It is not the plodding, methodical, gradual pursuit of
wealth that unfolds in the succeeding pages;
instead, the history of bank notes, both real and counterfeit, captures the get-rich-quick scheme, the confidence game, and the mania for speculation that obsessed Melville and the nation during this era. This alchemical vision of wealth creationthe magical transformation of flimsy paper into concrete capitalis part of the hidden history of the nations economic development, and to see the counterfeit economy is to gain a glimpse of that spirit. Mihm, Stephen (2009-05-01). A Nation of Counterfeiters: Capitalists, Con Men, and the Making of the United States 1865 1873 1907 1920 1863 1929 A Nation of Counterfeiters Stephen Mihm until: National bank charter (end of free banking era) Banking panic of 1873 Leading up to 1884: national and international speculation in stocks, unstable railroad corporations and banks, panics. Prohibition And The Age of Innocence is published 1861-1865 The first industrialized war, war on our soil, 10% of Northern men, %30 of Southern men, steamships and mass produced weapons but no pennicilliin. Panic of 1907 Following serious depressions in 1890, 1893. The Great Depression This crisis is the worst of the series, and prompts The New Deal. Major change. Fear Itself, Ira Katznelson 19 C Timeline The turn of the 19 th century into the 20 th century in American was a time of rapid change, at a pace its hard to imagine. The last covered wagons were still crossing the country when the light bulb was invented and waves of industrialization marched forward. 1914-17 1907 The Great War World War I, trench warfare before modern medicine. THE GREAT DEPRESSION TIMELINE BREAD LINES IN THE 1930S More Images GLOOM OF INCOMPARABLE FORCE THE NEW DEAL AND HOPE July 1932: Mussolini celebrates that the liberal state is destined to perish. The New Deals rearrangement of values and institutions, and its support for the Western liberal political tradition, answered this challenge. OBJECTIVES: Defeat Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, maintain internal solidarity all at once. From the early days of the New Deal, the democratic world watched with great curiosity. Many were convinced that there was a nearly perfect coincidence between the particular causes of the United States and the universal causes of humanity
The New Deal proved Mussolini wrong. The Gods of liberalism did not die. The dictatorships vortex of violence and brutality was not only met but also trumped by a model of constitutionalism and law. BOTH waged and won war AND brought real economic safety THREE BIG FEARS Dictatorships War and global violence and the advent of atomic weapons The explosive racial realities of the South
KATZNELSON: MEASURABLE RISK GENERATES WORRY. UNMEASURABLE RISK ABOUT THE DURATION AND MAGNITUDE OF UNCERTAINTY SPAWNS FEAR.
Try to recreate the contingency of that moment in time, the sense that the country might not recover. Fascism was TEMPTING, HEROIC Dictatorships on the Left and the Right American had been torn in half within a lifetime, Europe was torn in half in 1914 The United States possessed many of the same features that Hannah Arendt was soon to associate with the rise of totalitarianism. These included racism as a robust ideology, imperial expansion, and the control of subject populations. (p. 14 Katznelson) A LONG SHADOW The New Deal today is often seen as the WPA and a set of banking regulations.
We live with a sense of inevitability our democracy, our economy Intertwined and natural The end of history Perfect identity between: humanistic, liberal values and the basic arrangement of our society.
This reality was once in jeopardy, contingent, and the New Deal is the name we give for a truly remarkable set of circumstances that in a real way allow us to take for granted this arrangement.
FEAR WAS NOT BANISHED AFTER 4 YEARS: UNTIL 1953: UNREMITTING SENSE OF FRAGILITY
Difficult alliances, at home and abroad
Crucial reality of The New Deal: the Democrats had a coalition that included white Southern Democrats Republicans were more purely conservative, against change in the system as it stood. Party of business that objected on the grounds of growth. Dixie Democrats were veto players content and moral tenor of the New Deal were profoundly affected that paradoxically violated widely accepted moral norms, a precedent that continues today. No black and white Wall Street Journal BEST IMAGES FROM THE CRISIS
Schecter, Darrow (1994) Radical Theories - Paths Beyond Marxism and Social Democracy. Chapter 5. Market Socialism, Self-Management and The Case For Workers' Co-Ops PDF