of over 10% annually, on average, from 1929 to 1932.Agricultural distress was intense: farm prices fell by 53% from 1929 to 1932. PresidentHoover opposed government intervention to ease the mounting economic distress. Hisone major action, creation (1932) of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation to lendmoney to ailing corporations, was seen as inadequate. Hoover lost the 1932 election toFranklin D. Roosevelt. The depression brought a deflation not only of incomes but of hope. In his firstinaugural address (March 1933), President Franklin D. Roosevelt declared that "the onlything we have to fear is fear itself." But though his New Deal grappled with economicproblems throughout his first two terms, it had no consistent policy. At first Roosevelttried to stimulate the economy through the National Recovery Administration, chargedwith establishing minimum wages and codes of fair competition in every industry. It wasbased on the idea of spreading work and reducing unfair competitive practices by means ofcooperation in industry, so as to stabilize production and prevent the price slashing thathad begun after 1929. This approach was abandoned after the Supreme Court declared theNRA unconstitutional in Schecter Poultry Corporation V. United States (1935).Roosevelt's second administration gave more emphasis to public works and othergovernment expenditures as a means of stimulating the economy, but it did not pursue thisapproach vigorously enough to achieve full economic recovery. At the end of the 1930s, unemployment was estimated at 17.2%. Other innovations of the Rooseveltadministrations had long-lasting effects, both economically and politically. To aid peoplewho could find no work, the New Deal extended federal relief on a vast scale. The CivilianConservation Corps took young men off the streets and sent them out to plant forests anddrain swamps. The government refinanced about one-fifth of farm mortgages through theFarm Credit Administratio...
