Hugh Samuel Johnson (August 5, 1882 – April 15, 1942) was a United States Army officer, businessman, speech writer, government official and newspaper columnist. He was a member of the Brain Trust of Franklin D. Roosevelt from 1932 to 1934. He wrote numerous speeches for FDR and helped plan the New Deal. Appointed head of the National Recovery Administration (NRA) in 1933, he was highly energetic in his "blue eagle" campaign to reorganize American business to reduce competition and raise wages and prices. Schlesinger (1958) and Ohl (1985) conclude that he was an excellent organizer, but that he was also domineering, abusive, outspoken, and unable to work harmoniously with his peers. He lost control of the NRA in August 1934.Schlesinger, Arthur Jr. The Coming of the New Deal (1958) pp 105–6, 156; Ohl, John Kennedy. Hugh S. Johnson and the New Deal. DeKalb, Ill.: Northern Illinois Univ Press, 1985.
Early life He was born in Fort Scott, Kansas in 1882Hamby, For the Survival of Democracy: Franklin Roosevelt and the World Crisis of the 1930s, 2004, p. 144. to Samuel L. and Elizabeth (née Mead) Johnson.White, The National Cyclopaedia of American Biography, 1967, p. 5.
His paternal grandparents, Samuel and Matilda (MacAlan) Johnson, emigrated to the United States from Ireland in 1837 and originally settled in Brooklyn, New York. Hugh's father was a lawyer, and he attended public school in Wichita, Kansas, before the family moved to Alva, Oklahoma Territory. He attempted to run away from home to join the Oklahoma state militia at the age of 15, but he was apprehended by his family before he left town.Crawford, "He Risked Disgrace to Speed the Draft," New York Times, June 9, 1918. His father promised to try to secure him an appointment to the United States Military Academy (West Point), and was successful in obtaining an alternate appointment. Johnson himself discovered that the individual who was first in line for the appointment was too old, and convinced him to step aside so that Johnson could enter the academy.
Military career
Johnson entered West Point in 1899,Cullum, Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates..., 1920, p. 1044.Howard, "Our Twenty-one Generals of Forty Years and Under," New York Times, August 24, 1919. and graduated and was commissioned a second lieutenant in the 1st Cavalry on June 11, 1903. Douglas MacArthur was one of his West Point classmates. From 1907 to 1909 he was stationed at Pampanga, Philippines, but later was transferred to California. In the early years of the 20th century, most national parks in the United States were administered by units of the United States Army.See, generally: Hampton, How the U.S. Cavalry Saved Our National Parks, 1971. Johnson was subsequently stationed at Yosemite and Sequoia national parks. He was promoted to first lieutenant on March 11, 1911, and was named superintendent of Sequoia National Park in 1912.
Wishing to follow in his father's footsteps, Johnson won permission from General Enoch Crowder to attend the University of California (at Berkeley) where he received his Bachelor of Arts degree (with honors) in 1915 and his Juris Doctor in 1916 (doubling up on courses to graduate in half the time required). Transferring to the Judge Advocate General's Corps (JAG), from May to October 1916 he served under General John J. Pershing in Mexico with the Pancho Villa Expedition. promoted to captain on July 1, 1916, he transferred to the JAG headquarters in Washington, D.C., in October 1916. He was promoted to major on May 15, 1917, and to lieutenant colonel on August 5, 1917. He was named Deputy Provost Marshal General in October 1917,"Col. H. S. Johnson Deputy Provost Marshal," New York Times, January 25, 1918. and the same month was named to a Department of War committee on military training (the U.S. had entered World War I on April 6, 1917)."Plans to Mobilize Schools to Aid War," New York Times, February 17, 1918.
As a captain, Johnson helped co-author the regulations implementing the Selective Service Act of 1917. Without Congressional authorization, he ordered completed several of the initial first steps needed to implement the draft. The action could have led to his court-martial had Congress not acted (a month later) to pass the conscription law. He was promoted to colonel on January 8, 1918, and to brigadier general on April 15, 1918."Promotes 10 Brigadiers," New York Times, April 17, 1918. At the time of his promotion, he was the youngest person, at the age of 35, to reach the rank of brigadier general since the Civil War, and the youngest West Point graduate to remain continuously in the service who had ever reached the rank. Ohl (1985) finds that Johnson was an excellent second-in-command during the war in the Office of the Provost Marshal under Brigadier General Enoch H. Crowder as long as he was closely watched and tightly supervised. His considerable talents were effectively drawn upon in the planning and implementation of the registration and draft before and during the conflict. However he was never able to work smoothly with others.Ohl (1985)
Upon his promotion to brigadier general, Johnson was appointed director of the Purchase and Supply Branch of the General Staff in April 1918, and was promoted to assistant director of the Purchase, Storage and Traffic Division of the General Staff in October 1918. In this capacity, he worked closely with the War Industries Board. He favorably impressed many businessmen, including Bernard Baruch (head of the War Industries Board). These contacts later proved critical in winning Johnson a position with President Franklin D. Roosevelt's administration. He was put in command of the 15th Infantry Brigade which was part of the 8th Division, but the unit did not deploy to Europe because the war had ended. Cullum, Biographical Register of the Officers and Graduates..., 1920, p. 1045.
Johnson resigned from the U.S. Army on February 25, 1919. For his service in the Provost Marshal's office and in executing the draft, he was awarded the Army Distinguished Service Medal in 1926. The citation for the medal reads:
After World War I Johnson was named assistant general manager of the Moline Plow Company on September 1, 1919. Moline Plow's president, George Peek, and Johnson were both supporters of the McNary–Haugen Farm Relief Bill, a proposed federal law which would have established the first farm price supports in U.S. history.
Johnson left Moline Plow in 1927 to become an adviser to Bernard Baruch.Davis, Henry Blaine Jr. (1998). Generals in Khaki. Pentland Press, Inc. p. 204. . OCLC 40298151 He joined the Brain Trust of Franklin D. Roosevelt in the 1932 presidential election. His major role was drafting speeches, most notably one that FDR delivered in Pittsburgh denouncing the reckless spending of the Hoover administration and calling for a very conservative fiscal policy.Frank Freidel, Franklin D. Roosevelt: The Triumph (1956) 361-63
New Deal career NRA
Three months into President Roosevelt’s term, with banking reforms and agricultural support already under way, FDR’s advisers sought a new approach dubbed “workplace democratization.” Early drafts of the industrial recovery legislation had been prepared by Raymond Moley, but in spring 1933 Roosevelt charged Hugh S. Johnson—an Army veteran turned businessman and progressive—with administering the new Act.Johnson, The Blue Eagle from Egg to Earth, pp. 12–15. On June 16, 1933, the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) took effect.National Industrial Recovery Act (1933), National Archives. Title II of the Act created the Public Works Administration to fund construction projects, while Title I established the National Recovery Administration (NRA) to oversee industry codes for “fair competition.”
Under the NIRA, thousands of firms joined industry-wide “codes” setting wages, hours, production limits and price guidelines in cooperation with labor and consumer representatives. In contrast to top-down planning, each Code was drafted by committees of business, labor and consumer groups at a public hearing. A Deputy Administrator then mediated differences and, failing agreement, deferred to the state for a final determination—seeking “the greatest justice & fairness” for all participants.Johnson, The Blue Eagle, pp. 45–48. Section 7 guaranteed collective bargaining; in response the Act created the National Labor Board (NLB) with 20 regional panels appointed by the NRA to resolve labor disputes, issue subpoenas and oversee union elections.“1933 The NLB and ‘The Old NLRB’,” National Labor Relations Board. Between its inception and abolition, the NLB settled 1,019 strikes, avoided 498 more and mediated 1,800 other conflicts.Johnson, The Blue Eagle, p. 72.
The NRA also launched the Blue Eagle campaign: compliant firms displayed the eagle emblem to signal to patriotic consumers, while non-compliers faced boycotts.Johnson, The Blue Eagle, pp. 80–83.
The NRA involved ending the Great Depression by organizing thousands of businesses under codes drawn up by trade associations and industries. According to biographer John Ohl (as summarized by reviewer Lester V. Chandler): Johnson's priorities became evident almost immediately. In the prescription, "Self regulation of industry under government supervision" the emphasis was to be on maximum freedom for business to formulate its own rules with a minimum of government supervision. Consumer protection and the interests of labor were of decidedly lesser importance. To induce business to formulate and abide by codes of fair competition Johnson was willing to condone almost any type of price fixing, restriction of production, limitation of productive capacity, and other types of anti-competitive practices.Lester V. Chandler, review of Ohl, Hugh S. Johnson and the New Deal in Journal of Economic History (March 1987) 47: 286 DOI:10.1017/s0022050700047951
Johnson was recognized for his efforts when Time named him Man of the Year of 1933—choosing him instead of FDR.see TIME story By 1934 the enthusiasm that Johnson had so successfully created had faded. Johnson was faltering badly, which historians ascribe to the profound contradictions in NRA policies, compounded by heavy drinking on the job. Big business and labor unions both turned hostile.William H. Wilson, "How the chamber of commerce viewed the NRA: A re-examination." Mid America 42 (1962): 95-108.Bernard Bellush, The Failure of the NRA (1975).Martin, Madam Secretary: Frances Perkins, (1976) p. 331. According to historian Ellis Hawley:Ellis Hawley, review of Bernard Balush, The Failure of the NRA American Historical Review 81#4 1976 p. 995.at the hands of historians the National Recovery Administration of 1933-35 has fared badly. Cursed at the time, it has remained the epitome of political aberration, illustrative of the pitfalls of “planning” and deplored both for hampering recovery and delaying genuine reform.
In its brief existence, according to internal reports, the NRA created an estimated 2.78 million jobs—more than all other New Deal agencies combined by 1935, and added roughly $3 billion annually to purchasing power without direct Treasury appropriations.Johnson, The Blue Eagle, pp. 105–110. It established minimum wages, maximum hours, ended most child-labor practices and dissolved sweatshops across multiple industries.Houck, Rhetoric as Currency, 2001, pp. 98–102.
The key NRA code successes included: **Bituminous Coal Code**: This code unified northern and southern Appalachian producers and restored over 4,500 small mines under fair labor rules.Berk, “The National Recovery Administration Reconsidered,” Studies in American Political Development 25(1):56–85, 2011. **Lumber Code**: This code reopened some 2,000 small mills with regulated prices and hours.Johnson, The Blue Eagle, pp. 120–123.