WILLIAMS, AUBREY

Aubrey Willis Williams (August 1890–March 1965) was deputy administrator of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) and deputy administrator of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) under Harry Hopkins, and also head of the National Youth Administration (NYA) throughout its existence. Born in Springville, Alabama, into a family impoverished by the Civil War, his formal education was minimal. At twenty-one he enrolled at Maryville College in Tennessee as a student for the ministry, before serving in World War I, first in the French Foreign Legion and later, after U.S. intervention, with the U.S. Army. Already a committed social activist, he qualified as a social worker at the University of Cincinnati, then worked for a decade in Wisconsin before joining Harry Hopkins's team in the first days of the New Deal.

Williams was responsible for the day-to-day operations of both the FERA and WPA, as well as being in effective control of the NYA. He was tough, resourceful and outspoken, firmly located in the New Deal's left wing, determined to use his position to attack the United States's social and economic imbalances, and especially to further the cause of civil rights for black Americans. In particular he used the NYA to provide employment and training for the nation's disadvantaged young people. He made powerful enemies among the forces opposed to New Deal liberalism, and in 1943 they engineered the dismantling of the NYA in spite of its importance to the war effort.

With that, Williams left public office, never to return. In 1945 he returned to Montgomery, Alabama, where he edited a small newspaper, and for the rest of his life, worked as a courageous and increasingly isolated regional spokesperson for the coming civil rights revolution. As such, he was frequently investigated by Senator Joseph McCarthy's lieutenants in the1950s. He lived long enough to take part in Martin Luther King, Jr.'s March on Washington in 1963.

See Also: BETHUNE, MARY MCLEOD; HOPKINS, HARRY; NATIONAL YOUTH ADMINISTRATION (NYA).

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Lindley, Ernest K., and Betty Lindley. A New Deal for Youth: The Story of the National Youth Administration. 1938.

Rawick, George P. "The New Deal and Youth." Ph.D. diss., University of Wisconsin, 1957.

Salmond, John A. A Southern Rebel. The Life and Times of Aubrey Willis Williams.

John A. Salmond