THE PRESIDENCY: Greatest Curse

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Day before leaving Warm Springs last week President Roosevelt drove down to the railway station to meet his military aide, Lieut. Colonel Edwin Watson, who was to accompany him to Chicago. "Come on, Pa," said the President, welcoming the colonel into his car. They tootled through the Foundation grounds, to the wooded hillside where the Presidential Marine guard was tenting. Pointing, the President said: "There's your tent, Pa. It's been pretty chilly lately but I think you'll be all right with a good army blanket. The stove is a bit rusty but the boys will build a fire in it and if the water freezes in your bucket you can thaw it out enough to shave." "That's fine," declared the colonel enthusiastically. "Eighty per cent of my service was spent under canvas and I don't see much of it on this White House assignment."

Disgruntled at the failure of his joke, the President drove his aide back to the commodious quarters waiting for him in one of the Foundation buildings.

Next morning it was drizzling as Franklin Roosevelt climbed the ramp to his private railroad car. At the top he turned and shouted "Oh, Henry!" Manager Henry Hooper of the Foundation scurried up. "Henry, I forgot to tell you: I left two bags of seeds, one walnut and one pine. I wish you would plant them in the nursery." Up went the gangplank. Off went the train. When the special stopped at Chattanooga, the President quit work on his speech, went out to the rear platform. "I don't have to tell you," he declared to the station crowd, "of my interest in this State and in this section of this State, because in the Tennessee Valley the nation as a whole is conducting—I hate to call it an experiment because it has got beyond that stage —but it is conducting a great humanitarian work which because of"—the train began to move—"its already proven success is going to mean much for the country in the days to come.'' The train was pulling out and Franklin Roosevelt, grasping tight the arm of Gus Gennerich, pitched the microphone into which he had been speaking over the railing to its owners on the platform. Following morning the Presidential train was parked in the Chicago Union Stockyards. Nearby, in the International Amphitheatre, Franklin Roosevelt stood looking down on 18,000 delegates to the annual convention of the American Farm Bureau Federation. Into their ears Farmer Roosevelt poured his justification of AAA. Excerpts:

"I knew enough of the problems of the men and women who were partners with the soil to realize the depth of their suffering and the extent of their need back there in 1932 and early 1933. I knew the pangs of fear and moments of rejoicing that come to the farmer as the harvest frowns or smiles. . . . "One of the greatest curses of American life has been speculation. I do not refer to the obvious speculation in stocks and bonds and land booms. . . . The kind of speculation I am talking about is the involuntary speculation of the farmer when he puts his crops into the ground. How can it be healthy for a country to have the price of crops vary 300% and 500% and 700%—all in less than a generation? . . .