ch 33 outline

Ch 33

FDR: Politician in a Wheelchair

--->Franklin D. Roosevelt's wife, Eleanor Roosevelt, was to become the most active First Lady in history

---> She powerfully influenced the policies of the national government, battling for the impoverished and oppressed

--->Roosevelt's commanding presence and golden speaking voice made him the premier American orator of his generation

Presidential Hopefuls of 1932

--->In the Democratic campaign of 1932, Roosevelt attacked the Republican Old Deal and concentrated on preaching a New Deal for the "forgotten man"

---> He promised to balance the nation's budget and decrease the heavy Hooverian deficits

--->Although Americans' distrust in the Republican party was high because of the dire economic state of the country (Great Depression), Herbert Hoover and the Republican party had hopes that the worst of the Depression was over

Hoover's Humiliation in 1932

--->Franklin Roosevelt won the election of 1932 by a sweeping majority, in both the popular vote and the Electoral College

--->Beginning in the election of 1932, blacks became, notably in the urban centers of the North, a vital element of the Democratic Party

FDR and the Three R's: Relief, Recovery, Reform

--->Franklin Roosevelt was inaugurated on March 4, 1933

--->On March 6-10, President Roosevelt declared a national banking holiday as a prelude to opening the banks on a sounder basis

---> The Hundred Days Congress/Emergency Congress (March 9-June 16, 1933) passed a series laws in order to cope with the national emergency (The Great Depression)

--->Roosevelt's New Deal programs aimed at 3 R's:

---> relief, recovery, reform

--->Congress gave President Roosevelt extraordinary blank-check powers

--->The New Dealers embraced such progressive ideas as unemployment insurance, old-age insurance, minimum-wage regulations, conservation and development of natural resources, and restrictions on child labor

Roosevelt Tackles Money and Banking

--->The impending banking crisis caused Congress to pass the Emergency Banking Relief Act of 1933

---> It gave the president power to regulate banking transactions and foreign exchange and to reopen solvent banks

--->Congress then passed the Glass-Steagall Banking Reform Act, creating the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)

--->A reform program, the FDIC insured individual bank deposits up to $5,000, ending the epidemic of bank failures

--->In order to protect the shrinking gold reserve, President Roosevelt ordered all private holdings of gold to be given to the Treasury in exchange for paper currency and then the nation to be taken off the gold standard-Congress passed laws providing for these measures

--->The goal of Roosevelt's "managed currency" was inflation, which he believed would relieve debtors' burdens and stimulate new production

Creating Jobs for the Jobless

-->President Roosevelt had no qualms about using federal money to assist the unemployed in order to jumpstart the economy

---> Congress created the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), which provided employment for about 3 million men in government camps

--->Congress's first major effort to deal with the massive unemployment was to pass the Federal Emergency Relief Act

--->Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA) was headed by Harry L. Hopkins

---> Created in 1933, the Civil Works Administration (CWA), a branch of the FERA, was designed to provide temporary jobs during the winter emergency

--->Relief was given to the farmers with the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), making available millions of dollars to help farmers meet their mortgages

--->Home Owners' Loan Corporation (HOLC) assisted many households that had trouble paying their mortgages

A Day for Every Demagogue

--->Father Charles Coughlin's anti-New Deal radio broadcasts eventually became so anti-Semitic and fascistic that he was forced off the air

---> Senator Huey P. Long publicized his "Share Our Wealth" program in which every family in the United States would receive $5,000

--->Dr. Francis E. Townsend attracted millions of senior citizens with his plan that each citizen over the age of 60 would receive $200 a month

--->Congress passed the Works Progress Administration (WPA) in 1935, with the objective of employment on useful projects

A Helping Hand for Industry and Labor

---> National Recovery Administration (NRA) was designed to assist industry, labor, and the unemployed

--->Although initially supported by the public, collapse of the NRA came in 1935 with the Supreme Court's Schechter decision in which it was ruled that Congress could not "delegate legislative powers" to the president and that congressional control of interstate commerce could apply to local fowl business

--->Public Works Administration (PWA) was intended for both industrial recovery and for unemployment relief

---> Headed by Harold L. Ickes, the agency spent over $4 billion on thousands of projects, including public buildings and highways.

--->In order to raise federal revenue and provide a level of employment, Congress repealed prohibition with the 21^st Amendment in late 1933

Paying Farmers Not to Farm

--->Congress created the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA)

--->It established "parity prices" for basic commodities

--->The Supreme Court struck down the AAA in 1936, declaring its regulatory taxation provisions unconstitutional

--->The New Deal Congress passed the Soil Conservation and Domestic Allotment Act of 1936

--->The Second Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 continued conservation payments; if farmers obeyed acreage restrictions on specific commodities, they would be eligible for parity payments.

Dust Bowls and Black Blizzards

--->Late in 1933, a prolonged drought struck the states of the trans-Mississippi Great Plains

--->The Dust Bowl was partially caused by the cultivation of countless acres, dry-farming techniques, and mechanization.

--->Frazier-Lemke Farm Bankruptcy Act, passed in 1934

---> It made possible a suspension of mortgage foreclosures for 5 years

--->In 1935, President Roosevelt set up the Resettlement Administration, given the task of moving near-farmless farmers to better lands

--->The Indian Reorganization Act of 1934 encouraged Native American tribes to establish self-government and to preserve their native crafts and traditions

Battling Bankers and Big Business

--->In order to protect the public against fraud, Congress passed the "Truth in Securities Act" (Federal Securities Act)

---> requiring promoters to transmit to the investor sworn information regarding the soundness of their stocks and bonds

--->In 1934, Congress took further steps to protect the public with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC)

The TVA Harnesses the Tennessee River

--->Zealous New Dealers accused the electric-power industry of gouging the public with excessive rates

--->2.5 million of America's most poverty-stricken people inhabited Muscle Shoals

--->In 1933, the Hundred Days Congress created the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)

---> assigned the task of predicting how much the production and distribution of electricity would cost so that a "yardstick" could be set up to test the fairness of rates charged by private companies

--->The large project of constructing dams on the Tennessee River brought to the area full employment, the blessings of cheap electric power, low-cost housing, abundant cheap nitrates, the restoration of eroded soil, reforestation, improved navigation, and flood control

--->The conservative reaction against the "socialistic" New Deal would confine the TVA's brand of federally guided resource management and comprehensive regional development to the Tennessee Valley

Housing Reform and Social Security

--->To speed recovery and better homes, President Roosevelt set up the Federal Housing Administration (FHA) in 1934

--->To strengthen the FHA, Congress created the United States Housing Authority (USHA) in 1937 --->It was designed to lend money to states or communities for low-cost construction.

The more important success of New Dealers was in the field of unemployment insurance and old-age pensions

---> The Social Security Act of 1935 provided for federal-state unemployment insurance

--->Republicans were strongly opposed to Social Security

A New Deal for Unskilled Labor

--->When the Supreme Court struck down the National Recovery Administration (NRA), Congress, sympathetic towards labor unions, passed the National Labor Relations Act of 1935 (Wagner Act) --->created a powerful National Labor Relations Board for administrative purposes and reasserted the rights of labor to engage in self-organization and to bargain collectively through representatives of its own choice

--->The stride for unskilled workers to organize was lead by John L. Lewis, boss of the United Mine Workers

-->formed the Committee for Industrial Organization (CIO) in 1935

--->Congress passed the Fair Labor Standards Act (Wages and Hours Bill) in 1938

--->In 1938, the CIO joined with the AF of L and the name "Committee for Industrial Organization" was changed to "Congress of Industrial Organizations."-led by John Lewis

---> By 1940, the CIO claimed about 4 million members.

Landon Challenges "the Champ" in 1936

--->As the election of 1936 neared, the New Dealers had achieved considerable progress, and millions of "reliefers" were grateful to their government

--->The Republicans chose Alfred M. Landon to run against President Roosevelt

--->President Roosevelt was reelected as president in a lopsided victory

Nine Old Men on the Supreme Bench

--->Ratified in 1933, the 20^th Amendment shortened the period from election to inauguration by 6 weeks

--->With his reelection, Roosevelt felt that the American people had wanted the New Deal

--->President Roosevelt released his plan to ask Congress to pass legislation allowing him to appoint one new justice to the Supreme Court for every member over the age of 70 who would not retire; the maximum number of justices would now be 15

The Court Changes Course

--->President Roosevelt was belittled for attempting to break down the checks and balances system among the 3 branches of government

--->Justice Owen J. Roberts, formerly regarded as a conservative, began to vote libera

--->In March 1937, the Supreme Court upheld the principle of state minimum wage for women, reversing its stand on a different case a year earlier

--->FDR aroused conservatives of both parties in Congress so that few New Deal reforms were passed after 1937

The Twilight of the New Deal

--->In 1937, the economy took another downturn as new Social Security taxes began to cut into payrolls and as the Roosevelt administration cut back on spending out of the continuing reverence for the orthodox economic doctrine of the balanced budget

---> Roosevelt embraced the recommendations of the British economist John Maynard Keynes

---> The newly-accepted "Keynesianism" economic program was to stimulate the economy by planned deficit spending

--->In 1939, Congress passed the Reorganization Act, giving President Roosevelt limited powers for administrative reforms, including the new Executive Office in the White House

--->Congress passed the Hatch Act of 1939, barring federal administrative officials from active political campaigning and soliciting

New Deal or Raw Deal?

--->Foes of the New Deal charged the president of spending too much money on his programs, significantly increasing the national debt; by 1939, the national debt was at $40,440,000,000

FDR's Balance Sheet

--->New Deal supporters had pointed out that relief, not economy, had been the primary objective of their war on the depression

---->FDR was a Hamiltonian in his idea of big government, but a Jeffersonian in his concern for the "forgotten man"