1919 Bishops' Plan: Documents

2. William Cardinal O'Connell's "The Reasonable Limits of State Activity,"

   In this address to the Educational Convention in St. Louis, MO on June 24, 1919, Cardinal O'Connell warns of the dangers of government interference in business and citizens' private lives. Cardinal O'Connell saw government legislation regarding labor and business as opening the door to a socialist form of government. Consequently, he criticized Bishops' Program of Reconstruction and its call for social reform legislation that would regulate working conditions and wages.

3. Selections from Ignatius Donnelly's novel, Caesar's Column: A Story of the Twentieth Century, Chapter 11, pp. 96-99; Chapter 12, pp. 101-108, pp. 112-114.

   In 1889, Donnelly wrote Caeser's Column, a utopian science fiction novel. The book is a cautionary tale set one hundred years in the future (1988). In Chapter XI, the protagonist learns that unbridled capitalism ruined the political and economic systems of the world. Donnelly also predicts globalization in this chapter. In Chapter XII, he outlines an economic system that he believes would result in a utopia.

   NOTE: Ignatius Donnelly's Caesar's Column contains ethnic prejudice, but we include it here because:

   John Ryan was powerfully influenced by Donnelly, a United States Congressmen, populist and author who lived in a town near Ryan's own in Minnesota. Late nineteenth-century populism, as historian Richard Hofstadter showed in his classic work, The Age of Reform, sometimes contained elements of anti-Semitism, aligning Jews with elite monetary power. Ignatius Donnelly's populism contained strains of anti-Semitism, and the excerpt from Caesar's Column included on this website, in attributing the impoverishment and exploitation of Europe to "Israelites" and to individuals with allegedly "Semitic blood," exhibit this prejudice. The passage also contains anti-Asian sentiment, very common in American society during this period. We have included the excerpt here because Donnelly's ideas (Ryan mentions the impact of Caesar's Column by name in his autobiography) heavily influenced Ryan's, and these passages clearly illustrate Donnelly's populist views.

   There is, however, no evidence that John Ryan himself was anti-Semitic. To the contrary, Ryan famously denounced the anti-Semitism of Father Charles Coughlin in a 1938 Commonweal, piece titled "Anti-Semitism in the Air," which was reprinted as a 1939 article titled "Catholics and Anti-Semitism" in Current History. He denounced anti-Semitism generally in a 1939 pamphlet titled "American Democracy vs. Racism, Communism." He was also a member of the Committee of Catholics to Fight Anti-Semitism.

4. Leo XIII's, Rerum Novarum

   Pope Leo XIII wrote this encyclical to address the rise of industrialism in western countries. Rerum Novarum examines the relationships between the Church, government, business, labor. It used neo-Thomistic reasoning to just the support of the right of labor to organize and the support of private property. The encylical rejected both unbridled capitalism and socialism.

5. British Labor Program Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5

   Many different social and economic programs from a range of countries influenced John Ryan's thinking on economic and social reform. This outline from Ryan's reference notes on the Bishops' Program reflect the influence of British reformist thought on his own.

6. Mother "Mary Harris" Jones documents

   Mother Jones took a different approach to labor issues than most Catholic social thinkers: she was an avowed radical and socialist. Known as the "Angel of the Miners," Jones always sided with labor. The documents presented here demonstrate her support of labor and her belief that business and government conspired to exploit laborers.

7. Selection from John A. Ryan's personal "Journal", November 11, 1894.

   John A. Ryan's personal "Journal", kept during his years in the seminary and shortly thereafter. This selection, written in November 11, 1894, expresses his disappointment at the losses suffered by the People's Party in the November elections. The People's Party referred to was the Populist Party, also called the Alliance or Farmers's Alliance.

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8. Selections from Social Doctrine in Action: A Personal History, (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1941)

   This selection describes the impact of Pope Leo XII's encyclical Rerum Novarum on John A. Ryan's social thinking. The encylical supported Ryan's Populist distrust of an unregulated free market and the necessity of government intervention in the economy to ensure the welfare of all.

9. Selections from John Ryan's personal journal on October 14, 16, 1892.

   John Ryan's Journal, written largely during his seminary years in the 1890s, provided an outlet for his musings on society. In these selections, Ryan muses on "man as social being," and the election of 1894. They reveal emerging beliefs that would be fully developed later, in publications such as the Bishops' Program of 1919.

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10. Selection from John A. Ryan, "Individualism," from The Catholic Encyclopedia (New York: Appleton Co., 1910) Volume VII, pp. 761-762

    In this encylcopedia entry, Ryan defines "individualism" as "the tendency to magnify individual liberty, as against external authority, and individual activity, as against associated activity." Extreme individualism, as defined by Ryan, rejects the intrusion of authority from church, state, and in the realm of business. Ryan states that the Catholic position is neither individualistic nor anti-individualistic.

11. Selections from John Ryan's personal "Journal," kept during his years at the Seminary and shortly thereafter, 1892-1898. These selections from the last entries for November 17, 21, 1894; October 10, 1897.

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12. John A. Ryan, Social Reconstruction (New York: MacMillan Co. 1920) pp. 213-216.

    This book was composed of a series of lectures delivered at Fordham University's School of Social Service at the end of 1919 and beginning of 1920 on the issue of social reconstruction, shortly after the issuance of the "Bishop's Program for Social Reconstruction."

13. Selection from John A. Ryan, "The Attitude of the Roman Catholic Church Towards Radical Social Reform," Community Forum n. d. 1917 (?)

    In this article, Ryan explains that the Catholic Church's approach to social reform is a conservative rather than a radical one.

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