Evening star., 1939-05-23
Text of Roosevelt Address
President Defends Spending in Speech
Before Retailers Forum

'orum
conservatives because we simply
cannot bring ourselves to take
radical chances with other peo-
pies property and other peoples
lives.
Now the owner of a private
business may have the legal right
to take long chance that may
make or break his personal for
tune. If he alone goes out of
business, the economic system is
not endangered.
But the people who run the
three branches of our Govern
ment do not have the moral right
to gamble with the well-being of
120,000,000 Americans. If mil
lions of citizens Starve. it is no
answer to the starving to say that
in the sweet by-and-by business,
left to itself, will give them a job.
PartisanS are going around the
country soaring parents who are
not starving by telling them of
an increased national debt which
their grandchildren will have to
pay. Certainly that is not as
alarming as telling parents who
are already starving that an un-
trammeled business setup will
provide their grandchildren with
food in 1889. Yet that is what
the radical gamblers of business
and politics might have to say
If they were to put their theories
into practice in l94l.
Not one of you who are good
Americans and practical Ameri-
cans believe that we could repeat
the catastrophe of those years
Immediately preceding and fol-
lowing 1929 and emerge from it
all with our economic and social
system unchanged. No business
man, big or little, can fairly or
patriotically ask his Government
to take a course of action that
runs that risk.
That is why our school of
thought-the conservative school
holds the view that an intelli-
gent nation should rest its faith
in arithmetic rather than in a
hunch.
50 Cents Of Dollar
Passes Over Counters.
Today, in order to provide
customers for business, your Gov
ernment uses Government cap
ital to provide jobs, to prevent
farm prices from collapsing and
to build up purchasing power
when private capital fails to do
it. For example, out of every
dollar spent by the Federal Gov
ernment to provide jobs. more
than SO cents passes over the
counters of the retail merchants
of America.
We also use what we call social
legislation-Such as legislation to
encourage better pay for low
paid labor and thereby provide
more and better customers for
you, such as legislation to pro-
tect investors so that they may
continue to be your customers
without losing their savings in
worthless stocks and bonds.
I wonder if you have any con-
ception of the number of busi-
nessmen and bankers and econo-
mists whom I talk with briefly or
at length in any given month of
the year. I wonder if you have
any conception of the variety of
suggestions and panaceas that
they offer to me. I wonder If you
know the very large percentage
of them who honestly and in
good faith, very naturally think
of national problems solely in
terms of their own business. I
wonder if you will be surprised if
I tell you that most of them leave
my office saying to me, why,
Mr.. President, I did not know
about that. You have given me
new perspective. never
thought of the problem in that
way before"
I sit in my Office with a busi-
nessman who thinks the surest
way to produce customers is to
balance the Federal budget at
once. I say to him, "HowP"
Sometimes he says, How should
know? That is your job" Some
times he says, Cut the budget
straight through 10 per cent or
20 per cent"
Shows Him Fat Book,
Budget of Nation.
Then I take from my desk
drawer a fat book and it is ap-
parent at once that he has never
seen or read the budget of the
Government of the United States.
He tries to change the subject,
but hold him to it. say, This
budget is not all of one piece; it
is an aggregate of thousands of
items. Either we will have to cut
every item 10 per cent or 20 per
cent you ask or, If we do not do
this, cut some items very much
more than 10 per cent or 20 per
cent"
I point out the one and a half
billion dollars for the Army and
Navy. He pounds the desk in
patriotic fervor and says, Don't
cut that item-not in these
days"
I show him the item of a bill
lion dollars for interest on the
public debt. He owns some Gov
ernment bonds and rejects any
cut in his interest.
I show him the billion dollar
item for war and civil service
pensions. He says, I'VE couldn't
get enough popular support to
cut those"
I mention the billion dollars
for running the permanent func-
tions of the regular Government
departments-they cost less to-
day than under my predecessor.
He readily agrees that the post
man and the Oman and the
Forest Service and the customs
people cannot be curtailed. The
only people he would sever from