdr's continue saying no to the aspiration of african-americans and said yes to every reactionary seven chairman that the congressional committee to the point of casting the margin on washington >> well, i don't think there is much mystery. he recognized that the server unblock, particularly in the senate was an extremely powerful bloc and that they were interested to on these sorts of issues and would simply not give way. now, some of the commentary that you hear about issues like the anti lynching law which came up. senator robert wagner of new york but that year after year

after year, and it debt of the the threat of filibuster or a filibuster would defeated. the commentary is that even though the idea of an anti lancing long actually was very popular. opinion polls show the majority of americans in favor of it even in the south. you did have this block in the senate that was determined to fight it and to prevent it from happening. you did not have a countervailing passion on this side of getting it done in this encounter that i talked about the few minutes ago, they went to the white house and said you will be able to defeat the threat of a filibuster if you make the anti lynching bill an administration bill. there was a procedural step, and it would have made it much harder for the filibuster to take place.

reza wasn't the did not want to do it. up the rest were too high. did not have a personal commitment to racial equality or to civil rights. that role in the administration as i'm sure you know was played by eleanor roosevelt and by harold ickes who before he joined the federal government had been the president of the chicago chapter of the naacp. it was both a man is to get marion anderson to sing in front of the lincoln memorial which is in my book. fact, it is dakota to my book because that was the first moment in which you can see this commitment by the federal government to that sort of racial equality. interestingly enough if you go back and you looked at a contemporary commentary by negro writers as -- the set to turn. before the 1936 election the crisis which was the house organ

of the naacp founded by w. e. b. du bois issued a judgment about the four candidates running for president in 1936. the republican fdr, the democrat norman thomas as the socialist and the communist candid. the crisis that for the negro in america, if we had to choose the best choice for us would be first earl browder and second norman thomas. but we recognized that there had been very little chance of getting elected. the other two, we will go with roosevelt. it is true, and it is sort of their reports to the new deal that they did not take that. it did not take racial politics very seriously at the time. last question.

>> eleanor roosevelt, how influential lushy in regards to the new deal and the politics involved? >> well, in most respects in most respects we have to say she was a peripheral figure. she was not involved in any of the major initiatives, even social security. she was pursuing her own agenda, and one might almost say that when she did have an influence it was a native influence command that was in the creation of resettlement communities, particularly a community in west virginia. eleanor roosevelt had this idea where she had been in cocaine with this idea and if you could import farmers to an ideal collective community, provide them with cows and barnes,

schools for the children, houses , you would be able to create something. the pores of the poor. the depth of the coal mining district, the land was not good. this was the first lady's project, so it got a lot of funding and it was under harold ickes who really hated it. and, in fact, it was pretty much a disaster. the government overspent on houses, imported houses for the coal district from new england that turned out to not be insulated and did not fit in the foundations. the government spent $10,000 per family when the budget was really 2,000. they wanted to give every family cow before they realize that most of these families had never melt to count. they create -- they built the school house for the children of these imported farm families and

staffed it with exponents of the latest and progressive education only for the farm families to discover that their kids are not learning how to read, write, and do arithmetic. so it all sort of came apart. it lasted about five years, but it existed because of the first lady. on the other hand, she really was a beacon on civil-rights. the whole marion anderson controversy which started when marion anderson, operatic soprano and american soprano was on a singing tour, she came to washington, was supposed to sing at freedom hall in washington which was owned by the daughters of the american revolution which had a policy of whites only on the stage. a member of the dia art.

this controversy simmers for several months, and then she wrote a letter and resigned. that put it on the front page. one of the most magnificent cultural moments in american history. marion anderson singing america from a makeshift stage in front of the lincoln memorial to 50,000 people. it really certified that hope for everybody was a part of this of ministration. thank you for coming. [applause] [applause] >> for more information and to read the of this column visit l.a. times dot com and search michael hall set -- hiltzik. >> next authors fred brown and jim mcdonald talk about their book, growing up seven.

>> the title of your book is growing of southern, how the south. my first question, how does the south it riders. >> we ask that question to that 13 writers that we interviewed. what makes a southern writer, what is a southern writer. is a southern writer any different from a writer al west or in the east or something like that. and most said that the writers in the south may not be -- the class by themselves as writers. they view themselves as southern writers because they live in the south but are americans on the last. very american, very southern. place. the west may be riding bay and larger. larger themes and everything.

a little more compact. at least these writers that we interviewed, all who were born before world war ii, that was sort of their definition. yes jemima's seven writer, but i am unamerican as well. i read about southern themes that all americans can appreciate and indoor. when we interviewed the great southern writer. it said that same question. what is it about the self that makes a writer southern. when he was a child he got into office by the something the fight that you lose of a once you remember. of course the self was on the losing end.

as we say, the late unpleasantness, the war between the states of the civil war, and that is the one we remember. you write about those. it creates tension. the south was wrong in that war. it did not think it was. and so we have a built-in kind of tension already in our lives, mostly for the seveners my age, that generation that we interviewed. we recall readily this a war. he had other grandparents or great-grandparents' that they could recall having met, talked to, heard, and even interviewed some of the civil war veterans when he was the answer. that presence of mind, that connection to the land, the people, the history that creates

all this tension we tend to read about that. >> of funny anecdotes. he lived in this house. sort of look like an old mansion. i guess it was. and we retain the really know this is our window. right down in this wonderful southern accent. that document was all blown over. there was a founder covered with moss. when he came down and said i love your garden. it's in disarray. the man had to care of it has left. as a venture of the back. no. i believe.

a lot of southerners i same matter-of-fact and just accepting it. and they're is a real closeness to grandparents and people who themselves were storytellers. and a lot of the southern writers, the old people told them their stories. then they say, you tell me your story which make them think even more about their lives and growing up in the south. >> how do you respond to the criticism that people may say that southern writers were just the south, to come up. >> i think it's like shelby said. that war that we lost, it's the one you remember. that is the one that southerners write a lot about. when we interviewed betsy cannot betsy, but they to los the

students today have a different sound of their writing about. not carolina. right stores every seven. yet their places are and a great stretch malls and the cities that have changed dramatically since i was born and says those authors were born that we read about in this book. they grow seven. but it's still a 17. the tensions of there. i think shelby was really right about this overall picture of how seveners to pay very close attention to the history or very close to the families.

families bay, as is extended family. have a newspaper friend uses the are all causes in the south anyway. i think to a certain extent that this kind of true. we may be looking back, but our writers for the most part, you can read william faulkner today and be just as stunned by what he is saying today as they were in the 30's when he was writing these novels about the south of the past, the south of his grandfather's which was the civil war. you can read those stories today and be just as moved by those same themes as were the readers of the 30's and '40's. i don't know that we always look in the past. i know that the past has shaped us.

as fault that says, the past is not even passed. i think we are haunted by what happens in the past and how we came through as a people. made a stronger. i, for one, think that we have actually done better off and stronger for having gone through the civil-rights and civil war. now i think today if you look at the south we are very -- i think we are very solid. i think we have been blessed to have had some of the writers to we have had, such as william morrison, eudora, wealthy, and others who really have helped us reflect what happens to us here. >> kendis encore book notes from 2001 author laura clarence discusses her biography of artist norman what