World War 1, New Deal, and Woman in the 1900,1920s. and 1930s - Essay Example

History and Political Science 22 March New Deal Franklin D. Roosevelt, a visionary politician, understood the need for radical measures to create an effective anti-crisis mechanism as well as the need to carry out social reforms that could halt the development of the protest movement in America. Roosevelt, with the help of his closest advisers, nicknamed the Brain Trust, prepared the social program which included reforming of the administrative and partly judicial power, economic planning and legislative regulation of economic relations. He explained the main objective of the New Deal in a speech to the electorate – it was a more equitable distribution of wealth and goods. The new course was formed from a number of legislative and administrative measures. Some of them were expected to fight the current crisis and some to act long term. In general, they formed a new regulatory system of social and economic relations. The new policy can be divided into four major blocks: measures to stabilize the financial system; measures to improve the situation in production sector and agricultural industry; labor and social legislation. The New Deal economic policy was aimed at the recovery of the fully unbalanced banking and financial system. For this purpose, Congress passed the Emergency Banking Relief Act (March 9, 1933), which granted the President broad powers in the financial sector. All the accounts of banks in the country were blocked to audit them in detail. The President got the right to monitor international financial operations, to confiscate gold from private ownership. Exchange of bank notes for gold was stopped. The state started to control banks’ gold reserves. The government devalued the dollar (in January 1934 to 14%). The number of banks was reduced by one fifth. The government strictly limited the banks. The Glass-Steagall Act (1933) prohibited the banks from combining deposit and investment functions. State deposit insurance was introduced in all the banks (up to five thousand dollars). The National Industrial Recovery Act was passed on 16 June 1933 and is the most significant legislation of the New Deal. It was enacted to provide general welfare, fight poverty, improve cooperation between workers and employers, eliminate and solve labor disputes and destructive competition leading to lower profits and reduced investment. It introduced the so-called Codes of Fair Competition - the special guidance documents for branches of industry, which were formulated by entrepreneurs and sanctioned by the President. All antitrust laws temporarily ceased to be effective and the government could cartelize companies by force. The codes also contained the rules of pricing, production, sale of goods and terms of employment in the industry. The norms of minimum wage per hour and maximum working hours (44 hours) were set. That was the most fundamental turn in the history of legal regulation of the U.S. economy. The New Deal’s agricultural policy was embodied primarily in the Agricultural Adjustment Act. A special administrative authority was created to regulate agriculture and balance supply and demand for agricultural products, raise their prices. For this purpose, a uniform percentage acreage reduction was introduced along with the compensation for raw land, which was harmful for the small farms. At the same time large-scale commercial farms received most of the premium payments and could, thereby, intensify production and get a considerable profit. The federal social insurance programs were introduced. The Social Security Act of 1935, for the first time in the U.S., guaranteed unemployment benefits and old-age pension. The next step was to reduce unemployment and its negative effects. Those activities were supervised by the Federal Emergency Relief Administration. The National Labor Relations Act (1935) officially proclaimed, for the first time in U.S. history, the recognition of trade unions and also provided legal guarantees for these rights. Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 set maximum working hours for some groups of workers and the minimum wage. The New Deal stabilized the economy to a certain extent but had a limited effect. The new crisis occurred in 1937. However, the New Deal policies led to the formation of the new economic and socio-political foundations in the United States, laid the basis for state regulation of social and economic relations for decades. Since then, improvement of the methods for state regulation of economy and social relations, like the active policy in the field of budgeting and crediting, aimed at ensuring sustainable level of demand, production and employment, has become the leading trend of the evolution of American capitalism. World War I All the attempts to achieve peace in Europe on terms acceptable to the United States and all the U.S. mediation attempts ended in a fiasco. So, Wilson hoped to win the objective by making a military contribution to the victory over Germany. Two of his main goals were set before the U.S. entered the war and became apparent during 1917-1918. They were confined to restoration of stability in Europe and creation of the League of Nations, which was planned to ensure peace and serve as an effective instrument for international development. America immediately increased economic and military assistance to the Allies and organized the expeditionary force which had to enter the fighting on the Western Front. According to the conscription, approved by the U.S. Congress on 18 May 1917, a million men aged from 21 to 31 years were called up for military service. Gen. John J. Pershing was appointed Commander-in-Chief of the AEF and vigorously set about organizing the armed forces. In the beginning of March 1918 the Allies contained the powerful German spring offensive campaign. By the summer, with the support of the American reinforcements, they were able to begin a counteroffensive. The U.S. Army has played a significant role in the defeat of Germany, successfully acting against the Saint-Mihiel penetration force and taking part in the overall offensive blow of the allied forces. For the sake of efficient organization of the logistics structure, Wilson asserted unprecedented government control over the economy. The Federal Control Act of March 21, 1918, consolidated, nationalized and subordinated all the railways of the country to William McAdoo. The specially formed railroad administration was to eliminate the competition and ensure strict coordination of activities. The War Department was given power to control enterprises in order to stimulate production and avoid unnecessary duplication. Herbert Hoover, head of the Food Administration, guided by the Food and Fuel Control Act, fixed prices for wheat at the highest level. To increase army food supplies he introduced the so-called “no wheat and no meat” days. Harry Garfield, head of the Federal Fuel Administration, also took strong measures to distribution of fuel. In addition to the large costs for its own military machine, the U.S. provided huge loans to the Allies, so that in the period between December 1916 and June 1919 their total debt was up to 24 262 million dollars. Such expenses were possible only thanks to the Liberty bonds issue. Another serious flaw in Wilson’s domestic policy was his inability to protect civil liberties - war hysteria in the country resulted in the prosecution of German- Americans, members of the anti-war groups and other dissidents. In January 1918, Wilson presented to Congress his 14 Points - a general declaration of American objectives in the war. The declaration was to recover international stability and called for the establishment of the League of Nations. That program differed largely from the military objectives approved previously by the Entente Powers and included in a series of secret treaties. In October 1918 Central European countries addressed a peace proposal to Wilson directly. Germany agreed to make peace on the terms of Wilson’s program. The president sent Colonel House to Europe to obtain the consent of the Allies. House successfully fulfilled his mission and on November 11, 1918, Germany signed the armistice agreement. Despite all preliminary agreements the differing points of view of Europe and America were obvious. It made clear that any post-war negotiations will lead to serious contradiction. Another problem was the actual disintegration of the old Europe. During the peace negotiations, Wilson was mostly focused on the creation of the League of Nations. To achieve the goal, he agreed to a number of compromises concerning, in particular, war indemnity and territorial issues, hoping to solve them in the future League. The Treaty of Versailles of 28 June, 1919, was the culmination of his political career. But in 1918, after the Republican victory in the elections, the internal political tensions escalated. Senator Lodge led the movement against the League of Nations. He and his supporters threatened to wreck its ratification. The supporters of the League were suddenly weakened, when Wilson, who has made an exhausting propaganda tour in support of the peace treaty, got seriously ill in the midst of the debate. It was clear that the U.S. Senate will not approve the treaty without corrections, but Wilson refused to compromise and the Senate rejected it twice. Therefore, formally the United States remained at war until July 2, 1921, when Congress finally adopted the joint resolution which officially announced the end of the war. Women Women’ rights movement in the early 20th century was an international phenomenon but nature and forms of the movement, as well as its rhetoric, were determined by specific socio-political conditions, cultural and historical traditions of society. At that moment the concern was not natural but mainly social rights of women, the right to liberty, equality, and fraternity. The struggle for women’s rights was conducted on many fronts: the suffragettes were active in advocating political and legal equality of women; socialists defended the idea of ??equal pay for equal work of women and women’s participation in trade unions; radical feminists promoted the idea of conscious motherhood and birth control; new women’s charities appeared which were the base for Christian feminism. All of these activities, each in its own way, helped women to get used to their new role as a subject of history. As a result of these slow changes in the 19th - first half of the 20th century women gained the right to education and equal remuneration. Later they got voting right and the right to be elected, at first to local, then to the top echelons power; the right to join trade unions and political parties; the right to divorce; in some places the right to use contraceptives and get abortion; state pregnancy aid and maternity leave, etc. So, slowly and gradually the shifts was marked in social relationship of gender. The struggle for emancipation was due to structural changes in society and, above all, to a significant increase of female labor in social production. The Women’s Trade Union League was established in 1903 to help its representatives to struggle for better working conditions. The League supported all strikes with women’s participation and provided substantial assistance to the strikers protecting the rights of arrested, organizing pickets, free kitchens and paying social allowance. Thanks to the League the U.S. Congress authorized the detailed study on the situation of working women and children. The 19 volume report was written and studied from 1908 to 1911. This led to the founding of the Women’s Bureau of the U.S. Department of Labor in 1920. Women are slowly but surely gained their rights. During World War I the movement practically ceased its activities. But in 1925 the Joint Standing Committee of the Women’s International Organizations was created to assert human rights for women. The decline of the women’s movement in the U.S. and Europe was conditioned by acquisition of voting rights and increase in female employment. It becomes more active only after the end of World War II. It took centuries to proclaim equal rights for citizens regardless of gender in the developed countries of Europe and America. Works cited Reeves, Thomas. Twentieth-Century America: A Brief History. New York: Oxford University Press, 2000. Read More