Background Information for To Kill a Mockingbird

  Traditional values challenged by the Jazz Age  Americans were busy buying automobiles, appliances, and speculating on the stock market  Everything bought on credit  Businesses made huge gains (65%) while worker’s wages had only increased 8% Roaring Twenties

  Imbalance between rich and poor created  Production of more and more goods resulted in rising personal debt  Black Tuesday  October 29, 1929 – stock market crashed  Triggered the Great Depression Roaring Twenties

  Worst economic collapse in the history of the world  Lasted from 1929 to the early 1940s  Banks failed, businesses closed, and more than 15 million Americans became unemployed The Great Depression

  President Hoover underestimated the crisis  Called it “a passing incident in our national lives”  Did not think the federal gov’t should offer relief to the poverty-stricken  Used “trickle-down economics” to help finance business and banks  Businesses preferred to lay off workers Hoover’s Reaction

 Hoover FlagHoovervilles

  Offered Americans a New Deal in 1932  Declared a four-day bank holiday  Passed the Emergency Banking Relief Act  Created alliance of labor unions, minorities, farmers, those receiving gov’t relief, and intellectuals FDR to the Rescue

  Success was earned, failure was deserved  Men hit harder psychologically than women  Humiliated to ask for assistance  Percentage of women working increased in areas of teaching and social service  Children took on more responsibilities  People developed habits of careful saving and were determined to make comfortable lives American Mindset

  In 1930, 50% of blacks were unemployed  Eleanor Roosevelt championed black rights  New Deal program prohibited discrimination  Discrimination continued in the South  Large number of black voters switched from Republican to Democrat during the depression Eleanor Roosevelt

  Southern United States  1930s  The Great Depression  A time of:  Prejudice  Race, gender, handicap, rich/poor, age, and religion  Legal segregation Setting of the Novel

  Gender bias against women  Women considered “weak”  Not educated for occupations outside the home  Wealthy women expected to oversee servants and entertain guests  Men were not considered capable of nurturing children so it was the women’s role  Scout is representative of Harper Lee in the novel Setting of the Novel

  Women given the right to vote in 1920  Juries consisted of white males  A “fair trial” did not include acceptance of a black man’s word against a white man’s  Atticus Finch = white lawyer hired to represent a black man in the novel  Tom Robinson = black man accused of raping a white women; represented by Atticus Finch Legal Issues of the 1930s