The Twenties:  A Decade of Turmoil

Twenties Introduction

The “Roaring Twenties” was a decade in which nothing big happened—there were no major catastrophes or large events—at least until the stock market crash of 1929—yet it is one of the most significant decades in U.S. history because of the great changes that came about in American society.  The Twenties were known by various images and names:  the Jazz Age, the age of the Lost Generation, flaming youth, flappers, radio and movies, bathtub gin, the speakeasy, organized crime, confession magazines, Hemingway and Fitzgerald, Charles Lindbergh, Babe Ruth, Bobby Jones, the Great Crash, Sacco and Vanzetti, Al Smith, cosmetics, Freud, the “new” woman, the Harlem Renaissance, consumerism—all these images and more are part of the fabulous Twenties!

The 1920s provided something of a roller coaster ride for the American people.  The euphoria surrounding the end of World War I was clouded by the great flu epidemic of 1919, the Red Scare of that year, and the frustration and bitterness left over from the fight over the ratification of the Treaty of Versailles.  The progress made toward reform under progressive Presidents Roosevelt and Wilson slowed to a crawl, as many Americans began to feel the need for a break from the moral intensity of the Progressive Era.

Demobilization from World War I proceeded more or less haphazardly.  Thousands of troops were discharged as the army was reduced to its prewar size.  The shipbuilding program was halted, and naval cargo vessels were sold to private shipping firms.  Railroads were returned to private control, although the ICC was strengthened to make them both more responsive to people’s needs and more efficient.  A period of labor strikes and race riots was followed by a business recession early in the decade.  Recovery resumed in a pro-business environment under three successive Republican administrations, and consumerism reached new heights as the age of advertising and credit buying advanced full bore.

Cultural conflicts and reactionary attitudes toward immigrants revealed deep differences among different segments of the population.  A golden age of radio, film, and sports was offset by the resurgence of the Ku Klux Klan and struggles to make Prohibition work.  In the latter part of the decade the stock market began to soar to unheard-of heights, and speculators pumped more and more cash, much of it borrowed, into increasingly inflated stocks.  When the inevitable crash came, reverberations were felt around the world, and the country was soon plunged into its worst depression in history.

Though the Twenties was a decade of enormous social change, myths about the era sometimes exaggerate the reality of that strange and often troubling time.  While consumerism boomed and many new inventions—radios and telephones, for example—became everyday items for many Americans, it was also a time of much bitterness, conflict, and disappointment.  The economic boom left many in the dust, America’s traditional openness to immigration was severely cut back, and racial tensions rose.  Prohibition, the “noble experiment,” caused ordinary citizens to resort to criminal behavior, even as government often winked and looked the other way.

Following the Great War, as the only major Western nation not devastated by that conflict, Americans felt pretty good about themselves.  The continued economic growth, political conservatism, and general absence of concerns over foreign affairs led Americans to think of themselves as “having it made.”  Proof of America’s spirit and achievements seemed to be personified by Charles Lindbergh as he made his historic flight from New York to Paris in 1927.  But the 1920s also saw deep divisions in the country despite the “roaring” atmosphere brought about by bathtub gin, speakeasies, flappers, women voting, jazz, sports, and all the rest.  Then at the end of that self-satisfied, raucous, and somewhat grumpy decade, when the expectations of many Americans knew no bounds, the stock market crashed and the Great Depression hit.

The Twenties were also known as a time of revolution in manners and morals, when young men, and especially young women, threw off many of the social restrictions of the Victorian era and began conducting themselves in ways that scandalized the older generations.  Young women liberated themselves in everything from hairstyles and clothing to deportment and public behavior, smoking cigarettes and drinking from flasks of illegal bootleg whiskey and bathtub gin.  The ’20s were known as the jazz age and saw the rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan, divisions between town and country that went beyond mere style, the Harlem Renaissance, an enormous growth in production of items such as automobiles once seen as luxuries, and a general feeling of near euphoria, as if for the middle and wealthy classes, at least, things would just keep going up.

The stock market crash of 1929 ended the dreams of many and ushered in the Great Depression of the 1930s.  Although the crash was not the cause of the Depression, it had a triggering effect, and the underlying economic weaknesses in the American economy brought on a period that was devastating for millions of Americans.  The Twenties saw Lindbergh fly solo across the Atlantic and Babe Ruth hit sixty home runs.  But it also saw the Scopes trial and the execution of Sacco and Vanzetti following their famous murder trial.  It was a time of revolution, and as Dickens said of an earlier revolution, in many ways it was the best of times and the worst of times.

The decade began amidst the ashes of the Great War, then part of the legacy of that conflict was the Spanish flu epidemic of 1918 and 1919, brought to the United States by soldiers returning from Europe.  The toll was staggering as 22 million people died around the world from the strange disease.  From September 1918 through June 1919, 675,000 Americans died from flu and pneumonia.  People began wearing surgical masks in public places, and venues in which people came in close contact, even including churches, were closed in an attempt to prevent further spread of the virus.

The Red Scare of 1919.  Americans knew about Communism, because Communists had been at large in the country for years, often associated with radical labor organizations such as the IWW, and Communist Party meetings were held in New York and other major cities more or less openly.  (See Warren Beatty’s film Reds for an interesting story about the radical politics of that era.)  Americans accepted and wanted to preserve the American way of doing things, which meant capitalism, private ownership of business, free-market competition, and the Horatio Alger myth that with enough pluck and a little luck, anyone could become a millionaire.

When the Bolshevik revolution succeeded in Russia, however, it sent a shock wave through the western world, and it was felt in America.  Americans have never been sympathetic to radicalism in any form, and this case was no different, especially when rumors of a Communist-inspired “world revolution” were heard.  Some radical activity clearly justified a response, as when a bomb was placed on the front door of the home of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer.  (It exploded prematurely, killing the bomber and frightening the children of Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt, who lived across the street.)  As additional bombs were found in the mails, the problem was blamed on “Reds,” and the government responded.

Under the direction of Attorney General Palmer, the FBI in 1919 set about rounding up “undesirables,” many of whom were innocent persons, and deported hundreds from the country.  Others associated with radicalism, rightly or wrongly, were harassed, lynched, jailed, and were subjected to all sorts of bigotry.  Thousands were arrested in 1919 and 1920 and often held for long periods without trial.  The “Red Scare” lasted only about two years, but it showed how frightening it could be to be the “wrong sort of person” in America at that time.  Sacco and Vanzetti, two Italian immigrants, felt the sting of the anti-anarchist feelings when they were executed in the electric chair in 1927.  The Red Scare of 1919–1920 was a precursor of McCarthyism, the anti-Communist witch hunt led by the Wisconsin Senator during the 1950s.

The Twenties were also a time of reaction against war—the Great War in particular and war in general—for although the Americans suffered relatively few casualties in 1918, they came during a very short period of time—more than 100,000 men died from all causes in about six months of actual fighting.  From that disillusionment the Twenties also brought a reaction against the expansionist ideas that had gotten America an empire and embroiled her in the Great War.  The widely held myth that human progress was advancing was exploded in the trenches of Europe’s battlefields.

The Twenties were in another sense a reactionary decade—a reaction against Victorian ideas of morality that saw young men and women openly defy what their parents still viewed as proper behavior for relationships between the sexes.  Young people went wild, in the eyes of some, though studies have suggested that there was more talk than action.  It was also a rebellious age, in which women continued the process of breaking out of older social patterns as they had begun to do during World War I.  They changed their dress styles, cut their hair short, smoked in public, and were not above taking a nip from a flask of Prohibition whiskey.

Films tended to reinforce the changing patterns, as vamps such as Theda Bara starred in films the were soon considered scandalous, and the movie industry began placing restrictions on what could be shown.  But the sexual openness also advanced the notion of romantic love, and women began to be seen more as partners in marriage than objects.  That phenomenon led to changes in family relationships, as birth rates fell and young people had more freedom, provided in part by the automobile, but also by shifting cultural practices.  Writers like F. Scott Fitzgerald and Ernest Hemingway caught the mood of the time in novels such as This Side of Paradise, The Great Gatsby,and The Sun Also Rises.

Women were also more liberated politically, as they gained the right to vote with ratification of the 19th Amendment on August 21, 1920, but as was said in a famous play of the time, they could no longer hide behind the petticoat.  Liberation brought increased responsibility, and it was only partial in any case.  People talked more openly of sex, but anti-obscenity laws still made it difficult to get information about birth control.  Women found it easier to find jobs, and working outside the home was more acceptable, but women rarely became doctors, lawyers, or business managers.  Initially women voters changed the political landscape very little, as most tended to vote with their husbands or other male family members.  The League of Women Voters was formed to assist women who wanted to learn more about politics.  The first Equal Rights Amendment was introduced in Congress in 1923  but got nowhere.  Women had come a long way, but still had a long way to go.

Town and Country Conflicts

Because of the growth of cities brought by immigration and internal migration, a sharpening divide grew between urban and rural areas.  Sophisticated city dwellers began to look at their country cousins as hicks or bumpkins, whereas those in the farm belts viewed the cities as places of degradation, immorality, and “foreign” influences.  For example, Prohibition was probably followed more in what was called the “Bible Belt” than in New York and Chicago, although moonshining prospered in the rural woods.

Prohibition.  The prohibition of the sale or use of alcohol for other than religious or medicinal purposes has been called a “noble experiment.”  If indeed it was, it was an experiment that failed to achieve its main goal.  It did manage some partial victories:  deaths from alcohol-related diseases did go down.  Accidents from alcohol abuse were lessened in some areas, and thousands of people did stop drinking, with likely benefits to the health and sanity of those who might otherwise have become alcoholics.  On the other hand, many thousands continued to drink in defiance of the law, and the enormous sums that could be earned from the illegal production, importation, and distribution of wine, whiskey, and beer financed organized crime throughout the period of Prohibition.  Al Capone’s income from his mob activities was estimated at $60 million per year.

(See the film The Untouchables with Kevin Kostner about breaking the Al Capone Ring in Chicago.  Though not very accurate historically, the film does depict the problems faced by those attempting to enforce Prohibition.)

Although more than thirty states had gone dry before Prohibition, and many jurisdictions stayed all or partially dry after Prohibition ended in 1933, many have claimed that Prohibition overall did more harm than good.  In any case the Prohibition experiment provides some historical insight into our current drug-related problems.  The struggle over Prohibition also tended to drive city and country even farther apart.

Fundamentalism.  Much of the difference between town and country was rooted in religion, as many in rural areas gravitated toward various brands of religious fundamentalism.  Fundamentalists insisted that the book of Genesis was the actual story of creation, and that theories such as Darwin’s evolution were the work of the devil.  This conflict was dramatized by one of the most famous trials of the century—the Scopes or “Monkey” trial in Tennessee in 1925.

The state of Tennessee had passed a law making the teaching of evolution in schools illegal, although when the governor signed the law, he expected and hoped that it would never be used.  Encouraged by citizens of the small town of Dayton, Tennessee, however, and with the backing of the ACLU, high school teacher John Scopes was persuaded to schedule classes on evolution in violation of the law.  The citizens of Dayton had sought publicity, and they succeeded beyond their wildest dreams.  Although the conviction of John Scopes was a foregone conclusion (no one denied that he had been willing to teach evolution), the trial turned into a showcase for the issue of academic freedom versus Orthodox Christianity.

The Scopes Trial. Attracted by the presence of three-time presidential candidate William Jennings Bryan, who came to support the prosecution, as well as famous agnostic lawyer Clarence Darrow of Chicago, who came to defend John Scopes, the media and the curious descended upon the town.  Among those was Baltimore journalist H. L. Mencken, whose newspaper offered to pay the $100 fine that John Scopes was awarded upon conviction.  Prevented by the judge, who was obviously biased in favor of the prosecution, from presenting any scientific witnesses, Darrow finally decided to put William Jennings Bryan on the witness stand as an expert witness on the Bible.

Darrow’s examination of Bryan demonstrated that matters of faith can be difficult to prove in a court of law.  Insisting upon a literal interpretation of the Bible, Bryan was obliged to defend the supposed date of the creation of Earth (around 4000 BC), Jonah being swallowed by a big fish, Joshua’s commanding the sun to stand still and Cain’s taking of a wife, even though the only woman created so far according to the Bible had been Eve.  The heat of the exchange often matched the sweltering temperature in the courtroom, and at least partially as a result of the strain of the confrontation, Bryan died shortly after the trial.  Scopes’s conviction was overturned on a technicality, but the trial brought the issue of religious controversy to the front pages all over America.

See the film Inherit the Wind, the 1960 version with Spencer Tracy as Colonel Drummond (Clarence Darrow) and Frederic March as Matthew Harrison Brady (William Jennings Bryan), for a sense of what that event was like.  Dramatic themes and details have been added, but the essence of it is sound history, based on the record of the trial.  Gene Kelly, best known for his dancing, portrays the character based on H. L. Mencken.)

The Ku Klux Klan.  The resurgence of the KKK in the 1920s is partially related to the two areas immediately above—Prohibition and religious controversy.  It is no defense of the Klan to say that it was highly successful in selling the idea that it supported “American ideals” such as strong families, religious faith (Protestant, of course), and patriotism.  Those otherwise admirable qualities had a dark side, however, as Klan members opposed immigration and leveled attacks against Catholics, Jews, “foreigners,” city dwellers, and anyone else who was not a white, Anglo-Saxon Protestant.  They also attacked prostitution and other forms of immorality, as they described it.

These appeals to “decency” attracted many good citizens, and Klan membership grew into the millions, though the real agenda of the Klan was often disguised during recruiting. In 1925 in Washington, D.C., some 40,000 Klan members held a rally and parade up Pennsylvania Avenue, and they rallied support against Catholic Democratic presidential candidate Al Smith in 1928. 

Despite their relatively benign outward message, the Klan still resorted to violence, particularly in places such as Oklahoma, Louisiana, and Indiana, and corruption among Klan leadership, generated in part by the wealth accumulated from dues-paying members, finally brought down the Klan. Following a scandal over the conviction of a Klan leader in a murder case, membership began to decline. By 1930 membership had declined drastically, but the institution did not die. Although attempts were made to revive the KKK following World War II, the organization has never been able to attract large numbers.

The Sacco-Vanzetti Trial.  Another famous trial took place in Massachusetts in the 1920s.  Two Italian immigrants, Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti (left, in handcuffs), were convicted of killing a paymaster during a robbery in South Braintree, Massachusetts in 1920. They were also believed to be anarchists, and as the case against them was not very strong, many believed (then and now) that they were unfairly convicted.  (The judge had referred to the defendants as “those anarchist bastards.”) 

Italian anarchists had been implicated in the bombing of the home of Attorney General Palmer, and one of them was an associate of Sacco.  Despite widespread protests from many quarters, and whether they were guilty or innocent, the two men were finally executed in the electric chair in 1927, while hundreds stood outside the prison in protest.  The Sacco-Vanzetti affair has understandably been connected with the resurgence of “Nativism” at that time.

Nativism Revisited.  Nativism first appeared, some have said, when the first colonists got off the boats and tried to keep the next boatloads from invading “their” turf.  Actually Nativism took hold around 1845 when the first wave of Irish Catholics began to flood the country.  Various Nativist groups organized political parties, including the Know Nothing Party, or tried to thrust their ideas onto the mainstream parties.  The great wave of immigration through Ellis Island and other entry points up to World War I provided the stimulus for immigration restriction that worked its way into the Twenties.

About 800,00 immigrants arrived in the first full year of immigration after the World War, and a new immigration bill was passed in 1921.  Then in 1924 Congress established far more severe limitations and quotas.  The idea was to keep the majority of immigrants looking like the majorities that were already here.  Thus Irish, Swedes, British, and Germans found it much easier to immigrate than Poles, Czechs, Greeks, and Italians.  No immigrants were allowed from Asian nations.  In 1929 immigration was limited to 150,000 annually, and most of the quotas went to Germany and the British Isles.  Mexico was exempt from the quota restrictions, and many low-paid workers arrived from that country.

The Harlem Renaissance.  The Twenties were not all negative by any means.  The emergence of what has been called the “New Negro” was one of the highlights of the decade.  Many Blacks began to take pride in their ethnicity, and a great outpouring of art, literature, and music from the hearts and minds of African Americans lifted not only Black culture but all of America.  Writers such as Ralph Ellison (The Invisible Man), Langston Hughes, Zora Neal Hurston (Their Eyes Were Watching God), Richard Wright (Native Son), and others provided insight into the human experience as seen by Black Americans.

Before and during World War I, thousands of Blacks had begun to migrate to northern cities in search of better economic opportunities, and there they developed new, rich urban cultures, often segregated in fact (though not by law) from white communities.  New York City’s Harlem is the most famous focal point of northern Black culture, but similar places existed in Detroit, Chicago, and other northern cities.  A Black Nationalist Movement was also part of the Twenties as leaders like W. E. B. DuBois and Marcus Garvey struggled to expand civil rights and cultural pride in Black Americans.  In the legal arena, the court system began slowly to dismantle the legal segregation that began in the aftermath of Reconstruction, but full liberation for Black people was still a long time away.

Race riots in the 1920s cast a shadow over the lives of African Americans, however, and groups such as the NAACP fought for passage of a federal anti-lynch law.  Although they were unsuccessful, the publicity they generated did reduce the number of lynchings substantially.  African Americans would have to wait until the civil rights movement of the 1950s and ’60s to see real changes in their status as citizens.

The 1920s was a decade of huge figures—heroes of the kind we rarely see any more.  In 1927 Charles Lindbergh made his famous flight across the Atlantic, and the full story can seem as incredible today as it was at the time.  Lindbergh took off from New York in an airplane that he himself helped design and build.  Although he had been working frantically for days to prepare for the flight, he slept practically not at all on the night before he took off.  His plane, the Spirit of St. Louis, which hangs in the Smithsonian today, was filled with gasoline in every empty space.  Lindbergh had no navigation devices, no radio, nothing but maps, a bag of sandwiches, and a jug of water.  Fighting fog, cold, and most of all fatigue, Lindbergh crossed the Atlantic Ocean and the English Channel, and after 33 1/2 hours he landed his plane in Paris.  Within twenty-four hours the virtually unknown American flyer became arguably the most famous man in the world.

(The movie of Lindbergh’s feat, The Spirit of St. Louis, was overseen by Lindbergh himself, and the actor who portrayed him, James Stewart, was himself an Air Force pilot.)

A “Golden Age.”  Americans started going to the movies and listening to the radio in enormous numbers, and they found themselves becoming more affluent as the markets rose, seemingly without end.  If the Harlem Renaissance opened Americans to Black literature, poetry, music, and other arts of a quality never seen before, literary figures like Fitzgerald, Hemingway, and Thomas Wolfe brought white American literature to a new plane as well.  The first “talkie,” The Jazz Singer, was produced in 1927; color moving pictures followed a few years later.  Americans of that era loved film stars such as Charlie Chaplin, and they honored heroes such as Charles Lindbergh.  They had more time to participate in and watch sporting events, and Babe Ruth became the first athlete to earn a salary of $100,000 for a season.  When reminded that that was more than President Hoover made, the Babe replied, “I had a better year.”

Business in the 1920s

The Age of the Consumer.  During the 1920s everybody seemed to be buying everything, and businesses set out to meet the demands of consumers, producing new products in record-breaking quantities.  Cars, radios, appliances, ready-made clothes, gadgets, and other consumer products found their way into more and more American homes and garages.  Americans also started buying stocks in greater numbers, providing capital to already booming companies.  All the signs pointed upward, and starry-eyed men and women began to believe that it was going to be a one-way trip, possibly forever. 

Henry Ford’s assembly line not only revolutionized production, it democratized the ownership of the automobile.  Ford showed that handsome profits could be made on small margin and high volume.  By 1925 his famous Model T sold for less than $300, a modest price by the standards of the 1920s.  Americans had never had it so good.  (Many, of course, would not have it so good again for a long time.)

Thanks to pioneers such as Lindbergh, the airplane began to come of age in the 1920s.  Although airplanes had been used for various modest purposes, mostly reconnaissance, in the World War, they were still exotic gadgets in 1920.  In 1925 an Airmail Act provided for the use of airplanes as mail carriers through a competitive bidding system.  After Lindbergh’s flight, planes began to carry passengers for travel rather than just for thrills.  Regularly scheduled flights began, and airports were constructed to handle passengers and small amounts of cargo.  American and United Airlines were two of the successful early airline companies.  The end was in sight for railroad domination of the transportation industry.

Farming in the 1920s.  Not everyone prospered in the 1920s.  Farmers, becoming increasingly more skillful and efficient in producing food, found that laws of supply and demand still plagued them.  Machinery began to replace animal power more and more, as tractors replaced horses and mules.  But those large machines were expensive.  The more farmers produced, the lower prices tended to fall.  Personal food  preferences changed as well, and Prohibition took grains used to make alcohol and used them for food crops.  In the early 1920s bread was at its lowest price in five hundred years relative to other necessities.  It was still tough to make a living down on the farm.

The U.S. government did attempt to assist farmers.  For example, the government passed the Flood Control Act in 1928 to control floods along the Mississippi River, which had recently overflowed its banks, causing havoc among farmers in that area.  During the 1920s about 27 percent of the U.S. workforce was in farming.

Politics in the 1920s

Grover Cleveland and Woodrow Wilson were the only Democratic presidents elected between Abraham Lincoln in 1860 and Franklin Roosevelt in 1933.  It is likely that a Republican would have won in 1912 instead of Wilson had the party not divided between Taft’s conservative Republicans and Roosevelt’s Progressives.  Wilson defeated New York Governor Charles Evans Hughes in 1916 largely on the fact that he had managed to keep the United States out of World War I.

During Wilson’s second term, of course, the United States did enter the war, President Wilson went to France to help negotiate the Treaty of Versailles, and a bitter fight erupted between Wilson and a Republican Senate over ratification of the treaty.  Wilson’s stroke, which he suffered on a campaign to drum up support for the treaty, incapacitated him, and his presidency ended on an unfortunate note.

The election of 1920, therefore, was as much about Wilson as about anything.  The Republican candidate, Senator Warren Gamaliel Harding of Ohio, called for a return to “normalcy,” a word he invented for the occasion.  His vice presidential candidate was Governor Calvin Coolidge of Massachusetts, who was best known for ending the Boston police strike of 1919.  During the strike Coolidge sent a telegram to Samuel Gompers, president of the American Federation of Labor, saying, “There is no right to strike against the public safety by anyone, anywhere, any time.”

The 1920 election resulted in a Republican landslide.  Harding/Coolidge received 16,152,200 popular votes and 404 electoral votes compared with Cox/Roosevelt totals of 9,147,353 popular votes and 127 electoral votes.  Most memorable about the election of 1920 is that for the first time women had the right to vote.  On the Democratic side another interesting note is that Franklin Roosevelt, President Wilson’s assistant secretary of the navy, was the vice presidential candidate alongside Governor James M. Cox of Ohio, a former newspaperman.

Harding’s presidency is not one of the high points in the history of that office.  Phrases used to describe the handsome man from Ohio included “harmless but incompetent,” “pompous,” and a “see-nothing president.”  He had some good cabinet officials, but his administration was tainted by corruption, as was his personal conduct.  Upon his death in 1823 he was initially mourned, but as the scandals emerged, people found Calvin Coolidge a pleasant relief.

The presidency of Calvin Coolidge has been identified by the phrase “Coolidge prosperity.”  Although the ’20s themselves were a raucous decade, in one sense things were returning to normal after the activism of Theodore Roosevelt and the international involvement of the idealistic Woodrow Wilson.  Led by pioneering businessmen such as Henry Ford, the American economy moved forward vigorously, and President Coolidge was credited with doing little or nothing, which, as Will Rogers remarked, was exactly what the American people wanted.  Although Coolidge’s White House was open to visitors, Coolidge himself, was known as “Silent Cal,” because he had little to say.  On one occasion a woman visitor gushed, “Mr. President, I bet a friend that I could get at least three words out of you!”  Coolidge’s response:  “You lose.”

The 1924 election was notable for several things.  The Democratic Party was in disarray and needed 103 ballots to nominate its candidate, Governor John Davis of West Virginia, at the 1924 convention in New York City.  The Progressive Party, still alive and well, nominated Robert LaFollette, who wound up with a respectable 4.8 million votes in the general election.  President Coolidge ran on an essentially conservative platform, promising to maintain the status quo.  Coolidge’s victory was not as impressive as Harding’s, but he won by a comfortable margin.

As the 1928 election approached, President Coolidge announced that he did not choose to run for reelection.  The nomination easily went to Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, a self-made millionaire and businessman whose managing of food relief for Europeans during the First World War had gained him much public admiration.  Although he had never held elective office, his fundamental honesty and calm demeanor made him an attractive candidate.

On the Democratic side, Governor Al Smith of New York was nominated following a rousing nomination speech by Franklin Roosevelt.  Governor Smith was Roman Catholic and “wet”; that is, he favored repeal of Prohibition.  The election saw the forces of intolerance out in full, as many Americans were not ready to see a Catholic elected president.  In addition, Governor Smith was thought to be a machine politician from New York, and his New York City accent sounded strange to many during his radio addresses.  The voice of the Ku Klux Klan, which had reemerged during the 1920s, is believed to have been a factor in opposition to Governor Smith.

An interesting side note is that although Governor Smith lost the election by a wide margin, Franklin Roosevelt, politically resurrected following his bout with polio, was comfortably elected governor of New York.  The results in 1928 gave 21 million popular and 444 electoral votes to Hoover, whereas Governor Smith got 15.4 million popular and 87 electoral votes, another Republican landslide.  In any event, President Hoover cracked the so-called “solid South,” which since Reconstruction had voted almost exclusively Democratic.  Hoover won some southern states because of the religion issue.

The 1920 Election. Harding and Coolidge defeat Cox and Franklin D. Roosevelt.

Harding’s Presidency is not one of the high points in the history of that office. Phrases used to describe the handsome man from Ohio included, "harmless but incompetent," "pompous" and a "see nothing president." He had some good cabinet officials, but his administration was tainted by corruption, as was his personal conduct. Upon his death he was initially mourned, but as the scandals emerged, people found Coolidge a pleasant relief.

The 1924 Election was notable for several things. The Democratic Party was in some disarray and needed 103 ballots to nominate their candidate, Governor John Davis of West Virginia at the 1924 Convention in NYC. The Progressive Party, still alive and well, nominated Robert LaFollette, who would up with a respectable 4.8 million votes in the general election. The results were as follows:

The 1928 Election saw the forces of intolerance out in full. Governor Al Smith of New York was opposed for being wet (anti-prohibition, pro-repeal) and Catholic. The voice of the Klan was heard at the polls. Results:

Note: Hoover actually won some southern states because of the religion issue.

In his inaugural address, President Hoover expressed confidence in the future of America:

Ours is a land rich in resources; stimulating in its glorious beauty; filled with millions of happy homes; blessed with comfort and opportunity.  In no nation are the institutions of progress more advanced.  In no nation are the fruits of accomplishment more secure.  In no nation is the government more worthy of respect.  No country is more loved by its people.  I have an abiding faith in their capacity, integrity and high purpose.  I have no fears for the future of our country.  It is bright with hope.

In March 1929 President Hoover had good reason to feel optimistic, but it was clear that storm clouds were already visible on the horizon. President Hoover was a brillian engineer adn self-made millionaire, but his financial policies wer not attuned to the coming economic disaster. as a conservative, he believed that market forces wouod correct the problems of the Depression, but in time he did take measures designed to alleviate the crisis. It was far too little.

The Great Bull Market and the Crash of 1929.  As more Americans began to invest in the stock market, often at very liberal credit terms, the markets went up.  Artificially fueled by increased credit purchases, consumer businesses produced and sold more and more, and the stock market kept pace.  But the market was overbuilt, credit was stretched thin, and when the crash came it came with a huge thud.  When capital dried up, buying slowed down, businesses laid off workers, further hurting consumer spending, and the economy spiraled downward to unimaginable depths.  People who had never wanted for anything found themselves not only unemployed but unemployable.  The situation was unprecedented, collectively and individually, and as the Depression worsened, the country floundered and people surrendered to despair.

From March 1928 through September 1929, the stock market had risen spectacularly.  Shares in General Electric climbed from $129 to $396; Radio (RCA), from $94 to $505; Montgomery Ward, from $133 to $466.  There seemed to be no limit to prosperity and the possibility of new wealth for millions of investors.  People mortgaged their homes to get cash with which to buy stocks, and brokers encouraged clients to purchase stock on margin.  A family with $1,000 in cash—a tidy sum in 1929—might be able to purchase $5,000 worth of stock with that down payment.  The brokerage offering the margin purchase would doubtless have borrowed funds from a bank to finance the deal.  As prices continued to rise, the structure became ever more shaky, and words of warning went unheeded.

Looking at the figures above, imagine yourself in a family in March 1928.  You and your spouse are comfortable, you own a home, and you have a small amount of savings.  But you keep hearing from neighbors, friends, business associates, or maybe you have even overheard gossip in a barbershop or on a train, about how much money people are making in the stock market—it has been booming throughout the ’20s.  You decide, why not us?  So you go down to the local bank and take out a mortgage on your home for about $2,000, and add your savings to it.  You find a stock broker and tell him you want to invest your money.  Since everything is booming, he may suggest that with your $2,000 in cash you may be able to buy two or three times that much stock by purchasing shares on margin.  You end up buying $10,000 worth of stock with your $2,000 cash—the broker loans you the $8,000 difference.

Eighteen months later, if your stock behaves like the ones above, it has tripled in value.  If you are smart, you sell a portion of your stock, pay off the loan to your broker, pay off your mortgage, and you are still way ahead of the game.  Many people were not that lucky.

Now let’s suppose that you are the same couple, but you walk into the broker’s office in September 1929 rather than in March 1928.  You go through the same process and wind up buying $10,000 worth of stock on your $2,000 mortgage and your $8,000 loan from the broker.  (For simplicity, we are ignoring transaction fees and so on.)  Then the crash hits, and it happens so suddenly that before you can gather your wits, the $10,000 worth of stock that you purchased is now worth a fraction of that.  Your broker calls in his margin loan, as he must to cover his losses, but of course you can’t pay him, and you lose your investment and maybe even your house.  It is little comfort that the broker also loses everything, and even less comfort to you that the bank that loaned the broker the money that he loaned to you is also in serious trouble.

The scenario above, while oversimplified, does demonstrate in a simple way what happened to thousands of people.  What is more complicated is the snowball effect that followed from the crash; the Depression started in 1929–1930, but also had roots in other causes.

Causes of the Crash and Depression

The Great Depression was not caused by the stock market crash of 1929—that was only the trigger.  The actual Depression was caused by a combination of factors of international scope and great complexity.  In the United States, for example, the consumerism of the 1920s and the increase in credit buying artificially accelerated the demand for consumer goods beyond what the real market factors would have told.  With the stock market crash, as purchasing power shrank and sales of consumer goods slowed, manufacturers were forced to pull back, and more people lost their jobs.  As more became unemployed, the demand for consumer goods shrank even further and the gap widened.

Then banks that held mortgages were unable to collect them, and even if they foreclosed, finding buyers for the repossessed properties was difficult.  Many banks ultimately failed, wiping out people’s savings, thus making the picture worse.  One problem led to another until the entire country was in the throes of a paralyzing economic slowdown.  Although some parts of the country were relatively untouched, in others it seemed as though entire towns and villages were without any substantial income.  The Depression documents that accompany this section will give you some vivid insights into the human problems created by the Depression.  Those who lived through it never forgot those times.

Summary of some of the causes of the Depression:

• Overproduction in farming and manufactures; commodity prices, raw materials too high
• Too much in profits, not enough in wages, or purchasing power
• Overexpansion of credit—margin, installment buying
• Economic difficulties in Europe from WWI, reparations, debts, loans
• Silver market depressed, Far East strapped, international trade down everywhere
• Hawley-Smoot Tariff hurts Europe
• Trigger effect—failures in one area spill into others
• Psychological shock

Some Twenties Links: 

• Bartolomeo Vanzetti: Final Statement in Court
• The Charles Lindbergh Foundation will get you information about his famous flight
• An Interesting Site on William Jennings Bryan and the Scopes Trial
• Another Scopes Trial Site
• Here's a Site with Many Links about the 1920s

Updated May 16, 2008 | | Part 3 Home