Agricultural Adjustment Administration by Lizeth Veronica Solorio

The beginning of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (Cynthia)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-06 20:15:30 UTC

As a response to the Great Depression and a way for economic recovery, after winning the presidential election in 1928, Franklin Delano Roosevelt created the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA) in May 1933 alongside the National Recovery Administration (NRA).

In an effort to stabilize and coordinate the American economy the AAA took place in the United States of America, majorly in the southern region, having a lot of effect in North Carolina.

Who were the primary participants in/beneficiaries of the program? (Lizeth)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-06 20:16:13 UTC

The Agricultural Adjustment Act was an omnibus farm-relief bill embodying the schemes of the major national farm organizations. It established the Agricultural Adjustment Administration under Secretary of Agriculture Henry Wallace to affect a “domestic allotment”. The AAA was designed to restore parity prices for "basic agricultural commodities." Benefit payments would compensate participating farmers who agreed to curb acreage or kill excess livestock.

Problems the Agricultural Adjustment Administration was supposed to address (Cynthia)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-06 20:18:08 UTC

The goal of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration was to reduce crop supply as a method to increase prices and sequentially increment the income of the farmers. Although the AAA reached its goal of reducing crops and increasing market prices, it did not benefit most of the farmers that were in need.

Since the AAA was administrated by economists, they did not take into consideration the plans of the farmers and discarded their benefits by relying on landowners and local administrations to distribute the budget. Instead of using the money fairly, the landowners evicted their farmers out of the land and invested the money into equipment, making landless southern farmers resort to leaving the farms since it was impossible for them to survive.

Lester Hunter, “I’d Rather Not Be on Relief” (1938) (Lizeth)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-06 20:19:21 UTC

This song written by Lester Hunger in 1938 portrays life as an immigrant worker in California during the Dust Bowl in 1930. This song discusses how immigrant workers preferred working on farms rather than in federal government programs. The song also explains the workers' quality of life, as they sing about how they dress in drags and are not paid enough to eat or live decently. The song concludes by saying how they hope for better times and the workers joining the C.I.O. which was a federation of unions that organized workers.

Connections between the source and the objectives of this organization/act (Lizeth)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-06 20:19:57 UTC

The connection between the source "I'd Rather Not Be on Relief" and the goals of the AAA organization of 1933 can be found in the historical context during the great depression. The song was aimed at protesting the working conditions that farm workers were going through, while the organization aimed to raise farm prices by producing less. The increase in crop prices may have had a positive effect as it increased farm income thus allowing them to increase workers' wages, but in most cases, the farmers kept most of the increase revenue instead of passing it on to the workers. The organization also wanted to reduce overproduction and stabilize the agricultural economy by getting rid of acreage or destroying crops and livestock. The organization's goal ended up affecting the workers as this change meant less labor to produce leaving hundreds of workers unemployed and evicting them from the land.

How long was your program operational? (Cynthia)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-06 20:20:31 UTC

The Agricultural Adjustment Administration (AAA) began in 1933 and ended in 1936 after the U.S. Supreme Court declared the act unconstitutional, deeming it illegal to tax the processors as a way to pay the farmers back.

However, it was replaced by the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 to regulate interstate and foreign commerce of agricultural resources.

Work Cited

lsolorio11 — 2024-03-06 21:49:02 UTC

https://www.britannica.com/money/Agricultural-Adjustment-Administration

Lester Hunter, “I’d Rather Not Be on Relief” (1938). Available online via Archive of
Folk Culture, Library of Congress, https://www.loc.gov/folklife/archive.html

E.E.Lewis, “Black Cotton Farmers and the AAA”, Teaching American History, https://teachingamericanhistory.org/document/black-cotton-farmers-and-the-aaa/#:~:text=The%20AAA%20had%20been%20formed%20under%20the%201933,deal%20for%20farmers%20who%20owned%20their%20own%20land.

The results of the Agricultural Adjustment Administration (Cynthia)

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-09 02:17:22 UTC

After the Agricultural Adjustment Act was signed in 1933, the Agricultural Adjustment Administration program was put into action to reduce crop production. Even though it succeeded in this mission, it also led to 10 million acres of cotton being plowed and 6 million hogs being killed, therefore creating the FSRC in 1933.

The Federal Surplus Relief Corporation (FSRC) was a project that originated from the AAA because of the negligence that was occuring during the early months of the AAA as an effort to improve the farmers' conditions by diverting the excess resources to relief corporations. Its name was later changed to the Federal Surplus Commodities Corporation in 1935.

Although the AAA had partial success since it succeeded in its goal by decreasing crop production and increasing market price, it also came with downsides such as the lack of income for small farmers, leading them out of the farms; the "slaughter of the innocents" (6 million hogs); and the displacing of black tenants and sharecroppers.

Works Cited

cmonto20_1 — 2024-03-09 03:09:40 UTC

“Agricultural Adjustment Administration - North Carolina History.” North Carolina History -, 2 Mar. 2024, northcarolinahistory.org/encyclopedia/agricultural-adjustment-administration/.

“The American Yawp.” Stanford University Press eBooks, 2019, https://doi.org/10.1515/9781503608146.

“Agricultural Adjustment Act.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, inc., 15 Feb. 2024, www.britannica.com/topic/Agricultural-Adjustment-Act.

lsolorio11 — 2024-03-10 21:51:36 UTC