The New Deal: Possible Conclusions

 

        The New Deal was essentially an opportunistic, non-revolutionary program which did not have any set philosophy by which it could be described. If FDR had any philosophy, it was simply that of pragmatism, of experimenting with anything to see whether it would work.

 

        The New Deal abandoned the faith that free competition and equality of opportunity alone would ensure social justice. Rather, social justice required the government to engage in positive social planning and stringent controls. Thus a new shift from opportunity and freedom to security and control.

 

The New Deal was a middle way between two extremes: laissez-faire capitalism/social economic Darwinism and communism. The New Deal was a series of reactions to the demands of reactionaries and radicals which cut the ground out from beneath “right” and “left” extremists. This is why some historians have argued that Roosevelt’s “patching up” of the capitalist system so it could effectively work again, makes him one of the greatest conservatives of the 20th century.

 

The New Deal whether viewed as conservative, “middle ground” , liberal, or radical left a number of consequences so that America would never be the same again:

 

1. A changed attitude about what the government’s role/responsibilities should be during a depression. Never again would the American people accept the notion that the government’s role was to do nothing. Henceforth, help for those effected and inducement of economic recovery were expected from the government.

 

2. Quite beyond the issue of complete economic collapse, the whole theory of laissez-faire - “that government governs best which governs least” - had been smashed. There emerged instead the concept of the welfare state that there is a certain decent standard of living for all Americans which the government should secure for them if need be.

 

3. #2 nurtured the growth of Big Government, increasing the power of the federal government at the expense of the states. With this came the growth of a huge and vast federal bureaucracy and its costs.

 

4. #1, #2, #3 indicate a shift in belief and attitude within the society that security, especially economic security, is desirable even if it sacrifices some freedom. Self reliance, rugged individualism, and personal liberty which Hoover and others championed, did not feed the family or restore the spirit of the American people when disaster struck. The effects or desirability of this change in the social and economic fabric of our society is THE DEBATE as we enter the 21st century.

 

5. The New Deal created “Power Bloc” politics. To counterbalance the influence and power of big business, the New Dealers appealed to Big Labor and Big Agriculture. Today’s politics reflect the influence of special interests in which the individual can no longer be very effective in protesting or promoting certain governmental policies or behavior.

 

6. #5 led to greater group conscientiousness and more political attention to submerged minority groups, especially blacks. Other ethnic minorities emerged as important pressure groups which could no longer be ignored. The New Deal greatly contributed to the attack on white Anglo-Saxon Protestant domination of the country which began in the 1950’s and has continued until today.