Established in March 1933 during the first Hundred Days of the Franklin D. Roosevelt administration, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) was an important part of both the conservation and the RELlEf efforts of the New Deal. One of the most popular New Deal agencies, it was also especially close to the heart of Roosevelt himself. Deeply troubled by the plight of hundreds of thousands of youthful transients at the depth of the Great Depression, Roosevelt and others saw the CCC as a way to conserve not only the nation’s land and natural resources but also the spirits of young men by providing them income and
New opportunities and experiences. The CCC peaked at roughly a half million workers in 1935, ultimately employed a total of some three million young men over its 1933-42 lifetime, and accomplished a large and imaginative assortment of projects.
At its inception, the CCC was authorized to employ some 250,000 young men in a variety of conservation efforts. Jobless young men between 18 and 25 years old were to enlist for a period of six months (renewable for three more terms, or up to two years) and were paid $30 a month ($25 of which they were to send home) for working on a variety of conservation projects. The program worked through established government agencies, coordinated by the CCC director, with the Labor Department selecting the young men, the War Department transporting them to camps, and the Agriculture and Interior Departments supervising the projects. The CCC did not enroll women, and it imposed a quota on Aerican Americans and operated segregated camps.
Perhaps most noted of the CCC accomplishments were its reforestation projects, which accounted for some 75 percent of all trees planted in the nation down to 1942. But the CCC did far more than this—in implementing other forms of erosion control; in protecting wildlife and building some 300,000 wildlife shelters; in stocking nearly 1 billion fish; in developing trails, campgrounds, and other infrastructure in national parks; in preserving and restoring national historical sites; in building dams for flood control; in building firebreaks, lookout towers, and trails for fire control; and in other ways protecting, preserving, and beautifying the nation’s natural and built environment. And in accomplishing such tasks, the CCC also pioneered in work relief that brought needed money to destitute young people and their families. Like subsequent New Deal programs aimed at work relief, training, and education for young people, it also had the desired effect of keeping them off the job market, so that jobs might go to unemployed adults.
As a work-relief agency, the CCC seemed increasingly unnecessary and was vulnerable to conservative opposition as prosperity returned with World War II. Even before the off-year election of 1942 gave a clear ideological majority to the congressional conservative coalition of Republicans and conservative Democrats, Congress stepped up its opposition to such holdover 1930s agencies as the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and the CCC. The CCC’s numbers had been falling steadily since the late 1930s in any event, and by 1942 it was to focus its efforts on those related to the war effort. Even public support for the CCC waned in these new circumstances. In July 1942, Roosevelt unhappily terminated the agency after Congress cut off its appropriations.
See also environmental issues.
Further reading: John Salmond, The Civilian Conservation Corps, 1933-1942: A New Deal Case Study (Durham, N. C.: Duke University Press, 1967).
World History
