Introduction

The Great Depression was a period of economic disaster for the United States. The beginning of this period is often related to the crash of the stock market in 1929. At its lowest point, in 1933, it is estimated that 33% of all non-farm workers were unemployed (Smiley, 2008). While this is a period that is often remembered with homelessness and unending bread lines for citizens just to get a meal, it was also the start of federal programs begun to help the underprivileged.

With the crash of the stock market, the nation's banks felt a significant loss, due in part to the loss of investments. This loss was then passed on to the citizens. Houses and properties were then foreclosed on and many ended up homeless. Businesses were not safe from this disaster, they also closed up their shops, leaving more unemployed and eventually homeless. Citizens that had invested money in the market found themselves completely broke. An estimated $140 billion was lost by citizens that had deposited their money in banks by 1933 (Wattenberg, n.d.).

Photo retrieved from http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/depression/about.htm

The United States was not the only country touched by this disaster. Foreign trade was affected by the lack of items being exported and by the lack of purchases of imported items. The decline of the Unites States economy had a worldwide impact. As banks collapsed all over the world, there was an abundance of items that countries had made or grown that they now had no market to sell to. Prices for goods fell and trade was significantly impacted.

Retrieved from http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/depression/about.html

The collapse of the stock market is often associated with the beginning of the period known as the Great Depression, however; to fully understand the cause, the previous ten years would need to be understood. There was a huge boom in the stock market in the 1920's. It was also a time of great industrial expansion. Investor's flocked to invest their money in what was seen as a secure way to expand on one's savings. Banks and private companies also got in on the action of investing. Foreign trade was profitable. It seemed as though most were making money prior to the collapse of the stock market. This economic boom followed by a catastrophic crash left devastation in its wake.

References:

Smiley, G. 2008. Great Depression. Retrieved from:

http://www.econlib.org/library/enc/GreatDepression.html

Wattenberg, B. n.d. Stock Market Crash. Retrieved from:

http://www.pbs.org.fmc/timeline/estockmktcrash.html

Great Depression: Crisis in the West

With the world and American economy completely collapsed, the Mid-West will suffer an additional economic and ecological catastrophic event. Beginning around 1931, the Mid-West farms of Kansas, Oklahoma, Texas, Colorado, and New Mexico would live through, about a decade of drought, dust, disease, and death. This event was referred to as Dust Bowl or Dust Bowel Drought. Farmers of the Mid-West were trying to deal with the economic devastation of the Great Depression by increasing their crop yields. In order for this to happen, the farmers increased their yield by plowing and planting on more land. The plowing resulted in destroying the native drought- resistant prairie grass. The result of land mismanagement by the farmers, drought conditions, and wind resulted in great dust storms, also called Black Blizzards. These dust storms were so immense and frightening the farmers thought it was the end of the world. Black Blizzards would turn the day into night, covering areas the size of states, burying houses, cars, and farm equipment. It was believed that about 2-3 feet of topsoil eroded away destroying all the farmers crops.

The dust storms were devastating to the farmers, world’s food supply, and our countries economy. Locally it was a health, social, and economic problem. In 1935, the Black Blizzard blew for 26 days straight affecting the farmers and their family’s health (“Disasters,” n.d., para. 16).

During the 1930s, the Great Depression era, Mid-West farmer’s bankruptcy rates went up nearly sixty-six percent or approximately 750,000 farms were lost due to bankruptcy. Socially the family unit was affected; marriage rates and birth rates declined, and farmers were unable to feed their families. Over 1 million women were abandoned by their husbands. These extreme conditions eventually led to mass migration, families would abandon their farms and head west to California and Oregon since farming conditions there were stable.

References

The dust bowel (n.d.). Disasters, the 1930s. Retrieved February 25, 2011, from
http://www.u-s/- history.com/pages/h1583.html

A black blizzard over Prowers Co., Colorado, 1937. (Western History Collection, University of Oklahoma) picture 1.

The Great Depression in the South

Before the Great Depression, the south was already disadvantaged as it attempted to recover from the Civil War. The south was economically behind on income, education, and jobs. The depression only made things worse. Even before the economic downturn of the early 1930’s the southern worker earned less than half the wages of any other American worker and constantly faced underemployment or unemployment. Forty-two percent of those in the south worked on farms as hired hands, tenants, or sharecroppers. In the south, sharecropping was a common job. Those who did not own land would negotiate a contract with a landowner who would then share the land for farming, wages, and supplies. As the Depression worsened, finding and holding a job became increasingly difficult. Most southern cities saw unemployment rates near or beyond the thirtieth percentile (Bindas, 2007). During the Great Depression, cotton prices plunged from eighteen to six cents a pound. Hundreds of thousands of sharecroppers left the land for the cities, leaving behind abandoned fields and homes. Jobs held by blacks, such as busboys, elevator operators, garbage men, porters, maids, and cooks were sought by desperate unemployed whites (The Rise and Fall, 2002).

Slavery ended as a result of the Civil War, however, most southern states tried to limit the economic and physical freedom of the formerly enslaved by adopting laws known as Black Codes. These Black Codes, became know as the Jim Crow laws. The term Jim Crow originated during the 1830’s in a song performed by Daddy Rice, a white minstrel show entertainer. Rice covered his face with charcoal to resemble a black man, then sang and danced a routine in caricature of a silly black person. How it became a term associated with the brutal segregation of blacks is unclear. The term generally identified with racist laws and actions that deprived blacks of their civil rights by defining blacks as inferior to whites (Davis, n.d. ).

Some southern states moved to legally impose segregation on public transportation, other public places, and schools. They also banned interracial marriages, and created voter registration restrictions. By 1910, every state of the former Confederacy had adopted laws that segregated all aspects of life wherein blacks and whites might socially mingle or come into contact (Davis n.d.).
Throughout most of Theodore Roosevelt’s first term, neither the president nor the Congress paid much attention to the suffering of blacks. The President did not want to antagonize the Southern Senators who controlled the Senate and who could block his efforts to end the Depression. Later, Mrs. Roosevelt became aware of the injustices suffered by blacks and she then began to speak out publicly on their behalf against race and prejudice. The United States Supreme Court began to hand down decisions favoring black challenges to segregation. Black civil rights organizations began to increase the activity and demands for their rights as citizens (The Rise and Fall, 2002).

Overall, the situation in the south during the Great Depression could be viewed as more severe due to the continued recovery from the Civil War, segregation efforts, and the over-dependence on agriculture as an economic driver. Greater economic diversification and de-segregation helped the south recover following the Great Depression just as the lack of both aided in its suffering during the Great Depression.

References

Bindas, K.J. (2007). Remembering the great depression in the rural south. Florida: University
Press of Florida.

Davis, R. (n.d.). From terror to triumph: Historical overview. Retrieved from
http://www.jimcrowhistory.org/history/overview/htm

Jim Crow. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/2004669584

Russell, L. (1938). Sharecropper family on front porch of cabin, Southeast Missouri Farms.
Retrieved from http://www.loc.gov/pictures/item/fsa1997023079/PP

The rise and fall of Jim Crow. Jim Crow stories. The great depression. Retrieved from
http://www.pbs.org/wnet/jimcrow/stories_events_depression.html

Hoover's Program

Hoover’s Program to end depression:

Herbert Clark Hoover was the 31^st President of the United States. Hoover attempted to end the Depression by presenting many options. Some of the policies he set forth included Mexican Repatriation. This was basically the deportation or removal of Mexicans and Mexican Americans that were seen as taking up American Jobs. Another act was the Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act. This act raised the tariffs on imported items. The government thought that this would encourage the purchase of American made products but this backfired because the Depression was spread throughout the world and not just America. Other countries also increased the tariff on American goods and therefore the Depression got worse. By the 1930s the Depression increased globally. Unemployment rates in the United States were over 24%, many Americans were homeless and began living in areas called “Hoovervilles”. These were named after President Hoover because of the American public’s disappointment with the government. Hoover then approved the Federal Home Loan Bank Act. This act would help lower mortgage rates, start new construction and decrease foreclosures. This act helped a little bit, but most thought it was too late. In his final attempt, Hoover set in place the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. This would provide loans to banks, railroads, and farmers. Hoover’s efforts helped President Roosevelt continue the mission of ending The Great Depression with his plan called the New Deal.

The reaction of the American’s to Hoover’s program to end the Depression wasn’t a really bright and enthusiastic one. People were frustrated that they were homeless and could not feed or dress their children. Most Americans were out of jobs and would do anything to obtain jobs. American’s wanted to see change and they were not seeing any results fast enough. They lost their confidence in their government.

The Hoover New Deal of 1932. (n.d.). Retrieved from https://mises.org/rothbard/agd/chapter11.asp

Pictures Retrieved from: http://www.google.com/images?hl=en&q=great+depression&um=1&ie=UTF-8&source=univ&sa=X&ei=ShxzTfONB4G8lQfG5ICmDw&ved=0CEIQsAQ&prmdo=1&biw=1277&bih=702

The New Deal and the 3 R's- relief, reform and recovery

The New Deal was a program that responded to the Great Depression which focused on the "3R's": relief, recovery, and reform. Relief was temporary for those who were unemployed. Many of the nation's parks, highways, and bridges were built during the Great Depression, projects designed and overseen by the WPA as part of Roosevelt's New Deal to put Americans to work (Croft Communications, Inc, 2010).

     In order to help the economy get over the depression, they would have to abandon the gold mines, and  limit their farming production so they can increase the prices on all their crops.  Many rural people lived in severe poverty.  Major programs addressed to their needs included the Resettlement Administration(RA), the Rural Electrification Administration (REA), rural welfare projects sponsored by the WPA, NYA, Forest Service and CCC, including school lunches, building new schools, opening roads in remote areas, and purchase of marginal land to enlarge national forests(Schlesinger,1959).

     Many different programs were directed at farmers.  The first 100 days produced the Farm Security Act to raise farm incomes by raising the prices farmers received, which was achieved by reducing total farm output.  The Agricultural Adjustment Act reflected the demands of leaders of major farm organizations, especially the Farm Bureau (Schlesinger, 1959).  The AAA was to raise prices for commodities; the output of corn, cotton, dairy products, hogs, rice, tobacco, and wheat (Heinemann, 1983).  The AAA established an important and long-lasting federal role in the planning on the entire agricultural sector of the economy and was the first program that was successful on the behalf of the troubled agricultural economy (Cushman, 1998).

     FDR’s “First Hundred Days” saw a whirlwind of activity as Roosevelt worked tirelessly, then and throughout his three terms, to pull America out of the Great Depression.

 President Roosevelt’s New Deal programs were designed to tackle the economic crisis on many

levels:

·         federal assistance for people who had lost their jobs, houses, savings, and livelihoods

·         job creation for the unemployed through massive public work projects

·         agriculture assistance for troubled industries

·         stricter banking regulations to prevent bank failures

·         creation of the FDIC to protect bank customers deposits

·         investment in the banking system to free up credit

      The long contraction and painfully slow recovery led many in the American population to accept and even call for a vastly expanded role for government, though most businesses resented the growing federal control of their activities. The federal government took over responsibility for the elderly population with the creation of Social Security and gave the involuntarily unemployed unemployment compensation.  The Wagner Act dramatically changed labor negotiations between employers and employees by promoting unions and acting as an arbiter to ensure “fair” labor contract negotiations (Smiley, 2002).

References:

Schlesinger, Arthur M Jr. (1959).  The Coming of the New Deal

   pp 27-84.

Heinemann, Ronald L. (1983). Depression and New Deal in Virginia

     pp 107.

Cushman, Barry. (1998).   Rethinking the New Deal Court p 107.

Smiley, Gene. (Dec. 2002).  Rethinking, the Great Depression.  A new view of it's

  cause and consequences.  Chicago.  Ivan R.

Ramos, Roberto (image) President and CEO of "The Vox Collective".  Dec. 29, 2008

An Idea web for The Great Depression (image) Courtesy of the Liberty of Congress Library.

Evans, Walker (image)  Family During the Depression.  Alabama, 1935.   http://www.publicdomaincontent.com

Public Domain Pictures of the Great Depression.  http://www.publicdomaincontent.com/,  1930.

Crime and the Federal Reaction

The country was fascinated by criminals in the early years of the Great Depression as bootlegging gangsters like Al Capone dominated the daily newspapers. Bank robberies, violent shootouts, and murders were regularly reported and homicide rates, which had been rising since 1901, peaked in 1935 (Kelso, 1994). These high-profile crimes were not the norm, however, and many historians attribute them to Prohibition and organized crime rather than the Depression (Young, 2007).
The rates of property crimes did fluctuate during this era, but the overall crime rate in the United States decreased from 1933-1960 (Kelso, 1994). In fact, crimes rates fell by 50% between 1933 and 1940 (Young, 2007). This dramatic decrease was probably the result of many factors, including the end of Prohibition and an increasingly strong, organized federal law enforcement response.
Before the 1930s, the prosecution of crime was largely seen as the responsibility of local and state authorities. Americans were suspicious of a national police force and its potential misuse. Widespread corruption at the local level, an increase in interstate crime, and unsuccessful investigations like the Lindbergh kidnapping, however, helped make the case for increased federal involvement in law enforcement (Theoharis, 1999).
President Roosevelt and Attorney General Homer Cummings helped persuade passage of legislation that greatly expanded federal law enforcement authority. By 1934, bank robbery, transportation of stolen property across state lines, racketeering, and fleeing a state to avoid prosecution were all federal crimes and FBI Agents could now carry guns, execute warrants, and make arrests (Theoharis, 1999). The FBI was emerging as a professional, specialized arm of law enforcement and their enhanced authority enabled them to take over investigations previously left to local authorities (Kelso, 1994). Criminals like the infamous “Bonnie and Clyde” had long exploited local law enforcement and their inability to give chase outside their own jurisdictions, but the FBI ended that. By 1934, John Dillinger, “Pretty Boy” Floyd, “Baby Face” Nelson, Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were all dead, most at the hands of federal agents (Theoharis, 1999). The FBI’s success rate helped gain greater public support for federal involvement in law enforcement, secured increased funding, and saw crime rates that steadily decreased for the next three decades (Kelso, 1994).

References:

Kelso, W.A. (1994). Poverty and the underclass: Changing perceptions of the poor in America. New York, NY: University Press.

Police with tommy guns [Photograph]. (1932). Retrieved March 1, 2011, from:
http://www.corbisimages.com/Enlargement/BE033383.html

President Roosevelt signs crime bill into law [Photograph]. (1934). Retrieved March 1, 2011, from: http://stamford.dems.info/album/index.html

Theoharis, A.G. (1999). The FBI: a comprehensive reference guide. Phoenix, AZ: Oryx Press.

[Untitled image of F.B.I. seal]. Retrieved March 1, 2011, from: http://www.fbi.gov/about-us/history/seal-motto

[Untitled photograph of Al Capone]. Retrieved March 1, 2011, from:
http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3216/3030960048_ab69f3a990_z.jpg

Young, W.H. & Young, N.K. (2007). The great depression in America: a cultural Encyclopedia. Westport, CT: Greenwood Publishing Corp., Inc.

The Second New Deal

After the failure of the first New Deal to restore the economics of the United States, In the years of 1935 and 1938 Franklin Roosevelt and the congress were introducing new agencies: Indian Reorganizations Act; Works Progress Administration which was in charge of public works projects from roads to schools; National Youth Administration which provided students with jobs; Rural Electrification Administration which was responsible for providing rural territories with electricity and Resettlement Administration which carried out urban planning in the depressed territories(W.L. Wunder).

What is significant about Roosevelt’s economic and social measures which he suggested in the Second New Deal was that they were aimed at providing the unemployed with work and social safety packages. A system of insurance was worked out for the elderly and disabled (U.S Department of State). This social security system was based on the taxes from employers and employees (U.S Department of State).

What was also unique about the United States Historical Period during the second new deal was that the Federal Programs were trying to strengthen unemployed families by providing work places, and influencing consumer demand. The Second New Deal led to higher wages and enabled millions of people with purchasing power (U.S Department of State). And the strongest advantage of the Second New Deal for businessman was that it provided protection for them from labor movement, agricultural economy, supervised the competition, and the major influence on the market.





Photo retrieved from http://www.salem-news.com/articles/july032009/dyi_hr_7-3-09.php

Bibliography:
1. The Second New Deal. Retrieved March 3, 2011 from U.S. Department of State website: http://countrystudies.us/united-states/history-98.htm
2. Wunder, W.L. (2009, February 6). The Second New Deal: Economic Security Legislation in the Great Depression. Retrieved March 3, 2011 from the website: http://www.suite101.com/content/the-second-new-deal-a94544