>> next, burton folsom and anita folsom contend that flynn d. roosevelt used world war ii to promote his own agenda which according to the authors included the expansion of the executive branch, curtailed civil liberties and excessive spending that left the country financially ill-prepared for the japanese attack on pearl harbor and the subsequent u.s. entry into world war ii. this is about an hour. >> good afternoon and welcome to the cato institute in exile. we're glad to have you folks here and we're very proud to say that in about two months the construction on our building will be complete and we'll be back in the fay hayek auditorium but for now we're glad to be undercroft auditorium to discuss this book "fdr goes to war." a long time ago, i went to mayfield high school in mayfield, kentucky, and in my

senior year i was the coeditor of the high school newspaper, the cardinal, and i think the features editor that year was my classmate anita prince, and she has gone on to bigger things. she got married for one thing to burt folsom. she got two degrees. she worked for president reagan and she was the president-elector and most recently she has directed hillsdale college's free market forum for five years. her co-author and husband is burton folsom, jr., who holds a ph.d. from the university of pittsburgh. i actually visited pitt for the first time last fall and saw something i'd never heard of, which i'm surprised at. the cathedral of learning which is the second tallest university

building in the world the tallest one you might guess as in moscow where they always thought building something bigger they were doing something better than capitalism but this is a 42-story university building and the first floors are built like a gothic cathedral. if you're in pittsburgh, spend some time in the cathedral of learning. but burt has taught in a double of colleges and now holds the charles klein chair of history and management at hillsdale college. he also serves as senior historian at the foundation of senior foundation where you can find some of his articles and he has pushed several books into the myth of the robber barons now it's in his sixth edition in which he explains of the market entrepreneurs and political entrepreneurs which is a good text for today's increasing

discussion between capitalism and enterprise. his work on the administration of flynn roosevelt began with his book new deal or raw deal how fdr's economic legacy has damaged america. that came out in the fall of 2008 just as everybody was saying we needed to emulate what fdr had done and so it got a lot of attention and his newest book is fdr goes to war in which he co-authored with anita. as i said in my book libertarianism as a primer we're still living in the washington that roosevelt built and the president in the political system that all goes back fdr's policy and it's important to understood how fdr governed and what he changed what had gone

before. and it also, i think, has an additional importance for libertarians and that is that the libertarian movement sort of arose in opposition to roosevelt's new deal and imperial presidency. and i think particularly if you wanted to pick a date and say, when did the libertarian movement began, obviously, political movements have long prehistories and histories but if you wanted to put a date, you might say it was 1943 when three women, rose wilder lane, isabelle patterson and ayn rand all published books about individualism, free markets and constitutionally limited government and sort of brought together the nucleus of a movement of new ideas and so that's why we occasionally turn here from public policy to history and to why we are delighted to host this event today, so please welcome the co-author of "fdr goes to war: how expanded executive power

spiraling national debt and restricted civil liberties shaped wartime america." professor burton folsom. [applause] >> let me just start with some opening remarks. we got franklin roosevelt, the president, world war ii the event you can't miss an event book with those topics. you have a president just bold dramatic greater than life himself. you have the biggest military event in the history of the world, world war ii. and what we're trying to do in this book is give a history of world war ii, 300 pages, readable for today -- for people to grasp the war itself, the president who conducted the war we have a chapter of pearl harbor, and aneatlia wrote the section on midway, the turning point militarily for the united

states in many ways. you have the generals, eisenhower, patton, all conducting enterprises that were essential to victory for the united states. you have the atomic bomb itself and we have to give removes some credit of thinking ahead of what might be developed that might make a pivotal difference in the war and then you have the end finally of the great depression which dominated the thinking of a generation of americans. coming to an end at the end of world war ii. you have a lot to work with. we work with those elements in the book, "fdr goes to war" and i would like anita to start off by commenting of some of these features of world war ii and franklin. go ahead. >> it's a pleasure to be here today for cato and my old friend david boaz, thank you so much for coming, but, yes, as burt just said our goal in writing

this book was to make it larger than just an economic text, although that is very important. but it's to give everyone a book that in 300 pages or so you can read and you can get an overview of world war ii, whether you're a young person trying to learn about world war ii. we have a son who's 26 years old and i can assure you most of his friends know almost nothing about that entire period. it's just amazing. also, we have material that we think you've probably never heard before. so to get right into it, i want to set the stage a little bit about the 1930s and to explain that part of what led to world war ii being such an upevil for the united states were the policies of franklin roosevelt during the 1930s, to give you some statistics and i'll be brief on those, for instance. factory output, the output

increased every decade beginning in 1899 for the following 10 years factory output was up 14%. 1919 to 1929, the roaring '20s, factory production was up 5.1% each year. but 1929 to 1939, it decreased slightly every single year during the 1930s. so our industrial complex, of course, by 1939 has aged it's out of touch with cutting edge innovations that are going on in europe and elsewhere. and suddenly we're faced with this with this problem of a military complex in europe and we can't -- we don't have anything to compete with them. in the book i mentioned the army chief of staff douglas mcarthur

at one point testified before congress in 1935 pleading for enough money so that his army would have enough bullets for 100,000 soldiers. we're not talking about stealth bombers or complex weapons here. we're talking literally about just even enough bullets to man 100,000 army. and even -- and i can certainly understand if you're not for a strong military american presence overseas, which we don't necessarily need. i do think a strong defense of america wards off problems. and in the 1930s we certainly didn't have that and germany was aware of that and so was japan and that leads to a lot of problems. well, the war, of course, comes along to the united states in late 1941 and suddenly factories have to be converted. what are you going to do? well, overnight for one thing

they restricted products to consumers. overnight in january, 1942, you could not buy tires for your car. if your tires had been getting a little aged and you thought, oh, well, next week i'll run down to sears roebuck and get a new set of tires, you are out of luck. and the only way you could get another set of tires was to go before the government's tire board and prove that you had an essential reason for getting a new set of tires. likewise, radios, bicycles, clocks -- even clocks, the common american could no longer purchase after the spring of 1942. all of those mechanisms were used in the war effort. now, most americans supported the sudden changes. and that was, of course, with the wave of patriotism that swept through, everyone wanted to win the war. most people did. many people had new -- knew

fighting men overseas and the way the war had began with japan bombing pearl harbor before the declaration of war was given to the secretary of state and that angered everyone but what did the government do to suddenly help the american economy meet the war emergency? well, it did what it does a lot of time and it began regulating everything. the federal war production board took control of the allocation of almost all materials in the united states and said, where they would be used, it took control of the fuel supply and it took control of the war production. the wpd is one of the most powerful agencies ever created by the federal government and would employ literally hundreds of thousands of bureaucrats by the end of the war. the government issued ration books to every american, even babies.

7 million ration books were issued the very first week that rationing went into effect which was the spring of 1942 and, of course, without rationed stamps from the rations books you couldn't purchase shoes, meat, gasoline, many items. and as as soon as the ration books were issued, there's always these unintended consequences. crooks discovered that these ration books were easy to copy. now, sometimes we have a picture of world war ii and the solidarity of the american people, but it's like any other time. there's a great deal of craftiness in the human nature and it came to thieves, let's just print their own ration books and they did by the hundreds of thousands. it was big business. and the theft of ration coupons was big business. there is an account of a veteran coming home after serving in the war overseas, coming back home to central indiana during the

latter days of the war, and he's at a rally, a high school rally in central indiana giving his story a fighting the japanese and all of these hardships he endured and he went outside to the parking lot after the rally and someone had broken into his car and stolen his gas coupons. so america wasn't quite as solid as sometimes i think the rosy picture that is painted of the war years. there were a great many struggles but by and large most americans supported the war and, of course, wanted the united states to win it. entrepreneurs had to come up with new things on the good side such as aircraft manufacturer, that's where we lag behind almost -- the most glaring example. for instance, in 1940, henry ford was asked to get behind mass production of aircraft. this is before we entered the war, but they knew that he was good at assembly lines. what can we do to mass produce

airplanes? the ford sent his son edsel and top executives out to california. california 1940 was one of the main places where aircraft was built and that seems strange and why? because most were put together outside. that sounds just unbelievable they were putting planes together one at a time out in the california sunshine. well, you can't build 10,000 bombers doing that. it would take you forever in a day. ford had to figure out how to do an assembly line for b-24s and in typical henry ford fashion, he owned a farm near michigan. he turned his farm land into a bomber plant called willow run and the bomber plant had the largest room in the world to build b-24s. it even had a curve in the assembly line because it was in a county and he didn't want to go over in the county where detroit was because he didn't want to give those democrats any tax money so the assembly line curved around, too.

another huge success during world war ii that we often don't realize is the development of penicillin. penicillin was not available before world war ii. now, sulfa was developed and one of the great successes not one injured man who was injured by the japanese bombing at pearl harbor had had to have an amputation due to infection. this was a new -- this was a new world in the military medicine. because the sulfa prevented the infections and they used it liberally and it worked. the problem with sulfa it didn't deal with extremely deep wound infections in the abdomen or the chest and those are so common in war, so penicillin had to be developed and that was done with the help of the british. the british, of course --

penicillin had been discovered in the 1920s. and even before that, chemists knew certain types of mold killed bacteria and sir ian fleming publicized penicillin and the british brought their strains of penicillin of what they had and because they were so constrained with the war they were able to develop enough penicillin with five patients and they tried it with five extremely ill patients and they knew it worked extremely well and they brought it over to the american department of agriculture, do you think you can grow penicillin and they said we'll try and it was a great partnership between the department of agriculture and private pharmaceutical companies. it still took a year and a half but it revolutionized medicine for the american soldier and then eventually the american public because by 1945, penicillin was available for american citizens.

and we were very soon -- very quickly sending it overseas. so that's one of the better success stories of world war ii. but overall, the american pebble met the challenge of pulling together in this wartime emergency knowing that the japanese were sailing off the coast of california and knowing that hitler had overrun europe, they met the challenge and through the entrepreneurship and the spirit of the american people made these great contributions. now, burt is going to come and talk a little bit about the economic and what got us out of -- at the end of the war and of the great depression. burt? >> thank you, anita. you know, we look at world war ii and franklin it seems so long ago, it's 70 years since the bombing at pearl harbor, and you don't really realize that much

of american politics from foreign policy to domestic policy is shaped by the events that happened in world war ii. franklin roosevelt was very anxious for an active role of government in the american economy. of course, world war provides it in a big way and it has gone into some details but roosevelt wanted it that way and you have during the war franklin roosevelt created the national resources planning board. they were supposed to take ideas for after the war to run the american economy. roosevelt picked this up and in his state of the union speech in 1944, he talked about the economic bill of rights. the economic bill of rights -- and i quote from parts of it include the right to a useful and remunerative job.

and the right of every family to a decent home. the right to a good education, the right to good medical care. these become new rights which roosevelt described as the new economic bill of rights. sometimes he called it the second bill of rights. and they roll off the tongue so nicely, don't they? right to a decent home. don't we all want decent homes. the right to a good education. the right to a useful and remunerative job. roosevelt issued these and these become the plan for after world war ii, when the war is over, then these rights can be given for. now, if you think about it, if anita has a right to a useful and remunerative job, then someone here has an obligation

to provide that job. if i have a right to a decent home, taxpayers have an obligation to provide that home if david has a right to adequate medical care, then there's hospitals or through federal funding of some kind, those hospitals, those physicians are obligated to supply that medical care. the right to free speech does not impose obligations to you to even listen to the speech least of all pay for it. the right for freedom of religion, we're in a church here, the right of freedom of religion does not obligate anyone to go to a certain church. it just provides the opportunity for someone to practice freedom of religion. the first bill of rights by the founders are rights.

the second bill of rights impose obligations and involve the government in a big way. now, what we see in the war is a huge tax structure being set up which roosevelt will want to use after the war and will be used after the war to fund more federal programs. in 1932, the year that franklin roosevelt was elected president, the income tax maximum that anybody had to pay was 25%. that's the most anybody had to pay. top incomes. most americans did not pay income tax at all. in some ways there's a problem with that. but we only had about 5% of americans pay any income tax right before the war in 1940. by the end of the war, two-thirds of american families were paying the federal income tax. and it started at 24%.

the exemption was only $500. if you made over $500, you started paying at 24%. that then increased in a progressive way up to a maximum of 94% on all income over $200,000. that means that if you earn $300,000 on your third 100,000, you keep $6,000, you give to the government $94,000. a lot of people, thought, hey, that might stifle entrepreneurship. roosevelt believed it's essentially for providing good homes, decent educations, medical care, this will be the basis for the funding of those kinds of actions. so what we see is a dramatic increase in the taxpayer base and in tax revenue. we see withholding reduced for

the first time. withholding, we have a chapter on that that will be introduced that will take money directly out of paychecks so the government can use it right away rather than having to wait for a year. what we see as a defense of franklin roosevelt by many people -- i'd like to read from a kentucky senator, senator happy chandler, a democratic senator from kentucky. the state where david was born, where anita was born but neither of them agree with happy chandler at least on this point. he said, quote, all of us owe the government. we owe it for everything we have. and that is the basis of obligation. and the government can take everything we have if it needs it. the government can assert its right to have all the taxes it needs for any purpose, either now or at any time in the

future. the chandler view expressed on the senate floor, we pulled this out of the congressional record and many like this, are the defense of the idea of government becoming the main source not only of -- for the economy, for providing jobs, for providing health care and a tax revenue going into the government so the government programs can provide those kinds of jobs, can provide decent homes. can provide good educations. when we got to the end of the war, roosevelt died, harry truman comes in -- harry truman essentially agrees with roosevelt on many of these issues. they're different kinds of people, two very different presidents but on these issues, truman is ready to go on with a lot of this. truman comes in. the economic planners are wanting to institute this but they think the war is going to go on till 1946.

germany, of course, surrenders in '45. it appears that it will go on for a long time. truman did not know about the atomic bomb when he became president. that's one of the shocks. roosevelt had never informed him that it was being developed. in fact, one of the odd things was the day that truman became president he did not know we had an atomic bomb but stalin did. one of the ironies of history, the russians knew we had it, the president of the united states did not. happily, secretary of war stimson told that to truman early in his presidency so now he knew and when he decided to use it on japan in august, congress is out of session. it takes most of america by surprise, august 6th an atomic bomb on heiroshimhiroshima, augn nagasaki and congress were out of session and the planners did

not have a chance to send their programs and immediately truman wants to get them into session but by this time some of the congressmen you know what? this 94% tax i don't think is going to get america back on track. the keynesians completely believed it. here's truman secretary of treasury gives you, where the americans were to favor this kind of intervention. lord commander keynes came out with this idea that you need public works, stimulate aggregate demand, lots of government intervention and you will eliminate unemployment through that. and so what secretary of treasury vincent, another kentuckian by the way, fred vincent, truman's secretary of treasury says, quote -- he says this right after the war the japanese have surrendered and he wants massive government intervention and he says history shows us, business, labor, agriculture cannot ensure them the maintenance of high levels of production and employment. in other words, markets don't work.

the government must assume responsibility and take measures broad enough to meet the issues. reporter i.f. stone completely agrees, as do many other reporters. stone says, quote, new agencies, new ideas, new directions end necessary or quickly if we are not to suffer relapse into a chronic mass of unemployment. the war's transfusions are no longer available to an alien capitalism. this ailing capitalism no longer has this worse transfusion. 12 million soldiers are coming home. immediately we've got to have these government programs for them. they predicted without massive government programs, new wpa's, new programs to build roads to programs to train people without these programs, in effect -- roosevelt -- excuse me, truman, roosevelt also, wanted to build like the tennessee valley

authority for the tennessee valley, others all around the country, other types of public works programs other types of use of dams, building of public works very much in truman's mind. unless these things happen, they predicted, listen, we got 12 million veterans coming home. senator kilgore of west virginia said i predict 19 million unemployed. it's going to be worse than the great depression, it will be worse than the 25% we had when roosevelt came into office. "time" magazine, others estimated no, maybe just 10 or 12 million unemployed. that's still going to put it at about 20%. predictions are very high unemployment. what do we get? 2 senators, one republican, one democrat say no. the chairman of the senate finance committee, senator walter george of georgia said this -- he supported a revenue act of 1945, which cut tax

rates, i'll get into that in a minute, but he said this, if this revenue act has the effect which it is hoped to have, it will so stimulate the expansion of business as to bring in a greater total revenue and create more jobs at the same time. in other words, i think we can get more revenue into the government and i think we can get more jobs created if we cut the tax rates and allow businesses to expand. it was a model completely different from the roosevelt model in the economic bill of rights. and he was -- we had the republicans agree, senator albert hawks a republican of new jersey said this, the repeal of the excess profits tax in my opinion may raise more revenue for the united states than would be raised if it were retained and it was at 90%. we had a 90% corporate tax. and hawks is saying, if you'll cut that tax below 90%, i think we can actually not only create more jobs because you stimulate

more business but you'll actually grow the economy and get more revenue at the same time. and hawks added this statement, senator hawks, you cannot get a golden egg out of a dead goose. hawks led enough republicans and senator george led enough democrats to pass the revenue act of 1945. and the revenue act of 1945 cut the corporate tax from 90% to 38%. imagine that. 90% to 38%. it cut the personal income tax. plus, it promised more cuts later. this is the first one. this is all we can get through now. more are coming later. we cut what was known as the capital stock tax. you had to pay a tax on every share of stock you owned. .. tax. it promised more cuts later. this is the first one. more are coming later. it was the capital stock tax. we eliminated that. we eliminated regulation and slash federal spending and

no longer be the takes more ammunition. the end results is the massive economic expansion. business is finally. and do these taxes 13 years even the hoover administration was not too good. now the tax rates our cut it is time to expand if you look at the postwar economy so much we take for granted today. and then mcdonald's gets going. television, xerox, all of these kinds of our entrepreneurs come to the fore after world war ii with a tremendous growth one of the most exciting statistics is we have 39 million people

employed civilian employment coming up at 55 million. the stock market increased by 20% 1946. private gnp increase 30% the only time it has done that in history. and further, the experts were estimating i think we will get $31 million in the federal treasury we have 31 billion. increasing more than 25% because the economy had expanded so much more than people expected. the end result is 3.9 percent unemployment in 1947 the united states has the burgeoning growth rate and rainier of who is trying to the keynesian means to get

back on their feet come with united states is able to send tons and tons of food over to feed the europeans to a different points were dying at the rate of one per second. those deaths were curtailed by the free food united states sent over after the war. the economy recovered and we cut the federal deficit during 1946 through 47. slightly because the revenue so much exceeded expectations. what i say is we have a lot during gold were to four lessons for today what works and what doesn't or the taxes we have come to expect, the economic bill of rights, the right to education was a student loan program, it changes with the

housing to a decent home going with urban renewal than the community reinvestment act of the '70s to promise very low interest rates to poor people so they could have homes to a accelerate the mortgage crisis that becomes an hinge to and the right to medical care so i simply say the politics of today have happily shaped from world or to but if you study more carefully, said we got out of the great depression by freeing up the economy to cut tax rates not by following the prescription to increase and perpetuate the high economic growth that we experienced during world war ii. thank you. [applause]

>> host: thank you. now we will open as for questions please wait for the microphone. i'll ask the first question come i read this book and i found it more straight forward and sober history than i thought from that "fdr goes to war" how expanded executive power, spiraling national debt, and restricted civil liberties shaped wartime america" did the marketers write the subtitle? [laughter] >> guest: this subtitle was developed by simon & schuster publishers but the person who developed it didn't on loan the basis of saying i deduce this from a content of the book and i think today is reasonable we talk about the growth of the production board come in the price control

control, rationing, the spiralling national debt, it doubled the first year of roosevelt or the first two terms of his presidency. then increase it is sixfold during world war ii. so what you have at the end is a national debt of $260 billion and the interest so we go from having to national debt of 20 billion to having the interest rate of 20 billion on the national debt that was almost 300 billion. so the national debt and a gross of the spending and that economic bill of rights you would perpetuate that is a big part of the war and the civil liberties we have not done as much with a record japanese-americans in turn roosevelt using

wiretaps extensively. it is essential for national defense. enemies could be sending messages. suddenly he wiretaps republicans that he wiretaps his wife eleanor some reseat the abuse of the civil liberties as well as well as shutting down magazines and newspapers even so the own attorney general had to fight him. that is a fair deduction of the content of the book although i have to give simon & schuster credit for doing the subtitle price think any dad got the main titled "fdr goes to war." >> my name is steve tisch george per car was thrown by the title of the book that

the tax rates had reached prewar levels but the other instances, the rationing direction of production to win the war, the consequences of the expanding debt i am not sure any other president would not have ended up with the same focus after the two potion war. >> part of the premise is one of the reasons we wound up of the haitian the tuition more because rissole week during the 1930's and we have been for may shin in "fdr goes to war" fdr cut military spending during the 1930's and terms of the percentage of military spending in the federal budget. this was on top of the factoring there who were presidency military budgets were very low. the american military was incredibly weak and behind

the rest of the world. we were 17 in terms of military strength and innovation. but as we shows through 40 in 41 through pearl harbor harbor, she has already declared military emergencies.wj and i agree any president faced with a war emergency has to do certain things but the extent to which roosevelt looked at this as an opportunity to really put

his big government ideas into action, and especially you get this with taxation. he had been wanting high rates of withholding from a huge percentage of americans for his entire life and he used the emergency to get that through. with respect to things quickly. the standard narrative for the post war boom is the more spending built up this enormous pent-up demand in americans and i think the narrative you've explained is a counter to that on the regulations and tax rates

truman so aligned with roosevelt on this matter do you believe it had roosevelt not buy it had he been healthy and not die in april of 45, that he somehow would have managed to do what truman according to you wanted to do but because of political naivete or whatever failed to do what roosevelt do you think have done that and presume it and if he would have done what he wanted to do, keep tax rates high to pursue that keynesian rather than supply side strategy than we wouldn't have had the postwar boom. >> what roosevelt have been likely to continue the new deal programs, the new deal movement? than truman?that is was just truman's political naivete? >> that accounts for some of it.

thank you.ngress andaving roosevelt had vast experience i theget congress, and had enorms confidence he could get his wayl on most things. plan the revival is what we call thea new deal revival, his plan for the postwar america of courseut you point out he died before he could do that. true in by the end of this remember he didn't even know web had an atomic bomb. he's trying to appoint cabinet members and find out what is going on because roosevelt kept him in the dark plus as a senator he hadn't had that close of access to the executive branch so he's still learning the job and the essence is because he is still learning the job he hasn't developed the political skills to be able to get what roosevelt might have been able to get.ept it then could roosevelt have isg achieved this.l skills ndme of these counterfactuali wo questions and i wonder if roosevelt would have been able to do it.

>> one thing that's interestings and we point this out in left your goes to war is that fdr had lost a lot of clout in congress in 39 and 40. his court packing scheme in 38 really angered a lot of peoplef and tried to purge various members of congress and senate. one was the senator from maryland and if you notice in the book they lead a filibuster to defeat several of the proposals that fdr once passed before congress adjourns in the summer of 1939.ch so he lost.eral people were very suspicious ofi9 him and the way that heous the wa manipulated. rking estimates it's tricky too because he was only working 20 hours a day or 20 hours a week. he had gone from 20 hours a day.

to 20 hours a weektions said its stress so roosevelt was only working half time. it is hard to be effective when you only work have time. although walter george was the subject of a purge result tried to get a modern office which is one reason he was so hostile to world war ii. some of chairman of the senate finance committee opposing you but it is hard to say if he would have tried and if you think roosevelt cannot pull this off tht someing th n pull and then that person ends up being an ally and is able to put off. certainly was easier for senator george they in a healthy roosevelt.

>> and other political change there was the democratic primaries. >> his son democratic senator and if you look at the influence of fdr rating in the waning since lyndon johnson who was in a member of congress with big government programs of course, from the elections of 1940. >> for example, he wants to put moses annenberg in prison and. a republican paper and if you go after those this on the irs audit that was vulnerable so he does not just pay the fine goes to

present than johnson is guilty of misuse of campaign contributions with his supporters and now the irs goes after john sen. so he comes to roosevelt. he has to pull the iras off of johnson so they could continue to be his man in texas then put them on moses annenberg to make sure they go to prison so fdr did call both of those off. dealing with the executive branch it could be powerful. >> where you both united in the way you viewed economic relations or the lack of with united states and japan leading up through world war ii?

how surprised do you believe the united states was with the attack on pearl harbor? >> i think we were pretty united with our view and i did the majority of the work so i will answer first. we do think in we point* out in the early pages 1933 met even before inaugurated, he talks with two of his advisers and they are a big new dealers part of the brain trust part columbia professors with the government directed economy and of course, those directing the economy should be intellect. anr mentioha and fdr mentions that he's always favored china and he thinks the world of japan might

work better sooner than later so why not flippant side to his nature and level point* out he had never been in a foxhole or the military or shot out. he took that rather lightly if you look at the men that died in the pacific i find that a policy he let them go into those exposed areas with such bad weapons and many of those men could blame fdr but as far as pearl harbor goes, we cut off the japanese from their resources and interesting study is to read the paper of the ambassador who is in tokyo during the 30's and pleading with washington to pop off the embargo.

and to put the embargo off. finn tune out embargo and scrap iron makes it difficult for the japanese to receive that to achieve ascendancy in tokyo. and do st. fdr knew about pearl harbor? i think he knew an attack was coming the first of december or the first two weeks but whwoul be? re ast evebody the japanese had 50,000 troops in a saigon vietnam. philippi back then french indochina. living to the philippines or singapore was an

fdr and a general marshall have the word department to warn the basis to go on high alert but if i had an hour i could go over what half-inch but it is the perfect storm of mistakes. everybody believes they were in command with the attitude it does not matter because we will not be attacked so why bother. that is a bad way to do with. but 1932, four, 36 come a commander and why you could have the attitude and you were fined and spent two years in hawaii and not do all lot. but december 1941 it was up four way to run things. i don't think fdr directly new that would be pearl harbor but new the attack was coming and i blame him most 1900 anti-aircraft guns

and given away hundreds of fire planes. and adderall richardson was fired and of very capable officer he went to the white house october 1940 which you did not do over two hours keeping the fleet at pearl harbor that we are vulnerable and need to move the fleet and finally it became pretty heated and he chose franklin roosevelt mr. president i have to inform you that most of the leaders of the pacific fleet do not have, -- confidence in you to the the baby. he did not doing anything at that precise moment but

would not act on what richard sens said and finally fdr was reelected the next month for a third term and right after the election he fires richardson. i don't know if a movie has gone into the life but he is back in the united states the day pearl harbor is attacked getting them news and he says i warned them over a year ago. and it still happened. >> >> did fdr acknowledge any limits constitutional limits with the commander in chief of world or to? you mention the and term and also reading historical accounts with the military tribunals that some of the historical accounts i have

read said he let it be known through back channels of the supreme court tries to challenge my authority to execute these people i will execute them anyway. i just wonder if you colleges any limits on the commander of chief. >> i have not seen any if they did i have not run across a he tended not to talk about that. but you judge by actions and i have not seen any indications. i never felt those restrictions applied. >> of d.r. reminds me sometimes maybe bill clinton reminds me of fdr because both men are very smart and careful not to step on a land mine if they don't have to. fdr frequently ignored the constitution.

>> asking a follow-up we have debated a good bit whether the new deal model is a good model for getting out of the great recession today. and have been people on both sides. should there be a similar debate differs of both treatment of civil liberties is a model for what we have done since 9/11 or should be or is cautionary? >> roosevelt by putting 110 japanese americans and internment camps has gone way beyond anything we have seen today but keep in mind there was a political angola. not only did he endures doing that the motive seems to be heavy political. we would talk about this often because the japanese

were such good workers to be so successful in the vegetable injury -- industry many anglo-saxon and spoke competitive pressures. if you would pull california you would find the majority of non japanese that thought if we get them out of the way this is a good thing but roosevelt played to that to put them in the internment camp even though j. edgar hoover said they are not dangerous. don't do this. he did it anyway and the attorney general did not like it but roosevelt enjoyed the political success of removing them not only are they removed and cannot vote against me but they are removed and those people will be voting for roosevelt. he will pick up house seats in california pro finally the western coordinator said where they still here? they have been here years we

let some of them now they are joining the army and highly decorated. why are we letting this group? you may indicate an individual who shows signs that you show whole group of people the sexual and grandma all the hauled into the camps. it is atrocious. so you have those are actually in charge of the camps to say it is not right for roosevelt keeps the coming and finally the secretary says i have been around those of zero longtime and i have a family after the election and things might change. sure enough, the first cabinet meeting after the 44 election after he is safe the elected three house seats gained a new work on getting the japanese out of the camps. . .

i. ingalls and the exhibit of order let's put them in there and take political what advantage of this and left at the restrictions. we will take one last question here. >> i just want to ask a couple questions.aboutss one is 90% plus the corporate, l tax rate were talking about in the excess profit this that of apply to across-the-board companies or is that part oftax? some progress of corporate tax system? that >> it was across-the-board. you had an earnings restrictiont but it wasn't very high so most companies were caught more than, 90% level but at least pretty h close to it and certainly all

major corporations were caughtn' ats the 90% level so that was n place and it's important to know that roosevelt and in many of his followers wanted to keep it that we were close to. after it was going to be a source of revenue for giving people the right to a decent home or education and right to a job. >> did you have anotherf question?coul have >> just on the politics of truman could he have vetoedany d these reductions in taxes if hei had wantedt. to?t sure bhat >> he could have and he didn't.t he was enthusiastic but went aresevelt is gone along with it.hink what would he have done? but truly was willing at least on his first tax cut to go along with it and part of it was he was no one is job in congress is urging him but when further tax cuts were passed by congress in 1946 in 1947 he vetoed them

again and again and again and ran against them in 1948 calling them tax cuts for the rich and made that the bassist, fundamental basis of his 1948 campaign for re-election. most of the money was going back to the rich and not toward the small guy. >> the book is fdr goes to war. thank you all for being here fourteen years. [applause] thank you. thank you. thank you. next w