THE HISTORY OF THE UNITED
STATES 1877-1945
Lecture 7
The Great Depression
FOREIGN POLICY IN THE 1920s
• Washington Conference 1921-1922
• Major colonial powers (U.S., France, Britain,
Japan)agree to settle any disputes with
peaceful means
• Naval but not continental force disarmament
• U.S. forces put down revolution in Nicaragua
• Kellog-Briand Pact 1928 Nations give up war
as an instrument of national policy
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT
(1882-1945)
• Privileged background, only child, distant (5th) cousin
of Theodore Roosevelt, related to people on the
Mayflower
• Harvard degree, Columbia Law School
• Tall, handsome, shrewd, athletic
• 1921: polio attack, cripples him
• Personal struggle with disease transforms the snobbish
aristocrat to one of the greatest political figures of the
century
• "If you had spent two years in bed trying to wiggle your
toe,” "after that anything would seem easy."
FDR
• State senator in New York, 1913: Asst.
Secretary of the Navy
• 1928: Governor of NY
• Main issues: conservation, old-age pension,
unemployment insurance, public works
projects
THE PRESIDENTIAL CAMPAIGN OF
1932
• Over 12 million people are jobless
• 20,000 World War One veterans march on
Washington, demanding bonuses scheduled
for 1945 1 USD for each day served in US, 1,25
for overseas
• Hoover, fearing radicals, calls on the Army to
put the demonstrations down.
• ”Well, this will elect me” 472-59 (votes in the
electoral college
FRANKLIN D. ROOSEVELT
• Outgoing personality, empathy with the less
fortunate
• A born leader, obsessed with power
• A bulldog determination to succeed
• The President of the forgotten man
THE HUMAN TOLL OF THE
DEPRESSION
• breadlines, soup kitchens, tin-can shanties and
tar-paper shacks known as "Hoovervilles,“
• apple sellers
• Arkies and Okies packed into Model A Fords
heading to California
• Rise of unemployment from 3 million to 12.5
million between 1929-1932
• Mass evictions, shelter found in caves, sewer
pipes
• Hoboes, vagrancy
THE HUMAN TOLL OF THE
DEPRESSION
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Higher marriage age, declining child birth rate
Starvation, (Cameroon sent help to US!)
Break-up of families, yet declining divorce rates
Decline of the status of men, lost wage-earner
position
• Improved status of women: holding the families
together
• Many a family has lost its automobile and found
its soul
IMAGES OF THE DEPRESSION
• http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article2156728/Long-lost-Depression-era-photoscapture-everyday-life-destituteAmericans.html
FDR
A NEW APPROACH
• Hoover: distant, not able to get his message
through
• FDR: the only thing we have to fear is fear
itself
• This nation asks for action, and action now!
• A pragmatist, trial and error approach
• A willingness to act, to be decisive, to
experiment
A NEW APPROACH
• The election of 1932 Realigning election
• A landslide election, Franklin D. Roosevelt
defeats Hoover
• I pledge you, I pledge myself to a new deal for
the American people
• Campaign song: Happy Days Are Here Again
THE BRAIN TRUST
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Pragmatists, not moralists
Influenced by the Progressive Movement
Rejection of laissez faire orthodoxy
Trust-busters: break up concentrated business power
Associationalists: cooperation between business, labor,
government
• Economic planners: a system of centralized national
planning
• "Take a method and try it,“ "if it fails admit it frankly
and try another. But above all try something."
STRENGTHENING THE BANKING
SYSTEM
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Declaring a four day bank holiday
Banks reorganize and reopen on Monday
March 9-June 16, the Hundred Days
Farm Credit Administration-refinancing farm
mortgages at lower rates
• Establishment of the Federal Deposit
Insurance Corporation
• Federal Securities Act-regulating Wall Street
RELIEVING HUMAN SUFFERING
• Civilian Conservation Corps-jobs for young men
(forestry, soil conservation, building recreational
areas)
• Federal Emergency Relief Act- public buildings,
road construction, adult literacy programs
• Civilian Works Administration
• Works Progress Administration (Federal Theatre
Project, Federal Writers Project, Natl Youth
Administration) putting unemployed talent to
work (Nixon, Ellison)
THE FARM CRISIS
• Late 1920: 1/5th of families lived in farms
• Farm income dropped by 2/3
• Overproduction due to fertilizers, better
machinery and plant varieties, but demand fell
• Less bread consumed, Europe imposes protective
tariffs, cotton replaced with rayon
• Natural disasters, boll weevil epidemic
• Dust Bowl: animal grazing, ploughing destroys the
surface of the land, drought and storms lead to
loss of land cover
AGRICULTURAL REGULATION
• Agricultural Adjustment Act: helping farmers to
limit production, paying farmers to grow less
• Henry Wallace: secretary of agriculture, reducing
supply, to keep prices high (plowing under 10
million acres of cotton, slaughtering 6 million
pigs, keeping only 1 million pounds of meat)
• Uprooting farmers, dustbowl in Oklahoma,
• Commemorated in Steinbeck’s Grapes of Wrath
• Soil conservation projects to deal with drought
OKIES OR UPROOTED FARMERS
REGULATING INDUSTRY
• National Industrial Recovery Act
• Two goals: promoting work relief, defining
labor standards, setting wages and codes of
fair competition
• Fair Practice Codes: 40 hour workweek, 13
USD minimum weekly wage
• Growing opposition on the part of business
THE NATIONAL RECOVERY
ADMINISTRATION
• Prices, wages, maximum hours, production levels
set in each industry
• Main goal: stabilizing the economy, eliminating
overproduction, labor conflicts
• Leader: Hugh Johnson, logo: blue eagle
• https://www.google.hu/search?q=blue+eagle+de
pression&client=firefoxa&hs=GaO&rls=org.mozilla:hu:official&source=ln
ms&tbm=isch&sa=X&ei=Cct3UsPKDYbTtAadk4Go
Ag&ved=0CAkQ_AUoAQ&biw=1280&bih=671.
REGIONAL PLANNING
• Tennessee Valley Authority- a govt. owned
corporation
• Harnessing the energy of the Tennessee River
• Transporting farmers from the age of kerosene
to the age of electricity
• Rural Electrification Administration-providing
energy to farms, 21 dams, 35% of farm
families are provided electricity
LAUNCHING THE SECOND NEW DEAL
• Fireside chats over the radio
• Effective use of the media, FDR not shown in
wheelchair
• Pushing for old age pension, an idea unheard
of in America
• Except: Huey Long’s Share Our Wealth
program, take away fortunes of the wealthy,
guarantee every family 5.000 USD, pensions
for the aged
HUEY LONG, the Kingfish
OTHER CRITICS
• Father Charles Coughlin: most influential
religious figure between the two wars
• Weekly radio program: The Golden Hour of the
Shrine of Little Flower 16 million listeners
• Demands nationalization of banks, inflating
dollar
• Anti-semitic beliefs blaming Jews and
Communists for the Depression
FRANCIS TOWNSEND
• A public health official, unemployed at age 67
• Pushing for old age pension
• 200 USD for all Americans over age 60 per
month, money should be spent in US
• All people over age 60 should retire, young
people inherit jobs—potentially ending
unemployment
SOCIAL SECURITY
• Roosevelt steals the thunder
• The Social Security Act of 1935
• The cornerstone and supreme achievement of
the New Deal
• Pension fund for retirees over
65,unemployment fund, disability assistance
• Low pension, not all workers are covered,
migrant workers excluded, based on regressive
taxation unfair to the poor
AFRICAN-AMERICANS
• 1936: 75% of black voters support FDR
• No major civil rights advances, due to need for
southern legislative support
• NRA: blacks had lower pay
• AAA: limiting production area, forces 100,000 blacks
off the land,
• Administration failed to outlaw lynching, or poll tax
• Advances: more visibility for blacks in government:
Mary McLeod Bethune, advisor of the National Youth
Administration
THE INDIAN NEW DEAL
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John Collier: Commissioner of Indian Affairs
1934: Indian Reorganization Act
Tribes could buy land
Government recognition of tribal constitutions
Supporting the use of Native American
language and customs
DECLINING MOMENTUM OF NEW
DEAL POLICIES
• Re-elected in 1936
• Supreme Court strikes down most laws
• FDR responds with court packing plan- extend
the size of the Supreme Court to 15, a new
judge for every judge over age 70
• New Deal does not end unemployment and
Depression, U.S. entry to World War Two does
COURT PACKING
• 1935: Schecter v. U.S. NIRA (National Industrial
Recovery Act) declared unconstitutional,
improper limitation of interstate commerce
(regulation of poultry industry)
• 1936 Supreme Court strikes down AAA
(Agricultural Adjustment Act)
• Judicial Procedures Reform bill of 1937: FDR’s
plan of expanding the Supreme Court: accused of
violating separation of powers
• Later nominates 5 justices to the Court
POPULAR CULTURE
• Woodie Guthrie, Pete Seeger: collecting folk
songs
• Rise of Southern Agrarians I’ll Take My Standmanifesto, calling for a return to a simpler life
• Appearance of superheroes
• Marx Brothers, W.C Fields (parody and ridicule
of traditional values of patriotism, family, etc)
• Frank Capra films, promotion of the American
dream
LEGACY OF the NEW DEAL
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Roosevelt waged war on the Depression
End of liberal capitalism
Pro-active governing, governing as crisis management
Broker state: govt. maneuvers and mediates among major
interest groups-as an honest broker it looks out to protect
not only business but workers, farmers, consumers,
unemployed
• FDR was accused of introducing socialism, communism, yet
he saved capitalism
• An aggressive govt. interference with the economy
• http://xroads.virginia.edu/~ma02/volpe/newdeal/resource
s.html
• http://www.google.hu/imgres?imgurl=http://j
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