ABSTRACT
But most of the businessmen I heard talking, and the ones I read about in the papers, hated Roosevelt’s guts. They hated the PWA and the WPA, they hated the CCC and the TVA, but most of all they hated Social Security and the Wagner Act, which guaranteed unions the right to organize. Here’s how businessmen saw it: The government was invading their turf. It was telling business what to do. It was violating the sacred right of the businessman and the worker to make a contract without outside interference. And the government was going into busi ness for itself, competing with legiti mate private interests. What, then, was the business program? Go away. Leave us alone. Stop undermining business confidence. The economy will come around when the meddling stops. And meanwhile, what about the unemployed? It’s not my busi ness.
