The Rt. Rev. New Dealer

"If the Republicans elect their candidate for the presidency in 1944 . . . the most important gains of labor would all be swept away within six months. . . . So long, however, as the present occupant of the White House remains there, no fears need be entertained for the cause of labor or the cause of social justice."

These words, spoken from a platform in Cleveland's Statler Hotel last week, came not from a member of the Democratic National Committee or the head of a labor union but from a Roman Catholic priest--balding, bushy-browed Monsignor John A. Ryan of Washington. Now 73 years old but vigorous as he was 20 years ago, Monsignor Ryan has long been U.S. Catholicism's most potent social reformer. His devotion to the Roosevelt administration led Father Charles E. Coughlin to dub him "the Rt. Rev. New Dealer." Six years ago his militant support of the President's Supreme Court packing scheme caused the weekly of the Baltimore archdiocese to say he had "a Fascist, dictatorial mind."

At the convention of the American Catholic Sociological Society, Monsignor Ryan lashed out last week at "the authentic Bourbons of our time . . . the National Association of Manufacturers; the attitudes and utterances of a majority of the metropolitan newspapers; the pronouncements and performances of the most powerful of the farm organizations, and the reactionary attitude of the majority of the recently elected Congress. . . . They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing."

The Washington priest pondered the shape of the world to come. On one matter he was convinced. "The millions of returning soldiers and sailors will not be satisfied or fooled by the old claptrap concerning 'rugged individualism,' 'American opportunity' or 'American equality.' . . . They will not be lulled to sleep by commonplaces about the limitations and difficulties of distribution, nor by promises of 'prosperity just around the corner.' They will demand jobs here and now. I do not believe that an economy dominated by the philosophy of 'free enterprise' will be able to meet that demand."

The socially conscious wing of the Catholic Church had already chosen sides for 1944.

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