New Deal

I. FDR and American Democracy

1. New Deal Political Coalition (African-Americans and American politics; liberals and intellectuals; white ethnics; keeping the South solid)

2. Rose of Federal Government (origins of American welfare state; Keynsianism and WWII)

3. Change of Liberalism (Brinkley article; bureaucracy as fourth branch?; liberals and power of presidency?)

4. Reaction (Supreme Court and 1937 controversy; formation of Conservative Coalition)

II. The New Deal

1. The Election (FDR and national politics; FDR gubernatorial record—Frankfurter, appeal to progressives—regulation, taxation, public power; challengers—Smith, Garner, Baker; FDR, agriculture, and South; black migration and Democratic outreach to African-Americans—from DePriest to Mitchell in Chicago; ethnic voters, labor, and formation of CIO; South, Depression, and poverty; FDR and intellectuals—Frankfurter connection, NYC and DC journalists)

2. The Program (the FDR cabinet; FDR as administrator; 100 Days; three early New Deal tracks—federal spending programs—PWA, WPA, CCC; anti-monopoly revived—regulatory impulse, decline of business’ political clout, FDIC, SEC, “New Dealers” and legal realists, TVA, Glass-Steagall; associationalism—AAA and NRA)

3. Critics Left and Right (Huey Long and share-the-wealth; Charles Townsend and old-age pensions; old progressives and reconciling to new era; Smith and Liberty League; role of race; 1935-6: Long assassination; tackling the public utilities issue; Social Security, Wagner Act, and establishment of modern American welfare state; limits of FDR vision—temporary nature and Morganthau, eclectic management style)

III. FDR’s Constitution—and Backlash

1. The Court-Packing Scheme (Schecter v. U.S. (1935) and liberal concerns; Wagner Act and Social Security Act pending; 1936 and limitations of FDR agenda—defeating Landon; polls, Maine and Vermont; poor preparation and political coalition; proposal and opposition—significance of Wheeler defection; judicial fallout: West Coast Hotel v. Parrish (1937); role of Roberts; appointments power and transformation of Court—Black, Douglas, Frankfurter, Murphy; constitutional fallout—emergence of rights-related liberalism, Thurman Arnold and transformation of anti-monopoly rationale; political fallout—creation of “conservative coalition” and 1938 midterm elections)

2. FDR and Race (traditional view—importance of South, compromises to segregation, Eleanor Roosevelt and Marian Anderson; revisionist view—liberals, NAACP, and Justice Department; lower court appointments; seeding cases?)

3. War and American Society (foreign policy and decision for third term; Willkie nomination and GOP; federal spending—Keynsianism by default?; economic growth; draft and expansion of army; civil rights, FEPC, and A. Philip Randolph; significance of anti-Nazi war rhetoric; internment and Korematsu; war development and path to a fourth term)