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Opposition to the New Deal

Opposition from the left - sharing the wealth amongst all, greater equality, government intervention.

Opposition from the right - preserving the wealth, traditional values

Liberty Leaguers
Wealthy who had supported FDR as the saviour of capitalism now turned against him. Believed he was going against Laissez faire and business.
Organised in April 1934 to promote private property and private enterprise unregulated by law.
Members saw FDR as traitor to his class - some referred to him as ‘that cripple in the White House’.
They compared the New Deal to Communism.

End Poverty in California - (EPIC)
The novelist Upton Sinclair set up the scheme where the unemployed would work together in groups (cooperatives) and could only spend money in other cooperatives.
Share Our Wealth
Huey Long - nicknamed ‘The Kingfish’ - Louisiana politician, popular public speaker. He called for all public fortunes over $3 million dollars should be confiscated and that every family should be given money to buy a house, car and radio. He was gunned down in 1935.
Townsend Clubs
Francis Townsend, a retired doctor had the idea of having pensions for all over 60 who received no salary for working and that the pension should be $200 per month. However none of the money could be saved all should be spent. He believed that this would benefit the economy in two ways: 1) The more spending the greater the production.
2) The more who retire will lead to more jobs for the young.
Townsend clubs had 500,000 members, they called for congress to put plan into operation.
However the plan was impractical - 1) payments would have taken up 50% of national income.
2) An army of bureaucrats would have been necessary to ensure that it worked.

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