AP American History Document Based Question

AP American History Document Based Question

“The New Deal accomplished a basic alteration in the terms of the social compact in the United States, creating a new set of relationships between workers and employers, rich and poor, small businessmen and bankers, the government and those it governed. The break with the past was seismic. America would never be the same.” Assess the validity of this statement using the documents and your knowledge of U S History.

Document A

“. . . . The truth is, we are all caught in a great economic system which is heartless. The modern corporation is not engaged in business as an individual. When we deal with it, we deal with an impersonal element, an immaterial piece of society. . . . Now do the workingmen employed by that stock corporation deal with that president and that board of directors? Not at all. . . . Can anybody bring them to account? It is next to impossible to do so. . . . And do our laws take note of this curious state of things? They do not. Our laws still deal with us on the basis of the old system . . . .

We used to think in the old-fashioned days when life was very simple that all that government had to do was to put on a policeman's uniform and say, “Now don't anybody hurt anybody else.” We used to say, that the ideal of government was for every man to be left alone and not interfered with, except when he interfered with somebody else; and that the best government was the government that did as little as possible. That was the idea that obtained in Jefferson's time. But we are coming now to realize that life is so complicated that we are not dealing with the old conditions, and that the law has to step in and create new conditions under which we may, live, the conditions which will make it tolerable for us to live. . . .” Woodrow Wilson, The New Freedom. Garden City. Doubleday, Doran, I913,7-8, 10-12, 19-20, 22-24.

Document B

“The Social Security Act, 1935,

SEC. 202. (a) Every qualified individual shall be entitled to receive, with respect to the period beginning on the date he attains the age of sixty-five. . . . an old-age benefit (savable as nearly as practicable in equal monthly installments) . . . .

SEC. 401. For the purpose of enabling each State to furnish financial assistance. . . . to needy dependent children, there is hereby authorized to be appropriated for each fiscal year. . . a sum sufficient to carry out the purposes of this title. The sums made available under this section shall be used for making payments to States which have submitted, and approved by the Board, State plans for aid to dependent children . . .”

SEC. 1001. For the purpose of enabling each State to furnish financial assistance . . . to needy individuals who are blind, there is hereby authorized to be appropriated for each fiscal year. . . . a sum sufficient to carry out the purposes of this title. . . .” U.S. Statutes at Large, XLIX (1935), 620.

Document C

“There is a crime here that goes beyond denunciation. There is a sorrow here that weeping cannot symbolize. There is a failure her that topples all our success. The fertile earth the straight tree rows, the sturdy trunks, and the ripe fruit. And children dying of pellagra must die because a profit cannot be taken from an orange. And coroners must fill in the certificates -died of malnutrition- because the food must rot, must be forced to rot.

The people come with nets to fish for potatoes in the river, and the guards hold them back; they come in rattling cars to get the dumped oranges, but the kerosene is sprayed. And they stand still and watch the potatoes float by, listen to the screaming pigs being killed in a ditch and covered with quicklime,watch the mountains of oranges slop down to a putrefying ooze; and in the eyes of the people there is the failure; and in the eyes of the hungry there is a growing wrath. In the souls of the people the grapes of wrath are filling and growing heavy for the vintage.” John Steinbeck, The Grapes of Wrath, 477.

Document D

“. . . . Our Republican leaders tell us economic law, sacred, inviolable, unchangeable, cause panics which no one could prevent. But while they prate of economic laws, men and women are starving. We must lay hold of the fact that economic laws are not made by nature. They are made by human beings . . . I pledge you, I pledge myself to a new deal for the American people . . . . It is inevitable that the main issues of this campaign should revolve about the clear fact of our economic condition, a depression so deep that it is without precedent in modern history. It will not do merely to state, as do Republican leaders to explain their broken promises of continued inaction, that the depression is world-wide. That was not their explanation of the apparent prosperity of1928. The people will not forget the claim made by them then that prosperity was only a domestic product manufactured by a Republican President and a Republican Congress. If they claim paternity for the one then they cannot deny paternity for the other.” FDR accepting Democratic nomination, July 2, 1932 New York Times, July 3, 1932.

Document E

“During the war we necessarily turned to the Government to solve every difficult economic problem. . . . To a large degree we regimented our whole people temporarily into a socialistic state. However justified in time of war if continued in peace time it would destroy not only our American system but with it our progress and freedom as well.

When the war closed, . . . We were challenged with a peace time choice between the American system of rugged individualism and a European philosophy of diametrically opposed doctrines, doctrines of paternalism and state socialism. The acceptance of these ideas would have meant the destruction of self-government through centralization of government. It would have meant the undermining of the individual initiative and enterprise through which our people have grown to unparalleled greatness.

The Republican Party. . . . restored the Government to its position as an umpire instead of a player in the economic game. For these reasons the American people have gone forward in progress while the rest of the world has halted, and some countries have even gone backwards . .

There has been revived in this campaign, however, a series of proposals which, if adopted, would be a long step toward. . . . the destructive operation of governmental conduct of commercial business. Because the country is faced with difficulty and doubt over certain national problems, that is, prohibition, farm relief and electrical power, our opponents propose that we must thrust Government a long way into the business which give rise to these problems. . . .

It is a false liberalism that interprets itself into the Government operation of commercial business. Every step of bureaucratizing of the business of our country poisons the very roots of liberalism, that is, political equality, free speech, free assembly, free press, and equality of opportunity. It is the road not to more liberty, but to less liberty.” Herbert Hoover, Speech in New York, October 22, 1928. New York Times, October 23, I928, i.

Document F

Agricultural Adjustment Act [1933]

“Sec. 2. It is hereby declared to be the policy of Congress

(1) To. . . . re-establish prices to farmers at a level that will give agricultural commodities a purchasing power with respect to articles that farmers buy, equivalent to the purchasing power of agricultural commodities in the base period. . . . [which] shall be the pre-War period, August1909-JuIy 1914. . . .

Sec. 8. In order to effectuate the declared policy, the Secretary of Agriculture shall have power -

(1) To provide for reduction in the acreage or. . . . in the production for market. . . . of any basic agricultural commodity. . . . The making of any such agreement shall not be held to be in violation of any of the anti-trust laws of the United States. . . .

Sec. 9. (a) To obtain revenue for extraordinary expenses incurred by reason of the national economic emergency there shall be levied processing taxes. . . . upon the first domestic processing of the commodity [which] shall be paid by the processor. . . .” U.S. Statutes at Large, XLVIII (1933), 31.

Document G

“The National Industrial Recovery Act [1933]. The Declaration of Policy below, indicates the purposes of the law.

Sec. I - A national emergency productive of widespread unemployment and disorganization of industry which burdens interstate and foreign commerce, affects the public welfare, and undermines the standards of living of the American people, is hereby declared to exist. It is hereby declared to be the policy of Congress to remove obstructions to the free flow of interstate and foreign commerce . . . . and to provide for the general welfare by promoting the organization of industry, for the purpose of cooperative action among trade groups, to induce and maintain united sanctions and supervision, to eliminate unfair competitive practices . . . to reduce and relieve unemployment, to improve standards of labor, and otherwise to rehabilitate industry, and to conserve natural resources.” U.S. Statutes at Large, XLVIII (1933), 195.

Document H

“National Labor Relations Act [1935]

SEC 1. . . . .The inequality of bargaining power between, employees, who do not possess full freedom of association or actual liberty of contract, and employers who are organized in the corporate or other forms of ownership association . . . . tend to aggravate recurrent business depressions by, depressing wage rates and the purchasing power of wage earners in industry, and by preventing the stabilization of competitive age rates and working conditions within and between industries.

SEC. 7. Employees shall have the right of self-organization, to form, join, or assist labor organizations, to bargain collectively through representatives of their own choosing, and to engage in concerted activities, for the purpose of collective bargaining or other mutual aid or protection.

SEC. 8. It shall be an unfair labor practice for an employer (1) To interfere with, restrain, or coerce employees in the exercise of the rights guaranteed in section 7. (2) To dominate or interfere with the formation or administration of any labor organization or contribute financial or other support to it. . . . (5) To refuse to bargain collectively with the representatives of his employees. . . .” U.S. Statutes at Large, XLIX (1935), 449-50.

Document I

“The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation was created in 1933 during the Great Depression, when many banks failed. The U. S. Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) protects depositors by insuring their bank accounts, up to $100,000. All national banks are required to belong, and most state banks are voluntary members. In 1989 the Resolution Trust Corporation (RTC) and the Savings Association Insurance Fund were formed under the FDIC to resolve or rescue troubled savings associations.” Time Magazine, May 16, 1993.

Document J

“The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is a federal agency whose purpose is to protect U.S. investors against malpractice in the securities and financial markets. Five commissioners are named by the president--subject to the approval of the Senate--to serve overlapping 5-year terms. The president selects one of the commissioners to serve as chairperson. No more than three may be members of the same political party. The SEC, in carrying out the mandates of the Securities Act of 1933, requires anyone offering stocks, bonds, or other securities for sale to file a registration statement with the SEC making "full and fair disclosure" of financial and other information relating to the issues involved. Companies must disclose the securities holdings of their officers and directors. The SEC also regulates securities exchanges and has the power to change the rules of the exchanges in the public interest. In addition, the SEC sets rules governing such activities as selling short, option trading, and floor trading.” Bibliography: Keller, E. C., and Arnold, J. L., SEC Guide (1992); Skousen, K. Fred, Introduction to the SEC, 4th ed. (1987).

Document K

“The term welfare state has been used since World War II to refer to the acceptance by democratic governments of the responsibility for the economic and social well-being of all their people. The programs of the welfare state have been aimed primarily at the alleviation of the hardships caused by unemployment, disability, and old age and the securing for all, regardless of income, of adequate medical care and other essential services. Despite opponents who claim that these services could be supplied by the private sector, welfare programs, have been deemed necessary. According to their supporters, modern industrial societies have become increasingly interdependent: persons on a family farm could rely on their own efforts to earn a living, but industrial workers are dependent on far-removed economic forces that influence demand for what they produce and over which they have no control. Also, industrialization and the social fabric have changed so abruptly that traditional social relationships--such as extended families, religious organizations, and neighbors accepting responsibility for helping each other in times of trouble--have been disrupted. The abilities of individuals, families, and local communities to provide sufficiently for their own needs have thus been lessened. The Social Security Amendments of 1965 added MEDICAID and MEDICARE, which are health insurance plans for low-income citizens and the elderly, respectively. . . The financing and implementation of such programs in the 1970s and 1980s called for constantly increasing taxes and massive administrative expansion with endless reports to be made and regulations to be complied with, a situation many considered excessively restrictive of private initiative and flexibility.” Aaron, Henry, On Social Welfare (1980).