Water Resources People and Issues
recommendations to the President. They did virtually no lobbying on the
Hill. They did not encourage their staff or their principal members to
participate in activities on the Hill and therefore they were always at the
mercy of the members from the principal agencies. Ickes, Secretary of
Agriculture [Henry A.] Wallace, Secretary of Commerce [Daniel C.] Roper,
Secretary of Labor [Frances] Perkins, FERA [Federal Emergency Relief
Administration] Administrator [Harry L.] Hopkins, Frederic Delano, Charles
E. Merriam, Wesley C. Mitchell, and the Secretary of War were members of
the board after the original planning board was abolished. They took a rather
detached view. They drew from the board what they could that was useful.
They didn't identify themselves closely with the board. The history of the
board, I think, has been thoughtfully recorded by Marion Clawson.
Q: In your deliberations for both the Mississippi Valley Committee and the
National Planning Board did, you pay much attention to methods of land
acquisition for flood control? Was that a concern?
A: In that earliest year it was not a major concern that I can recall.
Q: After you got through with the report for the National Planning Board, what
was your next assignment?
A: Then I began the activities of the National Resources Committee. The
National Resources Committee put out a series of reports called Drainage
Basin Problems and Programs--one in '36, one in `37--which were
comprehensive and which helped set out for the benefit of everybody in the
field the programs of all the interested agencies, including state agencies.
They identified questions that had been raised about projects by specifying
Q: Did these questions include financial questions? Cost sharing and things of
this sort?
A: Yes, very much so.
Q .. Did you get at all involved at this time in the deliberations on the '36 Flood
Control Act?
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