ABSTRACT
Gulick’s 1933 essay on ‘‘Politics, Administration and the ‘New Deal’’’ is an extraordinary study in futures, decades ahead of its time in a number of ways. Its initial theme is the usual argument for centralization, except that this time Gulick points to the increasing fragmentation within the federal government, which had been largely immune to Jacksonian organizational doctrines until well into the twentieth century. There are hints of the nature of the president’s Committee’s report yet to come. About other matters the essay is prophetic indeed. There is space here for only a few illustrative quotations:(31)
Merely to catch up with the industrial revolution, the American scheme of government will require profound changes; first, in its system of political boundaries; second, in its application of the principle of division of labor so that government can make proper use of the politician, the administrator and the technician; and third, in the relation of political parties and interest groups to the mechanisms of control. All these readjustments are being made through patchwork changes here and there. But the lag is great.
