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Table of Contents

What was the purpose of the New Deal?

What were the New Deal programs and what did they do?

What were the most important results of the New Deal?

What New Deal programs remain in effect?

New Deal, domestic program of the administration of U.S. Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) between 1933 and 1939, which took action to bring about immediate economic relief as well as reforms in industry, agriculture, finance, waterpower, labour, and housing, vastly increasing the scope of the federal government's activities. The term was taken from Roosevelt's speech accepting the Democratic nomination for the presidency on July 2, 1932. Reacting to the ineffectiveness of the administration of Pres. Herbert Hoover in meeting the ravages of the Great Depression, American voters the following November overwhelmingly voted in favour of the Democratic promise of a "new deal" for the "forgotten man." Opposed to the traditional American political philosophy of laissez-faire, the New Deal generally embraced the concept of a government-regulated economy aimed at achieving a balance between conflicting economic interests.

The Hundred Days

Much of the New Deal legislation was enacted within the first three months of Roosevelt's presidency (March 9-June 16, 1933), which became known as the Hundred Days. The new administration's first objective was to alleviate the suffering of the nation's huge number of unemployed workers. Such agencies as the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) were established to dispense emergency and short-term governmental aid and to provide temporary jobs, employment on construction projects, and youth work in the national forests. The WPA gave some 8.5 million people jobs. Its construction projects produced more than 650,000 miles of roads, 125,000 public buildings, 75,000 bridges, and 8,000 parks. Also under its aegis were the Federal Art Project, Federal Writers' Project, and Federal Theatre Project. The CCC provided national conservation work primarily for young unmarried men. Projects included planting trees, building flood barriers, fighting forest fires, and maintaining forest roads and trails.

Before 1935 the New Deal focused on revitalizing the country's stricken business and agricultural communities. To revive industrial activity, the National Recovery Administration (NRA) was granted authority to help shape industrial codes governing trade practices, wages, hours, child labour, and collective bargaining. The New Deal also tried to regulate the nation's financial hierarchy in order to avoid a repetition of the stock market crash of 1929 and the massive bank failures that followed. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) granted government insurance for bank deposits in member banks of the Federal Reserve System, and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) was established in 1934 to restore investor confidence in the stock market by ending the misleading sales practices and stock manipulations that had led to the stock market crash. The farm program, known as the Agricultural Adjustment Act, was signed in May 1933. It was centred in the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA), which attempted to raise prices by controlling the production of staple crops through cash subsidies to farmers. In addition, the arm of the federal government reached into the area of electric power, establishing in 1933 the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), which was to cover a seven-state area and supply cheap electricity, prevent floods, improve navigation, and produce nitrates.

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New Deal | Definition, History, Programs, Summary, & Facts

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New Deal, domestic program of the administration of U.S. Pres. Franklin D. Roosevelt (FDR) between 1933 and 1939, which took action to bring about immediate economic relief as well as reforms in industry, agriculture, finance, waterpower, labour, and housing, vastly increasing the scope of the federal government's activities.

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The New Deal was the set of federal programs launched by President Franklin D. Roosevelt after taking office in 1933, in response to the calamity of the Great Depression, and lasting until American entry into the Second World War in 1942. It had four major goals and achievements:

*Economic Recovery: The New Deal stabilized the banks and cleaned up the financial mess left over from the Stock Market crash of 1929. It stabilized prices for industry and agriculture and aided bankrupt state and local governments. Most of all, it injected a huge amount of federal spending to bolster aggregate incomes and demand.

*Job Creation: One in four Americans was out of work by 1933, after four years of depression. The New Deal created a multitude of agencies to provide jobs for millions of workers and paid wages that saved millions of destitute families. It also recognized the rights of workers to organize in unions.

*Investment in Public Works: The New Deal built hundreds of thousands of highways, bridges, hospitals, schools, theaters, libraries, city halls, homes, post offices, airports, and parks across America. These investments helped underwrite postwar prosperity and most of the New Deal infrastructure is still in use today.

*Civic Uplift: The New Deal touched every state, city, and town, improving the lives of ordinary people and reshaping the public sphere. New Dealers and the men and women who worked on New Deal programs believed they were not only serving their families and communities, but building the foundation for a great and caring society.

In less than a decade, the New Deal changed the face of America and laid the foundation for success in World War II and the prosperity of the postwar era - the greatest and fairest epoch in American history. Most of all, the New Deal inspired a civic, cultural, and economic renaissance. But the New Deal is fading from collective memory-a casualty of time, neglect, and politics. The Living New Deal is making visible that enduring legacy.

One of the ways we are doing that is to create brief introductions to New Deal laws and programs, a year-by-year timeline of New Deal legislation and events, and short bios of major New Deal figures.
To find out more, use the pull down menu or click on the following: New Deal Programs New Deal Timeline New Dealers
For a further introduction, see the New Deal in Brief by Richard Walker (2011).

For a more complete overview, see R. Walker & G. Brechin, The Living New Deal: the Unsung Benefits of the New Deal for the United States and California (2010)

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The New Deal was the set of federal programs launched by President Franklin D. Roosevelt after taking office in 1933, in response to the calamity of the Great Depression, and lasting until American entry into the Second World War in 1942.

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New Deal for the American People

On March 4, 1933, during the bleakest days of the Great Depression, newly elected President Franklin D. Roosevelt delivered his first inaugural address before 100,000 people on Washington's Capitol Plaza.

"First of all," he said, "let me assert my firm belief that the only thing we have to fear is fear itself."

He promised that he would act swiftly to face the "dark realities of the moment" and assured Americans that he would "wage a war against the emergency" just as though "we were in fact invaded by a foreign foe." His speech gave many people confidence that they'd elected a man who was not afraid to take bold steps to solve the nation's problems.

Did you know? Unemployment levels in some cities reached staggering levels during the Great Depression: By 1933, Toledo, Ohio's had reached 80 percent, and nearly 90 percent of Lowell, Massachusetts, was unemployed.

The next day, Roosevelt declared a four-day bank holiday to stop people from withdrawing their money from shaky banks. On March 9, Congress passed Roosevelt's Emergency Banking Act, which reorganized the banks and closed the ones that were insolvent.

In his first " fireside chat " three days later, the president urged Americans to put their savings back in the banks, and by the end of the month almost three quarters of them had reopened.

The First Hundred Days

Roosevelt's quest to end the Great Depression was just beginning, and would ramp up in what came to be known as " The First 100 Days." Roosevelt kicked things off by asking Congress to take the first step toward ending Prohibition-one of the more divisive issues of the 1920s-by making it legal once again for Americans to buy beer. (At the end of the year, Congress ratified the 21st Amendment and ended Prohibition for good.)

In May, he signed the Tennessee Valley Authority Act into law, creating the TVA and enabling the federal government to build dams along the Tennessee River that controlled flooding and generated inexpensive hydroelectric power for the people in the region.

That same month, Congress passed a bill that paid commodity farmers (farmers who produced things like wheat, dairy products, tobacco and corn) to leave their fields fallow in order to end agricultural surpluses and boost prices.

June's National Industrial Recovery Act guaranteed that workers would have the right to unionize and bargain collectively for higher wages and better working conditions; it also suspended some antitrust laws and established a federally funded Public Works Administration.

In addition to the Agricultural Adjustment Act, the Tennessee Valley Authority Act and the National Industrial Recovery Act, Roosevelt had won passage of 12 other major laws, including the Glass-Steagall Act (an important banking bill) and the Home Owners' Loan Act, in his first 100 days in office.

Almost every American found something to be pleased about and something to complain about in this motley collection of bills, but it was clear to all that FDR was taking the "direct, vigorous" action that he'd promised in his inaugural address.

Second New Deal

Despite the best efforts of President Roosevelt and his cabinet, however, the Great Depression continued. Unemployment persisted, the economy remained unstable, farmers continued to struggle in the Dust Bowl and people grew angrier and more desperate.

So, in the spring of 1935, Roosevelt launched a second, more aggressive series of federal programs, sometimes called the Second New Deal.

In April, he created the Works Progress Administration (WPA) to provide jobs for unemployed people. WPA projects weren't allowed to compete with private industry, so they focused on building things like post offices, bridges, schools, highways and parks. The WPA also gave work to artists, writers, theater directors and musicians.

In July 1935, the National Labor Relations Act, also known as the Wagner Act, created the National Labor Relations Board to supervise union elections and prevent businesses from treating their workers unfairly. In August, FDR signed the Social Security Act of 1935, which guaranteed pensions to millions of Americans, set up a system of unemployment insurance and stipulated that the federal government would help care for dependent children and the disabled.

In 1936, while campaigning for a second term, FDR told a roaring crowd at Madison Square Garden that "The forces of 'organized money' are unanimous in their hate for me-and I welcome their hatred."

He went on: "I should like to have it said of my first Administration that in it the forces of selfishness and of lust for power met their match, [and] I should like to have it said of my second Administration that in it these forces have met their master."

This FDR had come a long way from his earlier repudiation of class-based politics and was promising a much more aggressive fight against the people who were profiting from the Depression-era troubles of ordinary Americans. He won the election by a landslide.

Still, the Great Depression dragged on. Workers grew more militant: In December 1936, for example, the United Auto Workers strike at a GM plant in Flint, Michigan lasted for 44 days and spread to some 150,000 autoworkers in 35 cities.

By 1937, to the dismay of most corporate leaders, some 8 million workers had joined unions and were loudly demanding their rights.

The End of the New Deal?

Meanwhile, the New Deal itself confronted one political setback after another. Arguing that they represented an unconstitutional extension of federal authority, the conservative majority on the Supreme Court had already invalidated reform initiatives like the National Recovery Administration and the Agricultural Adjustment Administration.

In order to protect his programs from further meddling, in 1937 President Roosevelt announced a plan to add enough liberal justices to the Court to neutralize the "obstructionist" conservatives.

This " Court-packing " turned out to be unnecessary-soon after they caught wind of the plan, the conservative justices started voting to uphold New Deal projects-but the episode did a good deal of public-relations damage to the administration and gave ammunition to many of the president's Congressional opponents.

That same year, the economy slipped back into a recession when the government reduced its stimulus spending. Despite this seeming vindication of New Deal policies, increasing anti-Roosevelt sentiment made it difficult for him to enact any new programs.

On December 7, 1941, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor and the United States entered World War II. The war effort stimulated American industry and, as a result, effectively ended the Great Depression.

The New Deal and American Politics

From 1933 until 1941, President Roosevelt's New Deal programs and policies did more than just adjust interest rates, tinker with farm subsidies and create short-term make-work programs.

They created a brand-new, if tenuous, political coalition that included white working people, African Americans and left-wing intellectuals. More women entered the workforce as Roosevelt expanded the number of secretarial roles in government. These groups rarely shared the same interests-at least, they rarely thought they did- but they did share a powerful belief that an interventionist government was good for their families, the economy and the nation.

Their coalition has splintered over time, but many of the New Deal programs that bound them together-Social Security, unemployment insurance and federal agricultural subsidies, for instance-are still with us today.

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New Deal - Programs, Social Security & FDR

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The New Deal was a series of programs and projects instituted during the Great Depression by President Franklin D. Roosevelt that aimed to restore prosperity to Americans. A Second New Deal was put in place shortly thereafter as a way to continue the country's economic recovery.

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Opposition to the New Deal

For all the credit Roosevelt has been given for the success (or otherwise) of the New Deal, there was opposition in America to both what he was doing with regards to his economic policies to combat unemployment and to the beliefs he was perceived to have held.

Though Roosevelt had enormous success in the elections of 1936, 1940 and 1944, this success is somewhat disguised by the structure of America’s elections whereby a presidential candidate can win a state with the bare majority of votes but win all of what are called Electoral College seats for that state. Once a presidential candidate has a majority of Electoral College seats for the states that have announced their election result, they win the election and any state that has yet to announce its results does so to go through formalities.

Roosevelt’s own social class was horrified by the actions of the president. The president had been born in to a privileged family who lived a rich lifestyle on the east-coast of America – Roosevelt had been born at Hyde Park in New York State and spent his summer holidays at Campobello Island where the family had a summer holiday home.

To finance his first New Deal, Roosevelt had introduced higher taxes for the rich. They felt that he had betrayed his class and he was expelled from his social club for letting down “his people”.

Roosevelt’s response was typically blunt claiming that the policies he was pursuing would tread on the toes of the few while the majority benefited.

The New Deal also faced a lot of opposition from the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court took its stance from a legal viewpoint and in 1935 it effectively declared the National Recovery Administration (NRA) illegal.

In the following year it declared the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) unconstitutional thus killing off the AAA. The point made by the Supreme Court was that any efforts made to help farmers etc. should come at a state level and not federal level and that these parts of the New Deal went against the powers given to the states by the Constitution.

11 out of 16 of the Alphabet Laws were decreed unconstitutional in cases heard by the Supreme Court. The argument of the Supreme Court was that Roosevelt had tried to impose the power of the federal government on state governments – and this was unconstitutional. If a state deemed that there was a crisis is farming then it had the right to tackle this crisis as laid down by the Constitution but the federal government did not have the right to impose its decisions onto states.

Some politicians realised that the New Deal was not overwhelming popular with all the people and that there was a chance to make political capital out of this. The 1936 election result certainly showed that there was mileage in such an approach.

The most famous opponent of the New Deal was Huey Long, a Senator from Louisiana. He criticised Roosevelt for not doing enough for the poor. His alternative to the New Deal was called “Share Our Wealth”. By the standards of the time, Long was politically left of centre and his unpopularity was such that he had to surround himself with a gang of ‘heavies’ to protect him – and to deal with any hecklers he might come across at public meetings.

Long promised to confiscate any personal fortune over $3 million and that he would use this money to give each family in America between $4000 to $5000 so that they could buy a home and a car. Long also promised a national minimum wage, old age pensions and cheap food for the poor. Long also promised to make all education free in America.

Within Louisiana, Long essentially ran the state. Opponents were suitably dealt with; local elections were fixed and the police were bribed. In the state he was known as the “Kingfish“.

However, he had his enemies and in 1935 he was killed, ironically by one of his bodyguards who shot a man who was planning to kill Long. A bullet fired at the would-be assassin by one of the bodyguards, missed its target, ricocheted off of a corridor wall and hit Long in the stomach. Whether Long’s views would have had any appeal to the voters of 1936 (if he had stood for president) we will never know. He was, in fact, targeting the one group, the poor, whose input into elections has historically been poor. Those who he planned to attack financially, the better off, historically vote the most at elections, so it is highly improbable that Long would have beaten Roosevelt in the 1936 election.

Another vocal opponent of Roosevelt was a Catholic priest called Charles Coughlin. He set up the National Union for Justice and used his weekly radio programme to attack Roosevelt for being “anti-God”. Coughlin wanted the less well off to be paid what he described as a “fair wage”. He teamed up with Frances Townsend who also opposed the New Deal. Townsend wanted the federal government to give all citizens aged 60 and above $200 a month to be financed by a 2% sales tax. These 2 men allied themselves to Gerald Smith, Huey Long’s successor, and the three of them planned in 1936 to tap the voting strength of the less well off in America.

The 1936 election result showed that a substantial number of people voted against Roosevelt.

In November 1936, Roosevelt got 27 million votes while his Republican opponent, Alf Landon, got 16 million votes. Landon’s support represented 37% of the total number of voters. Roosevelt’s victory was described as a landslide, which it was in electoral terms as he only lost the states of Vermont and Maine, but 16 million voters clearly were not convinced by the New Deal. This election obviously took place after the “100 Days” of what the first New Deal. That over 1/3rd of voters voted against Roosevelt gives some indication that not all of America was behind him.

However, Roosevelt brushed aside this with the comment

“Everybody is against me except the voter.”

Opposition to the New Deal

For all the credit Roosevelt has been given for the success (or otherwise) of the New Deal, there was opposition in America to both what he was doing with regards to his economic policies to combat unemployment and to the beliefs he was perceived to have held.

Though Roosevelt had enormous success in the elections of 1936, 1940 and 1944, this success is somewhat disguised by the structure of America’s elections whereby a presidential candidate can win a state with the bare majority of votes but win all of what are called Electoral College seats for that state. Once a presidential candidate has a majority of Electoral College seats for the states that have announced their election result, they win the election and any state that has yet to announce its results does so to go through formalities.

Roosevelt’s own social class was horrified by the actions of the president. The president had been born in to a privileged family who lived a rich lifestyle on the east-coast of America – Roosevelt had been born at Hyde Park in New York State and spent his summer holidays at Campobello Island where the family had a summer holiday home.

To finance his first New Deal, Roosevelt had introduced higher taxes for the rich. They felt that he had betrayed his class and he was expelled from his social club for letting down “his people”.

Roosevelt’s response was typically blunt claiming that the policies he was pursuing would tread on the toes of the few while the majority benefited.

The New Deal also faced a lot of opposition from the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court took its stance from a legal viewpoint and in 1935 it effectively declared the National Recovery Administration (NRA) illegal.

In the following year it declared the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) unconstitutional thus killing off the AAA. The point made by the Supreme Court was that any efforts made to help farmers etc. should come at a state level and not federal level and that these parts of the New Deal went against the powers given to the states by the Constitution.

11 out of 16 of the Alphabet Laws were decreed unconstitutional in cases heard by the Supreme Court. The argument of the Supreme Court was that Roosevelt had tried to impose the power of the federal government on state governments – and this was unconstitutional. If a state deemed that there was a crisis is farming then it had the right to tackle this crisis as laid down by the Constitution but the federal government did not have the right to impose its decisions onto states.

Some politicians realised that the New Deal was not overwhelming popular with all the people and that there was a chance to make political capital out of this. The 1936 election result certainly showed that there was mileage in such an approach.

The most famous opponent of the New Deal was Huey Long, a Senator from Louisiana. He criticised Roosevelt for not doing enough for the poor. His alternative to the New Deal was called “Share Our Wealth”. By the standards of the time, Long was politically left of centre and his unpopularity was such that he had to surround himself with a gang of ‘heavies’ to protect him – and to deal with any hecklers he might come across at public meetings.

Long promised to confiscate any personal fortune over $3 million and that he would use this money to give each family in America between $4000 to $5000 so that they could buy a home and a car. Long also promised a national minimum wage, old age pensions and cheap food for the poor. Long also promised to make all education free in America.

Within Louisiana, Long essentially ran the state. Opponents were suitably dealt with; local elections were fixed and the police were bribed. In the state he was known as the “Kingfish“.

However, he had his enemies and in 1935 he was killed, ironically by one of his bodyguards who shot a man who was planning to kill Long. A bullet fired at the would-be assassin by one of the bodyguards, missed its target, ricocheted off of a corridor wall and hit Long in the stomach. Whether Long’s views would have had any appeal to the voters of 1936 (if he had stood for president) we will never know. He was, in fact, targeting the one group, the poor, whose input into elections has historically been poor. Those who he planned to attack financially, the better off, historically vote the most at elections, so it is highly improbable that Long would have beaten Roosevelt in the 1936 election.

Another vocal opponent of Roosevelt was a Catholic priest called Charles Coughlin. He set up the National Union for Justice and used his weekly radio programme to attack Roosevelt for being “anti-God”. Coughlin wanted the less well off to be paid what he described as a “fair wage”. He teamed up with Frances Townsend who also opposed the New Deal. Townsend wanted the federal government to give all citizens aged 60 and above $200 a month to be financed by a 2% sales tax. These 2 men allied themselves to Gerald Smith, Huey Long’s successor, and the three of them planned in 1936 to tap the voting strength of the less well off in America.

The 1936 election result showed that a substantial number of people voted against Roosevelt.

In November 1936, Roosevelt got 27 million votes while his Republican opponent, Alf Landon, got 16 million votes. Landon’s support represented 37% of the total number of voters. Roosevelt’s victory was described as a landslide, which it was in electoral terms as he only lost the states of Vermont and Maine, but 16 million voters clearly were not convinced by the New Deal. This election obviously took place after the “100 Days” of what the first New Deal. That over 1/3rd of voters voted against Roosevelt gives some indication that not all of America was behind him.

However, Roosevelt brushed aside this with the comment

“Everybody is against me except the voter.”

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Pictures of the USA presidents when younger compared with more standard photographs of the presidents

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The Roaring 20s Documentary - World History Project

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In the Roaring Twenties, a surging economy created an era of mass consumerism, as Jazz-Age flappers flouted Prohibition laws and the Harlem Renaissance redefined arts and culture.

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U.S. National Debt Clock 2022 at Current Rates