FDR & the New Deal

1. Describe how people struggled to survive during the depression.

Some people in the cities that were evicted from their homes when they lost their homes slept in parks and in sewer pipes, wrapping themselves in newspapers to fend off the cold. While others made makeshift homes out of scrap metal.

2. How was what happened to men during the Great Depression different from what happened to women? Children?

Some men that had become unemployed could not cope with it and then began walking the country hitching rides and looking for work. While women worked sewing clothes and canning food much to the resentment of men who thought it unfair that women should have work when so many men were unemployed. The children suffered from malnutrition and some teenagers looked for a way out of suffering and so they became "wild boys" who hopped aboard freight trains and crossed country looking for food, work and adventure.

3. Describe the causes and effects (on people) because of the Dust Bowl.

The causes of the Dust Bowl is that many people went crazy and the rate of people that went into mental hospitals and the rate of suicides rose a lot. The effects of the Dust Bowl was that many people showed great kindness to strangers and invited them into their homes and gave food and clothing to the needy. While families helped other families and shared resources and strengthened the bonds within their communities.

Objective: Summarize the initial steps Franklin D. Roosevelt took to reform banking and finance.

4. What was the New Deal and its three general goals? (The 3 Rs)

Relief for the needy, economic recovery, and financial reform.

5. What did Roosevelt do during the Hundred Days?

Congress passed more than 15 major peices of New Deal legislation. These laws, and others that followed, significantly expanded the federal government's role in the nation's economy.

6. Why were Roosevelt's fireside chats significant?

Because they made people feel as if the president were speaking to them directly.

7. Describe four significant agencies and/or bills that tightened regulation of banking and finance.

The Glass-Steagall Act provided federal insurance for individual bank accounts of up to $5,000, reassuring millions of bank customers that their money was safe. The Federal Securities Act, required corporations to provide complete information on all stock offerings and made them liable for many misrepresentations. The Agricultural Adjustment Act sought to raise crop prices by lowering production, which the government achieved by paying farmers to leave certain amounts of every acre unseeded. The Civilian Conservation Corps put young men to work building roads, developing parks, planting trees and helping in soil-erosion and flood-control projects.