Evening star., 1935-03-25
EXPERT PLANNING
UPHELD AS BEST
CHART FOR NATION
Work of National Board
Making Progress, DR..
Merriam Reports.
CONSTITUTION CITED
AS FIRST EXAMPLE
Practical Aspects Of Drawing
Plans for Future Questioned
at Forum Session.

Constant charting Of the course of
the Nation by boards of experts TO
keep it close to democracy's basic OBJ
jectives, as the alternative to an even
tual rhythm of clubs and statistical
clatter of machine guns" was urged
by DR.. Charles Merriam, professor of
political economy at the University Of
Chicago and member OF the National
Planning Board, before the Town Hall
Of Washington at the Shoreham Hotel
last night.
introduced by Dr. John w. Stude-
baker, commissioner Of education, as
one of the foremost political scientists
in the world, DR.. Merriam detailed the
history and functions of planning
boards and asserted that the Consti-
tuition itself was one of history's finest
examples of successful political and
economic planning.
The planning board, he said, neither
has nor expects any executive or legls-
lative power. Its function is to fore
cast eventualities through study OF
tendencies and draw up plans for con-
trolling them. Sound planning, he
said. is based upon control of few
strategic points by which the destinies
of the whole can be directed. Insight
becomes much more important than
forcing people into line by clubs or
imprisonment.
Gains Under Democracy.
Democracy" DR.. Merriam said, "as-
SumeS that the gains of civilization are
essentially mass gains to be enjoyed
by the people who create them. Ma
tional planning should be directed TO
this end. Liberty that does not bring
common welfare and social justice
loses its very soul. Liberty and democ-
racy have meaning only as reflected in
the welfare of the whole"
We have been living, Dr. Merriam
said, under conditions that the great
masses Of the people will not and
should not endure. Especially after
my recent return from Europe. can
not share the complacency of those
who look forward to a world Of little
change. I anticipate changes in the
present social pattern. The mold in
which the modern state was cast is
broken. The way is open for the con-
struction of finer type of national
life. The natural wealth of America
gives us means such as no other nation
has, but the necessary arrangements
cannot be made by drift and chance"
The National Planning Board already
is making far-reaching progress, DR..
Merriam said. especially in the field
of purchase of submarginal land. Due
to the studies of the board, the Gov
ernment has entered upon a 15-year
program for the purchase of approXi-
mately 100000 acres of land yearly
upon which agriculture cannot posi-
bly, thrive and restoring it to purposes
of more value to society.
Members of the panel which directed
questions at DR.. Merriam we're Walter
E. Myer editor of the American OBJ
server; DR.. Lewis Jorwin of the
Brookings Institution, Eugene Meyer.
publisher Of the Washington Post. and
Hilmar r. Baukage and William
Atherton Dupuy, newspaper writer's.
FTdCtlCdl ASptCtS.
Mr. Meyer questioned the practi-
cability of economic planning for the
future, giving the apparent failure of
the Interstate Commerce Commission
control of railroads as an example.
DR.. LorWin pointed out that the
opponents of national planning are
proceeding upon a fallacy of nine
teenth century philosophy which
assumes that there is a future"
somehow myStically and mysteriously
ordered from the beginning, and that
the problem is the "well-nigh impossi-
bic one" of getting behind the curtain
of this future and prophesying about
it. On the contrary, DR.. Lorwin said,
the present philosophy does not
assume a pre-existent future, but only
one which depends upon the events Of
today and which might be exactly con-
trolled if men knew enough.
AS an example of aimleSs drift, DR..
Studebaker told of finding recently
reports of % school houses in New
York State, each of which was main
tanned for a single point.