the Great Depression

• Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA)


  An ABC organization set up by FDR that paid farmers NOT to grow certain crops and cut back on livestock
• Bank Holiday

  FDR - closed all banks until gov. examiners could investigate their financial condition; only sound banks were allowed to reopen
• Black Tuesday

  October 29, 1929The day the stock market crashed signaling the start of the Great Depression.
• buying on margin


  paying a small percentage of a stock's price as a down payment and borrowing the rest
• Court Packing Scheme


  FDR's attempt to increase the number of Supreme Court justices from 9 to 15 so that his New Deal programs would not be declared unconstitutional.
• Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC)


  New Deal program that hired unemployed men to work on natural conservation projects
• Depression (historical)


  period when industry slows, prices & wages fall and unemployment rises
• Dust Bowl


  Region of the Great Plains that experienced a drought and ruined soil in 1930 lasting for a decade, leaving many farmers without work or wages.
• FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation)


  ABC organization by FDR. the government agency that insures customers' deposits if a bank fails
• Fireside chats by FDR

  informal talks given by FDR over the radio; sat by White House fireplace; gained the confidence of the people
• Hoovervilles


  Shanty towns that the unemployed built in the cities during the early years of the Depression; the name given to them shows that the people blamed Hoover directly for the Depression.
• New Deal


  A series of reforms enacted by the Franklin Roosevelt administration between 1933 and 1942 with the goal of ending the Great Depression.
• 3 R's of New Deal

  Relief, Recovery, Reform
• Securities & Exchange Commission (SEC)


  monitors the stock market and enforces laws regulating the sale of stocks and bonds
• Social Security Act

  (FDR) 1935, created a tax on workers and employers. That money provided monthly pensions for retired people.
• Causes of the Great Depression

  Tariffs, policies and War debt from WWI

  Crisis in farming sector

  Easy credit availability (1920's)

  Unequal distribution of wealth
• Overspeculation


  Means to over "guess." The majority of the people felt the stock market will go up, so they buy without thought of consequences
• Stock Market Crash

  The stock became very popular in the 1920's, then in 1929 in took a steep downturn and many lost their money and hope they had put in to the stock.
• Bank Failures - Great Depression

  The stock market crash caused over thousands of banks to fail; many Americans made a "run on the banks" only to find their savings and deposits gone forever. Over $140 billion is lost.
• Hoover and the Great Depression


  Believed the people could get out of the depression themselves and took a laissez faire approach, and volunteerism as a solution. Many Americans felt he did too little too late and blamed him with phases like "Hoovervilles" and "Hoover Flags."
• Huey Long


  As senator in 1932 of Washington preached his "Share Our Wealth" programs. Proposed taking money from large fortunes in country and distributing it giving every American family a comfortable income, assassinated.