(2 of 3)
Patent Medicines. "We are confronted with scores of theoretical panaceas which would inevitably delay recovery. . . . Some . . . agitate for economic patent medicines from foreign lands. . . . Others [believe] that by some legerdemain we can legislate ourselves out of a world-wide Depression. . . . Nothing can be gained in recovery of employment by detouring capital into the Treasury by taxes or loans, on the assumption that the Government can create more employment than industry and commerce. . . .— We have had one proposal after another which amounts to a dole from the Treasury. The largest is that of unemployment insurance. . . . The net results of Governmental doles are to lower wages and to endow the slacker. ... It is proposed that we can expedite recovery by another [tariff] revision. Nothing would more prolong Depression than a session of Congress devoted to this purpose. . . ."
Plan. "Many citizens insist we produce an advance 'plan' for the future development of the U. S. I presume the 'plan' idea is an infection from the slogan '5-year-plan' through which Russia is struggling to redeem herself from ten years of starvation and misery. I am able to propose an American plan to you. We plan to take care of 20,000,000 increase in population in the next 20 years. We plan to build for them 4,000,000 new and better homes, thousands of new and still more beautiful city buildings, thousands of factories; to increase the capacity of our railways; to add thousands of miles of highways and waterways; to install 25,000,000 electrical horsepower; to grow 20% more farm products. We plan to provide new parks, schools, colleges and churches. We plan more leisure for men and women. . . . We plan to secure a greater diffusion of wealth, a decrease in poverty and a great reduction in crime. . . . We should have full faith and confidence in those mighty resources, those intellectual and spiritual forces which have impelled this Nation to a success never before known in history. . . . Under the guidance of divine Providence they will return to us a greater and more wholesome prosperity than we have ever known."
Thus by offering his auditors a Plan in dramatic form did President Hoover envisage the country's surging advance through the next two decades. Next morning President Hoover breakfasted on Indiana strawberries and cream at the executive mansion. His special train then carried him into Ohio and to the white marble tomb of Warren Gamaliel Harding at Marion.†
The day to dedicate this $800,000 memorial had come at long last. What, if anything, would the President have to say about the scandals of the Harding era? Would he ignore them and thus stultify himself? Or would he name names and thus antagonize Republican Ohio?
With the 30th President standing by, the 31st President delivered a speech on the 2gth President which was altogether felicitous for the occasion. Excerpts: