TREASURY OFFICIAL SAYS PUBLIC DEBT SHOULD BE 'SUBSTANTIALLY RETIRED' BY 1952
Washington, D.C. (JFK+50) On October 30, 1923, G. B. Winston*, undersecretary of Treasury, told the Investment Banker's Association meeting at the New Willard Hotel here in the Nation's Capital, that "with gradual retirement of the public debt" it should be "substantially retired" by the year 1952.
According to a front page story in The Evening Star of the same date, the government of the United States "is pouring back into the investment reservoir...nearly half a billion dollars every year."
JFK+50 NOTE
Mr. Winston's prediction proved grossly incorrect. According to the JFK Library, the gross national debt at the end of fiscal year 1952-1953 stood at 266 billion dollars. That's a drop in the proverbial bucket today as we owe 31.4 trillion dollars. As the English character Malcolm Meriweather asked on an episode of the Andy Griffith Show, "Could we pay it back on the never-never?"
*Garrard Bigelow Winston (1892-1955) was born in Chicago & graduated Yale University, 1904 & Northwestern University Law School, 1906. GBW served as undersecretary of Treasury 1923-1927 & then joined Shearman & Sterling law firm.
SOURCES
"The first debt ceiling fight was in 1953. It looked almost exactly like the one today," by Stacey Vanek Smith, June 1, 2023, NPR, www.npr.org/
"U.S. Clear Of Debt By 1952, Predicted," The Evening Star, Washington, D.C., October 30, 1923, Chronicling America, Library of Congress, www.loc.gov/
