Crusade to Restore America

THE HUNGRY YEARS

While the many areas of the United States enjoyed prosperity during the 1920s, the South continued to suffer terrible hardships. A huge percentage of its economy was committed to growing cotton so the region lived and died by the prices it brought at market. Low cotton prices and overproduction devastated the incomes of small Georgian farmers. Equally, soil erosion, persistent drought, and the boll weevil invasion crippled rural farming communities in Georgia and throughout the South. In 1929, the rest of the country sank into the Great Depression but Georgians faced even bigger hardships. Between 1929 and 1932, farm prices fell sixty percent. Most farmers earned under $83 a year, less than half of what they made before the Depression. Despite all their grueling labor, many rural Georgians eked out a meager existence from their low wages. All over Georgia, workers labored from sunset to sundown for less than 50 cents a day.

Many people fled rural areas to pursue jobs in the state's cities and towns or out West. The Hoover administration chose not to intervene in the crisis hoping that limited spending and a balanced budget would help the nation bounce back. Although many Georgians also opposed federal intervention, with the majority of Georgia's citizens out of work, the need for outright aid trumped most concerns on this issue. In the 1932 presidential election, eighty-seven percent of Georgians voted for Franklin Delano Roosevelt and his promise to implement a package of federal programs that would give Americans a "new deal."