The Rise of the
New Deal Order
Liberalism in 1930s and 1940s
The New Deal, 1 & 2
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Two New Deals, First and Second
Experimentation: first 100 days and after
Not always consistent, some things worked,
some things didn’t
Three main goals: Relief, Recovery, Reform
World War II finally ended Depression by
achieving some of the goals of the 2nd New
Deal - Keynesianism
The First New Deal, 1933-1935
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FDR elected in 1932 landslide
Major goal: decrease production (which would raise
prices for goods, then get industry going again,
people back to work)
Major means of achieving goal: AAA and NIRA (both
in 1933)
Methods: voluntary cooperation (Hoover tried this)
among private industries and farmers to cut
production, maintain wages and employment
Effective for farmers
Not effective for industry; industrialists couldn’t get
along; ruled unconstitutional (interstate trade)
First New Deal (cont.)
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Other goals/methods/achievements:
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Banking Acts reform: FDIC, guaranteed deposits, halted
bank runs
SEC reform, oversees and regulates stock market
SEC rules: must divulge financial info., no paper
companies, separate commercial and personal banking (in
place until 1970s deregulation)
CCC/WPA etc. – direct temporary relief (money in pocket),
recovery (spend money in economy), pride, respect
TVA – relief, recovery – flood control and employment;
reform b/c public projects would be used as yardstick
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Targeted as “creeping socialism”
First New Deal and Workers’
Rights
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NIRA contained labor provisions which were
legally enforceable
Section 7a: right to organize union; prohibited
court injunctions against strikes
Outlawed child labor
Set 35-hour industrial work week
40 cents/hour minimum wage
Workers and others seized on this aspect of
First New Deal, pressured for more
Second New Deal, 1935-1941
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Government as countervailing power to
business
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Business had too much power
Govt. and labor can act as counterweight to
business power
Anti-monopoly
Basis for modern liberal ideas - Liberalism
Underconsumptionism = Keynesianism:
government must “prime the pump” – provide
relief, jobs, economic growth to increase
public consumption of goods/services =
economic growth, industry, jobs, income…
Second New Deal (cont.)
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NLRA, the Wagner Act (1935): labor’s
“Magna Carta”, guaranteed right to join a
union
Social Security Act (1935): established social
safety net
Wealth Tax Act: taxes on wealthiest to 75%
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Progressive taxation – higher on wealthiest
FDR’s Big 1936 victory – showed support for
2nd New Deal vs. 1st New Deal and critics
The CIO and the Labor Movement
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CIO formed in 1936, industrial unions, rival to
AFL trade unions
John L. Lewis, head of UMW and other CIO
leaders said “FDR wants you to join a union” –
made union membership patriotic
Flint, Michigan, GM sit-down strike in 1937; 170
sit-downs all over nation by March
Union members: 3 mil in 1933; 10.5 mil in 1941
Unionized major industries for first time: auto,
steel, meatpacking, rubber
Videos: GM Sit-down; Unionizing Ford
Flint Sit-down Strike, 1936-37
Studs
Terkel
Interview
Three
Stooges,
Sit-downers
Political Realignment, The New
Deal Coalition
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New Democratic Party majority composed of:
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Liberals and leftists
Workers, union members
Urban ethnic groups, immigrants
African Americans
Southern Democrats
Problems/weaknesses in coalition?:
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Diversity, regional divisions, So. Dems vs….
New Deal Culture:
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Take mind off of problems:
New Deal Culture:
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Inspiring hope and confidence:
New Deal Culture
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Charles Sheeler vs. Dorothea Lange:
Sheeler, Ford Plant, River Rouge,
Criss-Crossed Conveyors, 1927
Lange, Migrant Mother, 1936
New Deal Culture:
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Focus on work and workers; problems of
machine:
New Deal Culture:
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Focus on work and workers:
New Deal Culture:
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Focus on Flawed Economic System and
Effects of Great Depression:
Unemployed, not
their fault
Unemployment:
The search for
work crossed
lines of race
and age
New Deal Culture:
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Public Works Projects provided jobs and selfrespect:
CCC workers built National Parks, public buildings,
fought forest fires, and other public works
New Deal Culture:
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Focus on innocent victims of economic
problems and the less powerful:
New Deal Culture:
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Focus on rural poor, forgotten Americans:
John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath
Dorothea Lange’s FSA photographs
Regionalist painters and artists focused on rural
regions, farmers,
small town America
Woody Guthrie’s
songs
Dorothea Lange: Child and Her Mother, Wapato,
Yakima Valley, Washington
Dorothea
Lange: White
Angel Bread
Line, San
Francisco
Dorothea Lange:
Dorothea Lange:
New Deal Questions and
Issues
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Theme for the rest of this class: What
happens to the New Deal Order?
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Upheld and Strengthened?
Attacked and Dismantled?
Extended to other groups, rest of population?
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African Americans
Women
Entitlement vs. pitied