The Great Depression
1929-1939
Early years
• Hoover’s belief was to do nothing drastic, let
the economy follow a “natural” cycle. By early
1932, the Depression was at it’s worst. Hoover
reaches his low point when he orders the
Army to remove WWI veterans from
Washington DC, they were the “Bonus Army”
Election of 1932
• Hoover is the incumbent Republican
•
He runs on “staying the course”
• Franklin D. Roosevelt is the Democrat
He promises “Bold New Programs”
FDR wins in a landslide
March 4, 1933
FDR inaugurated the 32nd president of the
U.S. "The only thing we have to fear is fear
itself."
The New Deal
• FDR’s plan to fix the problems of America,
create parity for all.
Roosevelt’s 3 R’s
RELIEF
• Give people a means of daily subsistence,
food, clothing and shelter.
RECOVERY
• Get the economy going again, new jobs,
extended work programs, improving
infrastructure. Massive building programs
REFORM
• Change the methods that had led to the
Depression
100 Days
• FDR’s first 3 months in office, it is now the
standard by which all Presidential
administrations are measured.
• It should be noted that most of the 100 days
programs ultimately failed, were ineffective or
were ruled unconstitutional.
Fireside chats
• FDR used the new media of radio to speak
periodically with the American People. There
were 30 chats from 1933 until 1944.
New Deal Programs
• Relief
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Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC)
Federal Emergency Relief Act
Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA)
“artificial scarcity”
Civil Works Administration (CWA)
Works Progress Administration (WPA).
• Recovery
• National Industrial Recovery Act
(NIRA)establishing the Public Works
Administration (PWA) and the National
Recovery Administration (NRA).
• Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)
• National Labor Board
• 21st Amendment
• Federal Housing Administration (FHA)
• Rural Electrification Administration
• Reform
– Federal Securities Act
– Banking Act of 1933 (establishes FDIC)
– Securities Exchange Act
– Gold Reserve Act
– Banking Act of 1935
– Social Security Act
Supreme Court Cases
• Schecter Poultry Corp. v. United States the
NIRA of 1933 was unconstitutional.
• U.S. v. Butler Supreme Court rules 6-3 against
the Agricultural Adjustment Act
• Ashwander v. TVA – TVA is constitutional
• Court Packing -FDR wants to add a new
justice for each one over 70. Threatened the
Separation of Powers as outlined in the
Constitution. The Court ultimately became more
lenient with FDR’s New Deal Programs
Dust Bowl
• Dry land farming techniques, modern tractors
and bankruptcy lead to low ground cover and
drought, causing 100 million acres of farmland
to be lost.
• Many left the Great Plains to work in
California’s fruit fields. Hemingway wrote The
Grapes of Wrath about this migration. Many
never made it to California, settling in the
fields of Texas, New Mexico and Arizona.