[ek_hornbeck]

The reason that that happened is that Hoover was a progressive (FDR even more so.) Coolidge had been VP for the depression of the early ‘20s. The government stood by idly and did nothing, and it corrected itself about a year to a year and a half in.

You seem to be very confused about your US history. FDR was opposed to Smoot-Hawley, he ran as a free trade opponent of Hoover. In fact, FDR is the one most responsible for the myth that Smoot-Hawley caused the Great Depression.

[TBP]

FDR was a big-time progressive. He may have run against Smoot-Hawley, but he never intended to do anything about it, and his alphabet soup of Big Government agencies just made the Great Depression longer and deeper.