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  • 2016-11-10 (xsd:date)
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  • Republicans Last Controlled U.S. Government in 1928 and Depression Followed? (en)
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  • After the 8 November 2016 U.S. general election handed imminent control of the White House, House of Representatives, and the Senate to the Republicans, images were circulated via social media claiming political conditions had not been such since 1928, and suggesting that the result of those conditions was the onset of the Great Depression in 1929: The claim appeared to be too compelling to fact check on both sides of the aisle. Republicans embraced what looked to be a favorable political climate not seen in nearly a century, while Democrats lamented historical evidence that implied the circumstance would lead to economic ruin. Both sides were off base with respect to the image macro's accuracy on either front. First of all, Republican control of the White House and both houses of Congress didn't begin or end in 1928 — the GOP held sway over the executive and legislative branches for all of the decade from 1921-30. Second, that period was not the last such instance of one-party control favoring the GOP. Republicans also controlled both the executive and legislative in 1953-54, when Republican Dwight Eisenhower was President, the GOP held a clear majority in the House, and Republicans gained a slim 48 to 47 margin over Democrats in the Senate (with one Republican-leaning independent senator). And again from 2003-06, both chambers of Congress had a Republican majority while Republican George W. Bush occupied the White House. (Those conditions also existed for part of the period from 2001-02, during which time the Senate switched majorities from Democratic to Republican and back to Democratic). The second portion of the claim is stickier, essentially asserting that the result of Republican control of the U.S. government during the 1920s was the onset of the Great Depression. Although one might validly argue that Republican policies of the 1920s had something to do with bringing about the Great Depression, it's difficult to assess what measure of blame should be meted out to them, given that the economic downturn's causes were many and varied, some of its elements antedated the 1920s, and the Depression lingered on well after the nation switched to Democratic leadership in 1933. As the United States Office of the Historian's explainer page notes, the origins and scope of the Great Depression were not limited to the United States alone: A lack of economic oversight by the U.S. government and agricultural overproduction also played a large role in what would become an prlonged period of suffering in United States: Regardless, the Republican Party, the United States, and the world as a whole are all vastly different than they were eighty-eight years ago, so offering superficial comparisons between elements from now and back then is not likely to contribute much substance to today's political discourse. (en)
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