The President said:
I have some questions on the Unemployment Relief Organization under Mr. Gifford. I have received a splendid response to the invitations to become members of the Advisory Committee. Acceptances have been received from 52 out of the 60 invitations sent out. Two in addition have declined because of illness, and six are away on holidays, and have not been reached yet. Apparently the acceptances will be almost complete. Typical responses can be seen through Mr. Joslin [Secretary to the President].
We are receiving a large number of communications from public officials and voluntary organizations, especially those active over the last winter. There is a very large amount of reorganization and planning now in progress in preparation for the fall and winter. There is a very evident widespread resolution to meet the situation again. I cannot speak too highly of the actual results obtained by the multitude of committees and the public authorities over last winter. They had a very large load of relief to carry. There is a test—and a very positive test—by which the success of such efforts can be determined, that is the effect of distress upon public health. I have some years of experience in dealing with problems of distress and relief, as some of you know, and we have always tested the efficacy of relief by the reflex in public health. I therefore made an inquiry of Surgeon General Cumming, Chief of the Public Health Service, as to the state of public health over this last winter. That correspondence will be given to you. In brief it shows that the general mortality, the infant mortality, the sickness in the country was less in the winter of 1931 than in the winters of full employment of 1928 and 1929. The public health has apparently never been better than it has been over the past six months. It is a most credible showing of the effort which the country made last winter and one for which the voluntary organizations and local officials are entitled to a very great deal of credit.
I have one other question as to the progress of Federal employment in construction work. I have had the figures taken out anew and reduced into a single sentence. The number of persons directly and indirectly employed by the Federal government in construction and maintenance work at the opening of this depression was 180,000. This time last year the number was increased to 430,000. The number was 760,000 on the first of August. That number will probably increase some in the autumn with the increased employment in Federal aid road building. The road building will decrease some with the winter, but the contracts for public buildings will be in greater activity, and the Supervising Architect's Office anticipates that by January they will be employing somewhere from 80,000 to 100,000 more men than they are employing now.