APUSH 7.9 The Great Depression

Great Depression

Economic Depression in the 1930's characterized by its massive amount of unemployment, business and bank failures, and prevalent hard times.

Stock Market

This crashed after stock prices kept increasing and investors panicked to sell when there were no buyers available

Black Tuesday (Oct 29, 1929)

On this day, millions of panicky investors ordered their brokers to sell stocks when there were almost no buyers available to purchase them.

Dow Jones Index

This index fell from 381 to 198 following black tuesday

Income distribution

Cause of the Crash: Wages had risen little compared to the large increases in productivity at the time. The top 5 percent of the wealthiest Americans received 33% of all income

Buying on margin

Cause of the Crash: People felt they could play the market by speculating stocks would increase and then selling them for a quick profit. This action allowed people to borrow most of the price of a stock, making down payments as low as 10%. They couldnt pay back loans

Gross National Product

The value of all goods and services produced by the nation in one year. The Depression caused the United States's to drop from $104 Billion to $56 billion in four years.

Herbert Hoover

President during the first half of the depression

Hawley-Smoot Tariff (1930)

This was passed and increased import taxes ranging from 31-49%. Purpose was to protect markets from foreign competition. Backfired when other nations increased their tariffs on the United States goods and further drove the depression

Debt Moratorium

Refers to the suspension of the Dawes Plan for collecting War debts.

Farm Board

Authorized to help farmers stabilize prices by temporarily holding surplus grain and cotton in storage. Failed to stop the overproduction of agricultural goods

Reconstruction Finance Corporation

This was created in 1942 by congress to help failing railroads, banks, and insurance companies.

Bonus March (1932)

Incident where WWI veterans demanded their wartime bonuses immediately rather than in 1945.

FDR

The man

Eleanor Roosevelt

Wife of FDR

Twentieth Amendment ("Lame-Duck")

Shortened the period between presidential election and inauguration. Set a date Jan 20 for the start of a president's term in office

First New Deal

Relief, Recovery, and Reform

Refers to the New Deal's programs to serve relief for people out of work, recovery for businesses and the economy, and reform of American economic institutions

Brain Trust

FDR's advisers who were highly educated

Frances Perkins

Secretary of Labor. First woman to ever serve in a president's cabinet

Hundred Days

FDR calls congress into a long special session to enact more legislation than any other congress in history.

Bank Holiday

FDR orders all banks to be closed on March 6, 1933. This was done so the government could reorganize the banks so they could have the confidence of being solvent

Repeal of Prohibition

Passage of the Beer-Wine Revenue Act, which would contribute to the 21st amendment caused this

Fireside chats

FDR gave one of these on March 12, 1933 and assured that the reopened banks were safe.

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC)

This corporation guaranteed individual bank deposits.

Public Works Administration (PWA)

Led by Harold Ickes, allotted money to state and local govts for building roads, bridges, dams, and other public works

Harold Ickes

Secretary of the Interior. Led the PWA

Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC)

Employed young men on projects on federal lands and paid their families small monthly sums

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)

Was a huge experiment in regional development and public planning. Hired thousands of people in Tennessee Valley to work on dams, operate electric power plants, control flooding and erosion, and manufacture fertilizer

National Recovery Administration (NRA)

An attempt to guarantee reasonable profits for business and fair wages and hours for labor.

Schechter v. U.S

Declared the NRA unconstitutional in 1935

Securities and Exchange Commisssion

Was created to regulate the stock market and to place strict limits on the kind of speculative practice that led to the Wall Street crash in 1929.

Federal Housing Administration (FHA)

Gave both the construction industry and homeowners a boost by insuring bank loans for building new houses and repairing old ones.

Second New Deal

Part of the new deal that focused on Relief and Reform

Works Progress Administration (WPA)

Spent billions of dollars to provide millions with with jobs. It paid them double the relief rate but less than the going wage for regular workers.

Harry Hopkins

Created the WPA

National Labor Relations (wagner) Act (1935)

Reform labor law that guaranteed a worker's right to join a union and a union's right to bargain collectively. It also outlawed businesses that were unfair to albor

Social Security Act (1935)

Created a federal insurance program based upon the automatic collection of payments from employees and employees throughout people's working careers.

Father Charles Coughlin

Catholic priest who attracted a huge popular following in the early 1930s through his weekly radio broadcasts. His attacks on the new deal were fascist and anti-semetic

Francis Townsend

Retired physician who proposed a simple plan for guaranteeing a secure income. Proposed that a 2 percent federal sales tax be used to create a special fund. His plan inspired Roosevelt's Social Security system

Huey Long

1935 he challenged Roosevelt's leadership in the Democratic party. assassinated

Supreme Court reorganization Plan

Roosevelt's plan in 1937 that proposed that a pressident be authorized to appoint to the supreme court an additional justice for each current justice that was older than 70.5 years.

Congress of Industrial Organizations

Led by John L. Lewis. Joining of industrial unions

Fair Labor Standards Act

Act that established several regulations on businesses in interstate commerce:

- A minimum wage

Maximum standard workweek of 40 hours

- child labor restrictions