Decentralist Intellectuals and the New Deal

Author(s): Edward S. Shapiro

Source: The Journal of American History, Vol. 58, No. 4 (Mar., 1972), pp. 938-957
Published by: Organization of American Historians
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/1917852
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Decentralist
Intellectuals
and theNew Deal
EDWARD S. SHAPIRO

a decade ago William E. Leuchtenburg

notedthatthe full intellectualhistoryof the 1930s has yetto be written.'The earliesttreatments
of theRooseveltera were primarily
with
theworkof historianssympathetic
economicand politicalcollectivism.Their studieshave largelyshaped historicalunderstanding
of the intellectualhistoryof theNew Deal era. Their
emphasiswas upon intellectuals
suchas JohnDewey and ReinholdNiebuhr
and journals such as New Republic, Nation, and Common Sense. Their
workvirtuallyignoredintellectualsand journalswith otherinterpretations
of the economiccrisisof the 1930s. Especiallyunfamiliarto manyhistorians is a small group of intellectualswho, calling themselves"agrarians,"
and "decentralists,"
"distributists,"
arguedin behalfof a peaceful,middleclass revolutionleading to the widespreaddistribution
of property,
the decentralization
of economicand politicalauthority,
and the decentralization
of thecity.
The decentralist
intellectualsincludedSouthernAgrarians,historianand
journalistHerbertAgar,contributors
to Who Owns America?A New Declarationof Independenceand Free America,and membersof the Catholic
rural life movement.The SouthernAgrarianswere famous for I'll Take
My Stand: The South and the AgrarianTradition,published in 1930 in
orderto dramatizethe plightof southernagriculture,
and fortheiroppositionto big businessand the rapid industrialization
of the South.Agar,perhaps the most importantof the decentralistintellectuals,had been influenced by the English Distributistmovementof Hilaire Belloc and G. K.
Chestertonwhile livingin England duringthe late 1920s. Afterreturning
to the United States,he was instrumental
in the publicationof Who Owns
America?,a collectionof articlesby agrarianand non-agrariandecentralists
kLMOST

Edward S. Shapiro is associateprofessorof historyin Seton Hall University.

'William E. Leuchtenburg,
FranklinD. Rooseveltand the New Deal, 1932-1940 (New
York, 1963), 361. The argumentof thispaper is morefullypresentedin Edward S. Shapiro,
"The AmericanDistributistsand the New Deal" (doctoral dissertation,
Harvard University,
1968).
*938 -

Decentralist
Intellectuals

939

eager to formulatea politicalprogramacceptableto all varietiesof decentralistthought,and in the foundingof Free America,the firstmagazine
devotedexclusivelyto the dissemination
of decentralist
ideas. The mostsignificantstatements
of Catholicrural,social,economic,and politicalthought
to Cathwere made byJohnA. Rawe, Edgar Schmiedeler,and contributors
olic Rural Objectivespublishedin 1935, 1936, 1937, and 1944.2
The decentralistintellectualswere primarilyconcernedwith reversing
the trendtowardlarge-scaleindustrialization
for which theyblamed the
dispossessionof thepropertiedmiddleclass of shopkeepersand smallmanworkingclass,
ufacturers,
the creationof a depersonalizedand propertyless
and the centralizationof economicand politicalpower into fewerhands.
They fearedeconomicgiantismwas leading to an oligarchicor a socialistic
statewhich would carryeconomiccentralizationand the dispossessionof
the middle class to theirlogical conclusion.Moreover,theybelieved that
the federalgovernment's
policiestowardbig businessduringthe 1920s, especiallyhigh tariffsand rigged prices,had createdan imbalancebetween
productionand consumptionwhichwas responsiblefortheDepression.3
Decentralistspredictedthatliberal reformers
who wished to retainthe
basic structure
of large-scaleindustrialization
while melioratingsome of its
moreunfortunate
effects
would eventuallyeitherbe cooptedby the plutocof their
racyor become more radical upon recognizingthe superficiality
reforms.For the decentralistintellectuals,even Marxism was essentially
palliative.As Allen Tate, one SouthernAgrarian,wroteto literarycritic
Malcolm Cowley,"From mypointof view . .. you and theotherMarxians
are not revolutionary
enough: youwantto keep capitalismwiththecapitalism leftout." Tate claimed thatonly a programlookingto a returnto the
widespreadownershipof propertyhad a chance to overthrowcapitalism
and "createa decentsocietyin termsof Americanhistory."4
2 Virginia Rock, "The Making and Meaning of I'll Take My Stand: A Studyin Utopian
Conservatism,1925-1939" (doctoral dissertation,Universityof Minnesota,1961); Herbert
Agar, Land of the Free (Boston, 1935); RaymondWitte,Twenty-FiveYears of Crusading:
A Historyof the National CatholicRural Life Conference(Des Moines, 1948).
'Herbert Agar, "Introduction,"HerbertAgar and Allen Tate, eds., Who Owns America?
A New Declaration of Independence (Boston, 1936), vii; John Crowe Ransom, "What
Does the South Want?" ibid., 83-84; Herbert Agar, "Private Propertyor Capitalism,"
AmericanScholar,III (Autumn 1934), 396-403; Luigi G. Liguttiand JohnC. Rawe, Rural
Roads to Security:America's Third Strugglefor Freedom (Milwaukee, 1940), 41; John
Gould Fletcher,The Two Frontiers:A Studyin Historical Psychology(New York, 1930),
297; Andrew N. Lytle,"The Backwoods Progression,"AmericanReview, I (Sept. 1933),
considered
434. The SouthernAgrarians,concernedover the threatof industrialcommunism,
calling theirbook "Tracts Against Communism."Rob Roy Purdy,ed., Fugitives'Reunion:
Conversationsat Vanderbilt,May 3-5, 1956 (Nashville, 1959), 207.
'Daniel Aaron, Writerson the Left (New York, 1961), 352-53, 458. See also Herbert
Agar, "The Ideal We Share," New Masses, XIX (April 7, 1936), 27; HerbertAgar, "John

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The Journalof AmericanHistory

The othermajor threatto a propertiedsociety,the decentralist

intellectuals argued,was urbanization.For themthe distinctivefeaturesof the metropoliswere a dispossessedworkingclass controlledby demagogicpolitical bosses,the popularityof ideologies emphasizingcollectivismand class
and the monopolizationof privatepropertyby a financialand busiconflict,
ness plutocracy.Catholic decentralistsassertedthat urbanizationwas responsibleforincreasingsecularismamong Catholics,the decliningnumber
of persons enteringreligiousvocations,and the growingdiscrepancybetweenthe birthrateof AmericanCatholicswho were primarilyurban and
the higherbirthrate
of the moral,rural-oriented
Protestants.5
The post Civil War growthof factoriesand citieshad, accordingto decentralists,
sharplydividedAmericansocietyintoopposingfactions.While
one faction,centeredin theNortheast,admiredeconomiccentralization
and
generallyvoted Republican,the other faction,strongamong the farmers
and small businessmenof the South and Middle West, cherishedthe diffusion of propertyand looked to the Democratsas "the partyof ruralAmerica, of the farmer,the shopkeeper,the artisan."Decentralistsemphasized
the pervasivenessof conflictbetweenurban-industrial
America and rural
America.The agrarianpoet JohnGould FletcherdeclaredAmericacould
neverfulfillher spiritualand culturaldestinywithoutrejecting"the mock
cosmopolitanEuropeanism"of the East, turningits stancewestward,and
becoming "provincial,rooted in the backwoods,solitaryand remote,as
were Thoreau and Hawthorne."The SouthernAgrariansstressedthe tendencyof the Northeastto transform
othersectionsof the countryintoeconomiccolonies. "It is the natureof industrialenterprise,
corporatemonopoly and high finance,"Donald Davidson wrote,"to devour,to exploit,to
imperialize...." JohnCrowe Ransomproposedin 1929 a politicalalliance
betweenthe South and West since both sections"desire to defendhome,
Strachey,Marx, and the DistributistIdeal," AmericanReview,V (May 1935), 168-84; and
HerbertAgar, "The Marxian Myth: A Reply to Mr. Corey,"Free America,I (March 1937),
11-12. Marxistsrepliedthatdecentralistintellectualswere hopelessmiddle-classreactionaries
for believinglarge-scaleindustrialism,
could be destroyedand theUnited Statescould return
to a bourgeoiseconomyin which most people owned productiveproperty.GranvilleHicks,
The Great Tradition:An Interpretation
of AmericanLiteratureSince the Civil War (New
York, 1935), 282; Bern Brandon, "Metaphysicsof Reaction,"Marxist Quarterly,I (Jan.March 1937), 125-33.
'Agar, Land of the Free, 13-20; Troy J. Cauley, Agrarianism:A Programfor Farmers
(Chapel Hill, 1935), 191; Donald Davidson, review of Faith in Living, Free America,IV
(Oct. 1940), 19; JohnDonald Wade, "Of the Mean and Sure Estate,"Agar and Tate, eds.,
Who Owns America? 254-57; Edgar Schmiedeler,A BetterRural Life (New York, 1938),
1-12, 218-21, 234, 238, 246; Witte,Twenty-FiveYears of Crusading,1-6; MartinE. Schirber,
"AmericanCatholicismand Life On the Land," Social Order, 12 (May 1962), 201; Robert
D. Cross, "The ChangingImage of the CityamongAmericanCatholics,"CatholicHistorical
Review,XLVIII (April 1962), 33-52.

DecentralistIntellectuals

941

stabilityof life,the practiceof leisure,and the naturalenemyof bothis the

insidiousindustrialsystem."'6
intellectualsdid not believetheywere economicallyimThe decentralist
reactionaryfor espousingthe cause of small
practicaland technologically
businessand ruralAmericaduringthe 1920s and 1930s. On the contrary,
theystronglycontendedthat theirgoals and ideas harmonizedwith the
dominanttendenciesof moderntechnology.They pointedto the substitudecentralists
predicted,would
tionof electricity
forsteampower.Electricity,
lead to the dispersalof industrybecausetherewas no longerany need for
close to sourcesof coal, and because elecfactoriesto remainconcentrated
tricitycould easily be adapted to the requirementsof small factoriesand
home industries.Electricityalso promisedto make farmlife less onerous
and more attractiveand, thus,help stemthe driftof farmersto the cities.
offeredan opportunity"to make
As one enthusiastproclaimed,electricity
possible a sweeping programof decentralizedregional developmentin
claimedthe
termsof the mostadvancedscience."In addition,decentralists
of the automobileallowed men to move out of the city,to acintroduction
quire land and even engage in part-timefarming,and to commuteto their
urbanjobs.7
The nominationand electionof FranklinD. Rooseveltin 1932 encourembarkupon a
aged decentralists.They hoped to see an administration
and
programof economicand demographicdecentralization
comprehensive
aid for rural America. This expectationresultedfrom Roosevelt's wellknownoppositionto monopolies,Wall Street,and the decreasingeconomic
independenceof the small businessmanand the farmer,as well as his atHerbert Agar, What Is America? (London, 1936), 240-43; Fletcher,Two Frontiers,
178; Donald Davidson, The AttackOn Leviathan:Regionalismand Nationalismin the United
States (Chapel Hill, 1938), 127; John Crowe Ransom,"The South Defends Its Heritage,"
Harper's Magazine, 159 (June 1929), 117; AndrewNelson Lytle,"The Hind Tit," I'll Take
My Stand: The South and the AgrarianTradition (New York, 1930), 201-45; JohnDonald
Wade, "Old Wine in a New Bottle," Virginia QuarterlyReview, XI (April 1935), 246;
David Cushman Coyle, The IrrepressibleConflict:Business vs. Finance (Geneva, N. Y.,
1932), 12; David CushmanCoyle,Roads to a New America (Boston, 1938), 18-19. For the
widespreadprevalenceof the colonial economyidea among southernsocial scientistsand
politicians,see George BrownTindall, The Emergenceof theNew South,1913-1945 (Baton
Rouge, 1967), 594-99.
DecentralizeUs?" Free America,II (Nov. 1938),
'Peter Van Dresser, "Will Electricity
15; David Cushman Coyle, Electricity:Achievementsof Civilization (New York, 1939),
Efficiency,"
VirginiaQuarterlyReview,XIV (Summer
14; David CushmanCoyle,"Inefficient
1938), 368-79; Herbert Agar, Pursuit of Happiness: The Storyof AmericanDemocracy
(Boston, 1938), 50; Herman C. Nixon, FortyAcres and Steel Mules (Chapel Hill, 1938),
72, 77-78; Donald Davidson, "Agrarianismfor Commuters,"AmericanReview, I (May
1933), 240-41; Donald Davidson, "'Southern Agrarians' State Their Case," Progressive
Farmer and Southern Ruralist, LI (June 1936), 5; Cauley, Agrarianism,70; Ralph L.
Woods, AmericaReborn:A Plan forDecentralizationof Industry(New York, 1939), 81-99,
104-34.
6

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The Journalof AmericanHistory

temptsto improverurallife while governorof New York and some of his

1932 campaign promises. Moreover, Roosevelt in the 1932 campaign
vowed, if elected,to providerelieffor farmers,to disciplineWall Street,
and to "systematically
eliminatespecial advantages,special favors,special
privileges whereverpossible, whetherthey come from tariffsubsidies,
creditfavoritism,
taxationor otherwise."8
The majorinitialactsof theNew Deal, however,were fardifferent
from
the reformsproposedby the decentralistintellectuals.They had suggested
helping the small businessmanand the consumerby lowering tariffs,
strengthening
thegovernment's
antitrust
program,and withdrawingall poJiticalfavorsgiven big businessand high financesincethe Civil War. The
National IndustrialRecoveryAct (NIRA) of 1933 insteadauthorizedthe
suspensionof antitrust
laws so as to permitindustry-wide
economicplanning. The decentralists
predictedthatpermittingindustrialists
to establish
productionquotas would lead to higherpricesand profits,
diminishedcompetition,lower consumerpurchasingpower,a cartelizedeconomy,and the
"political,moral,and intellectualslaveryof the individual"resultingfrom
the economicand politicalplanningnecessaryto administersuch a law.9
The farmercould bestbe aided, decentralists
argued,throughthe prohibitionof land ownershipbybanks,insurancecompanies,and othercorporations;the heavytaxationof land owned by absenteelandlords;low-interest
loans; melioratinglandlord-tenant
relationsin behalf of the tenants;rural
electrification;
and the encouragement
of farmcooperatives.The keystone
of the earlyNew Deal farmprogramwas the AgriculturalAdjustmentAct
(AAA) of 1933, whichproposedto raise farmincomesby limitingpro8John Crowe Ransom to Andrew Nelson Lytle, Nov. 16, 1932, Andrew Lytle Papers
(Tennessee State Libraryand Archives); Lytle to Allen Tate, Feb. 23, 1933, Allen Tate
Papers (PrincetonUniversity);Herman C. Nixon to Donald Davidson, March 17, 25, 1931,
Donald Davidson Papers (VanderbiltUniversity);FrankL. Owsley, "Scottsboro,the Third
Crusade: The Sequel to Abolition and Reconstruction,"
AmericanReview, I (June 1933),
274; Daniel R. Fusfeld,The Economic Thought of FranklinD. Rooseveltand the Origins
of the New Deal (New York, 1956), 84-86, 123-30,203-05, 227-38, 245-46; FrankFreidel,
F. D. R. and the South (Baton Rouge, 1965), 6-18, 64-66; R. G. Tugwell, "The Sourcesof
New Deal Reformism,"Ethics,LXIV (July 1954), 266; R. G. Tugwell, "The Preparation
of a President,"WesternPolitical Quarterly,I (June 1948), 132-33; FranklinD. Roosevelt,
"GrowingUp by Plan," SurveyGraphic,LXVII (Feb. 1, 1932), 483-84; FranklinD. Roosevelt, "Back to the Land," Review of Reviews,LXXXIV (Oct. 1931), 63-64; FranklinD.
Roosevelt, "Actualities of AgriculturalPlanning," America Faces the Future, Charles A.
Beard,ed. (Boston, 1932), 331-38.
(New York, 1936), 382; Coyle,Irrepres'James Truslow Adams, The Living Jefferson
sible Conflict,13-16; David CushmanCoyle,"The Twilightof National Planning,"Harper's
Magazine, 171 (Oct. 1935), 562-65; HerbertAgar, "The Task for Conservatism,"
American
Review, III (April 1934), 10-12; Cauley, Agrarianism,197-98; Davidson, AttackOn Leviathan, 40; FrederickP. Kenkel, "Throwing the Small Fry to the Lion," Central-Blattand
Social Justice,XXVI (Nov. 1933), 241.

DecentralistIntellectuals

943

ductionand providingbenefitpaymentsto participatingfarmers.Decentralistsclaimed AAA would curtailfarmingat the verytime the governmentshould be encouragingan expansionof the farmpopulationand, by
makingfarmerswards of the state,dangerouslycentralizepoliticalpower
in Washington.Accordingto AndrewNelson Lytle,AAA was a "road to
agriculturalservility;it is up to us to diverthim [Roosevelt] towardsthe
more stable agrarianlife." Decentraliststraced the source of the New
Deal's agriculturalprogramto a mistakenbelief that farmerswere rural
businessmenwho, just like otherbusinessmen,needed a boost in income.
They contended,however,thatthe farmersmostneeded a moresecureland
tenureand a greaterdegree of economicself-sufficiency
ratherthan more
cash. No solution to the farm problem,Davidson wrote,could ever be
achievedin "termsof the industrialeconomicsnow being applied by the
Tugwells and Ezekielsof theRooseveltAdministration."
Even thosedecentralistswho recognizedthat,as long as industryhad its tariffsand other
subsidies,AAA benefitpaymentswere necessaryto compensatethe farmer
and to createa balancedand stableeconomy,believedAAA to be no substitute for guaranteeingland ownershipand reducingfarmtenancy.DecentralistsagreedwithDavidson thatthe earlyNew Deal, by legislatingbenefitpaymentsand ignoringthe problemof dispossession,had "done more
to pacifythefarmersthanto save them."'10
This lack of enthusiasmfor NIRA and AAA extendedas well to the
Trade AgreementsAct of June1934. This law authorizedthe Presidentto
enterintoreciprocaltariffagreementswithothernationswhichcould eventuallyresultin the loweringof tariffsby as much as 50 percent.Some decentralists,
disappointedthattariffs
were not to be cut even more,claimed
the industrialNortheastwas stillexploitingfarmersand consumers.David"John Crowe Ransom, "Happy Farmers,"American Review, I (Oct. 1933), 534-35;
Ransom,"What Does the South Want?" Agar and Tate, eds., Who Owns America? 189;
HerbertAgar, "JustWhy Economics?"North AmericanReview,240 (Sept. 1935), 200-05;
HerbertAgar, "What Is theNew Deal?" Louisville Courier-Journal,
April 22, 1936; Herbert
Agar, "Why Help the Farmer?" ibid., Aug. 14, 1939; John C. Rawe, "Agrarianism:An
EconomicFoundation,"Modern Schoolman,XIII (Nov. 1935), 18; JohnC. Rawe, "Agrarianism: The Basis for a BetterLife," AmericanReview, VI (Dec. 1935), 188-92; Cauley,
Agrarianism,94-103, 180-211; FrederickP. Kenkel, "Rural EconomicWelfare in the Light
of PresentConditions,"Central-Blattand Social Justice,XXVI (Nov. 1933), 236; Edgar
Balanced Abundance(New York, 1939), 21-25; David CushmanCoyle,UncomSchmiedeler,
mon Sense (Washington,1936), 77-79, 97-101; Lytle to Seward Collins, May 17, Aug. 25,
1933, Seward Collins Papers (Beinecke Library,Yale University);JohnGould Fletcherto
Frank L. Owsley, March 2, 1935, Frank Owsley Papers (in possession of Mrs. Frank L.
Owsley, Nashville, Tennessee); Allen Tate, "The Problemof the Unemployed:A Modest
Proposal," AmericanReview, I (May 1933), 135; Donald Davidson, "The Restorationof
the Farmer,"AmericanReview,III (April 1934), 100; Donald Davidson, "A Case in Farming," ibid. (Sept. 1934), 530.

944

The Journalof AmericanHistory

son argued that,despitethe trade act, the goal of the New Deal was nawhichcould "ruin the South's exporttradein cotton
tional self-sufficiency
and tobaccoand reducethe SouthernStatesto the conditionof pensioners
upon a socializedAmerica."FrankL. Owsley,a fellowSouthernAgrarian,
agreedwithDavidson, and in 1935 demandedsubsidiesforthe Southand
productsshouldtheNew Deal conWest on the exportof theiragricultural
however,feared
tinueto temporizeon the tariffissue. Other decentralists,
crops and
in
staple
trade
increase
would
of
barriers
tariff
that lowering
commercialfarmingat the expense of subsistenceagriculture.
strengthen
Agar and economistTroy J. Cauley proposedthattariffreductionbe combined withthe fosteringof subsistencefarmingin orderthatbothregional
and industrialexploitationand commercialfarmingcould be diminished."
intelThe redeemingfeaturesof the earlyNew Deal forthe decentralist
lectualswere the creationof the Tennessee Valley Authority(TVA) in
Administration(REA) in 1935. The
1933 and the Rural Electrification
flowingfromTVA and REA, theypredicted,would slow down
electricity
the movementof populationto the citiesby makingrurallife more comrural
fortable,encouragethe foundingof small-scaleand owner-operated
industries,facilitatethe movementof businessesinto ruralareas,breakthe
strangleholdof Wall Streetholdingcompaniesover southernpower companies, and by bolsteringthe ruraleconomiesof the West and South help
restoreeconomicbalanceto thenation.DecentralistsapprovedTVA's resetfarms,productlingof farmerson betterland, establishingdemonstration
and teaching
developinginexpensivefarmmachinery,
ing cheap fertilizers,
the most recentmethodsof soil conservation.All of these,theyfelt,promnoted
familyfarmingand the individual ownershipof land. They also
commendedTVA's emphasison decentralizeddecisionmakingand grassroots democracywhich theyfavorablycomparedto the centralizationand
found in many of the otherNew Deal agencies. They
bureaucratization
that
the
settingof pricesand productionquotas by NIRA and
pointedout
while
AAA had resultedin a vast expansionof the politicalbureaucracy,
TVA merelyestablishedan economicand social frameworkwithinwhich
Herman C. Nixon
private enterprisecould functionmore effectively.
11
Donald Davidson, "Where Regionalismand SectionalismMeet," Social Forces, 13 (Oct.
1934), 28-29; Davidson, AttackOn Leviathan,203-04, 283; FrankL. Owsley, "The Pillars
of Agrarianism,"AmericanReview, IV (March 1935), 533, 541-47; Herman C. Nixon,
South (Norman, 1941), 84-96; H. ClarenceNixon, "The
Possum Trot: Rural Community,
New Deal and the South," VirginiaQuarterlyReview,XIX (Summer 1943), 333; Schmiedeler, Balanced Abundance,8-9; Agar, Land of the Free, 272-73; HerbertAgar, "International Trade and Cotton," Louisville Courier-Journal,
Sept. 20, 1935; T. J. Cauley, "The
Integrationof Agrarianand ExchangeEconomies,"AmericanReview,V (Oct. 1935), 587602.

Intellectuals
Decentralist

945

card in the New Deal....

The nationneeds a
termedTVA "the strongest
that
seriesof thegrandprojectsof theTVA type. . . but it seemsfortunate
the erodedSouthbecamethe sceneof thefirstexperiment.'2
The decentralistintellectualswere disappointedthroughoutRoosevelt's
firsttermby the New Deal's failureto develop into the radical economic
movementtheyhad originallyexpected.In August 1933, Owsley looked
forwardto Rooseveltreducing"the plutocratsto ranksas faras controlof
the government
goes. New York is to be trimmedof its completefinancial
controlif he has his way." Fletcher,bemusedby the Hundred Days, complimentedthePresidentfor"puttingthe speculatorswheretheybelong-in
the wastebasket(many of thembelong on lamp-posts)," and anticipated
eagerlyfurtherattackson Wall Street.The economistDavid Cushman
Coyle hopefullydescribedthe New Deal in 1934 as "the quest of the
Americanpeople for a way to freethemselvesfromthe octopusof finance
that has been stranglingtheirfree businessfor several generations."But
the inabilityof the New Deal to destroycompletelyand quicklythe power
of high financedisillusionedthe decentralists.
They accusedtheNew Dealers of temporizingand leaving the power of plutocracyuntouched.The
"standpatRooseveltians,"Fletchercomplainedin 1934, seem "to be accomplishinglittlebeyondbecloudingthe real issues." Despite takingthe
countryoffthe gold standard,passingtwo major acts regulatingthe stock
"Fletcher to Davidson, July27, 1933, Davidson Papers; FrankL. Owsley, "Mr. Daniels
Discovers the South," SouthernReview, IV (Spring 1939), 670; David Cushman Coyle,
Land of Hope: The Way of Life in the Tennessee Valley (Evanston, 1941); David Cushits usefulnesson farms,
man Coyle, ElectricPower on the Farm: The Storyof Electricity,
and the movementto electrifyrural america (Washington, 1936); David Cushman Coyle,
"Planning Is a FightingWord," Harper's Magazine, 192 (June 1946), 555-56; Woods,
AmericaReborn,233-36, 306-12; Ralph L. Woods, review of God's Valley, Free America,
III (July 1939), 19-20'; HerbertAgar, "TVA and Socialism," Louisville Courier-Journal,
June9, 1937; HerbertAgar, "A Boost for Democracy,"ibid., March 7, 1939; R. F. Bessey,
"National Planningand Decentralization,"Free America,VII (Summer 1943), 14; Thomas
Haile, "Agricultureand The TVA," ibid., V (Nov. 1941), 3-6; Ransom,"What Does the
South Want?" Agar and Tate, eds., Who Owns America? 189; Charles RumfordWalker,
"The Farmer Harnesses the Kilowatt," Free America,IV (June 1940), 3-5; Liguttiand
Rawe, Rural Roads to Security,183, 309; Edgar Schmiedeler,The Rural South: Problemor
Prospect?(New York, 1940), 7; Nixon, FortyAcresand Steel Mules, 80-81. For a criticism
of TVA, see R. G. Tugwell and E. C. Banfield,"Grass Roots Democracy-Mythor Reality?"
criticismof TVA,
Public Administration
Review,X (Winter 1950), 47-55. For a decentralist
see Davidson, "Where Regionalismand SectionalismMeet," Social Forces, 25-27; Donald
Davidson, "That This Nation May Endure: The Need forPolitical Regionalism,"Agar and
Tate, eds., Who Owns America? 124-25; Donald Davidson, "Regionalismas Social Science,"
SouthernReview,III (Autumn 1937), 219-20; Donald Davidson, "On Being in Hock to the
North," Free America,III (May 1939), 4; Donald Davidson, "Political Regionalismand
Administrative
Regionalism,"Annals of The AmericanAcademyof Political and Social Science, 207 (Jan. 1940), 138-43; Donald Davidson, The Tennessee.The New River-CivilWar
to TVA (New York, 1948), ii; Donald Davidson, "Regionalism," Collier's 1954 Year
Book, William T. Couch, ed. (New York, 1954), 509.

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exchanges,and enactinglegislationdivorcinginvestment
bankingfrom
commercial
banking,Agar definedthe New Deal as "finance-capitalism
morefirmly
anditsknavery
withitsrewards
distributed,
curtailed.'3
concludedthattheNew Dealersbelievedthey
Decentralists
regretfully
without
couldrestore
industrial
and financial
prosperity
destroying
centralto a naivefaithin tinkering.
ization.This was attributed
The New Deal,
"merecrisislegislation,
mereextemporizing
Agarwrote,was evidently
in
thehopethatsomething
... willturnup." Tate blamedRooseveltforthe
thePresident
intoa diffuse
humanitarianism:
New Deal's degeneration
was
"an honestman,buthorribly
simple;the besthe can do is to thinkthe
wholeproblemwill be solvedwhena littleof thebig incomeis restored
the
andall menhaveenoughto eat."Otherdecentralists,
ascribed
however,
rather
thanto anypragto a collectivistic
New Deal floundering
philosophy
outlook.The exampleof NIRA andthepresence
matic,non-ideological
of
withintheNew Deal caused
RexfordG. Tugwelland othercollectivists
Davidsonto accusetheNew Dealersof merelyseeking"to repairourfala modicum
and to guarantee
of comfort
to thehuteringeconomic
system
ofourfalsewayoflife.Buttheyaredoingnothing
mancasualties
to repair
thefalsewayof life.Rathertheyseemto wantto crystallize
it in all its
theNew Deal did notacceptthedecentralist's
contenfalsity."Evidently
and lastingsocial reformcould
economicrecovery
tion thatpermanent
come only with economicdispersaland the widespreadownershipof
property.14
" Owsley to Davidson, Aug. 5, 1933, Davidson
Papers; Fletcherto Henry Bergen,Aug.
18, Nov. 15, 1933, May 11, 12, July5, 13, Nov. 19, Dec. 3, 1934, HenryBergenPapers (in
possessionof Eugene Haun, Ann Arbor,Michigan); Fletcherto Tate, July22, 1934, Tate
Papers; David Cushman Coyle, "Recoveryand Finance," Virginia QuarterlyReview, X
(Oct. 1934), 489-93; Coyle, UncommonSense, 123-34; John Crowe Ransom, "A Capital
for the New Deal," AmericanReview, II (Dec. 1933), 142; Lytle, "The Backwoods Progression,"431; Troy J. Cauley and Fred Wenn, "A Debate: Resolved: That the United
States Should Return to the Gold Standard,"Bulletin of Emory University,XX (June
1934), 59-61; RichardB. Ransom,"The Privateand CorporateEconomies,"AmericanReview, VI (Feb. 1936), 392-99; JohnC. Rawe, "Agricultureand the PropertyState," Agar
and Tate, eds., Who Owns America? 46-48; Agar, "The Task for Conservatism,"10-11.
14 HerbertAgar to Tate, Nov. 7, 1933, Tate Papers; HerbertAgar, "Private Property
or
Capitalism,"AmericanScholar,III (Autumn 1934), 397; Tate to Agar,Nov. 17, 1933, Tate
Papers; Richard B. Ransom, "New AmericanFrontiers:A Plan for PermanentRecovery,"
AmericanReview, V (Sept. 1935), 386-90; Andrew Nelson Lytle, "John Taylor and the
Political Economyof Agriculture,"Part III, AmericanReview, IV (Nov. 1934), 96. T. J.
Cauley criticizedthe New Deal stockmarketlegislationas "probablywell conceivedwithin
its limits," but "essentiallydirectedagainst symptomsratherthan fundamentalcauses. It
will prosperaccordingly."'Cauley,"Integrationof Agrarianand ExchangeEconomies,"602.
Donald Davidson, " 'I'll Take My Stand': A History,"AmericanReview,V (Summer1935),
320-21; Edd WinfieldParks, "On BanishingNonsense," AmericanReview, I (Oct. 1933),
574-76; FrederickP. Kenkel, "New Deals, Past and Present,V," Central-Blattand Social

Intellectuals
Decentralist

947

In 1935, thecourseof theNew Deal shifted.The Public UtilityHolding

of the Resettlement
CompanyAct, the Wealth Tax Act, the establishment
a
and the BankingAct and RevenueAct of 1936 reflected
Administration,
change fromcooperationbetweengovernmentand businessand the acceptanceof consolidationand planningto an emphasison the freemarketand
a distrustof concentrated
economicand politicalpower.15 The decentralist
intellectualswelcomedthis reversalin New Deal strategy.
As Agar wrote
Tate, "forthe firsttimein a long timewe have friendsin highplaces." The
New Deal was at last "seekingto findhow to make us once more a nation
in whichthe averageman is a small proprietor,
owninghis farm,shop, or
business." And yet theyremaineddissatisfiedwith the New Deal, complaining, for example, that the Wealth Tax Act should have graduated
taxes even more sharply."America will not startto recoverits lost freedom," Coyle stated,"until it can enactand enforceupper brackettax rates
thatwill stop the growthof greatfortunesand make themstartto shrink
away." As a resultof politicaltimidity,
the "tax policies of the New Deal
have been waveringand uncertain."And Lyle H. Lanierclaimedthat,after
fouryearsof the New Deal, the nationwas still afflicted
with "economic
fascism.''"1

would have voted Republicanin 1936 had the ReMany decentralists

publicansnominateda prominentprogressivesuch as SenatorWilliam E.
Borah of Idaho. The nominationof Alfred M. Landon, however,confirmedtheirdistrustof the Republicansas the partyof big business,and
theysupportedRoosevelt in the hope that a decisive Democraticvictory
would lead to a showdownwithplutocracy.Tate summarizedforthe New
Republicthesentimentof the decentralists.
I shallvoteforRoosevelt.. . . Thereareveryfewof thePresident's
policies
thatI like,buthe has beenawarethata crisisexists,andthereis at leasta strong
thathe will takefirmer
probability
and morecoherent
ground,in his secondadministration,
againstprivilegeand Big Business.ShouldLandonbe electedhe
wouldcertainly
of violencein his efforts
bringon a revolution
to restore
thegood
Justice,XXVII (June 1934), 77; Rawe, "Agrarianism:The Basis fora BetterLife," American Review, 176-88.
" ArthurM. Schlesinger,Jr.,The Politics of Upheaval (Boston, 1960), 385-95.
1"Agar to Tate, Sept. 29, 1935, Tate Papers;,HerbertAgar, "Share-Our-Wealth,"Louisville Courier-Journal,
Aug. 16, 1935; HerbertAgar, "'A CockeyedTax?' III," ibid., Oct.
21, 1936; David CushmanCoyle,WhyPay Taxes (Washington,1937), 79-80,91-96; David
CushmanCoyle, "Map of the New Deal," Scribner'sMagazine, XCIX (April 1936), 224;
David CushmanCoyle, "The Fallacy of Mass Production,"Agar and Tate, eds., Who Owns
America? 11; Rawe, "Agricultureand the PropertyState,"ibid., 49-51; RichardB. Ransom,
"Corporateand PrivatePersons,"ibid., 77-79; Lyle H. Lanier to Tate, Dec. 7, 1936, Tate
Papers.

948

The Journalof AmericanHistory

If I werea Communist,
I thinkI shouldvotefor
old daysof finance-capitalism.
Landon.:7
Roosevelt's overwhelmingvictoryencouraged decentralists,and they
anxiouslyanticipatedthe New Deal acceleratingits campaignagainstrural
ruralpoverty,especiallyas it pertainedto dispospoverty.For decentralists,
sessionand the growthin farmtenancy,was the mostimportantsocial and
economicproblemof the 1930s. They believedthatit was responsiblefor
the creationof a mobile farmproletariatlackingpersonalinitiativeand sothe erosionof human and naturalresources,the rise of
cial responsibility,
ruralpoliticaldemagoguery,
and the generalspiritof hopelessnessand degradationpermeatingwide portionsof the ruralSouth.The New Deal's attack on rural povertyhad begun in 1933 with a programestablishing
25,000 familieson subsistencehomesteads.Decentralistsstronglyendorsed
farmcolonization,arguingthat it enlargedthe rural population,reduced
industrialunemployment,
decreasedthe amountof moneyspentforrelief,
and did not necessarilyhave to lead to an increasein politicalcentralization. They were critical,nevertheless,of a programaiding only 25,000
familiesat a timewhen millionsof Americanswere unemployed.As Lytle
asserted,the subsistencehomesteads"are a move in the rightdirection,but
how timidand coyare theirsteps.... Our hope forthebetterment
of countrylife demandsthatthesecasual experimentsbe turnedinto a real offensive." Decentralistsalso disliked the New Dealer's paternalisticcontrol
over the homesteads,and theywere greatlydismayedwhen Tugwell's ReAdministration
settlement
absorbedthehomesteadprogramin 1935.18
The ResettlementAdministration's
operationof the subsistencehomesteadsreflected
Tugwell's oppositionto the back-to-the-land
movement,his
belief thatthe familyfarmwas a technologicalanachronismwhichwould
inevitablygive way to the factoryfarm,and his distrustof individualism
and politicaland economicdecentralization.
It encouragedcommercialand
mechanizedagriculture,introducedprogressiveschools in orderto aid in
"7Agar to Collins, Dec. 10, 1934, Collins Papers; HerbertAgar, "'Blind Mouths'-Notes
on the NominatingConventions,"SouthernReview, II (Autumn 1936), 231-33; John C.
Rawe, "Corporationsand Human Liberty:A Studyin Exploitation-II. Regainingthe Rights
of the Individual," AmericanReview, IV (Feb. 1935), 481; Allen Tate, "How They Are
Voting: IV," New Republic,LXXXVIII (Oct. 21, 1936), 304-05.
"James A. Byrnes,"Foreword," Catholic Rural Life Objectives,11 (1936), 3-6; Edgar
Schmiedeler,"A Review of Rural Insecurity,"ibid., III (1937), 51-52; JohnCrowe Ransom,
"The Stateand the Land," New Republic,LXX (Feb. 17, 1932), 8-10; AndrewLytle,"The
Small Farm Secures the State," Agar and Tate, eds., Who Owns America? 239; Woods,
AmericaReborn,297-30Y2;Free America,V (April 1941), 2, 11; Liguttiand Rawe, Rural
Roads to Security,171-73, 255-56; William H. Issel, "Ralph Borsodi and the AgrarianResponse to Modern America,"AgriculturalHistory,XLI (April 1967), 159-64.

Intellectuals
Decentralist

949

the transitionfroma competitiveto a cooperativesociety,and attemptedto

reformthe homesteadersalong collectivistlines. All of thiswas, of course,
who saw Tugwell as the primeexample of those
anathemato decentralists
New Dealers who "use the terminologyof industrialeconomistsand neagrariansystem.
glectto emphasizethe humanvalues of an unincorporated
They would controlproductionin the fieldin the same way as in the factory,establishhomesteadsonly by way of temporaryrelief,and allow the
furthercapitalizationof joint-stockinterestsin extensiveland holdings."'9
Troubled by Tugwell and the verymodest New Deal approach to rural
more
became increasingly
povertyand agrariandispossession,decentralists
vocal in demanding"a public policythatwill transformthe family-farm
ownersintotenantsor
operatorinto a farmownerinsteadof transforming
day laborerson a corporationfarm." Ransom and otherswho had supportedAAA as a stopgap measureto tide farmersover until a program
dealingwithdispossessioncould be developedwere especiallydisappointed
and disturbed.20
The growing discontentof farmers,the threatof socialist agitation
in the South,and the decisiveDemocratic
amongtenantsand sharecroppers
victoryin 1936 focusedattentionon the problemof farmtenancyand the
Bankheadproposal. This was a bill introducedby SenatorJohnH. Bankloans at low interestto enable sharehead of Alabama providinglong-term
croppersand tenantsto becomefarmowners.Bankheadmaintainedpassage
of his bill would enlargethe yeomanclass, rectifyin part the population
imbalance betweencountryand city,and reduce relief payments.2'The
')Joseph Dorfman,The Economic Mind in American Civilization (5 vols., New York,
1959), V, 502-15; ArthurM. Schlesinger,Jr.,The Comingof t13eNew Deal (Boston, 1958),
369-71; Paul K. Conkin, Tomorrowa New World: The New Deal CommunityProgram
(Ithaca, 1959), 186-213. In 1930, RexfordTugwell defineda farmas "an area of vicious,
ill-temperedsoil with a not verygood house, inadequate barns,makeshiftmachinery,happenstancestock,tired,overworkedmen and women-and all the pests and bucolic plagues
thatnaturehas evolved . . . a place whereugly,broodingmonotony,thathauntsby day and
night,unseatsthe mind." SidneyBaldwin,Povertyand Politics: The Rise and Decline of the
Farm SecurityAdministration(Chapel Hill, 1968), 88; Rawe, "Agrarianism.:An Economic
Foundation,"Modern Schoolman,18.
"' Edwin V. O'Hara, "A Spiritualand MaterialMission to Ruial America,"CatholicRural
Life Objectives,I (1935), 6; H. ClarenceNixon, "Farm Tenancyto the Forefront,"SouthwestReview, XXII (Oct. 1936), 11-12; Nixon, FortyAcres and Steel Mlules,56-57; Chard
Powers Smith,"Somethingto Do Now," Free America,I (Feb. 1937), 8; Coyle,Uncommon
Sense, 97-101; Ransom,"Happy Farmers,"AmericanReview, 522-23; and JohnCrowe Ransom, "Sociologyand the Black Belt," AmericanReview,IV (Dec. 1934), 153-54.
22 JohnH. Bankhead,"The One Way to Permanent
National Recovery,"Liberty,X (July
22, 1933), 18. Owsley believed the SouthernAgrarianshad been one of the formativeinfluencesbehind the introductionof the Bankhead bill. Frank L. Owsley, "The Agrarians
Today," Shenandoah, III (Summer 1952), 27; Bankhead to Owsley, March 15, 1935,
Owsley Papers.

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Bankhead bill quicklybecame the major politicalconcernof decentralists.

Owsley claimed it was the best proposal so far broughtforthduringthe
New Deal. "Most of the otherRooseveltlegislationhas dealt withthe distributionof income; this is the distribution
of capital." Decentralistspredictedthe Bankheadbill would invigorateNew Deal soil conservationprogramsby givingfarmersa personalstakein the land and, by increasingthe
numberof economicallyindependentfamilies,undercutthe attemptsof
NormanThomas and otherradicalsto win over the dispossessedruralclass
of the South and West. In addition,it would be cheaperthan farmrelief
since the loans would be paid back, and the recipientswould not become
dependenton the stateas had occurredunderAAA. The Bankheadbill was
not anotherpalliative,decentralistsclaimed; it was an effortto solve the
most fundamentalsocial and economicproblemof the twentiethcentury,
the drasticdecline in propertyownership.Commonweal,then under the
editorshipof Michael Williams, recommendedthe Bankhead measureto
everyonewho desired"the reestablishment
of the principleof privateproperty,and of the principleof personaland familyliberty-whichis dependent for its practicalrealizationupon the possessionof real personalpropertyin land by greatnumbersof individuals,and not upon the possession
of vast holdingsin land, and greatwealthof othersorts,by a small minorityof thenation."22
The Bankhead bill became law in 1937 and a new agency,the Farm SecurityAdministration
(FSA), was establishedto administera multi-faceted
programof land purchasingby tenantsand sharecroppers,
retirement
of
submarginalland, and ruralrehabilitation
of needyfarmfamiliesthrough
short-term
loans and grantsfor the purchaseof livestock,equipment,and
supplies.Will Alexanderwas appointedhead of FSA succeedingTugwell,
who had opposed the Bankhead Act, as chiefof the New Deal ruralpovertyprogram.Tugwell did not believe the land could absorb a significant
numberof the urban unemployed,nor did he believe the preservationof
the familyfarmshould be an object of public policy.The Bankhead Act,
he warned,would createlittlemore than "a contentedand scatteredpeasThe decentralist'sevaluationof the Bankhead Act was diametriantry."23
22 Owsley to Marvin M.
Lowes, March 16, 1935, Collins Papers; JohnC. Rawe to Edward
Day Stewart,Feb. 7, 1937, Owsley Papers; Fletcher to Owsley, May 25, 1935, Owsley
Papers; HerbertAgar, "A Substitutefor 'Share-Our-Wealth,'
" Louisville Courier-Journal,
Aug. 20, 1935; Nixon, "Farm Tenancyto the Forefront,"SouthwestReview, 12-15; Coyle,
UncommonSense, 97-101; Free America,I (Aug. 1937), 5; "In Supportof the Bankhead
Bill," Commonweal,XXI (April 26, 1935), 719.
28 Schlesinger,Coming of the New Deal, 380; Bernard Sternsher,
RexfordTugwell a;1d
the New Deal (New Brunswick,1964), 306.

Decentralist
Intellecttuals

951

cally opposed to Tugwell's assessment.Primarilythey objected to the

appropriationof only $50 million for FSA. As Free America remarked,
"The thingshould be attackedin termsof billions of dollars. Then only
can the driftintotenancyand degradationbe stoppedand reversed."24
Decentralistsattributed
the meeknessof the New Deal's approachto rural povertyto its insistenceon saving a diseased agriculturaleconomyin
order to achieve economicrecovery.Tinkeringwith farm subsidies and
acreagelimitations,
theyargued,had resultedin thenation"payingthrough
the nose to perpetuatea systemof commercialagriculture
whichmightbetter be allowed to fall of its own weight."They emphasizedthatthe New
Deal had not reformedthe tax structureso as to weigh most heavilyon
absenteelandlords,had not enactedlegislationendingland speculationor
guaranteeingbasic rightsto tenants,and had not starteda large land purchase program.Althoughthe New Deal had possiblyincreasedfarminit
come and helped rectify
the imbalancebetweenagricultureand industry,
had been at the expense of pushingmanypoor farmersoffthe land and
keepingthe remainingfarmerstightlycontrolledbya distantbureaucracy.25
The decentralistintellectualsclaimed the New Deal responseto wideas its
spread industrialunemploymentexhibitedthe same superficiality
farmprogram."Relief throughcharitabledoles," Ransomhad observedin
1932, "maybe humanitarianbut it is not economic... thismonth'sdole is
of no effectin preventingnextmonth's."Decentralistsrealizedthat,even
thoughindividualinitiativemightbe underminedand reliefrecipientsbecome dependenton the state,temporaryreliefmeasuresand government
This was the price the
jobs were needed to preventwidespreadsuffering.
nationhad to pay fornot being a decentralizedand propertiedsociety.But
alongsidethesethereshouldbe othermeasuresdesignedto maketheunemployed economicallyindependent,and it was the lack of the latterwhich
made theNew Deal's reliefprogramappearincreasingly
artificial
and inadequate. As Free Americaeditorializedin 1937, "At the outsetthe governmenthad no alternativebut to care for the immediateneedy. . . . But all
thatshould now be replacedbyothermeasurestendingto makethecitizens
24Free America,I (March 1937), 7; ibid., I (May 1937), 3-4; Edgar Schmiedeler,Our
Rural Proletariat(New York, 1939), 22-25; T. J. Cauley, "The Public Interestin the Use
of Rural Land," SouthwesternSocial Science Quarterly,XXX (March 1950), 252.
25 FrankMoney, "Agricultural
Paradox," Free America,I (Aug. 1937), 1; ibid., III (Aug.
1939), 2, 7; Ralph Borsodi, "Democracy,Plutocracy,Bureaucracy,"ibid., III (Aug. 1939),
11; Donald Davidson, review of Agriculturein Modern Life, ibid., III (Dec. 1939), 18;
Thomas H. Haile, "Free Men and the Market,"ibid., V (June 1941), 12; FrankL. Owsley,
"Pellagra Diet," SouthernReview, VI (Spring 1941), 751-53; JohnC. Rawe, "The Home
on the Land," Catholic Rural Life Bulletin, II (Feb. 20, 1939), 24; Edgar Schmiedeler,
VanishingHomesteads (New York, 1941), 23-25.

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self-reliant
and responsible."Agar questionedthe long-rangeimplications
of the New Deal's public works agencies hiringmillions of the unemployed.
bythestatein periodswhenunemployment
Greatpublicworks,carriedforward
They
partof theeconomy.
in privatebusinessis high,maybecomea permanent
Theywill
mayprovea blessing,and a solutionto theproblemof unemployment.
The menwhoworkforthestate
neverprovea solutionto theproblemof liberty.
canonlyremainfreeifa determining
majority
oftheirfellowcitizensdo notwork
forthestatebutkeeptheirownpowerovertheirownwillin theonlywayit can
The citizenswhoworkforthemselves
can
be kept:byearningtheirownsecurity.
of freewill.They
seeto itthatthecitizens
whoworkforthestatearenotdeprived
canguardtheguardians;theycanwatchthewatchmen.
Butifthetimecomeswhen
is dead.26
thebig majority,
or thewhole,is workingforthestate,liberty
Decentralistsapproachedthe Social SecurityAct of 1935 and the Fair
Labor StandardsAct of 1938 in the same ambivalentmanneras theydid
reliefmeasures.They recognizedthatan overlycentralizedindustrialsocietycontainedpersonsunable to provide for theirold age and unemployment,and yettheyfeareda federalsocial securityprogramwould further
concentrate
and make the people look to the state,rather
politicalauthority
than to themselves,for security.The 1935 act would be unnecessary,
of
course,in a propertiedsociety.Accordingly,Agar justifiedthe Social SecurityAct as somethingto temporarilytide the nation over until property
He believedthe New Deal actuallywanted "a
could be widelydistributed.
defenseof Americanfreedomin the onlyway it can be defended-by the
preservation
of real property."27
The Fair Labor StandardsAct establishedmaximumhoursand minimum
wage standardsand was the majorNew Deal factorymeasure.Factorylegcontended,was a makeshiftalternativefor the more
islation,decentralists
basic reforms.They arguedthat,althoughthe employeesof large-scalefactoriesmustbe protectedagainsteconomichazards,"thegreatertheneed for
such protectionthe deeperthe illness of the society."Such legislationwas
state.Davidson declared
merelypalliativeand could lead to a paternalistic
2'Ransom, "The State and the Land," 9-10; Free America,I (Sept. 1937), 4; Ralph Borsodi, "Planning: For What?" ibid., III (Dec. 1939), 16-18; Cauley,"Integrationof Agrarian
and Exchange Economies," 587; Tate, "The Problem of the Unemployed,"130-32, 135;
HerbertAgar, A Time for Greatness(Boston, 1942), 252.
2 HerbertAgar, "EveryMan a King," Louisville Courier-Journal,
Aug. 14, 1935. Several
decentralistscriticizedthe Social SecurityAct's failure to include farmlaborersand farm
tenantswithinits provisions.They accused the New Deal of needlessdiscrimination
against
rural America,particularlythe South with its large agrarianproletariat.David Cushman
Coyle, Roads to a New America (New York, 1937), 335-43; Herman C. Nixon, Social
Securityfor SouthernFarmers (Chapel Hill, 1936), 6-7; Schmiedeler,A BetterRural Life,
249-64.

Intellectuals
Decentralist

953

the Fair Labor StandardsAct illustratedthe New Deal's desire to retain,

Evidentlythe New Deal had
while reforming,centralizedindustrialism.
chosen "to leave social and economictendenciesas theyare, and apply a
fromabove, to make the results
certainamountof humanitariancorrection
of thosetendencieseasierto bear."28
For the decentralist
themajor importanceof factorylegislaintellectuals,
ratherthantheamelioration
tionwas its effecton economicdecentralization
of the workingconditionsof the industriallaborer.Coyle, in particular,
fearedthatmanysmall businesseswould go bankruptbecause of inability
to pay the minimumwage and thatthe 1938 act would impede the movement of industryfromthe Northeastto the low-wage areas of the South
and West. Free America,althoughsuspiciousof the Fair Labor Standards
Act,did anticipatesome good comingfromit. The magazinebelievedclose
supervisionwas needed over businessessuch as utilitiesand railroadsunable to decentralize.Perhapsthis act would be the prelude to democratic
controlover such property,and perhapsbusinessesnot wishingto fall undecentralize.Free Americaproposed:
der its provisionswould voluntarily
so large
industry
industry,
meddleall it likeswithbig nation-size
thegovernment
is impossible.
But let it keep
and employee
thatresponsibility
betweenemployer
servingonlya fewhundredmenand in whichperits handsofflittleindustry
sonal contactbetweenemployerand workeris not onlypossiblebut unavoidable.29

Decentralistsdenied thatthe urbanand industrialworkercould ever secure economicand social justice withina centralizedindustrialeconomy.
Even labor unions could not gain for him the economicsecurityand personal independencewhichwould be his if he owned a piece of land or controlleda small business.Labor unions,theyasserted,were simplynecessary
evils undermodernworkingconditions."If we cannotalterthe conditions
for the better,if we cannotget ahead in our race withcollectivism,"Free
Americacommented,"then we cannotcomplainthatthe workersproceed
to aid the labor
in a theoretically
collectivistdirection."New Deal efforts
movement,althoughdesirablein orderto createa countervailingforceto
oppose big business,failed to answerthe more pressingneed of economic
' John C. Rawe, "The AgrarianConcept of Property,"Modern Schoolman,XIV (Nov.
1936), 4; Donald Davidson, "Where Are the Laymen?A Studyin Policy-Making,"American Review, IX (Oct. 1937), 478; Richmond Croom Beatty,Lord Macaulay: Victorian
Liberal (Norman, 1938), 286.
29 Coyle, Roads to a New America,292-95; Free America,I (July 1937), 3-5; Davidson,
AttackOn Leviathan,282. Nixon and Agar, in contrast,favoredwage and hour legislation
of the South.Nixon, Possum
because it would preventa rapid and ruthlessindustrialization
Trot, 155-56; Herbert Agar, "The New Carpetbaggers,I," Louisville Courier-Journal,
April 9, 1937.

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Legislationsuch as Article7 (a) of NIRA and the Nadecentralization.

tionalLabor RelationsAct of 1935 was an "irrelevantmatterof greatinterest [to the workers]but onlya sourceof confusionin themorevitalstrugso thatit would not jam.'"30
gle to rearrangethe economicmachinery
more than
The National Housing Act of 1937 disturbeddecentralists
any other New Deal measure with the possible exception of NIRA.
This act authorizedthe United StatesHousing Authorityto extendlongloans to local public agenciesto clear slums and build
term,low-interest
housingprojects.Decentralistsarguedthatbuildinghousingon the sitesof
old slums merelyencouragedpeople to remainin the cityand offeredno
incentivefor industryto decentralize.And to make mattersworse, there
was nothingin the act providingforhome ownership."Outsideof givinga
fewpeople moredecentlivingquarters,"Free Americacomplained,"nothexpropriated,deing is to be done towardtranslatingour ever-increasing,
pendentproletariatinto an independentand responsiblecitizenry."Public
housingappearedto be a giganticsubsidyto urbanizedindustrysinceit enabled urbanlabor to be decentlyhoused withouthavingindustrypay forit
throughhigherwages. Decentralistsproposedthat,if possible,publichousthateach
ing be single dwellings,thatsuburbanbuildingbe givenpriority,
separatedwellingincludean acreof tillableland, and thattheoccupantsbe
educatedin theprinciplesof subsistenceagriculture.3'
The decentralistintellectualswere thus generallydisappointedwith the
variousNew Deal programsto reformindustrialand urbanlife. For them,
and public housingleftuntouchedeconomiccentralrelief,social security,
and dispossession.There were,nevertheization,financialaggrandizement,
less, some measuresduringRoosevelt'ssecond termwhich bore more directlyon the issue of economiccentralization.In March 1938, Thurman
generalin chargeof the AntitrustDivision
Arnoldwas appointedattorney
of theDepartmentof Justice,and he soon becamethemostactivetrustbust"0FreeAmerica,I (Feb. 1937), 3-5; ibid., I (July 1937), 5-6; Coyle, "Twilight of National Planning," 557-62; Beatty,Lord Macaulay, 286; Rawe, "AgrarianConcept of Property,"4; Allen Tate, "A View of theWhole South,"AmericanReview,II (Feb. 1934), 418Securityand Freedom," Free America, III (Feb. 1939),
19; Graham Carey, "Sufficiency,
10-11; Liguttiand Rawe, Rural Roads to Security,38-39; HerbertAgar, "Farm Owners or
Sept. 28, 1936.
Farm Unions?" Louisville Courier-Journal,
"tFree America,I (Sept. 1937), 7; ibid., I (April 1937), 4; ibid., I (Aug. 1937), 9;
Ralph L. Woods, "Defense and Decentralization,"Free America, IV (Sept. 1940), 3-5;
"These Men: The BiggestLittleMayor in the World," Free America,IV (Nov. 1940), 6-8;
Liguttiand Rawe, Rural Roads to Security,109-11; John C. Rawe, "The Modern Homestead: A Vital EconomicInstitution,"Modern Schoolman,XV (Jan. 1938), 34-35; Davidson, "Regionalismas Social Science," 224. Agar was almostapologeticforsupportingpublic
March 27, 1939;
housing.HerbertAgar, "Federal Housing, II," Louisville Courier-Journal,
HerbertAgar, "Free and Independent,"ibid., Feb. 8, 1938.

DecentralistIntellectuals

955

er in Americanhistory.One monthlater,Rooseveltrequestedfundsforan
inquiryby the
investigation
of monopolieswhichresultedin the three-year
TemporaryNational EconomicCommittee.There was also the selectionof
Hadan Alldredgeof Alabama, a vigorousfoe of regionalrailroadratedifferentials,as a commissionerof the InterstateCommerce Commission
(ICC), and the passage of the TransportationAct of 1940, empowering
ICC to aid farmersby reducingrailwayrateson agriculturalproducts.
Decentralistshailed these modest successes,32but they remained convincedthe New Deal had not tamedplutocracy.Tate, who in 1936 looked
forwardto theNew Deal attacking"privilegeand Big Business,"described
the United Statesin 1938 as a "plutocraticregimemaskedas a democracy."
Agar, who in 1936 predictedthatRooseveltintendedto push the struggle
against plutocracy"throughto a conclusion,"assertedin 1938 the New
Deal had been a failurebecause it had triedmerelyto amelioratethe worst
effectsof moderncapitalism- the resulthas been a permanentcrisisof
and a ten-year-long
unemployment
depression."Coyle, who in 1936 saw
the New Deal as "the earlystage of the finaleffortof the Americaneconomicand politicalsystemto throwoffthe shacklesof big business,"conduring
tinuallycalled formorevigorousattackson economiccentralization
the late 1930s. The growthof politicalcentralization
also dismayedthe desince it had
centralistintellectuals,a developmenttheysaw as unnecessary
not resultedin the discipliningof big businessor the creationof a propertied society.Accordingto the utopian agrarianRalph Borsodi, the New
to enDeal had made it "virtuallyimpossibleforanyoneto own property,
gage in business small or large, withoutpaying constantand obsequious
tributeto bureaucracy."83
Decentralist's criticismsof the New Deal for merely tinkering
32Nixon, "New Deal and the South," 329-33; Davidson, "On Being in Hock to the
North," 5; Joseph L. Nicholson, "The Place of Small Business," Free America,IV (June
1940), 9; HerbertAgar, "Roosevelt and Collectivism,"Louisville Courier-Journal,
May 7,
1938; Agar, A Time for Greatness,171, 176; Ellis W. Hawley, The New Deal and the
Problemof Monopoly: A Studyin EconomicAmbivalence(Princeton,1966), 439.
" Allen Tate, reviewof Pursuitof Happiness, Free America,II (Oct. 1938), 16-18; HerbertAgar, "Mr. Rooseveltand a Free Economy,"Louisville Courier-Journal,
June29, 1936;
HerbertAgar, "Pump-Priming,
II," ibid., Aug. 3, 1938; HerbertAgar, "DorothyThompson
and the New Deal, II," ibid., Aug. 13, 1938; HerbertAgar, "The Right to PrivateProperty,"Free America,III (June 1939), 7; Coyle, "Map of the New Deal," 220-21; Coyle,
"Inefficient
Efficiency,"
376-78; Borsodi, "Democracy,Plutocracy,Bureaucracy,"11; Ralph
Borsodi, "Decentralization,"Free America,II (Feb. 1938), 12; GrahamCarey,"Sufficiency,
Security,and Freedom," ibid., III (Jan. 1939), 5; Beatty,Lord Macaulay, 371; Chard
Powers Smith,"In Defence of Democracy,"Free America,I (April 1937), 5-7; FrancisP.
Miller, "Democracy: A Way of Life," ibid., I (Nov. 1937), 1-2; Stoyan Pribichevich,
"Modern Leviathan," ibid.; II (Aug. 1938), 13; Frank L. Owsley, review of The Social
Philosophyof John Taylor of Caroline, ibid., IV (Feb. 1940), 18-19; Liguttiand Rawe,
Rural Roads to Security,255-56.

956

The Journalof AmericanHistory

with capitalismand for failingto recognizethe need for drasticreforms

were surprisinglysimilar to the complaintsof collectivistintellectuals.
Common Sense, Nation, and New Republic,the threemajor journals of
liberals and collectivistsin the 1930s, all criticizedthe New Deal for attemptingto patch up capitalismratherthan moving toward collectivism.
Accordingto CommonSense, the New Deal was "whirligigreform"led
bya President"morerenownedforhis artisticjugglingthanforrobustresolution." Max Lerner,an editorof Nation, attributedthe New Deal's errors to Roosevelt's lack of "a clearlyarticulatedsocial philosophy,"and
predictedhe would be "betterremembered
forhis inadequaciesthanforhis
achievements."The historianCharlesA. Beard censuredthe New Deal for
not nationalizingthe banks and railroads,and for not acceptinghis vision
of an integratedeconomydirectedby government
planners."At the end of
the depression,if it everends," he grumbledin 1935, "the concentration
of
wealth in the United Stateswill doubtlessmark a new high point in the
evolutionof Americaneconomy."The problemfor the Marxisthistorian
Louis M. Hacker was "not how to sustainan edificewhose foundationis
slippingand whichhas displayedvital flawsin mostof the partsof its superstructure:
not where to continuepatchingfartheror even what to salvage, but whatto substitute."By calling a truceto class conflictin the hope
purchasingpower could be restored,the New Deal had been unable to
effectany "enduringchangesin the class relationsin Americaneconomic
society."The English socialistHarold J. Laski also dislikedRoosevelt'sreluctanceto diagram a long-rangecollectivistprogram.Laski regretfully
concludedthatRooseveltsimplydid notrecognizethat"the social systemin
Americatodayis bankrupt."34
The weaknessesof the New Deal, accordingto decentralist
intellectuals,
stemmedfromthe pragmaticspiritand intellectualflabbinessof American
liberalism. Refusing to contemplatefundamentalsocial and economic
change,theNew Deal had merelyattemptedto amelioratetheworstaspects
of large-scalecapitalismthroughwelfareprogramsand federalspending.
The basic problemsof dispossession,sectionalimperialism,and economic
centralization,decentralistsclaimed, had remained relativelyuntouched
FrankA. Warren,III, Liberals and Communism:The "Red Decade" Revisited(Bloomington,1966), 41-42; George Wolfskill and JohnA. Hudson, All but the People: Franklin
D. Rooseveltand His Critics,1933-39 (London, 1969), 135-36; Max Lerner,"Rooseveltand
History,"Nation, CXLVI (May 7, 1938), 534; Charles A. Beard, "National Politics and
War," Scribner'sMagazine, XCVII (Feb. 1935), 69-70; Louis M. Hacker, "The New Deal
Is No Revolution:Well, Then: What Next?" Harper's Magazine, 168 (Jan. 1934), 121-33;
Harold J. Laski, "On America," Living Age, CCCLXVIII (Aug. 1935), 554; Harold J.
Laski, "What Is Vital in Democracy?"SurveyGraphic,XXIV (April 1935), 179.
34

DecentralistIntellectuals

957

duringthe 1930s. This critiquelargelyagreeswiththe analysisof theNew

radicalhistoDeal by radicalsduringthe 1930s and bymanycontemporary
intellectualperrians.Althoughapproachingthe New Deal fromdiffering
spectives,theyalso emphasizethe inadequaciesof theRooseveltadministrathe national income
tion, especiallyits failureto redistribute
significantly
and its acceptanceof capitalismand privateproperty.This perhapsreveals
the moderatenatureof the New Deal. It disappointedbothcriticsand defendersof privateproperty.When contrastedwith the European reform
movementsof the 1930s, the New Deal increasinglyappears to be a caureadtious,middle-of-the-road
programwhichsatisfiedneitherdecentralist
ers of Free America nor the radical and socialistreadersof Nation and
New Republic.