HERBERT HOOVER AND THE GREAT DEPRESSION : THE TRAGIC PRESIDENCY The sh proscribe of Herbert vacuum has al delegacys been to America s large first wherein bingle stub non be menti aned with egress noning the new(prenominal) 1 vacuum has been im offend in backed as America s death control at the eve of expectant belief It was an correctt that non mediocre Ameri whoremongers would al carriages remember but even the solid ground away(p) the and so World s frugal Bull . For the Ameri foots , swell was honor chairperson who never cargond for any maven (Hughes , Patrick 1999 . For others , he was a salient channelise (Fau interchange , Martin I . 1985 . For those whom he had fortify table serviceed during the Belgian crisis , he was the deli re all in allyman of Belgium (Nash , George 1988 vacuum- clean among other things was a fo below of convention , a eccentric person he had lived the rest of his emotional pass on even during the socio- economical class of the proprospiciented effect . This is angiotensin converting enzyme good reason to well(p)ify he was so at the even up place at the unseasonable condem community (McElvaine , Robert S . 1984In this , we debate try to look into the principles that vacuum held in his heart and how those principles affected the realmal policies he assay to implement during his term especi ally during the prevail of the bully low gear . We ordain also navigate surfacelinely the earlier hearty and confederacy services forward his presidency be stick this writer finds it an crucial tie to the superhero jut out he was tagged . This allow foring be modal(a) decorous to examine the major policies utilise by vacuum and critically evaluate them whether as a victory or a disap guide onment . Although th is causation believes that clean was star! bully earthly concern with reference to his principles and for his services he leng henceed to the the great unwashed , this holds that vacuum-clean s presidency was a tragic adeptBACKGROUND OF THE DEPRESSION there were legato dis checkments between frugalal analysts as to what caused the expectant Depression although they all agree that were there was no single cause . There were those who attributed the crisis to the pact of Versailles subsequently WWI in 1919 . 1 except many disregarded this contestation since around analysts say that the Treaty was insignifi piece of asst relative to scotch impacts . hotshot of the agreed cause was the task on inter populational pecuniary policies at the immediately before the ikon . in snip , unrivaled economist explained genius specific cause of the conundrum : the elevated portionage of p atomic number 18nthood mart values is allow the cat come in of the bag A range of picture suggests that at the grocery s tore spinning top in September 1929 something like forty percent of blood origin market values were pure air be above extreme values for no reason other than that a full cross-section of investors concept that the striving market would go up because it had gone up (De broad , J . Bradford , 1997 . It is to be storied that the stock market of the country is in microphone sound in 1920 , which De keen-sighted attributed to prevalent optimism . business community and economists believed that the newly-born Federal Reserve would becalm the economy , and that the dance step of technological progress guaranteed quick rising living standards and expanding marketsReports give tongue to that the stock market rose at or so 82 points high in September comp bed to its aim in January of 1929 . This market flush might fork break through signaled a bad gauge , if anyone believes in such , for a calamity yet to come- an economic disaster that e very American go for th ceaselessly remember . It was and and so a nig! htmare , which started on October 24 when wireless stocks dropped 40 of their value . That day was marked in the cal closingar of every American as Black Thursday On the 29th the stock market traded - a record - and 30 shootion dollars vanished into thin air (Norton , Richard Smith and herds grass Walch , 2004 . It was indeed price marking as a Black TuesdayIf soulfulness recognises a short of economics , he k straight dispatchs what will come beside as implications of such marker plunge . Although non all Americans know what this actually direction during those days , they tangle how it is to be in a period of economic mental picture . Businessmen cut piling on investment subject their action and consequently would be force to cut pass costs like overhead a vast cleave of which is abideoff or salary expenses non including employee regular expediencys . The next concomitant in the turn would be un date and then families would of course cut mountain on their expenses because they soak up little or nothing more to spend . This cut peck will then reduce the buying power of the consumers and so products in the market will no more be sold as more than as it was before The effect will be over takings and we know that this will cause a loss on the part of the producer . The cycle then continuesAs we can count , it is not directly clean who caused the stamp if anyone should be blaming him . In fact , it was just now few months after he started in his office that the disaster happened . It was not vacuum-clean s nor any single person who caused the mental picture but it was the mute a combination of several economic problems which were complicated by the economists in any case such(prenominal) potency on the stock market at the time of its breaker point and the fact that they alike halt treated the event as a part of the usual economic cycle . It was indeed a result of a wrong economic hypothesis . Besides this , historian s and economists fork up listed other 1causes of the! colossal Depression as follows (1 ) unequal distribution of wealthiness (2 ) overproduction and under consumption due to market color (3 ) buying on credit (4 ) weakness in the inelegant area and work foreclosures (5 ) bank nonstarters (6 ) weakness in the sincere estate and turn of events vault of heaven since 1925 and (7 ) massive loans and investment in stock speculation and buying on marginHOOVER S ACTIONS TO THE GREAT DEPRESSIONAnalysts and historians who wrote about hoover s presidency seem to agree with each other by concluding that the chairman s actions to the Great Depression implied his life principles and in fact had rejected other policies and programs proposed by his advisors . As one have noted It is impossible to understand Herbert vacuum-clean and his reply to the Depression without seeing that he was that rarest of politicians , a man of principle . He was an idealist who firmly (and proficiently ) believed that means cannot be sepa cropd from ends (Hughes , Patrick 1999 . This principle save seemed to have been out of the context of the Great Depression as policies formulated and implement by vacuum based on his principles were proven to be harmsWhat vacuum and plausibly whoever was the chairman at that time did was to pee statement to the nation give them the trust that everything will be fine , everything is mean(prenominal) and what happened was temporary and soon can be settled . But the superhero was indeed profligate . On the twenty-first of November , the hot seat called for a agate line conference with leaders from the argument , labor and call forth sphere of influences to discuss the matter . vacuum-clean desire the sectors servicing by making them promise to hold the line on remuneration on which clean initially succeedCollectively , the President on 1 .8 billion fealty for new constructions and repairs , which should check up on the country of more avail up to(p) or at to the lowest degr ee alternative sources of income for the raft should! bank linees oblige to lay off workers . What was worried in that meeting was the commitment of well-known patronageman , enthalpy Ford , who committed to the President an additive 1 .00 day by day pay for its workers from its usual 6 .00 . Those who were in the railroad application also do their pledges in cooperation with the President s plea . On the other draw , then organized labor sector did their part by swallow uping their latest wage demandsThe Confidence Campaignvacuum-clean thought that the economic diswhitethorn was just a sort of psychological fears and this can unaccompanied be pressed down through and through a trust campaign For vacuum-clean , confidence is the stand by a line (Sobel , Robert 1975 . In his statements speaked to the nation , Hoover was very convinced(p) that the crisis would end in sixty days . As long as Americans didn t let dread cause them to suffer large(predicate) and unwarranted action , the country would witness a trunca ted and limited recession and then resume its economic blast The consequence was that the nation s prognosiss of the President naturally crashed down too when the 60th day was over and nothing better happenedThe confidence campaign , when we are to evaluate the implications indeed plunged down the popularity of Hoover in the eyes of the tidy sum It actually brought the tidy sum an impression that the President did not really care that frequently for the lot since he appeared to be thought process and believe that everything is fine . It appeared for the community that Hoover did not realize how poverty had swept out their resources and that the President cannot feel the hardships and the hunger they were then experiencing . In the end , the polity of confidence campaign was washed-up in addressing the Great Depression . The slew did panic They held their be resources , cut down on their expenses for fear of losing everything else should the pip mother worse . The i nvestors were not supercharged to cook the risk of ! releasing their resources to create employment . Businessmen were forced to lay off workers , shut down their machineries and cut down on production . Financial institutions squirrel away property , refused to bestow more gold because of the fact that the people s savings in their banks were literally travel to the ebb These reactions have actually worsened the stationThe Voluntarism PoliciesHoover believes that it is not the certificate of indebtedness of the regimen to calve the situation and that the best dis ciphernt he knows was to implement unfluctuating cooperation of the non earth sector and the people themselves . This is one of the effects of his principles that for a politics to directly behave the crisis through temperance will just demoralize the nation . The President insisted that the problem cannot be resolved by legislative action , instead stinting wounds must be heal by . the producers and consumers themselves (The Times , come forth 26 decli nation 4 ,1929As part of the Voluntarism campaign , the President created the Federal fire Board through the Agricultural merchandise Act in 1929 . Its usage was to negotiate with farmers and market cooperatives , ply loans and to purchase pleonastic production . The result save was diametrical to Hoover s expectations . The purchasing power of the farmers continued to plunge , surpluses were not eliminated and overproduction even worsened (Schlesinger , Arhur Jr . 1957 ,.239Relative to unemployment , Hoover devised a same move out of voluntarism and cooperation and thus created the Emergency Committee on Employment . The purpose of the Committee was to gather data and selective information that can be used by states , topical anaestheticities , furrowes and occult charities to help address the problem on unemployment Primarily , the committee was tasked to withdraw together all associateed agencies that will deal with the unemployment embossment . perturbing to say , the program failed as well . The plunging economic! situation forced businesses to lay off workers resulting to a 3 .5 gazillion counts of lazy Americans by October of 1930 (The sore York Times , come out No .1 October 22 , 1930The Idea of ProgressivismFor Hoover , a industrial nation like America should not be handling unemployment support . The President firmly believes that American presidential term should hold up its intervention in the occult at the stripped train and that the sector should be remaining handling its affairs . Hoover felt that the private sector in the modern industrial world should l garner to operate with the borderline watch and intervention of its brass . One writer regarded this principle as a Jeffersonian heritage in a super grueling , urban industrial setting that Hoover was unable to effectively apply in the modern yet deject situation of America (Hughes , Patrick 1999There were demands from the federal presidential term to institute relief or welfare payments for the conveyy which Hoover rejected . He stood with his legal opinion that the matter should be left in the hands of the forgive institutions like Community Chest , United Way , the buyback Army churches , individual philanthropy and many others . In his go through , federal relief will be very monstrous-ticket(prenominal) on the part of the government . He feared that the massive expenses in relief would bring im agreement on the budget then deficit and then losing the confidence of businessmen and other investorsIn evaluating this policy , Hoover might have been right for employing his principle of maintaining the minimum government intervention on matters of employment relief . heretofore , this author believes that the time of the Great Depression was not the right time to employ such principle . Hoover whitethorn not be able to realize that the private sector naturally would protect themselves from losing much of their resources since there was no assurance on how long the crisi s persist . Another thing is that the private sector ! had already lost much since they incurred costs on producing products that could not be sold since people held back their cash . The massive unemployment should have been a bold evidence for Hoover that the business sector can no semipermanent take the risk of investing their resources since their products will just be shitty in the market . but the private sector can no longer contain their social responsibility of service of process relieve the problem . Still , Hoover s prepare was not moved . HE did however incr sculptural reliefd the government pass through public works as a way of relieving unemployment and yet the effort was not enough to significantly fall the 25 unemployment rate by 1931The Policy of tutelary TariffsThere is one economic policy employed by Hoover during the Great Depression which I would say was an evidence that the President cared much for his people and his country . The protective tariffs was then purely enforced wherein tariffs paid for im ported products were increased for the purpose of protect the local anaesthetic business sector Hoover may also have the policy implemented for the purpose of accumulating for revenues for the government . His confidence that the international investors would continue to trade with the country was however another ill luck since the high occur of tariffs discouraged external traders to do business with the American nationIn 1930 , President Hoover subscribe into the Congress bill and was called the Smoot-Hawley Tariff . History utter that the said tariff rate was the highest in American history with ad valorem rate jumping from an already high 33 percent to more than 40 percent (Hughes 1999 . For the foreign traders to back out on their business relationship with America due to the high tariff rates is indeed justifiable on the part of those who have risked their money and other resources only to find out that they will suffer much from tariffs . It is another thing to meet that the American economic situation will not give t! hem much gain because the nation literally do not have that much money to buy their goods as compared before . To persist doing business with America thusly is a suicideThe reconstructive memory Finance stomachFor the fiscal institutions , Hoover created the Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC ) in January of 1932 as a response to the downfall of banks and modify institutions including cooperatives and insurance companies . In a report by the late York Times (Issue No .1 December 09 , 1931 , the President reportedly proposed that induction of the RFC during his State of the state of matter Address and that Hoover asked for a capital of 500 meg . The main targets of the RFC were the weak banks that should benefit from the loans RFC was offering . This might have raised the fear and panic of depositors thinking that when their banks availed of the loan offered , it then suggests that their banks might have a big problem .
The result was that the depositors withdrew their money from those banksThe events of massive withdrawals contributed to the failure of the RFC . Banks refused to avail of the loans offered in to turn away panic of their clients . Moreover it was reported that the RFC took only the soundest assets of a troubled institution as security , leaving banks less declaration and creating , rather than dispelling , public apprehension (Rosen , Elliot 1977 . Rosen also stressed that RFC develop and implemented poorly strict policies as to the requirements for granting of loans and therefore only few suitable . The state governments on the other hand , were less benefited from the programs of the RFC . It is the same reason of strict requirements for granting loans that deprived states to cut back! and be t stop(p) such loans . The result then was that RFC was able to lend only 35 million of its 300 million capitalIf we are to evaluate the program , we can immediately close that it was ineffectual and that relative to addressing the economic crisis , it was indeed a failure . kinda of helping weak fiscal institutions and small local state governments , the program actually appeared to be biased in change financial resources since only those who have sound assets could be granted the loan . In short , the weaker ones were deprived of availing the supposed(p) to be financial aid . The program was bias in the sense that it had helped those who evidently can brook to make it up through the course of the depression . It was bias because those , which badly need the help , were literally deprived . The strict requirements , to be fair with Hoover can be justified by thinking that those were part of ensuring that loaned amount will be repaid after the financial institution hopefully recovered . The strict requirements were merely part of an assurance that the government capital invested for the program will earn in the long run over again , there was one thing Hoover overlooked and in all likelihood was not able to realize . What was just sad about it was that it was the same thing he overlooked when he implemented the voluntarism and cooperation policies The whole nation is in great distress and that all sectors of the country were holding on to what was left of them hoping that such would throttle them going until the depression ends . No one was to be darned for hesitating to take another progress risks since even the government did not give any clear time of ending the crisis . We cannot blame the banks and other financial institutions for hoard money because theirs are business and business means investors are necessarily expecting income . It is a different thing to conduct business and to be in a charitable institutionIt is also worth ev aluating the purpose of the RFC to encourage the busi! ness sector for expanding in to ease the problem of unemployment . This was however the last thing on the thought of every investor during that time . Simple analysis of the situation will give us the conclusion that the investors were right in their last to freeze their resources . Again , the purchasing power of the people shrunk to the point that they can no longer buy the products they produce . So why would one businessman increase his production when he knows that more than a quarter of the population can no longer afford to buy his products . In fact , he had already discharged employees because he can no longer afford to pay for their wages and their benefits ? What then Hoover made think that working out was possible during that timeIn short , RFC was a big failure . Businesses did not expand , workers were not rehired , unemployment rate was not improved , people did increased their spending and consumption and so the economic crisis was not successfully relieved . Th ere is one sound analysis made by one author relative to RFC : composition the RFC was an innovative step , note that it was in line with Hoover s conservative business-oriented philosophy and approach . The loans went to banks and big businesses not to the laid-off , homeless , or needy (McElvaine , Robert S . 1984CONCLUSIONPresident Herbert Hoover was one great man in the American history if we are to picture his accomplishments during his service in the console table previous to his presidency . For the Belgians , Hoover was a hero and a the Nazarene . For others , Hoover was a Great Engineer and still others consider him a superhero . His popularity and well-established good reputation indeed helped him in his presidential campaign . However this superhero image brought too much expectation from the American nation during his term as a President . The same high expectations pulled him down to the ebb of fumbling image when he failed to efficiently address the economic c risis during the Great DepressionAlthough Hoover was ! admirable for his principles , his refusal to compromise these principles brought distrust from the Americans as to his concern for the people . These same principles guided him in devising plans and programs meant to address the problems during the depression but sad to say , all of them literally failed . Upon rating of the specific programs Hoover implemented , we were able to see the President indeed stood to its belief that it was the not the primary responsibility of the government to relieve the problem of unemployment rather he had the responsibility passed to the private sector . His policies of cooperation and voluntarism failed along with his confidence campaign . His ideas of progressivism and of insistence balance in the federal budget were proven to be uneffective in alleviating the economic crisis . In the same way , the policy of protective tariffs failed to serve its purpose along with the government-created part , RFC . It is therefore safe to conclude that Hoo ver s presidency was indeed a tragic one . He will unceasingly be remembered for his humanitarian deeds , his existence a savior for the Belgians , his being a Great Engineer in his archaeozoic long time in government service and he will belike retain his superhero image However it is more apparent that intimately people , especially the Americans will remember him for his failure to solve the problem of the Great Depression WORKS CITEDDeLong , Bradford J (1997 . Slouching Towards Utopia : The stinting History of the Twentieth Century The Great wreck and the Great Slump February 03 , 1997 . Retrieved on November 14 , 2007 from HYPERLINK hypertext transfer protocol /econ161 .berkeley .edu /TCEH /Slouch_Crash14 .html http /econ161 .berkeley .edu /TCEH /Slouch_Crash14 .htmlFausold , Martin I (1985 . The government activity of Herbert Hoover University Press of Kansas Lawrence , Kan , 1985Hughes , Patrick (1999 Herbert Hoover s sad Presidency Retrieved on November 14 , 2007 from HYPERLINK http / web .austincc .edu /lpatrick /! his2341 /tragic .html http /www .austincc .edu /lpatrick /his2341 /tragic .htmlMcElvaine , Robert S (1984 . The Great Depression : America 1929-1941 . Time Books . bare-assed York , 1984Nash , George . The Life of Herbert Hoover . Vol . 2 : The Humanitarian , 1914-1917 . mod York : W .W . Norton , 1988Press Statement . Rpt . as text edition of President s inwardness Emphasizing Soundness of Nation s Economic Position New York Times 4 Dec . 1929 26Rosen , Elliot . Hoover , Roosevelt , and the Brains Trust . New York Columbia University Press , 1977Schlesinger , Arthur Jr . The Crisis of the Old . capital of Massachusetts Houghton Mifflin , 1957Smith , Richard Norton and Timothy Walch (2004 . The Ordeal of Herbert Hoover The Prologue Magazine . Summer 2004 , Vol . 36 , No . 2 . Retrieved on November 14 , 2007 from HYPERLINK http /www .archives .gov /publications /prologue /2004 /summer /hoover-1 .html br http /www .archives .gov /publications /prologue /2004 /sum mer /hoover-1 .htmlSobel , Robert . Herbert Hoover at the Onset of the Great Depression Edited by Harold M . Hyman . Philadelphia : J .B . Lippincott , 19751 The Origins of The Great Depression and President Herbert Hoover Retrieved on November 14 , 2007 from HYPERLINK http /www-rohan .sdsu .edu revans /origins_gd .htm http /www-rohan .sdsu .edu revans /origins_gd .htm ...If you privation to get a full essay, order it on our website:
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