Fiche de révision : Roosevelt and the Great Depression Recovery

📋 Course Outline

1. Great Depression origins and stock market crash of 1929
2. Key dates and events of the 1929 Wall Street Crash
3. Economic and social impacts of the Great Depression in the US and worldwide
4. Roosevelt administration's response to the Great Depression
5. First New Deal programs: relief, recovery, and reforms
6. Second New Deal initiatives: social reforms and labor protections
7. Social Security Act and establishment of national pension system
8. Roosevelt’s fireside chats and public communication strategy
9. Keynesian economic theory and its influence on New Deal policies
10. Long-term effects and limitations of the New Deal and WWII recovery role

📖 1. Great Depression origins and stock market crash of 1929

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Great Depression : A severe worldwide economic depression that took place mostly during the 1930s, beginning in the United States.
• Stock market crash : A rapid and often unanticipated drop in stock prices.

📝 Essential Points

• The Great Depression was the worst economic downturn in US history and began in 1929, not abating until the end of the 1930s.
• The US economy was already in trouble before the crash because overproduction and rising unemployment were weakening it.
• The 1920s boom had been financed by debt, so falling prices became disastrous when people could not repay what they owed.
• Share prices had risen too fast and did not reflect the true condition of the US economy, which helped trigger panic when prices began to fall.

💡 Key Takeaway

The Great Depression was the worst economic downturn in US history and began in 1929, not abating until the end of the 1930s.

📖 2. Key dates and events of the 1929 Wall Street Crash

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Wall Street Crash - 1929-1939 : The stock market crash period associated with October 29, 1929, and remembered as the event that marked the beginning of the Great Depression.

📝 Essential Points

• Tuesday, October 29, 1929, was Black Tuesday, the fourth and last day of the crash and the peak of the panic.
• On Black Tuesday, investors traded over 16 million shares, making it the worst day in NYSE history.
• On Black Tuesday, investors lost $14 billion on the New York Stock Exchange, equal to about$206 billion in 2019 dollars.
• October 29, 1929, is the most iconic date of the crash and is closely associated with the climax of the Wall Street Crash and the beginning of the Great Depression.

💡 Key Takeaway

The crash is best memorized as a sequence of named panic days, beginning with Black Thursday and culminating in Black Tuesday. October 29, 1929, stands out as the decisive climax of the Wall Street Crash and the opening of the Great Depression.

📖 3. Economic and social impacts of the Great Depression in the US and worldwide

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Financial crisis : Not limited to the United States.

📝 Essential Points

• By 1933, unemployment in the United States had reached 25 percent.
• More than 5,000 banks had gone out of business by 1933.
• Long lines of desperate people outside banks became common as they tried to retrieve their savings.
• Many ordinary citizens lost their life savings when banks failed.

💡 Key Takeaway

The Great Depression caused mass unemployment, bank failures, and the loss of savings for many ordinary citizens. Its financial crisis also spread beyond the United States.

📖 4. Roosevelt administration's response to the Great Depression

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• First New Deal : The first phase of Roosevelt's program from 1933 to 1934, marked by banking reform laws, emergency relief programs, work relief programs, and agricultural programs.
• Federal government : The national government whose power Roosevelt believed was needed to get the country out of the Depression and whose role in the economy was greatly expanded by the New Deal.
• Domestic policies : Policies within the United States that Roosevelt used in the New Deal to respond to the Great Depression.

📝 Essential Points

• Roosevelt's response was based on the assumption that federal power was needed to get the country out of the Depression.
• The New Deal sought to reinvigorate the economy by stimulating consumer demand.
• The New Deal embraced federal deficit spending as a fiscal approach to promote economic growth.

💡 Key Takeaway

Roosevelt's response was based on the assumption that federal power was needed to get the country out of the Depression.

📖 5. First New Deal programs: relief, recovery, and reforms

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Relief programs : Emergency programs passed in the first days of Roosevelt's administration to address the most urgent problems.

📝 Essential Points

• The First New Deal covered 1933 to 1934.
• The first days of Roosevelt's administration saw the passage of banking reform laws, emergency relief programs, work relief programs, and agricultural programs.
• Many New Deal acts and agencies were known by acronyms such as WPA and CCC, which led people to call them alphabet soup.
• Many people remarked that the New Deal programs reminded them of alphabet soup.
• Many of the New Deal acts or agencies came to be known by their acronyms.

💡 Key Takeaway

The First New Deal was an emergency response from 1933 to 1934, organized around relief, recovery, and reforms. It focused on urgent problems through banking reform, relief, work relief, and agricultural measures.

📖 6. Second New Deal initiatives: social reforms and labor protections

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Second New Deal : A Second New Deal (1935-1938) dealt more with social issues, offered further legislative reforms and created the groundwork for today’s modern social welfare system.

📝 Essential Points

• The Second New Deal covered 1935 to 1938.
• The Second New Deal dealt more with social issues than the First New Deal.
• Historians commonly speak of a First New Deal (1933-1934) with the 3R's: relief, recovery, and reforms.
• Many of the New Deal acts or agencies came to be known by their acronyms.

💡 Key Takeaway

The Second New Deal marked a shift from the First New Deal’s emergency focus to broader social reform and protection. From 1935 to 1938, it added legislative reforms, union protection programs, and aid for tenant farmers and migrant workers.

📖 7. Social Security Act and establishment of national pension system

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Social Security Act: U.S. legislation passed on August 14, 1935, establishing a permanent national old-age pension system through employer and employee contributions.

• national old-age pension system: a permanent U.S. pension framework for old-age support, created by the Social Security Act and funded through employer and employee contributions.

• employee contributions: payments made by workers into the pension system, alongside employer contributions, to finance the national old-age pension system.

📝 Essential Points

• The Social Security Act was passed on August 14, 1935.
• It established a permanent national old-age pension system.
• The pension system was funded through employer and employee contributions.
• The Social Security system was later extended to include dependents, the disabled, and other groups.
• The Social Security Act became a central foundation of the modern American welfare state.

💡 Key Takeaway

The Social Security Act was the New Deal’s lasting institutional answer to old-age insecurity. By creating a permanent pension system and later extending it to wider groups, it helped lay the groundwork for the modern American welfare state.

📖 8. Roosevelt’s fireside chats and public communication strategy

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Banking crisis : The financial emergency Roosevelt addressed in the first fireside chat, when he explained the actions he and Congress had taken to deal with it.

📝 Essential Points

• Roosevelt delivered the first fireside chat on March 12, 1933.
• The first fireside chat was a live-radio address.
• In the first fireside chat, Roosevelt spoke about the banking crisis.
• Roosevelt used the fireside chats to explain the actions he and Congress had taken.
• The fireside chats helped Roosevelt communicate directly with the public in a reassuring and accessible way.

💡 Key Takeaway

Roosevelt’s fireside chats began with a live-radio address on March 12, 1933 about the banking crisis. They helped him explain policy directly to the public in a reassuring and accessible way.

📖 9. Keynesian economic theory and its influence on New Deal policies

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Consumer demand : The demand from consumers that Roosevelt’s New Deal sought to stimulate to reinvigorate the economy.
• Government expenditures : Public spending that Keynes advocated increasing, along with lower taxes, to stimulate demand and pull the global economy out of the depression.

📝 Essential Points

• Keynesian economics was developed by John Maynard Keynes during the 1930s to help explain the Great Depression.
• Keynes advocated increased government expenditures and lower taxes to stimulate demand.
• The New Deal embraced federal deficit spending to promote economic growth, and this fiscal approach came to be associated with Keynesian thinking.

💡 Key Takeaway

Keynesian economics was developed by John Maynard Keynes during the 1930s to help explain the Great Depression.

📖 10. Long-term effects and limitations of the New Deal and WWII recovery role

🔑 Key Concepts & Definitions

• Collective bargaining rights : Labor rights that remained in place as part of the New Deal's lasting federal regulation.
• Supreme Court : The federal court that ruled against several New Deal initiatives in 1935.

📝 Essential Points

• Roosevelt’s suggestion of expanding the Supreme Court to as many as fifteen Justices was a political misstep that haunted him for the rest of his career.
• By 1939, the New Deal had run its course.
• The New Deal left lasting federal regulation of wages, hours, child labor, and collective bargaining rights, along with the social security system.

💡 Key Takeaway

The New Deal left a durable federal legacy in labor regulation and social security, but it also faced judicial resistance and had run its course by 1939. Full recovery from the Great Depression came only with the massive military spending of World War II.

🧩 Additional Source Details

1. Black Tuesday was the fourth and last day of the 1929 crash, making it the climax of the panic.
2. The crash caused losses of $14 billion on the New York Stock Exchange, equal to$206 billion in 2019 dollars.
3. Black Thursday on October 24, 1929, was the first day of panic in the Wall Street Crash.
4. The crash was driven by speculative borrowing, with many investors buying shares on credit.
5. The Great Depression spread beyond the United States and affected Europe and the wider world.
6. Roosevelt's first New Deal began in 1933 and 1934, not just as a general emergency response.
7. The Second New Deal ran from 1935 to 1938 and included union protection programs.
8. The Second New Deal also aided tenant farmers and migrant workers.
9. The Social Security Act was passed on August 14, 1935, and created a permanent national old-age pension system.
10. The Social Security system was later extended to dependents, the disabled, and other groups.
11. Roosevelt's first fireside chat was delivered on March 12, 1933.
12. The first fireside chat addressed the banking crisis and explained actions taken by Roosevelt and Congress.
13. Keynesian economics was developed by British economist John Maynard Keynes during the 1930s to understand the Great Depression.
14. Keynes argued for higher government spending and lower taxes to stimulate demand and pull the global economy out of the depression.
15. The New Deal did not fully end the Depression; full recovery came only with massive World War II military spending.
16. PART 2 H1: The Roosevelt years from 1933 to 1945 LESSON How did Roosevelt address the challenges of the Great Depression?
17. PART 1 H1: The Roosevelt years from 1933 to 1945 How did Roosevelt address the challenges of the Great Depression?
18. H1: The Roosevelt years from 1933 to 1945 What led to the New Deal?

📅 Key Dates

📊 Synthesis Tables

First New Deal vs Second New Deal

Crash and Depression impacts

⚠️ Common Pitfalls & Confusions

1. Black Tuesday was the fourth and last day of the crash, not the first day of panic.
2. October 29, 1929 is the climax of the Wall Street Crash, not Black Thursday.
3. The Great Depression began in 1929 and did not abate until the end of the 1930s.
4. The First New Deal covered 1933 to 1934, while the Second New Deal covered 1935 to 1938.
5. The Social Security Act created a permanent national old-age pension system through employer and employee contributions.
6. Roosevelt’s first fireside chat was on March 12, 1933 and addressed the banking crisis.
7. Full recovery from the Great Depression came only with massive World War II military spending.

✅ Exam Checklist

1. Identify 1929 as the year of the stock market crash and the start of the Great Depression.
2. Remember Black Tuesday as October 29, 1929 and the peak of the panic.
3. Recall that over 16 million shares were traded on Black Tuesday.
4. Know that investors lost $14 billion on the New York Stock Exchange, equal to about$206 billion in 2019 dollars.
5. State that unemployment reached 25 percent in the United States by 1933.
6. State that more than 5,000 banks had gone out of business by 1933.
7. Distinguish the First New Deal (1933 to 1934) from the Second New Deal (1935 to 1938).
8. Link the First New Deal to relief, recovery, and reforms.
9. Link the Second New Deal to social issues, union protection, and aid for tenant farmers and migrant workers.
10. Know that the Social Security Act was passed on August 14, 1935 and created a permanent national old-age pension system.
11. Remember that Roosevelt’s first fireside chat was a live-radio address on March 12, 1933 about the banking crisis.
12. Connect Keynesian economics to higher government spending and lower taxes to stimulate demand.