Fear Itself: The New Deal and the Origins of Our Time
Surveying the Democratic Party’s control of the federal government from 1933 to 1953, Katznelson embarks not on a history of the New Deal per se but, rather, on an assessment of the limits placed on it by opposition in Congress. His work accordingly analyzes the voting scorecards for numerous acts of legislation, focusing intently on the influence of southern Democrats on political outcomes. Initially stalwart supporters of Roosevelt’s economic liberalism, southerners’ enthusiasm waned as they perceived the challenges to the social order of racial segregation posed by various proposals; by the late 1930s, they had essentially stopped further expansion of the New Deal. However, WWII revived New Dealers, whose wartime proposals for economic planning and fair employment Katznelson recounts through their legislative fates under the continuing influence of southern Democrats. Positing that the New Deal preserved liberal democracy, but at the expense of compromises with illiberal forces, Katznelson’s hefty history weighs other historians’ interpretations of the New Deal as it knowledgeably advances its own. --Gilbert Taylor--This text refers to theHardcoveredition.