Work Relief Administration Press Conferences
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Press Conference
Harry Hopkins
March 7, 1935
4:00 P.M.

Query:	How are you getting along in Ohio?
Mr. Hopkins:	All right.
Query:	Are there twenty-two million people on the relief roles now?
Mr. Hopkins:	No.
Query:	What is your estimate?
Mr. Hopkins:	It is not an estimate. We know how many. Webbink says twenty million five hundred thousand.
Query:	Why is it that so many have gone off, have been re-employed, and at the same time the relief load goes up?
Mr. Hopkins:	The longer the depression lasts, the higher the percentage of total unemployed we get on relief. That is, if ten people are unemployed in 1930, only one goes on relief; in 1931, if there are still ten people unemployed, two are on relief, and in 1931, if one is employed, there nevertheless will be three on the relief rolls. The relief goes up, because gradually all the resources finally go. Ever since 1929 we have had every year a higher percentage of the total number of unemployed on relief month after month except for the seasonal variation, and I think that is the answer to it.
Query:	How long will you have to go before these two curves get together?
Mr. Hopkins:	You mean if employment went back to 1929, when would the relief curve go back to where it was in 1929? I think a long time thereafter. There are other factors in that, especially when you talk about unemployables and old people who have never been on relief at all who have lost their money in the depression. They are on for good.
Query:	Should it be a fair statement to say that it industry picked up to 1929, you would still have a substantial relief load?
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes.
Query:	Can you break down that twenty million figure for us?
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes. The families on relief in January were 4,533,840; 700,000 were single persons, 40,000 teachers in adult education, 100,000 college students getting work relief, 70,000 on the statistics in rural rehabilitation. That makes the total of 5,490,000 cases. You must distinguish between families and cases. That is the family plus the single people. Twenty million five hundred thousand people, therefore, are dependent in whole or in part upon relief because many of these families are on relief.
Query:	Out of this 20,500,000 that will be affected by the President's proposed program, how many would that take care of out of that total?
Mr. Hopkins:	It would take care of a little more than the average per family in the nation because of the fact that we have made it a practice to try to get all the big relief families on work so if we have two million families on work, we have more individuals in those families than others getting direct relief, but, as a guess, I would say it would affect fifteen million.
Query:	Does that mean five million unemployables still on relief rolls?
Mr. Hopkins:	Well, you have to take into consideration there the drouth families. You see we have a minimum of 300,000 families getting relief because of drouth. They are included in the total number of families. These figures include everything, There are 300,000 drouth families getting relief simply because of drouth. Those are farmers that will be farming and are not on the work program.
Query:	How much work relief is there now?
Mr. Hopkins:	That is included in this. If you want to break that down of the 5,490,000 cases, two and one quarter million get their benefits by work. In addition to this, 200,000 transients do some work for their benefits. You can add that 200,000 transients to the two and one quarter million because transients are counted in the cases, The total is close to two and one-half million.
Query:	Is the peak of relief usually reached in February?
Mr. Hopkins:	In the past, it has been reached in March. We get indications of what it is going to be by the number of applications that come in. We keep track here; we know during the month of February how many applications come in in comparison with January, and the indications in this office are that the relief load will not rise in February over January, and there is no indication the first week of March that there is any substantial rise.
Query:	Have the states taken up any of the slack brought about by the drive which has been made to get contributions from the states?
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes, we have a number of states within the last few days, specifically: Oregon, Washington, Nebraska, North Dakota, Minnesota (as soon as they get a few things cleared up today).
Query:	I mean have they reached the point where they actually have taken over this load?
Mr. Hopkins:	If you think in terms of appropriating money, the states are doing it. We are getting some statistics together on this unemployable business.
Query:	Have the states' contributions been going downward?
Mr. Hopkins:	They have been going up steadily since March, 1933, and we are getting the largest contributions in terms of dollars that we have ever gotten.
Query:	I mean compared to local communities?
Mr. Hopkins:	Local communities have a tendency to go down. The states have more than taken that up so that as far as we are concerned, we think of states and local communities as one.
Query:	You made the statement a little while ago that you thought the increase in relief was due to the fact that the depression was lasting so long, and yet the total number of unemployed is smaller.
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes, I think it is.
Query:	Considerably smaller?
Mr. Hopkins:	I would not say, but I think that there is now going on a steady increase of employment. I cannot tell how big that is, I do not want to over-emphasize but I think that is going on.
Query:	What is your unemployment figure?
Mr. Hopkins:	I do not have one,
Query:	Do you feel that the relief rolls are over-loaded? I saw that in New York City they went over them, and knocked off 12,000.
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes, I saw it too, but you do not say how many were added, You see there are a large number taken off every month, but the increase is the net increase. There is a constant drive going on and a great deal of pressure on now to go over those rolls again very carefully to get everybody off that should be off.
Query:	I Just came from out west, and there is more talk than over before that a lot of people can have jobs but they prefer to stay on relief.
Mr. Hopkins:	I have no doubt that there are people on relief that do not need it, but we do everything we can to get them off.
Query:	You said yesterday you had approved the grant for Minnesota. Are you going to allow actual cash in advance of the final approval of the appropriation?
Mr. Hopkins:	No.
Query:	Could you elaborate on how you arrived at the figure for the Minnesota contribution?
Mr. Hopkins:	No, except that I think it is their fair share.
Query:	Do you have any rule or formula by which to determine the fair share of the state?
Mr. Hopkins:	We have a number of criteria but those criteria are flexible.
Query:	Do you discuss these criteria with the state officials?
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes.
Query:	Is there any appeal from your decision as to what constitutes the state's fair share?
Mr. Hopkins:	Some states do not put it up.
Query:	In other words, your word on what they are to contribute for Federal relief is final?
Mr. Hopkins:	I would not say that.
Query:	What would you say?
Mr. Hopkins:	I would say that the grant of relief to the states is discretionary with the Federal Relief Administrator. He is expected to use his best judgment, and he uses his best judgment
Query:	There is no appeal from his best judgment?
Mr. Hopkins:	There is nothing in the law that provides for any appeal.
Query:	I mean you have set up no standard by which you adjust differences of opinion?
Mr. Hopkins:	We adjust them all the time. If we finally disagree, we disagree, but we discuss these matters and adjust them all the time between the states.
Query:	In this situation, you have a weapon to use over the states, but the states have none to use over you.
Mr. Hopkins:	Are you worrying about the fact that Minnesota may be putting up too much money?
Query:	I am wondering how you arrived at the difference in amounts between the states.
Mr. Hopkins:	Well, we have people on our staff who I think know as much or more about public finance and taxation as anybody in the United States, and they advise me what in their opinion these states could and should do, and we consider every possible criteria in there. One of the criteria you have to take into consideration now is the drouth. Obviously, that is not something you can draw a line and say, this is this. It is a matter of opinion. We try to be reasonable about it, and I think we have been. Now, I think on the other hand some of these states—a few of them—would take advantage of a reasonable person, and they say, 'well this fellow is reasonable about this, let's give him another crack.'
Query:	These 20,500,000 people, how many are unemployed?
Mr. Hopkins:	Then you have to discuss whether the farmer is unemployed, for instance. You have to figure on this industrial unemployment. I would think as a matter of fact that we have about one-half of the unemployed on the relief lists of the United States, and that there is another half of the unemployed who are not on the relief rolls. I have a feeling that when you have all the unemployed that there are probably five million that might be classified as unemployed on the relief rolls. You see, in a family there are about 1.6 employable people in the average family in America. So, let us say the President has three and one-half million people—that would mean three and one-half million heads of families. In those families there might be as many as five million unemployed.
Query:	Getting back to fixing the amount the states pay, are your financial advisers also making suggestions of certain sources of taxation?
Mr. Hopkins:	No, we avoid that. We know all about taxes they now have.
Query:	When you find that a state has exhausted its funds, then the Federal Government takes the entire load?
Mr. Hopkins:	No, I would not say that.
Query:	Have you reached any agreement with Arkansas?
Mr. Hopkins:	Yes, I have reached an agreement.
Query:	They have a six million dollar tax bill there.
Mr. Hopkins:	Not as far as we are concerned. I think one and one-half million is for relief.
Query:	How are you getting along with Louisiana?
Mr. Hopkins:	So-so.
Query:	What do you mean by 'so-so'?
Mr. Hopkins:	Well, all right.
Query:	How about Illinois?
Mr. Hopkins:	Fine.
Query:	That was left out Saturday.
Mr. Hopkins:	There is nothing specific about it.
Query:	Has it been made since?
Mr. Hopkins:	If not, there is no reason for not making it.
Query:	What do you mean when you say you have a feeling that one-half of the unemployed are on relief? How do you arrive at that feeling?
Mr. Hopkins:	Well, you see, we have a very wide-spread organization here all over the country. We are constantly getting reports all the time, everywhere, every city and county in the nation, and beyond that I cannot answer. It has nothing to do with statistics.
Query:	How do the other half get along?
Mr. Hopkins:	They get along in several ways; some have savings, or friends and relatives take care of them, occasionally they pick up an odd job.
Query:	After you subtract fifteen million from twenty, what category do they fall in? Do they represent employables between 16 and 64?
Mr. Hopkins:	They represent, I would say, the drouth crowd first—old people, widows with dependent children, and people with handicaps of one kind or another what we call unemployables, but that is a term you have to watch, and it has to be used with great care. Unemployability means that a person cannot get a job in industry at the moment, Well, in 1929 or during the war a lot of people that we thought of as unemployable suddenly became employable.
Query:	How many of these 5,500,000 would you estimate the Security Program would take care of?
Mr. Hopkins:	It depends on how that bill finally comes out. It will take care of a very large share, especially the section of the bill with reference to dependent children.
Query:	How many people are unemployed that could have worked that have become of working age since 1929?
Mr. Hopkins:	I have that breakdown by a lot of cities. We have just made a study of all the big cities of employable people on relief. The first heading in that is employable people who have never worked. That is, youngsters getting out of school who have been looking for jobs. I do not know what that figure is offhand. We have those figures for every city in America, and we have the exact trades of all the employable people, and amongst other things, it shows how long these fellows held their last job. We have it all broken down by cities. It is a very interesting document. Some of you may have seen it. We have it broken down by about one hundred occupations.
Query:	I was wondering it that number had increased more than the slack taken up by industry?
Mr. Hopkins:	Five hundred thousand net go on every year. There are about two and one-half million more employable workers than in 1929,
Query:	Have you figured out in percentages how much of an increase there is in the cost of relief?
Mr. Hopkins:	No.
Query:	Are you contemplating any change in the Missouri Relief set-up?
Mr. Hopkins:	No.
Query:	Will Arkansas get any relief money until that bill is passed?
Mr. Hopkins:	I am not worrying about that.
Query:	To how many states do you have to suggest that they raise certain funds?
Mr. Hopkins:	A good many, I cannot think of them off-hand.
Query:	All of them have complied, except Ohio, Arkansas, and Minnesota?
Mr. Hopkins:	I would not say that. We are having negotiations all the time.
Query:	Do you know anything about the rural rehabilitation bill in connection with Connecticut, New York and other states?
Mr. Hopkins:	I saw in the paper that some bill was turned down by the Connecticut legislature. It is not important.
Query:	Do you know how many states received that bill?
Mr. Hopkins:	I doubt if any received that bill. There are state rural rehabilitation corporations, probably in thirty or thirty-five states under state laws.
Query:	Why not make public these various criteria?
Mr. Hopkins:	I cannot see any reason why we should not. It would be a very interesting local news story for any local city, and I guess we must have ninety of them now.
Query:	I think it would help a great deal.
Mr. Hopkins:	Do you want to see how many legislators are on the relief rolls?
Query:	They all sit down there and say they cannot do it, and if you shove them a bit, it might move things along.
Mr. Hopkins:	Well....
Query:	Mr. Ickes says 90,000 projects are ready to go. How many have you got?
Mr. Hopkins:	We have two and one-quarter million people working.
Query:	I understand you have a lot of projects.
Mr. Hopkins:	No, that is not quite right. Our Work Bureaus all over the United States have projects but they have not the money for materials; you cannot go into any office in America in which the city officials would not want to upt them through if the funds were available. I know we have 56,000 projects they are working on now in the United States.
Query:	You say that Connecticut was not important. Doesn't that definitely eliminate the program?
Mr. Hopkins:	No, there are more ways than one to kill a cat. It is nothing to us. We do not want Connecticut to do this it they do not want to, but there am plenty of people in the state of Connecticut who are broke who would like a chance to get under the auspices of our rural rehabilitation service. That is merely one device but there are other devices. The Relief Administration could go right out and do it practically any time they want.
Query:	Are there any possibilities of it?
Mr. Hopkins:	There might be.
Query:	Are you going to finish your speaking tour out west?
Mr. Hopkins:	Oh, gee, I do not like to ride on trains.
Query:	You flew back.
Mr. Hopkins:	I like that—I'll try it again.
Query:	If the number of unemployed continues and the trend is for more people to go on relief proportionately, what do you think the total of relief will be a month from now if unemployment continues at the present figure?
Mr. Hopkins:	I do not want to hazard an estimate, but I think the indications are that the relief load did not go up in February.
Query:	No prediction for March?
Mr. Hopkins:	I do not think it will go up in March if it follows the curve. In other years March has been the peak month. Then it goes down seasonally. We get a large decline in relief in the south early in the spring.
Query:	Can you tell me anything about contemplating relief for northern Maine?
Mr. Hopkins:	No.
Query:	If Governor Davey persists in asking you to take over the administration in Ohio, are you still not going to do it?
Mr. Hopkins:	I do not want to add anything more about Ohio. At this point the Conference Adjourned.