Lauchlin Currie
Lauchlin Bernard Currie (8 October 1902 - 23 December 1993) was born in West Dublin, Nova Scotia, the Son of Lauchlin and Alice (Eisenhauer) Currie. He attended the London School of Economics and received a B.S. Degree in 1925. In 1931 he received a Ph.D. Degree from Harvard. He married Dorothy York Bacon in 1927, and had two children, Lauchlin Morgan Currie and Roderich Bornish Currie. Currie first came to the United States in 1925, and was naturalized in 1934. He was an instructor and a tutor at Harvard University from 1927 to 1934, and a professor of international economics at Fletcher Graduate School of Law and Diplomacy, West Medford, Massachusetts, from 1933 to 1934. During this same period of time he was employed as a consultant by the Kendall Company, a cotton products concern in Boston. Currie served as a trustee of the William Alanson White Psychiatric Foundation, a member of the American Economic Association, and the author of a book entitled The Supply and Control of Money in the United States published in 1934 became a standard work on the subject.
During the latter part of 1934, Currie was appointed Senior Analyst by Secretary Henry Morgenthau for the United States Treasury Department and was later made Assistant Director of Research and Statistics for the Board of Governors for the Federal Reserve System, which position he retained until 1939, also reportedly won enthusiastic recognition.
In 1938 he began to give evidence of his growing importance. In that year he put forward a plan to solve railroad troubles by a lease-lend procedure through which the railroads would get equipment in much the same way that Britain gets war goods under the Lease—Lend Bill. In that same year, he wrote an "influential memorandum" on the causes of the recession in which he discussed, among other things, Social Security taxes, and pointed out that compensatory Federal spending to stimulate heavy industry might be more flexible if concentrated outside the regular budget.
In May of 1939, Currie gave testimony before the Temporary National Economic Committee. He reportedly showed that investments follow production and since 1932 State and local governments have been piling up savings so that the net Federal investment must be at least one billion dollars to provide equivalent purchasing power. In July of that year he was named President Roosevelt's personal Economic Advisor and Administrative Assistant.
He became Administrative Assistant to President Franklin Roosevelt in July of 1939, and in 1941 was named Head of the Economic Mission to China as personal envoy of the President in the early part of February, 1941, and returned to the United States on Match 10, 1941. While in China, Currie conferred with Generalissimo Chiang Kai-shek and other leading executives of the Chinese Government. Currie also found time to study Chinese arsenals, military training schools, and industrial cooperatives. Although his report had not been made public, he appears to have studied the economic structure in general and its special problems of currency and transportation in order to determine the best way for the United States to help the Chinese Nationalist government. During this same trip Currie also spent a few days in New Delhi, India, and returned to the United States on August 20, 1942.
Currie was listed as one of the individuals who attended the Institute of Pacific Relations Conference held at Mont Tremblant, Canada, from December 5, to 19, 1942. In the early part of September, 1943, Currie was appointed as Acting Deputy Administrator and he remained until the early part of 1945. He then resumed his former White House duties.
During the Hatch Act investigation of Nathan Gregory Silvermaster, an employee of the Department of Agriculture, Lauchlin Currie was interviewed. When asked to comment upon Silvermaster's political philosophy, Currie stated that in his mind conclusive evidence of whether or not a person is Communistically inclined was the individual's attitude up to June 23, l941, when Germany invaded the Soviet Union. Inasmuch as Silvermaster, according to Currie was an advocate of war prior to that time, Currie did not regard him as Communistic and stated that he was a "liberal" and "New Dealer in his political leanings." During the course of the investigation the Office of Naval Intelligence furnished information indicating that Currie and Silvermaster were associates and friendly.
Lauchlin Currie was one of the Federal employees listed as an affiliate of subversive organizations by the Dies Committee in a memorandum submitted to the Attorney General. It was stated he was a member of the Washington Committee to Aid China. He received a salary of $10,000 as Executive Assistant in the Office of the President.
An article appeared in the October 31, 1944, New York Daily Mirror reporting a speech by Governor Bricker stating that he declared Lauchlin Currie was a Federal employee with a subversive record. Currie was one of seven individuals named in Bricker's speech to "conclusively prove Roosevelt and the New Deal are in the hands of the radicals and the Communists."
Whittaker Chambers, a former affiliate of the Soviet Secret Intelligence Service in Washington, D. C., for the purpose of developing a government underground, stated that Lauchlin Currie was a 'fellow Traveler' who helped various Communists. This statement was made to a representative of the State Department when Chambers was questioned relative to individuals in the Government who were allegedly active in behalf of the Communist Party and the Soviet Union.
Owen Lattimore wrote a letter of introduction for Haakon Chevalier to Lauchlin Currie. Chevalier was attempting to obtain a Government job during this period of time. Chevalier is a known Soviet Secret Intelligence Service (NKVD) contact and was associated with numerous members of the Communist Party on the West Coast.
About this time Currie also met with Oskar R. Lange in Chicago.
A list of the individuals appointed to positions with the Foreign Economic Administration, dated October 26, 1943, issued by Leo T. Crowley, includes Lauchlin Currie as Acting Deputy Administrator. John Carter Vincent is also listed as an Acting Special Assistant to the Administrator.
In April, 1944, an anonymous letter was received by the FBI, the writer was subsequently identified as Katherine Perlo, wife of Victor Perlo. This letter, directed to the White House, listed the names of approximately twenty-five persons whom the writer designated as members of the Communist group in Washington or contacts thereof. Among those names listed was that of George Silverman with the following parenthetical notation along side this name: "Railroad Retirement Brd. — works thru close friends who are indebted to him — Lauchlin Currie - Harry White, etc. –"
In connection with inquiries conducted with respect to Michael Greenberg, it was learned Greenberg at one time was assigned to work with Currie at the White House on matters pertaining to Chinese affairs. In the Hatch Act investigation conducted of Greenberg a number of persons described him as being definitely a leftist if not a Communist. One source interviewed, George Taylor, Assistant Director of the Office of War Information, stated that Greenberg always advocated full and complete cooperation and support to the Chinese Communist Party.