Chapter 27: The New Deal

boondoggle

A derisive term used by opponents of New Deal federal works projects administered by FERA, CWA, and WPA. They objected to "make work" projects that seemed to have no other purpose than to put people on the government payroll.

Gerald P Nye

North Dakota Republican Senator who headed a 1934 Senate investigation into banking and the munitions industries. He concluded that they had conspired to drag the United States into WWI for their own profit. He labeled munitions manufacturers "merchants of death." His committee's report fed the isolationist mood of the mid-1930s

William Faulkner

Novelist who wrote several works depicting the multiple dilemmas of modern life. His major theme was of southerners imprisoned by their past and surroundings, trying to escape.

Henry A Wallace

FDR's secretary of agriculture in the 1930s and was elected vice president in 1940. He unsuccessfully ran for president on the Progressive party ticket in 1948

sit-down strike

Form of labor protests in which workers barricade themselves inside the factories. The objective is to shut down the factory by not allowing employers to continue production with strikebreakers. These were popular with industrial unions in the 1930s, but not with employers or the public

Said by Townsend

"The plan called for a guaranteed monthly pension of $200 for every retired citizen 60 or older."

Said by Long

"We propose that no family shall own more than three hundred times the average family wealth..." Focus is the SHARE OUR WEALTH SOCIETY

Charles Coughlin

A Catholic priest who contended on his popular radio show that inflating the currency could solve the Great Depression. He turned against the New Deal and verbally attacked bankers, New Dealers and Jews.

Greer

A German submarine fired upon this US naval destroyer in July 1941. President Roosevelt, ignoring that the US vessel may have provoked the attack, order the navy to "shoot on sight" any German craft in water south and west of Iceland and to convoy merchant vessels to Iceland.

Cash and Carry Policy

1939. Law passed by Congress which allowed a nation at war to purchase goods and arms in US as long as they paid cash and carried merchandise on their own ships. This benefited the Allies, because Britain was dominant naval power.

Said by Coughlin

:On this earth, you must belong to the church militant or get the hell out of it. That's the right word. You're either with me or or against me" also talks about the anti christ and jews in germany

John Maynard Keynes

A British economist who greatly influenced many NEw Deal advisors to FDR. He argued that the world depression could be conquered if governments would adopt deficit spending, reducing interest rates and taxes and increasing expenditures in order to stimulate consumption and investment

John Steinbeck

A California novelist who wrote "The Grapes of Wrath" which brilliantly portrayed the plight of millions impoverished by the Great Depression

Guffey-Snyder Act

A law which established minimum wages in the coal industry, it was declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court.

Second New Deal

A new set of programs and reforms launched by FDR in 1935

U.S.A

A trilogy written by John Dos Passos, trying to capture the mood of the Great Depression. An utterly realistic novel by a disillusioned liberal, it expressed an anticapitalist and pessimistic point of view. Dos Passos later became a conservative.

Hugo L. Black

An Alabama Senator appointed to the Supreme Court by President Roosevelt, who became a civil liberties and civil rights advocate on the bench. He was in support of Roosevelt's New Deal plan.

America First Committee

An isolationist organization in the 1930s led by aviation hero Charles Lindbergh that opposed any US intervention in world affairs that might lead the US into war.

Daughters of the American Revolution

An organization which denied black singer Marian Anderson the opportunity to perform at one of their venues. Because of this, Eleanor Roosevelt resigned from the organization and funded a concert for Anderson, which prompted a large interracial crowd

conservative coalition

By 1938, many conservative Democrats alienated by New Deal deficit spending and predominantly southerners, joined with Republicans to form an anti-New Deal alliance in Congress. The group succeeded in blocking additional New Deal legislation.

Francis Townsend

California physician and author of the old-age revolving pension plan, which called for a guaranteed monthly income for the unemployed elderly on the condition they spend the total income within thirty days to stimulate the economy. New Dealers rejected this plan in favor of the Social Security Act

Harry Hopkins

Close friend and personal advisor of President Roosevelt placed in charge of the WPA in 1935. He had earlier administered the FERA and later would administer the Lend-Lease Act, and was chairman of the World War II Production Board

court-packing scheme

Concerned that the conservative Supreme Court might declare his New Deal programs unconstitutional, Roosevelt asked Congress to allow him to appoint more justices, who would likely be more sympathetic to Roosevelt's program. Both Congress and the public rejected this plan and it was defeated.

Works Progress Administration

Congress created this administration in 1935 and it eventually spent $11 billion on federal works projects and provided employment for 8.5 million people. They built roads, bridges, schools, etc. The act also funded projects for artists, writers, and young people.

Civilian Conservation Corps

During the Hundred Days, Congress created this to provide government jobs in reforestation and other conservation projects to young men between 18-25. It eventually employed 300,000 people

fireside chats

During the depression years, FDR used the radio to communicate with American people. These broadcasts had a reassuring and steadying effect on the public and boosted confidence

Frances Perkins

Franklin Roosevelt's secretary of labor who was the first woman Cabinet member. A former social worker, she helped draft New Deal labor legislation.

"Four Freedoms"

Freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want and freedom from fear, the stated ideals in a speech from President Roosevelt.

Alfred Landon

Governor of Kansas who was the Republican presidential nominee in 1936. He and his party were defeated in a landslide victory for Democrat Franklin Roosevelt and the New Deal. His daughter Nancy Kassebaum Baker, was a senator from Kansas.

FERA (Federal Emergency Relief Administration)

Granted federal funds to state and local agencies to help the unemployed

Walter Millis

Historian who wrote "The Road to War: America, 1914-1917." He argued that the United States was dragged into WWI, a war he thought could have been avoided, by British propaganda, Allied purchases of American arms, and President Wilson's pro-British bias.

National Labor Relations Board

In 1934 the National Labor Relations Act (Wagner Act) created this agency to supervise union elections and designate winning unions as workers' official bargaining agents. The board could also issue cease-and-desist orders to employers who dealt unfairly with their workers

Schecter v. United States

In 1935, the Supreme Court ruled that the NIRA was unconstitutional. The court ruled that the NIRA gave too much legislative power to the executive branch and code authorities. Also known as the "sick children case"

quarantine speech

In 1937, responding to the Japanese invasion of China, FDR condemned international aggression and requested that aggressors be detached from world affairs. Isolationist Americans denounced the speech, and public opinion did not support any over action by the United States in cases of international

destroyers-for-bases deal

In 1940, FDR arranged to trade fifty old American naval vessels to Britain in exchange for six Caribbean naval installations. It was a shrewd deal that helped save Britain's fleet and bolster US defenses in the Atlantic

old-age revolving pensions

In response to the pitiful state of thousands of elderly persons during the depression, Dr. Francis Townsend proposed this plan that would make government payments to $200 a month to anyone unemployed and over sixty years of age with the stipulation that they spend it all in thirty days

dust bowl

In the 1930s, the combination of long droughts and unscientific farming methods on the Great Plains created frequent dust storms that blew away valuable topsoil. Thousands of indebted farmers left this bleak area to seek opportunities in the West

The Grapes of Wrath

John Steinbeck's novel about a struggling farm family during the Great Depression. Gave a face to the violence and exploitation that migrant farm workers faced in America

William Allen White

Kansas publisher of the Emporia Gazette who headed the Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies. He also wrote a biography of President Coolidge

Wendell Willkie

Leader of the private-business community's opposition to the TVA. In 1940, he was the Republican nominee to oppose FDR's bud for reelection to a third term. He focused his unsuccessful campaign on the president's increasingly interventionist foreign policy

Share Our Wealth

Louisiana Senator Huey Long criticized the New Deal as too half-hearted in its effort to help the poor. He proposed this program that called for the confiscation of fortunes and heavy taces on millionaires. He proposed the money be used to provide the poor with homesteads, annual incomes, and other benefits

Huey P. Long

Louisiana Senator who was a left wing critic of the New Deal, contending it did too little to help the poor. He advocated for a "Share Our Wealth" program to transfer wealth from the rich to the poor. He was assassinated in 1935.

John Collier

Named by FDR as commissioner of Indian affairs, he successfully urged Congress to pass the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 to replace the Dawes Severalty Act. This restored tribal government.

George W. Norris

Nebraska Senator and public-power enthusiast who helped block plans to turn over government built hydroelectric power plants at Muscle Shoals, Alabama to private capitalists. He sponsored the 1933 Tennessee Valley Authority Act

TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority)

New Deal program which gave electricity and jobs to rural Appalachia, including AL

Wagner Act

Officially the National Labor Relations Act and sometimes called Labor's Magna Carta, the 1935 act gave workers the right to organize and bargain collectively. It also created the National Labor Relations Board to supervise union elections and stop unfair labor practices by employers.

Social Security Act

Passed by Congress in 1935, this legislation established a system of old-age, unemployment, and survivors insurance funded by wage and payroll taxes. It did not include health insurance and did not originally cover many groups and individuals, especially poor people and minorities

Fair Labor Standards Act

Passed by Congress in 1938, this legislation abolished child labor and established a national minimum wage (40 cents) and a forty hour work week.

National Industrial Recovery Act

Passed in 1933 as a keystone of the early New Deal, this permitted manufacturers to establish industry wide codes of "fair business practices" - setting prices and production levels. It also provided for minimum wages and maximum working hours for labor

AAA

Passed in 1933 as part of the New Deal, this plan placed restrictions on farm production and paid government subsidies to growers of staple crops. Money for the payments was raised by a processing tax on middle men. The object was to raise farm prices, but it proved counterproductive.

Lend-Lease Act

Plan devised by FDR in 1941 to assist Britain with its defense, which in turn would help America's own defense. To fund this plan, Roosevelt asked Congress for a $7 billion loan and the power to sell, lend, lease or transfer war material to any country whose defense he declared as vital to that of the United States

John L Lewis

President of the United Mine Workers Union in the 1930s who took full advantage of Section 7a of the NIRA to expand his union's membership. He and others formed the Committee of Industrial Organization in the AFL, which in 1939 became the separate CIO with him as its president.

election of 1936 candidates

Roosevelt V. Alfred Landon. Landon wins.

parity

The Agricultural Adjustment Act was designed to give subsidies to farmers in order to life agricultural prices to equality with industrial prices based on the 1909 and 1914 ratio of the two

Winston Churchill

The British prime minister in World War II who became politically and personally close to President Roosevelt.

interest group democracy

Term used by some historians to describe the New Deal because it responded to special interest groups that were well organized and could articulate their interests and lobby Congress. While it responded to interest-group pressure, the New Deal slighted the unorganized majority consumers.

economic royalists

Term used during the 1936 presidential campaign by President Roosevelt that referred to businessmen after he abandoned any effort to court the business community because it had not been cooperative with his New Deal. By this he meant to gain political support from the popular dislike of "greedy" business in the 1930s

Hundred Days

Term used to designate the period between Franklin Roosevelt's inauguration and the adjournment of Congress on June 16. During this period, Congress passed an immense body of legislation requested by Roosevelt to try and stimulate the depressed economy

Securities and Exchange Commission

The 1934 Securities and Exchange Act required all stock exchanged to be licensed by this commission. Later, commodity exchanges and investment trusts were included. It was designed to regulate the issue of new securities, the conduct of stockbrokers and stock-market speculation

Congress of Industrial Organizations

The New Deal's support for labor organization foster the creation of this organization, which organized the workers in mass production industries like steel and automobiles. It did much to improve the working conditions of unskilled factory workers, increase the political influence of labor, and bring minorities into the labor movement.

payroll tax

The Social Security Act set up an old-age and unemployment insurance system funded partly by a tax on workers wages and partly by a tax on payrolls paid by employers.

Francisco Franco

The fascist leader of Spanish rebels who, with the help of fascist Italy and Nazi Germany, overthrew the liberal Spanish Republic in the 1936 Spanish Civil War. The US reaction to the war was to broaden its neutrality acts to include civil wars, thus isolating itself from these events

Eleanor Roosevelt

The wife of President Franklin D. Roosevelt who was a force for civil rights and a spokeswoman for better treatment and equal employment opportunities for African Americans and women during the depression.

Sudetenland

This German-speaking section of Czechoslovakia was ceded to Hitler in 1938 at an international conference in Munich, Germany. Hitler declared the region his last territorial conquest. The next year he went against his world and took the remainder of Czechoslovakia

Reuben James

This destroyer was sunk by the Germans in October 1941. As a result, Congress voted to allow the arming of American merchant ships and to permit them to carry cargoes to Allied ports

Roosevelt revolution

This label identifies the New Deal programs that Franklin D. Roosevelt and the transformation they effected on the government. His New Deal vastly expanded the power and responsibility of the federal government such that the widespread suffering of another Great Depression is not likely to be repeated.

United States v. Butler

This was a Supreme Court case during the New Deal. The case ruled the AAA unconstitutional because it taxed one group to pay another.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

This was created by Congress in 1933 to guarantee bank deposits up to $5000. It was designed to protect individual savings accounts from loss due to bank closing

William Faulkner

Wrote about poverty and racism in the south

John Dos Passos

a novelist who wrote of WWI and its impacts on art and civilization. He was a conservative, pessimistic and had disillusion to post-war urban America

dark horse

a presidential candidate who is unexpectedly nominated by a political party, as James K. Polk (Dem, 1844) and Wendell Willkie (Rep, 1940)

Molly Dewson

head of the Women's Division of the Democratic National Committee