Dreamers Rise
An Open Notebook
And for those who choose the twisty road, prefer it to the straight
Let joy beat out old misery, as love will conquer hate.
 Illustration by Henry L. Stephens from The Goblin Snob (ca. 1855) | |||||
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A sort of electronic broadside, composed of rants and reviews, conceits and speculations, and whatever else feels the need to be here. Issued as chance will have it. Hard times
A rumor 'round town that the money's gone — The Vulgar Boatmen
About twenty years ago I devoured in quick succession the three volumes of Arthur Schlesinger's The Age of Roosevelt, (individually, The Crisis of the Old Order, The Coming of the New Deal, and The Politics of Upheaval). I had always been interested in the New Deal era, in part because it laid the foundations of the America I was to grow up in, but also because of the fact that during those years the country not only engaged (for once) in thoughtful conversation about how society ought to be organized, but actually took bold and considered steps to produce something concrete as a result of that dialogue. It wasn't just the debate between New Dealers and anti-New Dealers, or the more radical battle between socialism and capitalism; even within Roosevelt's circle of advisors, his “brain trust,” there were fundamental disagreements over both philosophy and practice. The unprecedented crisis of the Great Depression created room for policy innovations — the FDIC, the WPA, Social Security — of an ambitiousness that would have been out of the question a decade earlier. (It hardly needs saying that such innovations are now not in favor.) You didn't necessarily have to agree with Roosevelt's policies, or with Schlesinger's interpretations (though in both cases I was sympathetic), to admire the New Dealers' vision. They thought big and sometimes failed disastrously, but compared to today's timid thinkers and leaders they seemed giants.
Eventually I needed room and gave the books away, figuring that I could always borrow them from the library if I ever needed them again. Recent events have made this seem as good a time as any. I'm neither an economist nor a prophet and I have no idea how the present economic crisis will shake out, though it seems clear that we are a long way from hitting bottom and that things are likely to be rough — maybe very rough — for years to come. In many ways the country has changed enormously since the last great financial meltdown. With a few exceptions, the descendants of the rural proletariat of the 1930s now have running water, electricity, and automobiles, though they may have no health insurance and be over the heads in debt. And unlike the 1930s, not only are people not rioting, they are not even marching — though it may come to that. Here is how Schlesinger sets the scene, in the months preceding Roosevelt's inauguration, in the Prologue to The Age of Upheaval: Hunger marchers, pinched and bitter, were parading cold streets in New York and Chicago. On the countryside unrest had already flared into violence. Farmers stopped milk trucks along Iowa roads and poured the milk into the ditch. Mobs halted mortgage sales, ran the men from the banks and insurance companies out of town, intimidated courts and judges, demanded a moratorium on debts. When a sales company in Nebraska invaded a farm and seized two trucks, the farmers in the Newman Grove district organized a posse, called it the “Red Army,” and took the trucks back. In West Virginia, mining families, turned out of their homes, lived in tents along the road on pinto beans and black coffee.Maybe it's still early, or maybe we're all anesthetized by television and creature comforts, but there's been no suggestion of anything like that so far. In other ways, though, things have changed little. The Republican Party, after making its peace with the New Deal for many years, has once again now largely repudiated it and positioned itself as the party of laissez-faire and “getting the government off the people's backs,” hollow slogans at a time when people are looking for constructive and concerted action. Since the present occupant of the White House is ineligible for another term it is left to John McCain to play the part of Herbert Hoover, which he seems more than ready to do. If the polls are to be believed, with four weeks left before the election he is not only bereft of positive suggestions on how to lead the country out of the present crisis but has no new ideas on how to run a campaign either. October 6, 2008 [ Permalink ]
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