The problems of the Great Depression affected every group of Americans. In 1933 the unemployment rate in the U.S. was over twenty-five percent. At the same time, unemployment rates for a variety of American minorities exceeded up to 50 percent. (Race During the Great Depression) As much as the Great Depression caused suffering for white Americans, the hardships skyrocketed for racial minorities, including African Americans, Mexican Americans, Native Americans, and Asian Americans.
No one grieved more than African Americans. By 1932, approximately half of black Americans experienced unemployment. (Race During the Great Depression) African Americans were the first to be fired from jobs when the economy lolled and was the last to be hired. (Women
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(FlatWorld) In June 1934, John Collier of the U.S. Office of Indian Affairs introduced the Indian New Deal. This program changed the course of the U.S. Indian policy. Instead of forcing Native Americans into U.S. society, the policy payed for the economic development of tribes, advocated for Native traditions, and promoted independent governments. (Minority Groups and the Great Depression) Secretary of the Interior, Harold Ickes, participated in the American Indian Defense Association. This was a group formed by John Collier in the 1920's to protect the property and culture of Native tribes. Ickes appointed Collier as the Commissioner of the Bureau of Indian affairs. (FlatWorld) The reforms that emerged in the 1930's stood on the notion that Native culture belongs in twentieth-century America. John Collier launched a policy to reinstitute the spirit of Native-American governments through the Indian Reorganization Act of 1934. The IRA repudiated the previous allocation system and coaxed tribes to design their own constitutions. New Deal reforms also seeked to create secular schools on reservations, rather than sponsor religious schools that disrespected Native traditions. (Native Americans, Impact of the Great Depression on) Unlike most of America, the 1930's was regarded as a progressive time in Native American Civil