Name: The New Deal: Crash Course US History #34
Uploaded: 2022-06-20T11:14:09.000Z
Duration: 14 min 57 s
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Hi, I'm John Green, this is CrashCourse U.S. history, and today we're going to get

a little bit controversial, as we discuss the FDR administration's response to the

That's the National Recovery Administration, by the way, not the National Rifle Association

or the No Rodents Allowed Club, which I'm a card-carrying member of.

Did the New Deal end the Depression (spoiler alert: mehhh)?

More controversially, did it destroy American freedom or expand the definition of liberty?

Ohh, Me from the Past, you are not qualified to make that statement.

I was just trying to be, like, provocative and controversial.

You have the worst ideas about how to make people like you.

But anyway, not EVERYTHING about the New Deal was controversial.

intro The New Deal redefined the role of the federal

government for most Americans and it led to a re-alignment of the constituents in the

Democratic Party, the so-called New Deal coalition.

(Good job with the naming there, historians.)

And regardless of whether you think the New Deal meant more freedom for more people or

was a plot by red shirt wearing Communists, the New Deal is extremely important in American

What are you trying to say about me, Stan?

As the owner of the means of production, I demand that you dock the wages of the writer

So after his mediocre response to the Great Depression, Herbert Hoover did not have any

chance of winning the presidential election of 1932, but he also ran like he didn't

Plus, his opponent was Franklin Delano Roosevelt, who was as close to a born politician as the

United States has ever seen, except for Kid President.

The phrase New Deal came from FDR's campaign, and when he was running FDR suggested that

it was the government's responsibility to guarantee every man a right to make a comfortable

living, but he didn't say HOW he meant to accomplish this.

Like, it wasn't gonna come from government spending, since FDR was calling for a balanced

budget and criticizing Hoover for spending so much.

Maybe it would somehow magically happen if we made alcohol legal again and one thing

FDR did call for was an end to Prohibition, which was a campaign promise he kept.

After three years of Great Depression, many Americans seriously needed a drink, and the

government sought tax revenue, so no more Prohibition.

FDR won 57% of the vote and the Democrats took control of Congress for the first time

While FDR gets most of the credit, he didn't actually create the New Deal or put it into

Basically, it was a set of government programs intended to fix the depression and prevent

There are a couple of ways historians conceptualize it.

One is to categorize the programs by their function.

This is where we see the New Deal described as three R's.

The relief programs gave help, usually money, to poor people in need.

Recovery programs were intended to fix the economy in the short run and put people back

And lastly, the Run DMC program was designed to increase the sales of Adidas shoes.

No, alas, it was reform programs that were designed to regulate the economy in the future

But some of the programs, like Social Security, don't fit easily into one category, and

there are some blurred lines between recovery and reform.

Like, how do you categorize the bank holiday and the Emergency Banking Act of March 1933,

FDR's order to close the banks temporarily also created the FDIC, which insures individual

deposits against future banking disasters.

By the way, we still have all that stuff, but was it recovery, because it helped the

short-term economy by making more stable banks, or was it reform because federal deposit insurance

A second way to think about the New Deal is to divide it into phases, which historians

with their A number one naming creativity call the First and Second New Deal.

This more chronological approach indicates that there has to be some kind of cause and

effect thing going on because otherwise why would there be a second New Deal if the first

The First New Deal comprises Roosevelt's programs before 1935, many of which were passed

in the first hundred days of his presidency.

It turns out that when it comes to getting our notoriously gridlocked Congress to pass

legislation, nothing motivates like crisis and fear.

So, in a brief break from its trademark obstructionism, Congress passed laws establishing the Civilian

Conservation Corps, which paid young people to build national parks, the Agricultural

Adjustment Act, the Glass Stegall act, which barred commercial banks from buying and selling

stocks, and the National Industrial Recovery Act.

Which established the National Recovery Administration, which has lightening bolts in its claws.

The NRA was designed to be government planners and business leaders working together to coordinate

industry standards for production, prices, and working conditions.

But that whole public-private cooperation idea wasn't much immediate help to many

of the starving unemployed, so the Hundred Days reluctantly included the Federal Emergency

Relief Administration, to give welfare payments to people who were desperate.

Roosevelt worried about people becoming dependent on relief handouts, and preferred programs

One section of the NIRA created the Public Works Administration, which appropriated $33

billion to build stuff like the Triborough Bridge.

The Civil Works Administration, launched in November 1933 and eventually employed 4 million

people building bridges, schools, and airports.

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The New Deal: Crash Course US History #34

depression

controversial

associate

campaign