Essay On The Great Depression Dbq

Grant Feiner

Unit 7 DBQ

During the period called the Roaring Twenties America’s economy was flourishing. Most citizens were investing into the stock market to make a profit. Everything was going well as most were making a profit off of the stocks that they acquired, but Americans wouldn’t be at the top for long. During August of 1929 the stock market crashed due to the way that Americans were driving up the prices was unsustainable. The stock market crash of 1929 began a time period called The Great Depression. The Great Depression was an era of major unemployment and buisness faliure that lasted until 1939 with the help of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal which implemented a framework that could protect American’s interests

During the time period women were also unemployed, but a lot of the time fewer women looked for help than the men. This sentiment is reinforced by Meridel Lesuer who wrote a magazine called New Masses which states, “It’s one of the great mysteries of teh city where women go when they are out of work and hungry. There are not many women in the bread line. There are no flop houses for women as there are for men, where a bed can be had for a quarter or less.”(Doc A). This displays how during the time period women seemed as if they were invisible and were given less attention than unemployed men. The New Deal helped give attention to women with the implementation of social security which is depicted by the Library of Congress with Document D which depicts a poster for social security that displays what it will do. Social security being implemented helped women because it displayed that the government cares about the well being of all Americans and is less likely to ignore them in the future. With the government’s influence in women’s lives increasing, many problems that they felt during The Great Depression are dealt with due to the effectiveness of the New

One of the problems that they faced was discrimination in finding employment which caused African Americans to have unemployment rates that doubled or tripled that of whites. These rates were largely due to the government ignoring African Americans during Hoover’s presidency, but this was changed with Roosevelt’s New Deal. A newspaper called The Crisis commented on the New Deal’s affects on African Americans when they stated, “[The] most important contribution of the Roosevelt administration is teh age-old color line problem in America…government has taken on meaning and substance for the Negro masses.”(Doc I). The Crisis’ paper shows that the New Deal created much needed employment opportunities for African Americans worldwide. The New Deal tried to improve the lives of black southerners through the creation of the resettlement administration which faced many problems, but ultimately served many black families. The University of Oxford reinforces this by stating, “Cumulatively, the New Deal assisted black southerners by allocating money to African American schools, funding public health programs, and improving black housing.”(Murphy). This research encyclopedia shows how President Roosevelt’s new plan served black communities and helped support African American communities. The aforementioned displays that the government’s increased influence in the