Abstract
After the 1929 Wall Street Crash and during the Great Depression, the US National Catholic Welfare Conference published three fundamental documents on the economic situation. The US bishops were inspired by the Catholic Social teaching and by the ideas of Mgr. John A. Ryan, among the most influential US Catholic Social reformers and a great supporter of FDR’S New Deal. By analysing documents kept at Vatican Secret Archives, F. D. Roosevelt Presidential Library and at the Archives of Catholic University of America, this paper aims at highlighting and discussing the role played by the US Catholic Church during the Great Depression, underlying its frequent critical attitude towards the American ‘economic system’ and its thought about ‘errors and distortions’ of Capitalism.
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Notes
- 1.
For a detailed account of the history of Catholic immigration in the United States and, more generally, of the events related to Catholicism in USA see: John T. Ellis, American Catholicism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1956); Jaroslav Pelikan, The Riddle of Roman Catholicism (New York and Nashville: The Abingdon Press, 1959); Theodore Maynard, The Story of American Catholicism (New York, NY: Macmillan, 1960); Thomas T. McAvoy, ed., Roman Catholicism and the American Way of life (Notre Dame, IN: University of Notre Dame Press, 1960); Harold J. Abramson, Ethnic Diversity in Catholic America (New York, NY: Wiley, 1973); Andrew M. Greeley, The American Catholic. A Social Portrait (New York, NY: Basic Book, 1977); James J. Hennesey, American Catholics: A History of the Roman Catholic Community in the United States (New York: Oxford University Press, 1981); Gerald P. Fogarty, The Vatican and the American Hierarchy from 1870 to 1965 (Stuttgart: Hiersemann, 1982), George Gallup, Jr. and Jim Castelli, The American Catholic People (New York: Doubleday, 1987); Stephen M. De Giovanni, Archbishop Corrigan and the Italian Immigrants (Huntington, IN: Our Sunday Visitory Publication, 1994); Charles R. Morris, American Catholic (New York: Random House, 1997); Daniela Saresella, Cattolicesimo italiano e sfida americana (Brescia: Morcelliana, 2001); Matteo Sanfilippo, L’affermazione del cattolicesimo nel Nord America: élite, emigranti e Chiesa cattolica negli Stati Uniti e nel Canada, 1750–1920 (Viterbo: Sette Città, 2003); Peter R. D’Agostino, Rome in America: Transnational Catholic Ideology from the Risorgimento to Fascism (Chapel Hill and London: The University of North Carolina Press, 2004); Patrick W. Carey, Catholics in America: A History (Westport, CT and London: Praeger, 2004); Matteo Sanfilippo, ‘Parrocchie ed emigrazione negli Stati Uniti’, Studi Emigrazione 168 (2007): 993–1005; Matteo Sanfilippo, ‘L’emigrazione italiana verso gli Stati Uniti negli anni 1889–1900: una prospettiva vaticana’, Giornale di storia contemporanea 1 (2008): 54–78; and Massimo Di Gioacchino, ‘Religione e società nelle Little Italies statunitensi (1876–1915)’, Una rassegna tra studi e fonti 11 (2015): 95–108.
- 2.
See, among others, John Cooney, The American Pope: The Life and Times of Francis Cardinal Spellman (New York: Times Books, 1984).
- 3.
For a detailed account of American Catholicism during the FDR Administrations and the New Deal years see, among others: Francis L. Broderick, Right Reverend New Dealer: John A. Ryan (New York: Macmillan, 1963); David J. O’Brien, American Catholics and Social Reform: The New Deal Years (New York: Oxford University Press, 1968); George Q. Flynn, American Catholics & the Roosevelt Presidency, 1932–1936 (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1968); Stefano Luconi, Little Italies e New Deal. La coalizione rooseveltiana e il voto italo-americano a Filadelfia e Pittsburgh (Milano: Franco Angeli, 2002); Kevin E. Schmiesing, ‘Catholics Critics of the New Deal: ‘Alternative” Traditions in Catholic Social Thought’, Catholic Social Science Review 7 (2002): 145–159; and David B. Woolner and Richard G. Kurial, FDR, The Vatican, and the Roman Catholic Church in America, 1933–1945 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003).
- 4.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, Detroit Speech, October 2, 1932, in George Q. Flynn, American Catholics and the Roosevelt Presidency, 1932–1936 (Lexington: University of Kentucky Press, 1968), 17.
- 5.
Bishop’s Program of Social Reconstruction, National Catholic Welfare Conference, Washington, 1919.
- 6.
One can just think of the events that invested the Irish, and, even more, the German community. Prejudice against the Irish-Americans had quickly spread based on the hypothesis of their lack of involvement alongside the British ally, due to the strong bond with the land of origin in which the independence thrusts were ever stronger. Woodrow Wilson, during the Paris Peace Conference, said he was annoyed by the attitude of Irish Catholics during the war, saying: ‘My first impulse was to tell the Irish to go to hell but, feeling inside me that this way of saying would not have been a gesture worthy of a statesman, I denied myself this personal satisfaction’. The attitude of mistrust and hostility towards immigrants from the territories of the central empires was also very harsh. Before the US entry into the war, many had enrolled in the German and Austrian armies and this was the basis of a feeling of mistrust and intolerance also towards those who, though coming from these countries, had remained in their new homeland, and in 1917 would participate in the war in the armed forces with stars and stripes.
- 7.
Cfr. Francis L. Broderick, Right Reverend New Dealer: John A. Ryan (New York: Macmillan, 1963); Patrick W. Gearty, The Economic Thought of Monsignor John A. Ryan (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 1952); and Aaron I. Abell, ‘Monsignor John A. Ryan: An Historical Appreciation’, The Review of Politics 8, no. 1 (1946): 128–134.
- 8.
On this specific issue is clear the influence of the thought of Liberatore on Ryan’s ideas. In his ‘Principi di economia politica’ (1889) Liberatore wrote about minimum wage as commitment of primary importance for governments.
- 9.
On the US Catholic Church and Child Labor see Vincent A. McQuade, The American Catholic Attitude on Child Labor Since 1891 (Washington, DC: The Catholic University of America, 1938).
- 10.
See Piero Barucci, ‘I cattolici e il mercato’, Studi e note di economia 3 (1998): 18. In particular, as noted by Barucci (p. 20) in the works of Liberatore (Principii di economia politica, Trattato, Roma, 1889) and Luigi Sturzo (Note e Appunti di Economia sociale del Sac. Dott. Luigi Sturzo, prof. nel Seminario Vescovile di Caltagirone, 1900, in L. Sturzo, La battaglia meridonalista, a cura di G. De Rosa, Laterza, Bari (1979): 195–242) is not fully deployed the organicistic conception of society and voluntarist conception of the economy of Toniolo. Liberatore with a fierce criticism of the influence exerted on the economic science by modern liberalism reiterates the necessary subordination of the economy to politics and morals, and affirm the need for the public power action to defend the weak and manage the strong; however, if some state intervention in economic facts is needed, one can find also severe criticism of Socialism by the Jesuit, as well as a clear defence of private property.
- 11.
For a detailed account of the impact of the Rerum Novarum in the United States see Aaron I. Abell, ‘The Reception of Leo XIII’s Labor Enclyclica in America, 1891–1919’, The Review of Politics 7, no. 4 (1945): 464–495; On the Rerum Novarum see, among others Giovanni Antonazzi and Gabriele De Rosa, ed., L’Enciclica Rerum Novarum e il suo tempo (Rome: Ediz. di Storia e Letteratura, 1991).
- 12.
John A. Ryan, A Living Wage: Its Ethical and Economic Aspects (New York: Macmillan, 1906); John A. Ryan, Distributive Justice: The Right and Wrong of Our Present Distribution of Wealth (New York: Macmillan, 1916).
- 13.
Particularly relevant in this respect was the position expressed by the president of the National Association of Manufactures which wrote that the Program of the bishops could be said to be a ‘Socialist propaganda document’.
- 14.
Pastoral Letter of the Archbishops and Bishops of the United States, September 26, 1919. SRSS AAEESS = Segreteria di Stato, Sezione per i Rapporti con gli Stati, Archivio Storico, Archivio della Sacra Congregazione per gli Affari Ecclesiastici Straordinari, Affari Ecclesiastici Straordinari (AAEESS), America, IV, P.O. 172, fasc.14–18, fasc.17.
- 15.
Raymond A. McGowan, Bolshevism in Russia and America (New York: Paulist Press, 1920).
- 16.
See Richard Lowitt and Maurine Beasley, One Third of a Nation (Urbana: University of Illinois, 1981).
- 17.
See Francis J. Lally, The Catholic Church in a Changing America (Boston: Brown and Company, 1962).
- 18.
Statement by the bishops of the Administrative Committees of the NCWC on Unemployment, November 12, 1930, in Raphael Huber, Our Bishops Speak: National Pastorals and Annual Statements of the Hierarchy of the United States (Resolutions of Episcopal Committees and Communications of the Administrative Board of the National Catholic Welfare Conference, Milwaukee, Wisconsin, 1919–1951: The Bruce Publishing Company, 1952).
- 19.
Statement of the Hierarchy of the United States on the Economic Crisis, November 12, 1931, in R. Huber, Our Bishops Speak.
- 20.
See Francis L. Broderick, ‘The Encyclicals and Social Action: Is John A. Ryan Typical?’, The Catholic Historical Review 55, no. 1 (1963): 1–6.
- 21.
John A. Ryan, ‘The New Things in the New Encyclical’, Ecclesiastical Review 85 (1931): 13–14.
- 22.
A Statement on the Present Crisis, Administrative Committee of the NCWC, June 1, 1933, SVA, AAEESS, America, IV, P.O. 230, Fasc.54.
- 23.
SRSS AAEES, America, IV, P.O. 230, Fasc.54 The letter states: ‘May the statement find its way into every home and be the subject of discussion in every family’. Through sermons, conferences, instructions and lectures especially can the teaching of the Church on the Social Question be brought to the attention of our Catholic people so that they may be thoroughly acquainted with it and thus be able to explain the position of the Church to those not of our faith […] This is but complying with the wish of the Holy Father. It will make practical His Holiness ‘plan of Catholic Action. I shall be pleased to send a copy of the bishop’s statement to our Holy Father’.
- 24.
SRSS AAEESS, America, IV, P.O. 230, Fasc.54 The letter states: ‘Ho letto con attenzione lo “Statement” e l’ho trovato sostanzialmente modellato sulle recenti Encicliche del Santo Padre. Anche qui in America fortunatamente si va abbastanza consolidando tra gli acattolici, specie intellettuali, l’idea che la Chiesa Cattolica è la sola istituzione, la quale possiede in sé i principi per la soluzione della crisi sociale. Questo si legge spesso, si sente proclamato in pubblici discorsi ed in private conversazioni: e non è che il risultato delle Encicliche, particolarmente della “Quadragesimo Anno”’.
- 25.
SRSS AAEESS, America, IV, P.O. 230, Fasc.54.
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D’Alessio, G. (2019). US Catholicism and Economic Justice: 1919–1929. In: Berger, S., Przyrembel, A. (eds) Moralizing Capitalism. Palgrave Studies in the History of Social Movements. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-20565-2_10
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