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On Evidence and Interpretation: Reply to Katznelson and Pietrykowski
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 16 December 2008
Extract
In my essay I questioned two premises of Ira Katznelson's and Bruce Pietrykowski's interpretation of the failure of the Third New Deal: whether conflict over the New Deal during the 1940s can be understood as a debate over the developmental and fiscalist modes of state-economy relations; and whether an approach rooted in the analysis of bureaucratic missions and functions is a useful way to get at this question or, more generally, the broader issue of how to link state capacity with political choice. My own assessment of the evidence led me to reject their interpretation of the failure of the Third New Deal and to advance an alternative way of thinking about the question of state capacity and political choice. Now, in their very interesting rejoinder, Katznelson and Pietrykowski have raised some important issues that help clarify our differences and show what is at stake in this discussion. I should like to respond briefly to their comments and clarify my own views.
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References
1. Mrozek, Donald J., “The Truman Administration and the Enlistment of the Aviation Industry in Postwar Defense,” in Perkins, Edwin J., ed., Men and Organizations (New York: G.P. Putnam's Sons, 1977), p. 181Google Scholar.
2. Stowe to Martin, May 1, 1945, David Stowe Papers, Folder: Labor/Manpower Organization, Box 9, Harry S Truman Library.
3. For a discussion of the main features of the Japanese and French developmentalist states, see Marquand, David, The Unprincipled Society (London: Jonathan Cape, 1988), pp. 104–107Google Scholar.
4. Relief and Society Security (Washington, DC: The Brookings Institution, 1946), pp. 4, 567.
5. Demobilization and Readjustment (Washington, DC: National Resources Planning Board, 1943), pp. 42–43. This was reminiscent of the supply-side employment strategy implicit in many New Deal policies – the CCC, NYA, NRA, and Fair Labor Standards Act. Supply-side schemes to deal with unemployment abounded in the mid-1940s. The labor department drafted a plan in mid-1944 to pay younger workers education allowances in lieu of unemployment compensation “to eliminate them from the post-war labor market.” Smith to President, August 31, 1944, Harold D. Smith Papers, Box 4, FDRL. On supply-side employment strategies in the New Deal, see Jensen, Richard J., “The Causes and Cures of Unemployment in the Great Depression,” Journal of Interdisciplinary History 19 (01 1989): 571–72CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
6. Congressional Quarterly Almanac, 1946', vol. II (Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Press, 1947), p. 647; Congressional Quarterly Almanac, 1947 (Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Press, 1948), vol. III, pp. 582, 586. Taft tirelessly argued for an income “floor,” saying that, “in the field of education the Federal Government, as in the fields of health, relief, and medical care, has a secondary interest or obligation to see that there is a basic floor under those essential services for all adults and children in the United States.”
7. The New York Times, July 31, 1946; Congressional Quarterly Almanac, 1945, vol. I (Washington, DC: Congressional Quarterly Press, 1946), p. 480. Northern Democrats could not even depend on staunch New Dealers like Lister Hill of Alabama, who co-sponsored with George Aiken of Vermont a means-tested alternative to Truman's national health insurance scheme.
8. For evidence and analysis, see, in addition to chap. 1 in my Divergent Fates, Leff, Mark, “Taxing the Forgotten Man: The Politics of Social Security Finance in the New Deal,” Journal of American History 70 (1983): 359–80CrossRefGoogle Scholar.
9. I must acknowledge that the placement of the footnote and the wording may lend themselves to misinterpretation.