How Did Hoover Deal With The Great Depression

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The horrific problems caused by the Great Depression in America needed to be solved. In 1932, a new president offered a different approach called the New Deal. This president was Franklin Delano Roosevelt. Roosevelt received 7 million more votes than Herbert Hoover, who failed to assist with the Great Depression. Roosevelt was extremely different to Hoover, which is what helped Roosevelt achieve the greatest presidential victory America had ever seen. Hoover took office shortly after the crash, therefore many Americans blamed him for it, and others blamed him for not doing enough to deal with the depression. Roosevelt promised a new deal for the American people and provided them with someone to trust and be confident in. Roosevelt was able …show more content…

In order to do this the government would need to create a demand for supplies, which would generate a need for jobs, therefore providing the people with money and making them consumers again. As well as this, the president would need to provide society with food, clothes and shelter. Hoover wasn’t improving the situation, which led to towns and cities running their own public relief programmes that organised temporary homes, food, clothes and jobs for the unemployed, although the money eventually ran out and thousands of families had relief funds cut. The situation worsened when 25,000 servicemen, who were promised a bonus payment of $500, marched to Washington DC and gathered in camps around the city. Hoover saw this as a revolutionary threat and called in the army who used tanks and tear gas, killing two veterans and injuring thousands. Despite Hoover making excuses for his actions, he became even more unpopular. Roosevelt managed to ameliorate the situation by using the radio to reach millions of Americans. He understood that American’s needed to trust and have confidence in his attempt at recovering the economy, hence why in these ‘fireside chats’, he explained why America had fallen into depression and how he was going to fix it. The successful broadcasts were able to relax the American public and clearly shows that Roosevelt’s response to the political challenges posed by the Great Depression was more effective than

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