New Deal Strengths And Weaknesses

The United States was born and grew at a rapid state and the growth expanded the nation’s size in land, politics, and the economy. However, every great nation eventually falls. In 1929, the United States economy fell to its knees and began to disintegrate. America’s economy had multiple setbacks, but they were merely bumps on the road for an event no American anticipated. The economy itself had multiple weaknesses and can be seen as the causes of the economic crash and the Great Depression; with bad distribution of income, bad corporation structure, bad banking structure, dubious state of foreign balance, and poor state of economic intelligence America’s economy completely crashed on October 1929. The decrease of consumer purchase, produce over pilling and the mass trading of stocks and shares starting on Black Thursday and finally on Black Tuesday the millions of shares became worthless. Black Tuesday was the very

beginning of the economic crash and America entered a down spiral of events leading to the Great Depression. For ten years American citizens left were financially unstable and unemployed. During these ten years, Franklin D.

Roosevelt attempted reforms and restoration of the crippled American nation known as the New Deal. The New Deal is criticized by two history professors that develop arguments to claim whether the New Deal prolonged the Great Depression or assisted the United States.

History professor Gary Dean Best develops an argumentative claim which he states Roosevelt’s New Deal prolonged the Great Depression. In Best’s article, “Pride, Prejudice and Politics: Roosevelt Versus Recovery, 1933-1938”, Best uses multiple perspectives during the eight years of weakness in order to achieve his goal to make his claim. According to Best he does not only look at the individual social programs and reforms, but the after effects of these programs and sees failure, “with the failure of the United States to recover from the depression during the eight peacetime years that he and his policies governed the nation. I consider that failure tragic…but also because of the image that the depression-plagued United States projected to the world at

a crucial time in international affairs” (Best 254). The author sees this failure as a disgrace to the United States and created a negative image during a time where America needed to be the leader for democracy and international affairs. His standpoint clearly is how can America be a leading nation when it cannot help itself in such crippling times? He looks at the idea of WWII being the savor of America since according to Keynesian. Keynesian thesis states, WWII forced Roosevelt to spend to the amount where it allowed economic recovery, but Best sees this as a mere excuse. He criticizes Roosevelt for being incapable of being a chief executive and did not stimulate business. The belief of Roosevelt and the New Deal uplifting American spirts and financial stability has been introduced continuously throughout History and just like Best says, “Such textbooks (and those in college, too) frequently contain a chapter on the Great Depression, followed by one on the New Deal, the implication being that somewhere early in the second of the chapters the depression was ended by Roosevelt’s policies” (257). The idea of Roosevelt being the savior during the Great Depression has been repeated over and over again and the New Deal within textbooks give only a generalizations of the years of depression. Best believes this idea has been spoon fed to Americans and even historians and leaves Roosevelt to be praised. Best makes a call to action for his fellow historians to reconsider the New Deal and to reexamine history in order to evaluate if the Great Depression was prolonged, “We can only speculate concerning the possible alteration of events from 1937 onward had the United States faced the world with the economic strength and military potential it might have displayed had wiser economic policies prevailed from 1933 to 1938” (259).