The New Deal - APUSH Revision

FDR and

the New Deal

The Most-Loved First Lady

FDR's wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, is considered by most historians to be the best, most-loved First Lady in presidential history. She had a deep concern for the poor and was outspoken in her support (sometimes to the President's embarrassment) of African-Americans. In 1934, she convinced FDR to get Congress to provide more extensive relief for farmers and workers.

Alphabet Agencies

Over the course of the New Deal and the Second New Deal, FDR initiated many programs with acronyms. They have come to be commonly called the Alphabet Agencies. We learned all about them in our New Deal project earlier in this unit. Here are a

Few especially important ones:

The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) - created jobs and brought electricity to the rural Tennessee River valley area, most of which had never had electricity before.

The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) - provided jobs to young men building roads, parks, rest areas, etc. The young men lived in camps similar to the military, with most of their money being sent home to their families.

Alphabet Agencies

The Public Works Administration (PWA) - the government provided jobs to adult men to build bridges, libraries, courthouses, schools, etc. They did this through private construction companies, though, and so racism in hiring was very prevalent.

The Works Progress Administration (WPA) - similar to the PWA, but also employed artists, musicians, writers, actors, etc. to do various cultural projects (painting murals, writing plays, doing historical research, etc).

The National Youth Administration (NYA) - originally part of the WPA, the NYA paid high school students a small monthly wage to do various part-time work that included job training.

Alphabet Agencies

Most of the programs for the New Deal expired after the Great Depression. Two important New Deal programs, however, still exist and affect Americans today.

The Wagner Act (National labor Relations Act) - protects the rights of workers to join unions and to collectively bargain (negotiate) with their employers. It also created the National Labor Relations Board to oversee all of this.

The Social Security Act - created many different programs, but the main program provides retirement money to the elderly and the permanently disabled. It was created by Labor Secretary Frances Perkins, the first woman named to a presidential cabinet in U.S. history.

FDR and the Supreme Court

There was just one thing holding back FDR's New Deal - the Supreme Court. The fairly conservative court had a reputation for interpreting the Constitution very strictly and thus knocked down several New Deal programs such as the Agricultural Adjustment Act as Unconstitutional. FDR attempted to fix this by proposing a change in how judges were appointed and replaced that would allow him to "pack" the court with judges he liked. This worried many Americans, especially Congress, who worried that it would violate the principle of Separation of Powers. In the end, Roosevelt didn't get his way and his reputation was hurt, but the more conservative judges retired and were replaced with judges more friendly to the New Deal anyway.

Note: This video is very biased, but it does have some good information.

Who did the New Deal affect?

Frances Perkins

Women - Appointed to govt. positions, more women in the workplace. However, they were mostly not helped by the New Deal at all.

African-Americans - Played key roles in govt., but FDR failed to support civil rights, and many New Deal programs discriminated against them.

Mexican-Americans - mainly worked in the farming industry, which wasn't well-protected. Also, large numbers of them were deported to open up jobs for whites.

Native Americans - were granted citizenship and got some of their land back.

Eleanor Roosevelt and

singer Marian Anderson

What DID end the Great Depression?

Historians agree that while the New Deal helped a lot with the Great Depression, it didn't do enough to actually end it. So, how did the Great Depression end?

It was massive military spending in preparation for and during World War II that actually helped pull the American economy out of the Great Depression.

The 1932 Election

Democrat Franklin Delano Roosevelt wins the presidency in the election of 1932. Meanwhile, the Democrats also win control of both the Senate and the House of Representatives.

This means that the Democrats would have control over what the government did for at least two years.

FDR puts together a plan to fix the Great Depression. He calls it "The New Deal."

New Deal Policies:

1. Relief for the needy

Programs to help the poor, either with direct relief or through jobs programs

2. Recovery for the economy

Programs to help business recover

3. Financial Reform

New regulations on banking and the stock market

The First Hundred Days

After his inauguration, Roosevelt launched a period of intense activity known as the Hundred Days, lasting from March 9 to June 16, 1933. Since then, every President is judged by the media on how much he is able to get done in his first 100 days.

The actions Roosevelt took during his first 100 days significantly expanded the federal government's role in the nation’s economy.

Fireside Chats

One thing that helped FDR to get his programs passed were his "Fireside Chats." These were radio speeches about current issues and proposed New Deal policies. They made Americans feel like the President actually cared about them and understood their problems, and they helped FDR to cement popular support for the New Deal, pressuring Congress to go along with it.

Banking Reform

Prior to the Great Depression, there had been very few laws regulating banks - specifically, there were no laws saying how much money they had to keep on site. So, when panicked people made "bank runs," trying to get all of their money out before a bank closed down, it actually caused the banks to close down.

FDR realized that to fix the Great Depression, people needed to be confident in their bank. So, one of his first New Deal policies was the Emergency Banking Relief Act. The act immediately put all banks on a "holiday." Then the U.S. Treasury Department could inspect each bank to make sure it was okay. If it was, it reopened. If not, they stayed closed and were offered loans to help them reopen.

Banking Reform

Congress then passed the Glass-Steagall Act, which did two things: 1) banned banks from investing in the stock market or other markets (this part was repealed in 1999) and 2) created the FDIC, which insures bank deposits up to $250,000 (today; it was $2500 in 1933.

Stock Market Reform

It was also important to FDR that there never be another Black Tuesday. The Great Crash had been caused by unregulated speculation, so in 1934, the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) was formed. Still active today, the SEC regulates the stock market, passing various rules and policing trading to make sure they are followed.