Federal emergency relief administration what was the purpose

FERA funds helped construct 40, miles of new roads, , miles of repaired roads, and 5, public buildings [5]. The termination of the FERA was an extended process. It began with the creation of the WPA in May , yet the agency continued to operate through December of that year. With thousands of teachers out of work there were, at the same time, hundreds of thousands of men and women in need of educational facilities. We decided to put these unemployed teachers to work teaching those unemployed who wanted instruction.

In March , at the peak of the emergency education program, more than 44, persons were employed and the number of pupils was slightly higher than 1,, Each state could choose to develop or emphasize any or all of the following, depending on local conditions: 1 General adult education; 2 literary classes for adults; 3 vocational education; 4 vocational rehabilitation; and 5 nursery schools for pre-school children from underprivileged homes.

Another part of the emergency education program was the college student aid program. It provided part-time employment for those college students who would otherwise have been unable to continue their education. The projects for the students were planned and supervised in large part by the college authorities.

Funds through the emergency education program were made available for student employment at Washington State University WSU in Pullman from to During part of this time period there were also funds available through the Civil Works Administration but these were primarily for public works projects.

The Committee operated through the office of the Dean of Men. Although the FERA funds enabled many students to attend WSU who could not otherwise afford to, the program was terminated in when this relief activity was transferred to the Works Progress Administration. Prior to FERA, few efforts were made to institute special projects for women.

In October , Hopkins appointed a director for the newly created Women's Division. FERA also ordered states to appoint a qualified woman to head a women's division in each state agency. These agencies were to plan special projects that would benefit women and to exert pressure on other divisions of state relief agencies to insure that women had equal consideration for work opportunities for which they were qualified.

The Federal Surplus Relief Corporation had two main purposes. First, it helped keep farmers above the destitution level by serving as an agency for removing price-depressing surplus commodities from the open market. Secondly, it served as the agency through which these surplus commodities were made available to the state and local relief administrations for distribution to relief clients.

At times, processing of the commodities was done by work divisions of the state relief agencies. The Self-Help Cooperative Program was a small part of FERA which had as its mission to help existing grassroots cooperatives produce goods for themselves and to facilitate the exchange or barter of other goods needed by the members of the cooperative but which could not be produced within this group.

The program also helped groups that wished to start cooperatives. Thus, the state governments did not have to repay these funds. FERA eventually distributed billions of dollars to the states.

Roosevelt hoped that his New Deal would allow Americans to cope with the Great Depression, would help end the current economic downturn, and would help prevent another depression from occurring in the future. Such an all-encompassing event changed family narratives as well. As with any major historical event—and especially those of a decidedly traumatic nature—how relatives responded to or weathered the crisis of the Great Depression formed an essential aspect of family history.

The efforts of the federal government to counteract the Depression through the various programs of President Franklin D. Roosevelt's New Deal—and in particular the work of the Federal Emergency Relief Administration during the depths of the Depression—produced many records that document such personal experiences, offering useful information about individuals and family members at a dramatic moment in history.

The Federal Emergency Relief Act of May 12, , implemented President Roosevelt's first major initiative to combat the adverse economic and social effects of the Great Depression. The act established the Federal Emergency Relief Administration, a grant-making agency authorized to distribute federal aid to the states for relief. In the early years of the Depression, responsibility for emergency relief had rested almost entirely on state and local governments, but swelling unemployment and economic hardship fostered the growing perception that the Depression required a greater, national response.

That viewpoint launched Roosevelt into the White House in and provided the catalyst for his subsequent New Deal programs. In contrast to the ERA's local approach, FERA gave the federal government a more centralized role in economic recovery by allocating rather than loaning funds for both direct relief cash payments to individuals for immediate necessities such as food and shelter and state-directed work relief projects intended to get the unemployed back to work, even if only temporarily.

Rather than establish a whole new federal hierarchy, which might delay relief to the general public, FERA assumed oversight of existing state relief programs. To ensure compliance and foster better understanding of relief needs in response to economic and social conditions, FERA established minimum national relief standards and served as a clearinghouse for information on relief problems, policies, and procedures. Conceived in response to the need to put millions of unemployed people immediately back to work during the harsh winter of —, the CWA created thousands of construction jobs for unskilled laborers.

Projects mainly included building or improving roadways, schools, playgrounds, and airports; laying sewer pipes and masonry walls; or simply raking leaves and shoveling show in public and national parks. Women employed by the CWA often sewed garments for the destitute.

Employing approximately 4 million workers by January , the CWA proved immensely popular among the general public but was nevertheless disbanded by Congress on March 31, , due to increasing political fears that the program would create too much "public" employment centered on temporary work devoid of lasting value. Permanently shifting the focus of economic recovery from direct relief assistance to enhanced work relief, the act implemented a massive public works program under the direction of the Works Progress Administration WPA.

The largest and most ambitious of the New Deal agencies, the WPA essentially resembled a much amplified version of FERA, and by the end of it had assumed all of its predecessor's relief functions. As soon as FERA opened for business in May , applicants seeking relief assistance flooded the agency's main offices in Washington, D. All letters received, along with carbon copies of replies, were arranged in the agency's central correspondence file.

The "Old" series uses an alphabetical arrangement by subject, while the "New" series uses a three-digit decimal classification scheme. The categories or topic headings in the subject series demonstrate various aspects of general relief efforts. The central files of all three agencies also include a "State" series, which covers administrative matters and reports concerning relief operations within a single state or territory. FERA's "State Series, March —" Entry 10 contains important correspondence with state relief administrators, arranged alphabetically by state or territory and then by decimal scheme according to the following classifications: "General Correspondence" , "Rural Rehabilitation" , "Transients" , "Education" , "Medical Care" , "Work Relief" , and "Complaints"