Evening star., 1938-03-14
Roosevelt


Continued From First Page)
work that does not conflict with exist
ing so-called public works. I cannot
give you details of it now :"
Just for background, speaking on
that by way of explanation, these
people would be people who are today
IN the dole. They are today perform
ing no useful work and earning no
money. Those are the only people We
would take-people performing abso-
lutely no work at all and now Just
being barely supported by communi-
ties and States
In that same conference the PreSi-
dent sketched a bill for farm relief
an effort to increase the value of
farm products.
A reporter asked-Is it permanent
legislation?
The President-No. Obviously. a
farm bill is in the nature of an eX-
pertinent. We all recognize that. MY
position toward farm legislation is
that we ought to try to do something
10 increase the value of farm prod
ucs, and if the darn thing doesn't
work, We can say so quite frankly,
but at least try it.
Here is an excerpt from the confer
ence of April 7, 1888:
0uestion-Might we have an ex-
preston from you that there is no
disposition on the part of the ad-
ministration to initiate the currency
itself? l mean to print currency in a
manner other than has been done.
The President-What do you mean,
start the printing presses?
Reporter-Yes.
The President-Of the record. We
are not going to start the printing
presses. That is silly.
Asked About Currency.
Ouestion-Mr. President. are you
ready to define what you consider a
sound currency as expressed in your
inaugural message? In your inaugu-
raj message you said you were going
to stand for sound currency.
The President-I am not going to
write a book about it,
Question-Can you say how much
the public works program will over
come the five billion dollar deflation
which you have mentioned?
The President-That is very hard to
tell. You can figure it 20 different
ways I don't know.
More talk on imitation. and on COM
modify price levels. gold standards
and public works program. took
place at the conference of April 10.
1888. An excerpt follows:
The President-Oh. yes. and by the
way-entirely off the record-do not
write stories about five or six billion
dollars of public works. That is wild.
In other words, the public works pro-
fully use between now and next spring
There is no use attempting to go
ahead with program of projects
which will require all kinds of engi-
neerins in the first instance end with
the actual employment unable to
$tfl' lol ~ "IIOlS ytdl. WDdb we
want is the type of public works that
will put people to work Immediately
get them to work as soon as possible
QHestion-Is that off the record?
The President--I think you can use
that.
Question-That won't be so much,
then?
No Definite Figures.
The President-1t won't be five or
six billion dollars. I have no idea.
but it will not be anything like that.
Question-It won't be much more
than billion?
The President-We are looking over
the field and seeing how many public
works there are that are practical.
useful, self-sustaining as far as pos
sible. and that can be started quickly.
There is limit to that.
Question-Where did you get your
cold?
The President-I don't know; I
think got it from talking too
much
On May 10. 1888. the chief topics
Under discussion were disarmament.
foreign debts and the Economic Con-
ference. Into the discussion of the
Economic Conference Mr.. Roosevelt
injected a light note. as follows:
Question-Mr. President, do you or
do you not consider the solution of
the war debt vital to the success of
the Economic Conference?
The President-Have I stopped
tickling the soles of my mother-in-
law? Daughter). Yes or no? I
don't know, it is too difficult a oues-
ton to answer. Are my mother-in-
laws feet ticklish? Naughter.) In
other words. of course some cleaning
up Of the debt issues would be a fine
thing. but it is not necessarily tied
up with the success of the Economic
Conference. The two are not neces-