Leading his team through September 11th taught Jonathan McBride, former Head of Inclusion & Diversity at BlackRock, key lessons that apply to anyone facing a crisis:

BBCS Showcase: Insights into BBC Studios’ offerings in Liverpool. Mark Reynolds, director of Unscripted, BBC Studios At this month’s BBC Showcase, a key launch will be Perfect Planet – a series that BBC Studios unscripted portfolio director Mark Reynolds describes as “the next landmark natural history series” to air on BBC this year. In a fireside chat with YourStory Founder and CEO Shradha Sharma during the 11th edition of TechSparks, India’s largest tech-entrepreneurship event, the veteran leader delved into communication. Fireside chat during the B. Riley Securities Oncology Investor Conference being held virtually. The fireside chat is scheduled to take place on Wednesday, January 20, 2021 at 2:30 PM ET.

• Put humanity first. In times of stress, treat people the way THEY want to be treated. Bring the team together and ask, “what’s the one thing you need to do to keep yourself sane?” Then, ask everyone to hold each other accountable, either by helping others do what they need, or by calling them out for not doing what they’re supposed to.
• Admit you’re fallible. If you’re feeling lost and that you don’t know what to do at the moment—don’t worry, no one does. Remember Brene Brown’s admonition that “vulnerability is our most accurate measure of courage” and work with your team to overcome obstacles together.
• Decide what not to do. Your to-do list at this time may feel overwhelming, but you don’t have to do everything at once. Pick two things to stop doing, and move on from there. In a way, times of crisis gives teams freedom—they don’t necessarily have to adhere to the bureaucracy and limitations of “business as usual.”

Read the Transcript

Lucy Blair Chung:

Jonathan is the former head of Inclusion & Diversity at BlackRock. He was also a former head of personnel for President Obama and was also an entrepreneur, and he’s going to tell us a little bit about that. So let’s just jump right in. When we chatted, you told us a good story for this time about running a company during September 11th.

Jonathan McBride:

Yeah. Thanks, Lucy, and we can goback… Also, by the way, I was just listening to Kerry, which was reallyhelpful and insightful and we can go back to some of the questions. I can addon to some of the questions about bosses and stuff like that.

Lucy Blair Chung:

Definitely. I’ll come back. That’d begreat.

Jonathan McBride:

Yeah. Picking up on the theme, it sounds like the last two speakers have been talking about, you know, this is a time for humanity first, like don’t confuse what people know with how they’re feeling about it because… And if I were going to kind of say what’s the kind of simple rule we can all follow in this time, it’d be provocative.

It might be the case that your priest, or your rabbi, or your mother, or whomever was wrong when you were a kid when they told you to treat others the way you want to be treated, which is a great way to get a self-focused kid to think about other people. But the reality in the world is that you treat people the way they are best treated or whether the way they would choose to be treated. So instead of the golden rule, it’s the platinum rule of treat people the way they want to be treated. The reality is everyone’s going through this different because they’re experiencing it based on a whole bunch of information in their lives, right? Their view of this is based on their prior experiences and set of expectations. So you have to get past that. But we’re all human so you can kind of connect to people on a human basis. And I’ll give you an example of when this didn’t work.

As you mentioned, Lucy, I was… I started a company when I was 29 with a couple of friends and that was a year and a half before a plane crashed into a building. I was 30, almost 31 at the time, they were both 31, most of our employees were older than us. I think the oldest was 60 or 62 and had quit a job paying them $1 million to come get paid $90,000 by us to join our company. We were in lower Manhattan on Broadway and Houston and had experienced September literally together in the morning before I sent everybody home, so we went through the whole morning together. And then people were restricted from coming that far South for many weeks.

So we were back in the office probably 14, 18 days later. We had to walk in and talk to these folks. We are still somewhat of a startup and they knew the world that just kind of imploded a bit and there was so much uncertainty. My two partners and I had stayed up all night debating how should we speak to them, what should we talk about? Our rule was we’d set a time limit on our debates and then we would vote; since there were three of us, we’d never had a tie. The other two guys were really kind of leaning it on we should talk about how tough this is, but how unfortunate it would be if the thing that we’ve built together also comes to it, and kind of really focus on that and get people to feel like owners.

My gut instinct, and I’ll admit it wasn’t so much stronger than theirs, so it was kind of like a 52/48 thing. It wasn’t like I was seeing the future, but I was I thinking, well, maybe we should just start with how do people feel and let that run out the clock for the first meeting. Like the first meeting be us checking them as humans and not talking about business. So we’d debated all night; I lost the vote. We went into have the conversation the two of them wanted to start, I was standing behind them. We had about 54 full-time people and we had a bunch of freelancers and stuff on the phone, about 200. We’re sitting there and I’m looking at the 54 people standing behind my partners. About two sentences into their refrain, I knew we had lost everybody. Like you could just see on their faces this look of like, are you kidding me? So I tried to step forward and get into a conversation. It was was awkward to say the least.

We didn’t talk about those, Lucy, but I was thinking about this morning when I got up, I don’t know, we had that company for six and a half more years, we eventually sold it. I don’t know if we ever totally got all of them back. I’m really not sure. I was thinking about that this morning and there’s certain people, I can tell you without naming names, and I think basically that was that for us because they were really…they’re not…they’re… Kerry’s exactly right, people are going to be scrutinized very carefully as to how they go through this experience. My favorite, regardless of politics, my favorite Michelle Obama quote is not “when they go low, we go high,” everybody loves that one, but about four months after they took the presidency, she got asked by some reporter, was the presidency pressure filled? Are you seeing a different man in your husband? And she said, really fast, “The presidency doesn’t change who you are, it reveals who you are.”

That’s what crisis does. Pressuremoments reveal your character. And people know that, so they’re going to bewatching very carefully to see how you behave versus just what you say. Whichis why video conferencing helps a lot because you can see my physicality and Ican fake my words and my tone a little bit, but it’s very hard to fake myphysicality. It’s sending signals immediately as to whether or not I’mbelievable and authentic, which is the key.

Lucy Blair Chung:

I’m curious then because I, yes,definitely, that these moments of kind of power and pressure reveal. What isthe advice that you’re giving to leaders who now have to kind of go in front oftheir company like you once did and hopefully not feel the way that you did andhopefully not lose their employees for the next six, six and a half years in amajor way?

Jonathan McBride:

Well, there’s been really good advice given already, which is the first thing Kerry talked a little bit about, which is you ask them, which was great, in the middle of the conversation, how you doing? And I would say stopping and thinking for yourself first how you are doing and making that part of your story, and you going first as a leader. I want to be clear, leaders can be the boss or anyone else. In this moment, anyone can be on a call and switch gears for a second, say, “Hey, can we just stop for a second? I bet everybody’s feeling a lot. I want to talk a little bit about how I’m feeling and see if everybody feels the same because I feel a little isolated now.” Like tell the story, right?

Anybody can step up and model good behavior. I can tell you, as a boss, when people have done stuff like that for me and saved my butt because I didn’t realize I had started at the wrong place, I actually appreciated it. But the first thing is, remember the platinum rule, not the golden rule. Remember that everybody else is going through their own thing. It’ll prompt you to ask more questions and that’s the right thing to do.

Secondly, you have to be ready with your own answers as to how you’re feeling. Context is very different, but human emotion is consistent. You need to verbalize your emotions and how you feel. It can’t just be what you’re doing or how you’re thinking about it. Those are important. But as soon as you tell someone you feel isolated or concerned about your children or at risk, or whatever, then people can start to meet you where you are. So make sure you verbalize the emotion as well as the thoughts and the actions because that’s how humans connect. You can read all about how Pixar constructs a narrative. Then we connect through human emotions because they’re shared. They’re kind of consistent. So that would be extremely important.

I would say in terms of thinking about as a leader, if you’re trying to lead a group, definitely spend some time thinking about how you want to come out of this. For you, individually, and maybe for your team, separately, it could even be a team exercise, but when people are going back to normal at some point, some version of normal, or a new normal, and people were coming back to the office or whatever the case may be, well, what’d you want for instance your people to say about you in remembering this time? Because they’re all going to remember it, right? What would you want them or what might they all want their customers or partners to say about them, which is a good exercise? Come up with those, figure out what those three or four things are, two or three actually would be better, and write them down. Before you do a Zoom call, before you talk to anybody, before you engage anybody, just look at them and remind yourself of the things you are trying to project and you’ll be more likely to project them.

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Then the last thing is really quickly mix this type of video call with strict little reminders. The way incentive theory works is when I give you a bonus or a holiday present or birthday present, you barely remember what it is because you’ve been waiting for it all year or you’ve been expecting it, so it doesn’t have the incentive effect unless it’s a lot more or a lot less than you expected.

But the research is pretty clear,that when somebody surprises somebody with something small and thoughtful, theyremember it for years because it caught him off guard. It was personalized andit was actually bite sized. That is a small note saying, “How is yourchild doing?” But remembering the child’s name, or that they havesomething that makes them high risk, or the school that they went to, orwhatever the case may be. So I would definitely mix up group conversations likethis and starting with how people feel, which is exactly right, with kind ofsmall bite sized things.

Lucy Blair Chung:

I like that. I love how practicalthat advice is. You said you wanted to touch on some of the points that I thinkKerry got asked specifically. It sounded like, what do you do if you’re not theleader? You mentioned this, everyone can kind of be the boss in this moment andmaybe what that looks like, but what’s your advice there if you have a leaderthat’s not showing up in the way that you’ve just described and kind of isn’tthinking about what they want to have been said about them? I’m curious what’syour thoughts on that

Jonathan McBride:

Yeah. One, the kind of small things are reaching out to people and touching base with them is easy to do. The volunteering on calls, things you’ve been thinking about. Or sometimes it’s easier not to sound like a know-it-all and so you can say, “Hey, I was on this amazing conversation on Zoom on Friday and the speakers mentioned these three things. Maybe we should think about that.” Right? But you can inject things into the conversation that people of goodwill will pick up and take.

To be clear, measurement on leadership is not your behavior, measurement on leadership is who follows you when they’re uncertain. That’s the actual standard of leadership and it’s not about who has the big title in the corner office. In times like this, and I think you can fact check me on this, but I think the majority of CEOs in the Fortune 500 or 1,000 were from kind of non-dominant groups like ethnicity, race, gender, et cetera, got their jobs in crisis. Because, in crisis, everything strips away. All practical kind of like behaviors are stripped away and people are just good or they’re not.

So you can definitely do that. Reaching out and modeling the behavior with the other human beings and checking in on them what you can do. Reminding them of human things like, “Hey, do you have anybody in your life who lives alone? Is that person older? Are you calling them regularly?” One thing you can do with your team is, as people come back to this, they’re going to come back to this slowly. And you could even do this now, but one of the big consulting groups turned around its culture over many year period by doing one thing, and literally it’s one thing: when teams got together for really intense engagements, they would sit and talk and everybody would fess up about what’s the one thing I need to do when I’m intensely working on a project Monday through Friday to keep me sane? Is it going and seeing my kids twice a week by picking them up from school, is it running during the noon hour, whatever it is.

Because most people are afraid to do it when everybody’s at the office working and they’re afraid they’re being judged, so they don’t do it. So what they do is have everybody put it on the table and then everybody forms a contact that says, “We’re going to make you do that.” The stories are like people taking people’s running shoes and putting it next to the elevator and everyone’s standing there and staring at them at noon until they walk out. But right now, what are the things that make you feel a part of this team? What are the important things that drive belongingness for you? Which is a different question, and then making that be real.

And then the same thing, as people come back, to help normalize again, what’s going to be important for you? Having that same set of conversations and everybody commit to help the other person do those things, and then write them down, and keep people on and call them out. As a leader, the first time you call somebody out for not doing what they’re supposed to be doing, everybody will get the point. Again, you don’t have to be running the meeting to do that.

The last thing is somebody askedabout leaders saying I don’t know. This is a wonderful moment to practice notknowing, because no one knows. The mark of a good leader is not knowingeverything and doing everything perfectly. People don’t trust the perfectperson because they know the guy is something. What makes people care for youin narratives and in storytelling and everything else is that you’re fallibleand they’re pulling for you, that you’ve been vulnerable with them, and they’rethe hero in the story by choosing to follow you. So it’s actually extremelyimportant for you to sometimes say you don’t know, or you feel a little bitscared, or you’re nervous, you’re uncomfortable. If you want people to followyou, they follow authenticity, not perfection because they don’t thinkperfection is real, and it’s not. So admitting that you’re infallible and thatyou don’t know is a really, really super important thing.

Lucy Blair Chung:

We’re getting a lot of plus ones forthat, so thank you for that point. Anyone who has questions pop them in becauseI’m going to be pulling from all of you after this question for Jonathan. I’mcurious what behaviors you’re seeing that you think will kind of stick in ournew normal? Behaviors that maybe… Because you seem to sort of sit on thatbleeding edge of culture and organizational design. But what have you beenlooking at and saying, “Actually, I think that that’s a behavior that isactually going to stay post this crisis.”?

Jonathan McBride:

I don’t. I’m a little bit pessimistic about behaviors sticking in moments like this. I’ve been through a bunch of experience. I went through the shutdown when we were in the White House and no one was there for a while, I went through 9/11 with my team, I went through the blackout with my team. I’ve been through a bunch of different scenarios that I’ve been talking to people about this exact question. Everyone’s story was the same. We went into this thing, we had to come up with all these work arounds and change behaviors and drop platforms and processes and get stuff done, and it was really kind of cool. It was actually really great and we worked better. And then we went back to normal as soon as the lights came on. Everyone had a story like that.

So my advice would be specifically on this because I don’t know what’s going to change. I mean, are we going to work better virtually? Yes. Companies are going to be much better on the back-end than they were on the front-end and having people work virtually. Are people going to be a little more comfortable with the technologies and stuff like that? Yes. But a really good thing to do as a leader or a member of a team is to suggest, “Hey, let’s keep track of a running list of things we either don’t ever want to do again because we’re doing it right now and we hate it, which is kind of fun, but then also list of things maybe we shouldn’t go back to because we found cool, interesting ways to do it.” And then plan to have a checkpoint conversation before you all fully come back to the office or engage in normally again, somebody normally.

As a leader, pick two. You don’t have to do 17 of them. If you take two of the things your team tell you they don’t want to do anymore after what they learned and you institutionalize them, people will be, “Oh, this person’s just amazing.” I want to mention that, for years now, I’ve seen when things happen in office environments, because I had been in situations where I’m on a million chat groups and I’m in everyone’s network and something’s going on and no one’s talking about it, then you see one person go, “Oh, my manager walked in and asked me if I’m okay. And then you see, “Who’s your manager? I’m going to quit. I’m going to work for him. He’s amazing.” Like there’s a kind of this full stack on effect.

You don’t have to do superhuman things, you have to surprise people a little. Right? You have to be a little better than expectations or than the mean. So that list of things you’re going to shut down, or whatever the case may be, having it be fun and something you all talk about during your meetings and people joke about, people could say out loud, “Hey, do whatever you just said, we’re not doing that ever again.” Right? Just have fun with it, but then take it seriously before you come back.

I will say that, in my experience, Ihave yet to both experience or talk to someone in the last couple of days wherethey did that. Everyone is always going back, including myself, in environmentswhere they’ve actually had choices. You just kind of fall back into yourroutines and patterns.

Lucy Blair Chung:

So during this time, I mean, sort ofrelated, I’m getting a couple of questions about, and we’ll definitely get tothis later too, everyone in our remote session as well, of how do you create ahealthy culture and a culture of empathy and trust in a virtual while we’re allvirtual and working remotely? What are your suggestions on that?

Jonathan McBride:

I think it’s a little harder remotely, but I think humans are human. You’re just dealing with humans and the technology and remoteness is a variable. People trust people based on their sense of understanding of that person, not necessarily… The one thing I would differ with Kerry on is that I don’t think this is a moment of tolerance. This is a moment of understanding. Tolerance is I’ll deal with you for this period of time. That would probably shut off at the end when we go back to normal. Lucy, once I know that you’re someone who processes over time rather than in the moment, if I’m running a meeting where I’m going to make a decision, I’m going to call you the next day because I’m like wondering, Lucy’s going to have a really good idea the next day, let me call her before I make a decision. Right? Once people understand where people come from, it’s very hard for most people a good 10th, to lose that part. Right?

One thing I would really want to make sure, and you’re going to prompt me maybe, but I want to say it now, which is some of you are probably nervous about starting these conversations because they’re unusual for everybody in the workplace and you haven’t done it before. Here’s the thing I’ve seen work over and over and over again is admitting. Start your conversation with the individual or the group saying, “Hey, I want to talk about something right now and it’s really personal. I got to tell you, I’m a little nervous and I’m really afraid that I’m going to say something wrong or do something wrong or whatever. But I realize it’s so important to you that I’m willing to be really nervous and potentially make a mistake if you’ll just give me a little bit of a break and tell me what I do, but know that I don’t mean it.”

What you’ve done is you’ve established in the other person a belief that you’re a person with positive intent. The assumption of positive intent is the difference between someone saying something silly and stupid and I got to tell them, “Hey, you didn’t mean it, but” which is a way to approach a bad boss. “I know you didn’t mean it, but for people who might have heard this. You might want to tweak this.” The difference between that and what a jerk, they meant that for me, right? And most people don’t wake up in the morning and say, “I want to microaggress this person all day long.” That’s not how people work.

Begin your conversation with humanityand with fallibility, but also just establishing [inaudible 00:18:42] sayingagain, “I’m nervous and uncomfortable.” As soon as you say thateverybody will be right with you because they’ve felt nervous and uncomfortablein their life. They hadn’t been the boss necessarily and they haven’t let aZoom conversation in a pandemic, but they’ve been nervous. So once you saythat, people are on your side. And then you can actually open up theconversation and they’ll give you a break and they will give you some goodadvice. They’ll be like, “Hey, don’t do this.”

Lucy Blair Chung:

I think the definitely would notprompt you, that’s amazing advice and I love how you validated that it’suncomfortable and that it’s unusual while also giving quite practical, specificways to script it. It actually perfectly segues to our next set of speakers.Jonathan, thank you truly so much. It really was an honor to be able to talkwith you today. Thank you.

Jonathan McBride:

Thanks so much for inviting me. Goodluck, everyone. Be well.

Last Thursday I described in detail certain economic problems which everyone admits now face the Nation. For the many messages which have come to me after that speech, and which it is physically impossible to answer individually, I take this means of saying 'thank you.'

Tonight, sitting at my desk in the White House, I make my first radio report to the people in my second term of office.

I am reminded of that evening in March, four years ago, when I made my first radio report to you. We were then in the midst of the great banking crisis.

Soon after, with the authority of the Congress, we asked the Nation to turn over all of its privately held gold, dollar for dollar, to the Government of the United States.

Today's recovery proves how right that policy was.

But when, almost two years later, it came before the Supreme Court its constitutionality was upheld only by a five-to-four vote. The change of one vote would have thrown all the affairs of this great Nation back into hopeless chaos. In effect, four Justices ruled that the right under a private contract to exact a pound of flesh was more sacred than the main objectives of the Constitution to establish an enduring Nation.

In 1933 you and I knew that we must never let our economic system get completely out of joint again- that we could not afford to take the risk of another great depression.

We also became convinced that the only way to avoid a repetition of those dark days was to have a government with power to prevent and to cure the abuses and the inequalities which had thrown that system out of joint.

We then began a program of remedying those abuses and inequalities-to give balance and stability to our economic system to make it bomb-proof against the causes of 1929.

Today we are only part-way through that program—and recovery is speeding up to a point where the dangers of 1929 are again becoming possible, not this week or month perhaps, but within a year or two.

National laws are needed to complete that program. Individual or local or state effort alone cannot protect us in 1937 any better than ten years ago.

It will take time—and plenty of time—to work out our remedies administratively even after legislation is passed. To complete our program of protection in time, therefore, we cannot delay one moment in making certain that our National Government has power to carry through.

Four years ago action did not come until the eleventh hour. It was almost too late.

If we learned anything from the depression we will not allow ourselves to run around in new circles of futile discussion and debate, always postponing the day of decision.

The American people have learned from the depression. For in the last three national elections an overwhelming majority of them voted a mandate that the Congress and the President begin the task of providing that protection—not after long years of debate, but now.

The Courts, however, have cast doubts on the ability of the elected Congress to protect us against catastrophe by meeting squarely our modern social and economic conditions.

We are at a crisis in our ability to proceed with that protection. It is a quiet crisis. There are no lines of depositors outside closed banks. But to the far-sighted it is far-reaching in its possibilities of injury to America.

I want to talk with you very simply about the need for present action in this crisis- the need to meet the unanswered challenge of one-third of a Nation ill-nourished, ill-clad, ill-housed.

Last Thursday I described the American form of Government as a three horse team provided by the Constitution to the American people so that their field might be plowed. The three horses are, of course, the three branches of government—the Congress, the Executive and the Courts. Two of the horses are pulling in unison today; the third is not. Those who have intimated that the President of the United States is trying to drive that team, overlook the simple fact that the President, as Chief Executive, is himself one of the three horses.

It is the American people themselves who are in the driver's seat. It is the American people themselves who want the furrow plowed.

It is the American people themselves who expect the third horse to pull in unison with the other two.

I hope that you have re-read the Constitution of the United States in these past few weeks. Like the Bible, it ought to be read again and again.

It is an easy document to understand when you remember that it was called into being because the Articles of Confederation under which the original thirteen States tried to operate after the Revolution showed the need of a National Government with power enough to handle national problems. In its Preamble, the Constitution states that it was intended to form a more perfect Union and promote the general welfare; and the powers given to the Congress to carry out those purposes can be best described by saying that they were all the powers needed to meet each and every problem which then had a national character and which could not be met by merely local action.

But the framers went further. Having in mind that in succeeding generations many other problems then undreamed of would become national problems, they gave to the Congress the ample broad powers 'to levy taxes . . . and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.'

That, my friends, is what I honestly believe to have been the clear and underlying purpose of the patriots who wrote a Federal Constitution to create a National Government with national power, intended as they said, 'to form a more perfect union for ourselves and our posterity.'

For nearly twenty years there was no conflict between the Congress and the Court. Then Congress passed a statute which, in 1803, the Court said violated an express provision of the Constitution. The Court claimed the power to declare it unconstitutional and did so declare it. But a little later the Court itself admitted that it was an extraordinary power to exercise and through Mr. Justice Washington laid down this limitation upon it: 'It is but a decent respect due to the wisdom, the integrity and the patriotism of the legislative body, by which any law is passed, to presume in favor of its validity until its violation of the Constitution is proved beyond all reasonable doubt.'

But since the rise of the modern movement for social and economic progress through legislation, the Court has more and more often and more and more boldly asserted a power to veto laws passed by the Congress and State Legislatures in complete disregard of this original limitation.

In the last four years the sound rule of giving statutes the benefit of all reasonable doubt has been cast aside. The Court has been acting not as a judicial body, but as a policy-making body.

When the Congress has sought to stabilize national agriculture, to improve the conditions of labor, to safeguard business against unfair competition, to protect our national resources, and in many other ways, to serve our clearly national needs, the majority of the Court has been assuming the power to pass on the wisdom of these Acts of the Congress—and to approve or disapprove the public policy written into these laws.

That is not only my accusation. It is the accusation of most distinguished Justices of the present Supreme Court. I have not the time to quote to you all the language used by dissenting Justices in many of these cases. But in the case holding the Railroad Retirement Act unconstitutional, for instance, Chief Justice Hughes said in a dissenting opinion that the majority opinion was 'a departure from sound principles,' and placed 'an unwarranted limitation upon the commerce clause.' And three other Justices agreed with him.

In the case holding the A.A.A. unconstitutional, Justice Stone said of the majority opinion that it was a 'tortured construction of the Constitution.' And two other Justices agreed with him.

In the case holding the New York Minimum Wage Law unconstitutional, Justice Stone said that the majority were actually reading-into the Constitution their own 'personal economic predilections,' and that if the legislative power is not left free to choose the methods of solving the problems of poverty, subsistence and health of large numbers in the community, then 'government is to be rendered impotent.' And two other Justices agreed with him.

In the face of these dissenting opinions, there is no basis for the claim made by some members of the Court that something in the Constitution has compelled them regretfully to thwart the will of the people.

In the face of such dissenting opinions, it is perfectly clear, that as Chief Justice Hughes has said: 'We are under a Constitution, but the Constitution is what the Judges say it is.'

The Court in addition to the proper use of its judicial functions has improperly set itself up as a third House of the Congress—a super-legislature, as one of the justices has called it-reading into the Constitution words and implications which are not there, and which were never intended to be there.

We have, therefore, reached the point as a Nation where we must take action to save the Constitution from the Court and the Court from itself. We must find a way to take an appeal from the Supreme Court to the Constitution itself. We want a Supreme Court which will do justice under the Constitution—not over it. In our Courts we want a government of laws and not of men.

I want—as all Americans want—an independent judiciary as proposed by the framers of the Constitution. That means a Supreme Court that will enforce the Constitution as written—that will refuse to amend the Constitution by the arbitrary exercise of judicial power—amendment by judicial say-so. It does not mean a judiciary so independent that it can deny the existence of facts universally recognized.

How then could we proceed to perform the mandate given us? It was said in last year's Democratic platform, 'If these problems cannot be effectively solved within the Constitution, we shall seek such clarifying amendment as will assure the power to enact those laws, adequately to regulate commerce, protect public health and safety, and safeguard economic security.' In other words, we said we would seek an amendment only if every other possible means by legislation were to fail.

When I commenced to review the situation with the problem squarely before me, I came by a process of elimination to the conclusion that, short of amendments, the only method which was clearly constitutional, and would at the same time carry out other much needed reforms, was to infuse new blood into all our Courts. We must have men worthy and equipped to carry out impartial justice. But, at the same time, we must have Judges who will bring to the Courts a present-day sense of the Constitution -Judges who will retain in the Courts the judicial functions of a court, and reject the legislative powers which the courts have today assumed.

In forty-five out of the forty-eight States of the Union, Judges are chosen not for life but for a period of years. In many States Judges must retire at the age of seventy. Congress has provided financial security by offering life pensions at full pay for Federal Judges on all Courts who are willing to retire at seventy. In the case of Supreme Court Justices, that pension is $20,000 a year. But all Federal Judges, once appointed, can, if they choose, hold office for life, no matter how old they may get to be.

What is my proposal? It is simply this: whenever a Judge or Justice of any Federal Court has reached the age of seventy and does not avail himself of the opportunity to retire on a pension, a new member shall be appointed by the President then in office, with the approval, as required by the Constitution, of the Senate of the United States.

That plan has two chief purposes. By bringing into the judicial system a steady and continuing stream of new and younger blood, I hope, first, to make the administration of all Federal justice speedier and, therefore, less costly; secondly, to bring to the decision of social and economic problems younger men who have had personal experience and contact with modern facts and circumstances under which average men have to live and work. This plan will save our national Constitution from hardening of the judicial arteries.

The number of Judges to be appointed would depend wholly on the decision of present Judges now over seventy, or those · who would subsequently reach the age of seventy.

If, for instance, any one of the six Justices of the Supreme Court now over the age of seventy should retire as provided under the plan, no additional place would be created. Consequently, although there never can be more than fifteen, there may be 'only fourteen, or thirteen, or twelve. And there may be only nine.

There is nothing novel or radical about this idea. It seeks to maintain the Federal bench in full vigor. It has been discussed and approved by many persons of high authority ever since a similar proposal passed the House of Representatives in 1869.

Why was the age fixed at seventy? Because the laws of many States, the practice of the Civil Service, the regulations of the Army and Navy, and the rules of many of our Universities and of almost every great private business enterprise, commonly fix the retirement age at seventy years or less.

The statute would apply to all the courts in the Federal system. There is general approval so far as the lower Federal courts are concerned. The plan has met opposition only so far as the Supreme Court of the United States itself is concerned. If such a plan is good for the lower courts it certainly ought to be equally good for the highest Court from which there is no appeal.

Those opposing this plan have sought to arouse prejudice and fear by crying that I am seeking to 'pack' the Supreme Court and that a baneful precedent will be established.

What do they mean by the words 'packing the Court'?

Let me answer this question with a bluntness that will end all honest misunderstanding of my purposes.

If by that phrase 'packing the Court' it is charged that I wish to place on the bench spineless puppets who would disregard the law and would decide specific cases as I wished them to be decided, I make this answer: that no President fit for his office would appoint, and no Senate of honorable men fit for their office would confirm, that kind of appointees to the Supreme Court.

But if by that phrase the charge is made that I would appoint and the Senate would confirm Justices worthy to sit beside present members of the Court who understand those modern conditions, that I will appoint Justices who will not undertake to override the judgment of the Congress on legislative policy, that I will appoint Justices who will act as Justices and not as legislators- if the appointment of such Justices can be called 'packing the Courts,' then I say that I and with me the vast majority of the American people favor doing just that thing—now.

Is it a dangerous precedent for the Congress to change the number of the Justices? The Congress has always had, and will have, that power. The number of Justices has been changed several times before, in the Administrations of John Adams and Thomas Jefferson- both signers of the Declaration of Independence- Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln and Ulysses S. Grant.

I suggest only the addition of Justices to the bench in accordance with a clearly defined principle relating to a clearly defined age limit. Fundamentally, if in the future, America cannot trust the Congress it elects to refrain from abuse of our Constitutional usages, democracy will have failed far beyond the importance to it of any kind of precedent concerning the Judiciary.

We think it so much in the public interest to maintain a vigorous judiciary that we encourage the retirement of elderly Judges by offering them a life pension at full salary. Why then should we leave the fulfillment of this public policy to chance or make it dependent upon the desire or prejudice of any individual Justice?

It is the clear intention of our public policy to provide for a constant flow of new and younger blood into the Judiciary. Normally every President appoints a large number of District and Circuit Judges and a few members of the Supreme Court. Until my first term practically every President of the United States had appointed at least one member of the Supreme Court. President Taft appointed five members and named a Chief Justice; President Wilson, three; President Harding, four, including a Chief Justice; President Coolidge, one; President Hoover, three, including a Chief Justice.

Such a succession of appointments should have provided a Court well-balanced as to age. But chance and the disinclination of individuals to leave the Supreme bench have now given us a Court in which five Justices will be over seventy-five years of age before next June and one over seventy. Thus a sound public policy has been defeated.

I now propose that we establish by law an assurance against any such ill-balanced Court in the future. I propose that hereafter, when a Judge reaches the age of seventy, a new and younger Judge shall be added to the Court automatically. In this way I propose to enforce a sound public policy by law instead of leaving the composition of our Federal Courts, including the highest, to be determined by chance or the personal decision of individuals.

If such a law as I propose is regarded as establishing a new precedent, is it not a most desirable precedent?

When To Jump: An Unscripted Fireside Chat On Taking Risks Related

Like all lawyers, like all Americans, I regret the necessity of this controversy. But the welfare of the United States, and indeed of the Constitution itself, is what we all must think about first. Our difficulty with the Court today rises not from the Court as an institution but from human beings within it. But we cannot yield our constitutional destiny to the personal judgment of a few men who, being fearful of the future, would deny us the necessary means of dealing with the present.

This plan of mine is no attack on the Court; it seeks to restore the Court to its rightful and historic place in our system of Constitutional Government and to have it resume its high task of building anew on the Constitution 'a system of living law.' The Court itself can best undo what the Court has done.

I have thus explained to you the reasons that lie behind our efforts to secure results by legislation within the Constitution. I hope that thereby the difficult process of constitutional amendment may be rendered unnecessary. But let us examine that process.

There are many types of amendment proposed. Each one is radically different from the other. There is no substantial group within the Congress or outside it who are agreed on any single amendment.

It would take months or years to get substantial agreement upon the type and language of an amendment. It would take months and years thereafter to get a two-thirds majority in favor of that amendment in both Houses of the Congress.

Then would come the long course of ratification by threefourths of all the States. No amendment which any powerful economic interests or the leaders of any powerful political party have had reason to oppose has ever been ratified within anything like a reasonable time. And thirteen States which contain only five percent of the voting population can block ratification even though the thirty-five States with ninety-five percent of the population are in favor of it.

A very large percentage of newspaper publishers, Chambers of Commerce, Bar Associations, Manufacturers' Associations, who are trying to give the impression that they really do want a constitutional amendment would be the first to exclaim as soon as an amendment was proposed, 'Oh! I was for an amendment all right, but this amendment that you have proposed is not the kind of an amendment that I was thinking about. I am, therefore, going to spend my time, my efforts and my money to block that amendment, although I would be awfully glad to help get some other kind of amendment ratified.'

Two groups oppose my plan on the ground that they favor a constitutional amendment. The first includes those who fundamentally object to social and economic legislation along modern lines. This is the same group who during the campaign last Fall tried to block the mandate of the people.

Now they are making a last stand. And the strategy of that last stand is to suggest the time-consuming process of amendment in order to kill off by delay the legislation demanded by the mandate.

To them I say: I do not think you will be able long to fool the American people as to your purposes.

The other group is composed of those who honestly believe the amendment process is the best and who would be willing to support a reasonable amendment if they could agree on one.

To them I say: we cannot rely on an amendment as the immediate or only answer to our present difficulties. When the time comes for action, you will find that many of those who pretend to support you will sabotage any constructive amendment which is proposed. Look at these strange bed-fellows of yours. When before have you found them really at your side in your fights for progress?

And remember one thing more. Even if an amendment were passed, and even if in the years to come it were to be ratified, its meaning would depend upon the kind of Justices who would be sitting on the Supreme Court bench. An amendment, like the rest of the Constitution, is what the Justices say it is rather than what its framers or you might hope it is.

This proposal of mine will not infringe in the slightest upon the civil or religious liberties so dear to every American.

My record as Governor and as President proves my devotion to those liberties. You who know me can have no fear that I would tolerate the destruction by any branch of government of any part of Our heritage of freedom.

The present attempt by those opposed to progress to play upon the fears of danger to personal liberty brings again to mind that crude and cruel strategy tried by the same opposition to frighten the workers of America in a pay-envelope propaganda against the Social Security Law. The workers were not fooled by that propaganda then. The people of America will not be fooled by such propaganda now.

I am in favor of action through legislation:

First, because I believe that it can be passed at this session of the Congress.

Second, because it will provide a reinvigorated, liberal-minded Judiciary necessary to furnish quicker and cheaper justice from bottom to top.

Third, because it will provide a series of Federal Courts willing to enforce the Constitution as written, and unwilling to assert legislative powers by writing into it their own political and economic policies.

During the past half century the balance of power between the three great branches of the Federal Government, has been tipped out of balance by the Courts in direct contradiction of the high purposes of the framers of the Constitution. It is my purpose to restore that balance. You who know me will accept my solemn assurance that in a world in which democracy is under attack, I seek to make American democracy succeed. You and I will do our part.

This work is in the public domain in the United States because it is a work of the United States federal government (see17 U.S.C. 105).

When To Jump: An Unscripted Fireside Chat On Taking Risks Associated