<P> Recovery was pursued through "pump - priming" (that is, federal spending). The NIRA included $3.3 billion of spending through the Public Works Administration . Roosevelt worked with Senator Norris to create the largest government - owned industrial enterprise in American history--the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA)--which built dams and power stations, controlled floods, and modernized agriculture and home conditions in the poverty - stricken Tennessee Valley . Executive Order 6102 declared that all privately held gold of American citizens was to be sold to the U.S. Treasury and the price raised from $20 to $35 per ounce . The goal was to counter the deflation which was paralyzing the economy . </P> <P> Roosevelt tried to keep his campaign promise by cutting the federal budget--including a reduction in military spending from $752 million in 1932 to $531 million in 1934 and a 40% cut in spending on veterans' benefits--by removing 500,000 veterans and widows from the pension rolls and reducing benefits for the remainder, as well as cutting the salaries of federal employees and reducing spending on research and education . But the veterans were well organized and strongly protested, and most benefits were restored or increased by 1934 . Veterans groups such as the American Legion and the Veterans of Foreign Wars won their campaign to transform their benefits from payments due in 1945 to immediate cash when Congress overrode the President's veto and passed the Bonus Act in January 1936 . It pumped sums equal to 2% of the GDP into the consumer economy and had a major stimulus effect . </P> <P> Roosevelt expected that his party would lose several races in the 1934 Congressional elections, as the president's party had done in most previous midterm elections, but the Democrats picked up seats in both houses of Congress . Empowered by the public's apparent vote of confidence in his administration, the first item on Roosevelt's agenda in the 74th Congress was the creation of a social insurance program . The Social Security Act established Social Security and promised economic security for the elderly, the poor and the sick . Roosevelt insisted that it should be funded by payroll taxes rather than from the general fund, saying, "We put those payroll contributions there so as to give the contributors a legal, moral, and political right to collect their pensions and unemployment benefits . With those taxes in there, no damn politician can ever scrap my social security program ." Compared with the social security systems in western European countries, the Social Security Act of 1935 was rather conservative . But for the first time the federal government took responsibility for the economic security of the aged, the temporarily unemployed, dependent children, and the handicapped . Against Roosevelt's original intention for universal coverage, the act only applied to roughly sixty percent of the labor force, as farmers, domestic workers, and other groups were excluded . </P> <P> Roosevelt consolidated the various relief organizations, though some, like the PWA, continued to exist . After winning Congressional authorization for further funding of relief efforts, Roosevelt established the Works Progress Administration (WPA). Under the leadership of Harry Hopkins, the WPA employed over three million people in its first year of existence . The WPA undertook numerous construction projects but also provided funding to the National Youth Administration and arts organizations . </P>

Who was the president during pearl harbor attack