Letter from John Beemster to President Herbert Hoover

Chicago, Ill., August 27,1930. To the President of the United States of America, is THE WAIRE for Washington, D.C. Mr. President. #1 ack 9/6/30 Are you aware of the serious condition in regard to the unemployment situation? Not only the large number of unemployed workingmen, but also their alarming condition? There are people here in Chicago that are almost starving, and unless something is star- ted at once for their relief, they will be starving before the year is over. The local charitable organizations are doing all they can to alleviate the situation, and in nor- mal times and under normal conditions, they can and do take care of the poor. But the present critical condition is beyond their means to cope with, and they are compelled to refuse assistance to many worthy cases. As secretary of a local branch of an international organization of charity,nam ly the St. Vincent de Paul Society, known the world over for its practical work among the poor and the unfortunate people, I am greatly interested in their welfare. I doubt, Mr. President, that you really know how serious and threathening for the poor, the pre- sent times are. I have no intention to weary you with a recital of some of the cases that I have met. I mention only the fact that between eight and nine hundred men are sleeping outdoors every night, in only one of the parks here, namely Grant Park; as you can read on the enclosed clipping from the Chicago Tribune. The total number in Chi- cago, of those sleeping in parks and under viaducts of railroads, is estimated at about ten thousand. If history repeats itself, as it does sometimes, the future looks dark in- deed, and no time should be lost to remedy conditions. The Pope of Rome, according to the newspapers, questioned Mgr. Ryan, Rector of the Catholic University at Washington who was recently in Europe, about the unemployment conditions in this country, and pointed out its attendant dangers. Mgr.Ryan minimized the situation and said there were no grounds for real danger. I fear that in time he may think different. The Holy Father, Pope Pius x1, sees clearly the danger; as his il- lustrious predicessor Leo xill did in his days, when he issued his famous Encyclical Rerum Novarum, about the condition of labor in the Christian world, and laid down the basic fact that the workingman is entitled to a living wage, and then and there defined what that méant. Today, unfortunately, many people are not able to earn anything at all, leave alone a living wage. This deplorable condition, ofcourse, is chiefly if not entirely caused by the ever increasing number of labor saving devices and improved machinery, throwing every year thousands of willing workers out of a job. This is the paramount issue of today: what to do with the men that lose their work through machinery taking their work away from them. I have a great deal of leisure time and in going around the parks, where many of the unemployed come together, I hear their conversation and their bitter denunciation of their unhappy condition and their gloomy future. I fear that serious trouble will oc- cur with the coming of cold weather, unless measures are taken now to forestall such a probability, by devising relief in time. A callous indifference for the suffering of the unemployed and their children or a culpable ignoring of actual conditions may bring the same results in this country, which they brought to some of the countries of Europe, and with which every student of history is familiar. Respectfully yours, Johnteemster 25 East 113th St.