John Moser

That got a lot of attention and that ended up in violence.

A lot of times when the violence took place, the violence was on the part of factory owners who would send armed guards to break things up.

There were violent protests in the countryside.

This guy Milo Reno started the Farm Holiday Association where the idea was, well, the prices are so low because people are sending too much stuff to market.

So we are going to get farmers voluntarily to not send their stuff to market.

And if some decided they wanted to send their stuff to market anyway, members of the Farm Holiday Association would actually seize shipments of milk and stuff and dump them out in order to keep prices from falling.

Yeah, this was a disaster for Hoover in terms of public relations.

They camped out in this area called Anacostia Flats.

They were there.

They learned they weren't going to get what they wanted.

Many at that point left, but not everyone.

And Hoover wanted them gone, but his instructions were not to use violence.

The U S army, the unit that was involved was under the command of general Douglas MacArthur.

There you go.

He flatly disobeyed orders and he sent in tanks and use tear gas.

And the result was, it would just, it looked terrible.

Hoover could have said, well,

MacArthur, this was not what I intended at all.

MacArthur exceeded his orders, but for whatever reason, he decided that it would play better for him to portray himself as Mr. Law and Order.

And so he defended the acts of MacArthur and implied that MacArthur was acting under his orders.