Garet Garrett

Garet Garrett (1878–1954), born Edward Peter Garrett, was an American journalist and author who was noted for his critiques of the New Deal and U.S. involvement in the Second World War.

Early years

Garet Garrett was born in 1878 in Illinois. By 1903, he had become a well known writer for the old "New York Sun". In 1911, he wrote a fairly successful book, "Where the Money Grows and Anatomy of the Bubble". In 1916, at the age of 38, Garrett became the executive editor of the "New York Tribune", after having worked as a financial writer for "The New York Times", the "Saturday Evening Post", and "The Wall Street Journal". From 1920 to 1933, his primary focus was on writing books.

Between 1920 and 1932 Garrett wrote and had eight books including "The American Omen" in 1928 and "A Bubble That Broke the World" in 1932. He also wrote regular columns for several business and financial publications.

Political Viewpoint

Garett's political viewpoint overall, and the central theme throughout all his books, is libertarian or classical liberal. All his works exemplify the basic premise that a man is responsible for his own life, and that no man can expect a free ride off others, through forced income distribution schemes such as socialism and communism. As the 20th century progressed, he believed that Americans were signing away their birthright of freedom, through trading in their responsiblities of self-governance and self-responsibility, in return for more socialist measures such as the new deal.

His most influential work is commonly regarded to be "The Driver". Published in 1922, it tells the story of an entrepreneur who, through is own vision and work ethic, takes over a failing railway, turning it into a hugely productive and profitable asset for the benefit of himself and the rest of the nation. Unable to see what he has achieved in turning his own business and the wider economy around from recession to boom, and blinded by the intense wealth and power he enjoys as a result, the general population and the government turn against him, ultimately destroying him instead of celebrating his success.

Justin Raimondo and the Ludwig von Mises Institute have observed that there are similarities between "Atlas Shrugged" and "The Driver". It is unknown whether Rand was familiar with this work, but "The Driver"’s central character is Henry Galt, while "Atlas Shrugged"’s principal character is John Galt. At one point in "The Driver", someone asks, “Who is Henry Galt?”; in "Atlas Shrugged", many characters repeatedly inquire, “Who is John Galt?”

Critic of the New Deal and Roosevelt's foreign policy

After the election of Franklin Delano Roosevelt, Garrett went on to become one of the most vocal critics of the New Deal and what he saw as its socialist measures. He wrote a series of his columns in the "Saturday Evening Post" between 1933 to 1940, which were later compiled into a collection of his essays titled "Salvos against the New Deal: Selections from the Saturday Evening Post: 1933-1940", published in 2002. The "Saturday Evening Post" kept Garrett on as a columnist despite the fact that at one point it became financially perilous for the magazine to do so. In 1940 the management of the "Saturday Evening Post" made Garrett editorial-writer-in-chief after the death of George Horace Lorimer. Garrett was highly critical of the Roosevelt Administration's moves toward intervention in the war then underway in Europe; he covered this topic in a series of editorials which were collected under the title "Defend America First: The Antiwar Editorials of the Saturday Evening Post, 1939-1942," which was published in 2003.

Later years

In 1953, Garrett published "The People's Pottage" (later republished as "The Burden of Empire" and more recently as "Ex America: the 50th Anniversary of the People's Pottage"), which consisted of 3 essays: "The Revolution Was", "Ex America" and "The Rise of Empire"). Through these works, he questioned the aftermath of the Roosevelt administration and its impact on American society. In these works, he coined a phrase for a revolutionary methodology used by conservative thinking to understand the transformation of the old culture/regime: "revolution within the form." Garet Garrett died in 1954 at the age of 76.

Works

*"Where the Money Grows and Anatomy of the Bubble" (1911)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/bluewound.pdf The Blue Wound] " (1921) [http://garetgarrett.blogspot.com/2007/01/coming-in-2007-blue-wound.html] [http://garetgarrett.blogspot.com/2007/08/blue-wound-live-blog.html]
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/driver.pdf The Driver] " (1922) [http://garetgarrett.blogspot.com/2008/08/driver-part-i-introductory-comments.html]
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/bushel.pdf Satan's Bushel] " (1923) [http://garetgarrett.blogspot.com/2006/12/what-satans-bushel-looks-like.html]
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/cinderbuggy.pdf The Cinder Buggy] " (1923)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/ouroboros.pdf Ouroboros or the Mechanical Extension of Mankind] " (1926)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/harangue.pdf Harangue (The Trees Said to the Bramble Come Reign Over Us)] " (1926)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/americanomen.pdf The American Omen] " (1928)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/bubbleworld.pdf A Bubble That Broke the World] " (1932)
*" [http://www.lewrockwell.com/orig5/garrett1.html The Revolution Was] " (1938)
*"Rise of Empire" (1941)
*"On the Wings of Debt (Economic Sentinel)" (1943)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/timeisborn.pdf A Time is Born] " (1944)
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/pottage.pdf The People's Pottage] "(1953) (later reprinted as "Burden of Empire: The Legacy of the Roosevelt-Truman Revolution" and "Ex America: the 50th Anniversary of the People's Pottage")
*" [http://www.mises.org/books/wildwheel.pdf The Wild Wheel] " (1952)
*"The American Story" (1955)
*"Salvos Against the New Deal: Selections from the Saturday Evening Post: 1933-1940", edited by Bruce Ramsey (2002) [http://cassandra2004.blogspot.com/2005/11/classics-of-conservatism-part-xiii.html]
*"Defend America First: The Antiwar Editorials of the Saturday Evening Post, 1939-1942", edited by Bruce Ramsey (2003)

References

*"Profit's Prophet: Garet Garrett (1878-1954)", by Carl Ryant (1989)
*"Reclaiming the American Right: The Lost Legacy of the Conservative Movement", (Chapter 3) by Justin Raimondo (1993)

External links

* [http://oasis.harvard.edu/html/hou01242.html Bequest of Papers to Houghton Library, Harvard College Library]
* [http://www.amexpat.com/books.php?nls=en#0015 Ex America] by Garet Garrett
* [http://garetgarrett.blogspot.com/ Garet Garrett blog]
*" [http://mises.org/studyguide.aspx?action=source&source=American%20Affairs American Affairs] "
* [http://blog.mises.org/archives/007246.asp] Ayn Rand and Garet Garrett discussion at the Mises Institute