Abstract

An Open Letter to Oswald G. Villard

The article presents the correspondence between Oswald G. Villard and Franklin Roosevelt. This letter ends with some fourteen pertinent questions to which he asked an answer, yes or no. These questions go much deeper than a halt-hearted approach to government operation of the railroads and possibly of the power industry. The importance of any answers to these specific questions which Villard ask on power and the control of industry is considerably affected by the answer to a preliminary and more fundamental question. Some of the questions asked are: Do you believe that the capitalist nationalist social order is doomed?; Do you believe that capitalism can remain capitalism and yet get rid of unemployment and abolish cyclical depression? If so, how?