The high unemployment rates of the 1930s made those who had jobs both thankful that they had jobs and fearful that they could lose them. Those who could not find jobs often took to the roads--thousands of men regularly rode the rails. The numbers in skid rows increased greatly, and other homeless set up homes in shantytowns throughout the nation that became known as "Hoovervilles." Because the Depression caused so much suffering, it is not surprising that it caused major changes in the political structure in the United States.
From the Civil War until the Depression, the Republican party was the dominant political party--it generally controlled the House of Representatives, the U.S. Senate, and the Presidency. In the elections of 1930, the Democrats took control of the House of Representatives, and after the 1936 elections they outnumbered the Republicans 331 to 89. Only once in the next fifty years did Republicans capture a majority in the House. After the Republicans lost control of the Senate in 1932, they regained a majority in only six of the next fifty years. In the same year of 1932, Franklin Roosevelt was overwhelmingly elected, defeating Herbert Hoover with a total of 22.8 million votes to 15.8 million. Along with the change in dominant political party has come a change in what Americans expect from government. Only a limited understanding of American politics is possible without understanding the effects of this period; the shadow of the Depression dominated American political life for decades.