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Rexford Tugwell

Biography

3:52

History Brief: Roosevelt's First 100 Days

 

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Puerto Rico Forward: Gov. Rexford Tugwell

 

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1930s President Roosevelt's New Deal

 

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La planta insolente - Castro talks to Rexford Tugwell scene (No subtitles)

 

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La gran fiesta - Jesús T. Piñero talks to Rexford Tugwell scene ( No substitles)

Rexford Guy Tugwell was an economist who became part of Franklin D. Roosevelt's first "Brain Trust," a group of Columbia University academics who helped develop policy recommendations leading up to Roosevelt's New Deal. Tugwell served in FDR's administration until he was forced out in 1936. He was a specialist on planning and believed the government should have large-scale plans to move the economy out of the Great Depression because private enterprise was too frozen in place to do the job. He helped design the New Deal farm program and the Resettlement Administration that moved subsistence farmers into small rented farms under close supervision. His ideas on suburban planning resulted in the construction of Greenbelt, Maryland, with low-cost rents for relief families. He was denounced by conservatives who said his government-imposed planning violated the values of individualism.