The 1930s

Works Progress Administration

(1939-43) The Works Progress Administration was the largest and most ambitious American New Deal agency, employing millions of people to carry out public works projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads.The economy would in turn be stimulated by the increased purchasing power of the newly employed, whose wages under the program ranged from $15 to $90 per month. Special programs allowed Skilled workers the chance to work.

Civil Works Administration

(Winter of 1933-34)The Civil Works Administration was a short-lived U.S. job creation program established by the New Deal during the Great Depression to rapidly create manual labor jobs for millions of unemployed workers.Employed over 4 million workers, about 3% of the population. Constructed and repaired public buildings, roadways, and parks. Although the CWA provided much employment, there were critics who said there was nothing of permanent value. Roosevelt told his cabinet that this criticism moved him to end the program and replace it with the WPA which would have long-term value for the society, in addition to short-term benefits for the unemployed. We also became more in debt.

demagogue

A political leader who seeks support by appealing to popular desires and prejudices rather than by using rational argument. They use a scapegoat. Huey Long is an example.

Bank Holiday

After a month-long run on American banks, Franklin Delano Roosevelt proclaimed a Bank Holiday, beginning March 6, 1933, that shut down the banking system. When the banks reopened on March 13, depositors stood in line to return their hoarded cash. On the Sunday evening before the banks reopened, Roosevelt addressed the nation through one of his signature "FIRESIDE CHATS." With honest words in soothing tones, the President assured sixty million radio listeners that the crisis was over and the nation's banks were secure. On the first day back in business, deposits exceeded withdrawals. By the beginning of April, Americans confidently returned a billion dollars to the banking system. The bank crisis was over.

National Labor Relations Act (1935)/ Wagner Act

Also known as the Wagner Act, this bill was signed into law by President Franklin Roosevelt on July 5, 1935. It established the National Labor Relations Board and addressed relations between unions and employers in the private sector.

Southern Democrats and the New Deal

During the 1930s, as the New Deal began to move Democrats as a whole to the left in economic policy, Southern Democrats were mostly supportive, although by the late 1930s there was a growing conservative faction. Southern Democrats were not antagonistic to the New Deal as such. They wanted curbs on the power of Northern banks, railroads and other corporations, federal public works and relief for the homeless and unemployed—provided that they got these things in a way that did not disturb white supremacy in the South.

Franklin D. Roosevelt

Franklin Delano Roosevelt, often referred to by his initials FDR, was an American statesman and political leader who served as the 32nd President. Franklin D. Roosevelt was the only U.S. president to be elected four times, serving 12 years in office from March 4, 1933 to his death on April 12, 1945. Within his first 100 days after taking office in March of 1933, President Franklin D. Roosevelt called for a "New Deal" for Americans, proposing sweeping economic reforms to address the Great Depression. The greatest crisis in American history since the Civil War, 13 million Americans were unemployed and hundreds of banks were closed.

H. Hoover Voluntarism

Hoover's belief that people should not look for handouts from the government when in trouble. Believed the government had no right to force people to do anything. Relied on people's good will to do things for others. Failed to stem the tide of business collapse.

Social Security Act

On August 14, 1935, the Social Security Act established a system of old-age benefits for workers, benefits for victims of industrial accidents, unemployment insurance, aid for dependent mothers and children, the blind, and the physically handicapped. Eighty-two years after President Franklin Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act on August 14, 1935, Social Security remains one of the nation's most successful, effective, and popular programs. Many of the federal and state programs that provide income security to U.S. families have their roots in the Social Security Act (the Act) of 1935. This Act provided for unemployment insurance, old-age insurance, and means-tested welfare programs.

Court Packing

On February 5, 1937, President Franklin Roosevelt announces a controversial plan to expand the Supreme Court to as many as 15 judges, allegedly to make it more efficient. Critics immediately charged that Roosevelt was trying to "pack" the court and thus neutralize Supreme Court justices hostile to his New Deal. This would lead to a much different court system.

Quarantine Speech

On October 5, 1937, he gave a speech in Chicago, which became widely known as FDR's Quarantine Speech. By giving his Quarantine Speech, Roosevelt intended to influence peaceful nations to get together and bring about an isolation of aggressive nations. He drew parallels between the spread of violence at the time with a contagious illness, saying that, just like a community agrees to quarantine a few members who are afflicted by a disease, for its larger good, peace-loving nations should also similarly 'quarantine' evil powers which endangered world peace.

Tennessee Valley Authority

President Roosevelt signed the Tennessee Valley Authority Act on May 18, 1933, creating the TVA as a Federal corporation. The new agency was asked to tackle important problems facing the valley, such as flooding, providing electricity to homes and businesses, and replanting forests. Wildly successful and never repeated. All purpose agency of recovery, relief, and reform Weird hybrid agency. Corporation and government. ( Sells stocks and bonds can seize your land). Provides navigation, flood control, electricity generation, and more.

Huey Long

Share The Wealth was a movement begun in February 1934, during the Great Depression, by Huey Long, a governor and later United States Senator from Louisiana. Huey Long first proposed the plan in a national radio address, which is now referred to as the "Share Our Wealth Speech". Did not endorse Eisenhower's New Deal and was a demagogue.

Agricultural Adjustment Act

The Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) was signed into law by President Franklin Roosevelt on May 12, 1933. Among the law's goals were limiting crop production, reducing stock numbers, and refinancing mortgages with terms more favorable to struggling farmers. Nevertheless, many of the farm products removed from economic circulation were utilized in productive ways. This had a negative effect on sharecroppers and tenants that worked on the land that was no longer going to be used. They were out of work and forced to leave the land they lived on. This also increased the percentage of unemployed workers in the nation. Many sharecroppers that still worked on the land did not receive the benefits of the allotment programs because the landlords would keep the money for themselves instead of fairly distributing it.

Civilian Conservation Corps

The Civilian Conservation Corps was a public work relief program that operated from 1933 to 1942 in the United States for unemployed, unmarried men. Considered by many to be one of the most successful of Roosevelt's New Deal programs, the CCC planted more than three billion trees and constructed trails and shelters in more than 800 parks nationwide during its nine years of existence. The CCC helped to shape the modern national and state park systems we enjoy today. A worker received $30 in payment per month for his services in addition to room and board at a work camp. The men were required to send $22 to 25 of their monthly earnings home to support their families. The CCC became a model for future conservation programs, such as The National Civilian Community Corps.

National Recovery Act (N.R.A)

The National Industrial Recovery Act of 1933 (NIRA) was a US labor law and consumer law passed by the US Congress to authorize the President to regulate industry for fair wages and prices that would stimulate economic recovery. The code provisions of the act were controversial because they created industrial alliances and "effectively fixed prices and wages, established production quotas, and imposed restrictions on entry of other companies into the alliances." Participants in the code program placed Blue Eagle signs with red "N.R.A." letters at their places of business. The NIRA was declared unconstitutional in May 1935 when the Supreme Court issued its unanimous decision in the case Schechter Poultry Corp. v. United States. The court ruled that the NIRA assigned lawmaking powers to the NRA in violation of the Constitution's allocation of such powers to Congress.

The New Deal

The New Deal was a series of federal programs, public work projects, financial reforms and regulations enacted in the United States during the 1930s in response to the Great Depression. Focused on relief, reform, and recovery. It was certainly successful in both short-term relief, and in implementing long-term structural reform. However, as Roosevelt's political enemies fought him, the New Deal failed to end the Great Depression.