Franklin D Roosevelt's New Deal Programs

1544 Words7 Pages

When President Franklin Roosevelt announced the New Deal program, he became the voice of America’s progressivism and liberalism. The New Deal programs moved America’s social, economic, and political problems through relief, recovery, and reform. On the other hand, some of the New Deal programs cause more destructive to America recovery. Nevertheless, whether Roosevelt programs were effective or non-effective, their goal was to lead the nation to a road of economic recovery. Roosevelt programs established the mold for identifying and approaching the United States problems then and now. However the New Deal programs did not mean the same things for different groups such as for African Americans, farmers, women, etc. To analyze the age of Roosevelt, …show more content…

The people were looking for a relief, so the government responded with the New Deal programs. In the book “The Era of Franklin D. Roosevelt”, Richard Polenberg, gives his interpretation of the age of Roosevelt and the New Deal programs. Polenberg elucidate different programs that Roosevelt created, the outcome of the programs, and the obstacles that Roosevelt faced while creating the programs. Roosevelt faced heavy criticism in responds to his New Deal program from former president to the Supreme Court. President Hoover argued that the despite the country slipping into a deeper depression, it was not the government jobs to help the citizens. He quotes that the government intervention would “cripple the mental and spiritual energies of our people…and dry up the spirit of liberty and progress (Polenberg, pg. 117). It was ironic that Hoover felt no urge to help his citizens out of the Great Depression, when he was partially blame for the causing it. Although, the book “The Disinherited” is fiction it represented what most Americans thought of Hoover and his administration and that his polices thrusted America into the Great Depression. When Hoover was president there were no permeant jobs, people lived in a deplorable state, there was a shortage of food and people lost their homes. In the film “American Reds” it states that one/forth Americans were unemployed, during the Hoover administration. Workers had no …show more content…

If citizens were facing economic distress, he wanted the government to assist” (Polenberg, pg.13). The programs both help and hurt millions of struggling Americans during the depression. The New Deal programs created jobs for the unemployed, created social security, public welfare, etc. While this may be true, many skilled workers could get interview to attain a job. The newsreel “Work Pays America” illustrates the benefits of the New Deal WPA’s various programs. The newsreel shows that with the New Deal programs that every American can prosper from them. The WPA shows Americans that would normally be unemployed working. It showed Women, Men, African-American, and Caucasian working together. The “Agricultural Adjustment Act” helps impoverish farmers, by improving roads allowing them better transportation access, yet it cause the food prices to skyrocket that most families could not afford food. In the film “Our Daily Bread, the family had to trade their guitar for chicken. Guitars usually have a higher value than chicken, but because of the Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), which was meant to help farmers, the food cost was up. Whether good or bad these programs defined the economic actions of the age of Roosevelt, as Roosevelt was the force behind the

More about Franklin D Roosevelt's New Deal Programs