22.1 Launching the New Deal
1. Roosevelt understood his mandate to be that he must help bring hope and reassurance to the people of America. Franklin D. Roosevelt sought to embark on a economic recovery program by strengthening the federal government which helped to intervene in the national economy in order to bring a halt to the economic crisis. Most importantly he was trying to instill hope to the working class, offering them his plans concerning the New Deal which was quite popular even though it was vague in description during the 1932 election.
2. Many voters were reassured by Roosevelt’s speech because he won support from the “solid South” and the increasingly large urban ethnic population. His democratic platform was a sharp contrast of that of the Republican who had trouble defending failed policies and strategies. Roosevelt worked to help the working class by offering to form up programs that would help produce jobs and help bring order back to the economy.
3. Roosevelt’s opponents might have been uneasy about the nation’s future under his leadership due to his vague details about the programs he offered to form up. Another reason opponents might have been uneasy is that Roosevelt planned to strengthen the federal government, allowing it to intervene in the national economy to help bring about order to the economic crisis.
22.2 Radicalism on the Left
1. Long’s criticisms of Roosevelt were not entirely unfair, and held much truth behind his critique of Roosevelt. He saw the New Deal to be too timid, and felt that Roosevelt had not been true to his word because of the increase in unemployment and the increase in money to the big men. Long feels that in order to fix what Roosevelt hasn’t the nation must come together to try to even out the playing fields for business men, while helping the poor get out of poverty.
2. The assumptions that lay behind Long’s program are that just about everything Roosevelt promised to fix hasn’t been done. He...