• Understand the causes of the Great Depression, and assess its impact on various groups of Americans, including workers, farmers, and the middle class.

• Compare and contrast the political styles of Presidents Hoover and Roosevelt, as well as their approaches to dealing with the Depression.

• Characterize the New Deal, and explain how it evolved over time. Identify key pieces of New Deal legislation.

• Identify critics of the New Deal on the both the right and left, and discuss their arguments.

• Describe the impact of the election of 1936 on the nation’s political landscape.

• Outline the reasons for the emergence and success of the CIO.

• Understand the role of the Supreme Court in the 1930s, as well as the motivation behind and fallout from President Roosevelt’s "court-packing" scheme.

• Discuss the effect of the New Deal on workers, farmers, artists, African Americans, and regions like the South and West. Assess the legacy of the New Deal for the nation as a whole.

1929 Stock market crash.

1929–32 Herbert Hoover’s presidency.

1930 Smoot-Hawley tariff enacted.

1932 Bonus Army clashes with federal troops.

FDR defeats Hoover for president.

1932–45 Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s presidency.

1932–39 Dust storms.

1933 Unemployment nearly reaches 25 percent.

Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) passed.

Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) created.

National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) passed.

United States abandons gold standard.

1934 American Liberty League founded.

Upton Sinclair campaigns for governor of California.

Widespread labor unrest.

Father Coughlin founds the National Union for Social Justice.

Huey Long launches the Share Our Wealth movement.

1935 Huey Long assassinated.

Creation of the WPA.

Passage of the Wagner Act.

Passage of the Social Security Act.

Rural Electrification Administration created.

CIO founded.

Appearance of Charlie Chaplin’s Modern Times.

1936 FDR wins reelection in a landslide.

CIO launches sit-down strike at GM.

1937 FDR proposes Court-packing scheme.

Supreme Court upholds the Wagner Act.

Renewed economic slump.

1938 John Steinbeck publishes The Grapes of Wrath.

Antilynching bill fails in Congress.

Fair Labor Standards Act passed.

Republicans sweep midterm elections.