Details
TRUMAN, HARRY S. Typed letter signed ("Harry") with bold five-line autograph postscript as Senator, to Edward D. McKim of Omaha, Washington, D.C., 21 February 1941. 2 pages, 4to, on Senate stationery, binding hole at top edges.
SENATOR TRUMAN'S NEW DEAL PHILOSOPHY
"I fear that you don't completely understand the New Deal point of view. The trend of 'normalcy' which brought us into this war and our financial straits was toward absolute control by a very few in the financial field. The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company and the Prudential, the New York Life and one or two others, are...in control of the situation in such a way that small companies in the long run would cease to have an opportunity to exist. I would much rather see a thousand life insurance companies with four millions or forty millions in assets, than to have one four billion or forty billion dollar company. That same thing is true of steel, copper, aluminum, rubber, and all the other vital commodities. Our rubber situation has been brought about by the fact that some of our biggest industrialists were in agreement with Germany on the use of certain patents for synthetic rubber. Part of our agricultural woes are due to this same agreement for the use of synthetic gasoline and alcohol.
"My understanding of the New Deal is to give just such fellows as you a chance to operate. I believe in the long run, had not this tremendous world turmoil resulted from the things I have been talking about, your interest would have been fundamentally the same as mine. You keep on creating dollars so that we can tax them, and when you get so that you can't do that you and I will go back in the Army...."
SENATOR TRUMAN'S NEW DEAL PHILOSOPHY
"I fear that you don't completely understand the New Deal point of view. The trend of 'normalcy' which brought us into this war and our financial straits was toward absolute control by a very few in the financial field. The Metropolitan Life Insurance Company and the Prudential, the New York Life and one or two others, are...in control of the situation in such a way that small companies in the long run would cease to have an opportunity to exist. I would much rather see a thousand life insurance companies with four millions or forty millions in assets, than to have one four billion or forty billion dollar company. That same thing is true of steel, copper, aluminum, rubber, and all the other vital commodities. Our rubber situation has been brought about by the fact that some of our biggest industrialists were in agreement with Germany on the use of certain patents for synthetic rubber. Part of our agricultural woes are due to this same agreement for the use of synthetic gasoline and alcohol.
"My understanding of the New Deal is to give just such fellows as you a chance to operate. I believe in the long run, had not this tremendous world turmoil resulted from the things I have been talking about, your interest would have been fundamentally the same as mine. You keep on creating dollars so that we can tax them, and when you get so that you can't do that you and I will go back in the Army...."