55. What is “Relocation”?

Indian removal is a 19^th century policy of the government of the US to relocate Native American tribes living east of the Mississippi river to lands west of the river.

Since the Presidency of Thomas Jefferson, America`s policy had been to allow Native Americans to remain east of the Mississippi as long as they became “civilized”. His original plan was to guide the Natives towards adopting a sedentary agricultural lifestyle. Jefferson`s expectation was that Indians would become economically dependent on trade with white Americans, and they would thereby willing to give up land that they would otherwise not part with, in exchange for trade goods. There was a long history of Native American land being purchased, usually by treaty and sometimes under coercion. In the early 19^th century the notion of “land exchange” developed and began to be incorporated into land cession treaties. Native Americans would relinquish land in the east in exchange for equal or comparable land west of the Mississippi river. The idea was proposed as early as 1803, by Jefferson, but was not used in actual treaties until 1817, when the Cherokee (tribe) agreed to cede two large tracts of land in the east for one of equal size in present-day Arkansas. Many other treaties of this nature quickly followed.

With the inauguration of Andrew Jackson in 1829 government stance towards Indians turned harsher. The president aggressively pursued plans to move all Indian tribes to the west. Finally, the Indian Removal Act was signed into law (26 May 1830). The most considerable impact was experienced by the “Five Civilized Tribes” – the Chickasaw, Choctaw, Creek, Seminole and Cherokee. Although relocation was declared as voluntary, those who remained were to obey federal laws destroying their tribal and personal rights and had to suffer from endless harassment by white settlers. Widely used was the practice of bribery and pressure to force the leaders to sign land treaties. It caused the division within the very tribes. The process of removal was called by many people a “trail of tears and death”. Large number of Indians was wiped off the face of the earth by diseases, starvation, fights, cold. Federal troops, who were to accompany and protect the settlers, did nothing but worsened hardships due to the weak organization.

Now descendants of Indian tribes live mostly in Oklahoma.

56. When were «The New Deal » programs carried out? What is the wpa?

The New Deal was a series of economic programs implemented in the US between 1933 and 1936. They were passed by the US Congress during the first term of President Franklin D. Roosevelt. The programs were Roosevelt`s responses to the Great Depression, and focused on what historians called the “3 Rs” – Relief, Recovery and Reform. Many historians distinguish a “First New Deal” (1933) and a “Second New Deal” (1934-1936). The “First New Deal” dealt with diverse groups, from banking and railroads to industry and farming, all of which demanded help for economic recovery. The “Second New Deal” included the Wagner act to promote labor unions, the Works Progress Administration (WPA) relief program, the Social Security Act, and new programs to aid tenant farmers and migrant workers. The final major items of New Deal legislation were the creation the United States Housing Authority and Farm Security Administration, both in 1937, and the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which set maximum hours and minimum wages for most categories of workers.

WPA – The Works Progress Administration (renamed during 1939 as the Works Project Administration) was the largest and most ambitious New Deal agency, employing millions of unskilled workers to carry out public work projects, including the construction of public buildings and roads, and operated large arts, drama, media, and literacy projects.

Almost every community in the US had a park, bridge or school constructed by the agency, which especially benefited rural and Western areas. The budget at the outset of the WPA in 1935 was $ 1,4 billion a year and in total it spent $13,4 billion. Headed by Harry Hopkins, at its peak in 1938 it provided paid jobs for three million unemployed men (and some women), as well as youth in a separate division, the National Youth Administration. The WPA was liquidated in 1943 as a result of low unemployment due to the economic boom of World War II.