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A COMPARISON
The controversy which is pro
ceeonng in the Unitecd S'ates over
.ne kNew Deal is somewhat inter
esting. The Tories say that it- is
proceeding on reactionary lines,
but it is too early yet to say
whither it will lead. +Here, inr Aus
Lralia, many claim that RoIsevelt
s doini' what they would do if
hey oniy had the chance. These
declaimers have, at times, had the
chance, but on the last occasion
ail they succeeded in doing was
o imake confusion worse. Ro'ase
velt has not yet done that in the
United States; if he had he would
not have had such a sweeping vic
tory when the elections were held.
Roosevelt s critics over there have
descr bed his New 'Deal as a dice
tatorship, as resemnbling Fascism,
Bolshevism. Some have said it
was German, Italiani, Russian. In
a recent fireside talk Roosevelt
fired a mnibshell at 'these critics
The President'of 'the United Statie,
believes inithe "personal "factor,
and he makes a point of haiving
talks to the niatio' 'from' 'White
-Iouse .'-n Su'-day evenmgg,'about
once a fortnight. 'In this pariiulari
talk he claimed that. 'they 'New;
Dcd was basecd on .the> Britidih
modle'1 we cdonot-kno'how this
claim of' Roosevelt's will- suit the
local espousers uf the New Dal.
Her are the words; Roosevelt
uisz: d :They point' to 'Erglarind,'
he said "They would have' you
be eve that England ' has made
pr'ogre's by a' do-nothing policy,;
by letting nature take her course;
England has her peculiarities; :and
tWe have zurs,'but Il do notbelieve
any: intelligent· observer can ac
'cuse England of undue orthodoxy.
in the' present emergency." '-He
pointed 'to the gold standard. Both
countries had set it 'aside. Eng
land, he claimed, had advanced
much farther than the United
States in bringing security to the'
worker and in her recognitioni If
collective bargaining as the ,basis
of industrial relationships. Results
to date 'seem 'to bear him out. "It
is perhaps not strange,' said
P'resdent Roosevelt, "that the
'Ccnserva'tive press ' ha's tola us,
with parondable irony, that much
of our New Deal programme is
only.an' attempt 'to catch up with
gnglish reforms that go 'back ten
years'or more." This is a some
what rueful confession coming
from the fuunder of the New Del,,
but there is somenthing to be said
in. excuse for the facts. For three
centuries the United States has
had no boundaries in the eco
nomiic sense. If men did nut like
-the' conditions which they found
'round them, they cduld go
bush"'as we would put it. They
have had three centuries of
pioneer inidividualism, what one
writer has described as the "free
booter philosophy of the frontier."
Ind'ividualism is a splendid thing
u to a point, and that point .is
wiere the ':'ther man's individual'
istic expression 'begins. That is
why we 'tolerate State interfer
ence, not because we like it, but
because there ,are 'so rmanv who
are animated with the "freebooter
philosophy." The 'United States
has been struck suddenly with the
fact that there is an end to her
p'hilosop'h3 which had ptood the
test fsr three hundred years be
cause there were no boundaries.
Britain for a century had a eneas
ure of the same phil'osophy in her
sea trading. To-day she has awak
ened to the fact that those days of
easy conquest are passing. Every
where she meets competition from
inther nations. Easy markets,
which were once at her feet, are
now manufacturing for 'themselves
.many of the 'things' they requiie.
IBut the comparison between
Britaihi and ,America shows great
difference in'the methods of meet
ing new circumstances. Britain
lIemel lne ong ago that 'there were
such things as reactions. For many
- generra'tions th'se who did not like
reactions in the United States
wcnt to Arizona or Nevada.
Britain had learned-she had to
do so-to accommodate herself
to these reactions, but when the
crash came they had not learned
the les:n 'in' America. There the
subordinating of self to the state
was not thought of. Consequently,
when the opportunity for 'the full
expression of 'this freebooter
phil'sophy arose as it did after
the war, sneculation took mad
flights. It became an orgy; laws
of common sense were there only
to be disregarded. England had
had more experience; her South
Sa Bubblies were 'two hundred
'-ears old. but history in England
is nnt easily forgctten. Then again
England has a better developed
banking svs em th'n that of
America, and that helped to save
Britain 'as our system helped to
save Australi'. Britain was never
threatened with the paralysis of
her 'b'anking as was 'the ,United
States. America to-day may be
copying 'Britain, as Roosevelt
claims. but ahe h~s a long way to
go before her citizens will have
cultivated 'that steadiness lof out
"ink which make it impossible fnr
Britain or Australia to adoot will
"i'ly ab-"nt a'd drarat %
'ha"-es. We involuntarily look
for 'the catch.
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