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| A poster created by WPA artists |
In our travels, especially
those taking us through the national parks, we often see buildings and roads dating
from the thirties, when FDR’s administration established many conservation projects as part
of the New Deal. Always interested in conservation of natural resources, FDR
cared deeply about human conservation as well.
The Civilian Conservation
Corps (CCC ) provided work for more than 300,000 young men who were unemployed
during the Depression. Those were the Dust Bowl years, when soil blew away from
farms, and families lost their livelihood. In addition, the stock market crash
of 1929 had led to massive unemployment in rural and urban areas as well.
The CCC jobs were tough; the
men were not given much training, and performed manual labor. They stocked
streams with fish, fought wildfires, built highways, and did other difficult,
important work. Sadly, after beginning as integrated programs, CCC programs
soon became segregated, and blacks were prevented from moving into supervisory
positions. [i] It
was also limited to men, who at that time were considered the breadwinners of their
families.
When World War II began, many
young men were drafted or joined the military services voluntarily, which provide
employment for them and reduced the pool available for the CCC. Within a few
years the CCC had largely disappeared, though even today many states have
smaller programs based on it.
Another popular New Deal
program, the Works Progress Administration (WPA), provided needed income for
many writers and artists. Artists
supported by the WPA’S Federal Art Project (including Jackson Pollock[ii]
and Thomas Hart Benton[iii])
collectively created more than 100,000 paintings and murals and over 18,000 sculptures.[iv] Many
can still be seen in places such as Coit Tower in San Francisco.
Perhaps it is time to bring
back these New Deal programs. Many people who lack computer and other
specialized skills are unemployed. Most writers and artists receive notoriously
low compensation for their work. If unemployed
or underpaid men and women were able to make a little money while contributing
to the infrastructure, they would be paying taxes instead of collecting welfare.
The heavy physical labor of the CCC workers would not be possible for everyone,
but most people could work in some capacity. We can, in the words of a
prominent politician, “make America great again.” Not by building a wall along
our border or deporting Muslims, but by investing in all our people and in
projects that benefit the environment.
Text copyright 2016 by Carol Leth Stone
Text copyright 2016 by Carol Leth Stone
newdeal.feri.org/aaccc/
(July 23, 2016)
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