The New Deal in the United States

Abstract

IN Fact of October 1938, under the title “Roosevelt and his New Deal”, Stephen K. Bailey gives a concise account of the achievements of the New Deal up to the end of September, which indicates not merely the problems which faced Roosevelt but also the background of social and economic conflict against which they have to be assessed. In successive chapters, the attempts made to meet the needs of the farmer, under the Agricultural Adjustment Administration and the Farm Credit Administration, etc., the industrialist, under the National Industrial Recovery Act and the Public Works Administration, as well as the needs of labour and the unemployment situation by the Federal Relief Administration, are surveyed. The complexity of the situation is clearly indicated as well as the way in which the conflict between big business interests and labour has been intensified, the difficulties which the Federation has to overcome in the direction of social reform, the establishment of a really sound banking system, and the problem of the Supreme Court. Mr. Bailey hazards no guess as to the outcome of the present situation: the successes and failures of the New Deal are impartially indicated as well as some of the reasons for the vagaries of American foreign policy; but his account, whether or not it is used as an introduction to further study, should at least contribute to the sympathetic understanding of the American situation, although the rather sombre picture he gives of the relation between employers and employees and of the attitude of the former to social reform does not encourage optimism.