A Day for Every Demagogue -- The TVA Harnesses the

Tennessee

Pd. 5 Group 4Carlyle, Sam, Jawoin, Katelijn

A Day for Every DemagogueAlthough families recieved some support from the government, unemployment rates remained high and moral was low. This vulnerable environment allowed various demagogues to arise and amass followings. Among these were Father Charles Coughlin, Senator Huey P. "Kingfish" Long, and Dr. Francis E. Townsend.     The WPA was authorized by Congress in 1935 as an attempt to create employment one useful government projects. These projects ranged from roads to buildings to monkey pens. Within 8 years almost 9 million people were given jobs, which probably helped more than "hand-outs" would have.    The WPA also found part-time jobs for high school and college students, as well as actors, musicians, and writers.

Demagogues of the Depression• Father Charles Coughlin was

a Catholic priest who began broadcasting radical messages to roughly 40 million radio listeners. His rants were anti-semitic and fascistic, and he was eventually silenced in1942.

• Huey P. Long was a Louisiana governor who rallied support for his "Share Our Wealth" program. The plan called for every family to recieve $5,000 at the expense of the wealthy. Long was assassinated in 1935.

• Francis E. Townsend called for a program for senior citizens (anyone over sixty) to recieve $200 a month, provided that the money be spent within the month. Such a program would have cost half the national income, according to one estimate.

Huey P. Long

New Visibility for Women

• First Lady Eleanor Roosevelt• Secretary of Labor Frances Perkins

o  First woman in the cabinet•  Mary McLeod Bethune

o  Director of the Office in Minority Affairs in the National Youth Administration

o  Organized "Black Cabinet" to make sure blacks were benefiting from the New Deal

o Was the highest ranked Afircam American woman in Roosevelt's administration

•  Peals S. Buck-novelisto  Won Nobel Prize in Literature in

1938 for The Good Earth

New Visibility for Women• Contributions in the Social Sciences

o  Ruth Benedict- Anthropoligist  "culture and personality movement"  Patterns of Culture- established the

study of cultures as "collective personalities"

o  Margaret Mead  Coming of Age in Samoa

 studies of adolescence among Pacific Island peoples

 Bold ideas about sexuality, gender roles, intergenerational relationships

Helped popularize cultural anthropology

Helping Industry and Labor

National Recovery Administration•  For immediate help and long

range recovery and reform•  To help industry, labor, and

unemployed•  "Fair Competition"

o Set maximum hours and minimum wages

•  Laborers guaranteed right to organize and bargain collectively

•  yellowdog contracts forbidden•  restrictions made on child labor

Helping Industry and Labor

Public Works Administration• For industrial recovery and

unemployment relief•  headed by Harold L. Ickes•  Spent more that $4 billion on

34,000 projectso  public buildings, highways,

parkways  Grand Coulee Dam on

Columbia RiverLiquor Industry Improved• 21st Amendment- repealed

Prohibitiono  revenue (taxes), employment

Paying farmers not to farm

A radical new aproach to farm recovery was welcomed when the Emergency congress established the agricultural adjustment administration (aka The AAA). The AAA would eliminate price depressing surpluses by paying growers to reduce their crop acreage. The millions of dollars needed for these payments was to be raised by taxing processors of fram products such as flour millers, who in turn would shift the burden to consumers.

Dust Bowls and Black BlizzardsNature does hath its fury.During the late 1933 a drought strikes the states of the trans-Mississippi great plains. the sun was darkened by millions of tons of powdery topsoil from homesteads in a area that strecthed from eastern colorado to western Missouri (AkA The Dust Bowl). This event brought ideas of the end of the world or the second coming of christ.tens of thousands of refugees flee their homes to escape from the dusty plains. John steinbeck's best-selling novel grapes of wrath reflects the dust bowl and in some critics would say it was the Uncle Tom's Cabin of the dust bowl.

Battling Bankers and Big Business• The Hundred Days Congress passed

the “Truth in Securities Act”, which required promoters to transmit to the investor sworn information regarding the soundness of their stocks and bonds. This is the first major federal legislation to regulate the offer and sales of securities, something that was previously handled by state governments.

• The Securities and Exchange Commission was authorized in 1934, to protect the public from fraud, deception and inside manipulation. This made stock markets more like trading marts rather than casinos.

• The Public Utility Holding Company Act of 1935 prevented bloated growth in massive corporations, unless deemed economically needful.

The TVA Harnesses the Tennessee River• The electric-power industry came under

criticism from New Deal reformers, who believed they were charging excessive rates, even after receiving water-power sites from the public.

• A plan was created to give jobs to the 2.5 people living in poverty in the Tennessee River valley and also put a stop to the power monopoly. The Tennessee Valley Authority was established in 1933, to accomplish these goals.

• TVA tried to find a precise cost for the distribution of electricity, but many utility corporations claimed their low costs were a result of dishonest bookkeeping and the absence of taxes. Many felt this was a step towards socialism.

• The project resulted in full employment in the area, cheap electrical power, low-cost housing, abundant cheap nitrates, the restoration of eroded soil, reforestatioin, improved navigation, and flood control.

• The project’s success led to similar establishments across the nation, mostly in the west, allowing for a growth in the urban west, but none were federally guided like the TVA, because of the fear of socialism.

"Author! Author!" The Solution Site. 09 Mar. 2009 http://www.thesolutionsite.com/lesson/9458/lesson5.html.

The Eleanor Roosevelt Papers."Public Works Administration." Teaching Eleanor Roosevelt, ed. by Allida Black, June Hopkins, et. al. (Hyde Park, New York: Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site, 2003). http://www.nps.gov/archive/elro/glossary/pwa.htm [Accessed March 9, 2009].

"Eleanor Roosevelt - First Lady - Picture of Eleanor Roosevelt." Women's History - Comprehensive Women's History Research Guide. 09 Mar. 2009 http://womenshistory.about.com/od/firstladiesus/ig/First-Ladies-Picture-Gallery/Eleanor-Roosevelt.htm.

Happy Repeal Day!!!" Seven Trees. 09 Mar. 2009 http://seventrees.blogspot.com/2008/12/happy-repeal-day.html.November 2007." LUPEC Boston. 09 Mar. 2009 <http://lupecboston.blogspot.com/2007_11_01_archive.html>.

"Happy Repeal Day! «." Moody's Pen. 09 Mar. 2009 http://csmoody.wordpress.com/2008/12/05/happy-repeal-day/?referer=sphere_related_content/.

Lake Roosevelt NRA: The Story of the Columbia Basin Project (How It Developed)." National Park Service - Experience Your America. 09 Mar. 2009 <http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/dams/columbia_basin/sec8.htm>.

 "Malaspina Great Books - Ruth Fulton Benedict(1887)." Malaspina Global Portal - Home. 09 Mar. 2009 http://www.malaspina.org/benedictr.htm.

"National Recovery Administration: Information from Answers.com." Answers.com - Online Dictionary, Encyclopedia and much more. 09 Mar. 2009 http://www.answers.com/topic/national-recovery-administration.

"Portrait of Harold L. Ickes” © Bettmann/CORBIS, RM, Government, Harold Ickes, Head and shoulders portraits, People, Political leaders, Portraits." Stock photography, footage, rights: Corbis. 09 Mar. 2009 http://pro.corbis.com/search/Enlargement.aspx?CID=isg&mediauid=%7B5CE7AB24-0457-4778-80FC-78C834217B82%7D.

Works Cited

Works Cited (cont)

""MARY MCLEOD BETHUNE." African American History. 09 Mar. 2009 http://negroartist.com/MARY%20MCLEOD%20BETHUNE/index.html. "Rhetoric 3266 | Group Process, Team Building, and Leadership." CultureCat | Rhetoric and Feminism. 09 Mar. 2009 <http://culturecat.net/files/3266.html>. "Women in the Progressive Era." National Women's History Museum. 09 Mar. 2009 <http://www.nwhm.org/ProgressiveEra/legacy.html>.http://pro.corbis.com/images/BE034661.jpg?size=67&uid=%7B15EC45B8-5DF7-45AA-9280-388F54D48C25%7Dhttp://fitsnews.files.wordpress.com/2007/05/huey-p-long.jpg