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Frances PerkinsFrances Perkins
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on matters which are submitted to them by a responsible officer.” How, I've got that as a principle. I remember once trying to sell it to him as a principle. He looked astonished and said, “How can you call that a principle?”

I said, “I call it a principle, having been stung enough times to know that whenever you let people give advice on anything that occurs to them, they'll give you some advice you jolly well can't afford to have, and they'll give it publicly.” That always is true.

But he didn't deduce a set of principles, or even one or two simple principles, from an administrative experience. It was very personal with him. He administered in a very personal way. He expected everything to go all right at the end, but he never was quite aware of the method by which it came out all right.

He did say something like “Dr. New Deal is dead and Dr. Win-the-War is with us.” That was probably at a press conference. The press goads you into saying some fool thing like that. That's what the matter is with press conferences. You can't repudiate any statement like that. You shouldn't have said it. You wouldn't have said it if the press hadn't been needling you for something or other. The press conference is a dreadful instrument for making people say something that theyafterwards have to live with. After all, the New Deal wasn't dead, never has been dead. Of course, he had





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