This excerpt is from a press conference given by President Herbert Hoover in 1929. The question is one somewhat of analysis. We have had a period of overspeculation that has been extremely widespread, one of those waves of speculation that are more or less uncontrollable, as evidenced by the efforts of the Federal Reserve Board, and that ultimately results in a crash due to its own weight. . . . The ultimate result of it is a complete isolation of the stock market phenomenon from the general business phenomenon. In other words, the financial world is functioning entirely normal and rather more easily today than it was 2 weeks ago, because interest rates are less and there is more capital available. The effect on production is purely psychological.

. . . The sum of it is, therefore, that we have gone through a crisis in the stock market, but for the first time in history the crisis has been isolated to the stock market itself. It has not extended into either the production activities of the country or the financial fabric of the country, and for that I think we may give the major credit to the constitution of the Federal Reserve System.

This excerpt is from President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s first inaugural address in 1933.

In such a spirit on my part and on yours we face our common difficulties. . . . Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes have risen; our ability to pay has fallen; government of all kinds is faced by serious curtailment of income; the means of exchange are frozen in the currents of trade; the withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on every side; farmers find no markets for their produce; the savings of many years in thousands of families are gone. More important, a host of unemployed citizens face the grim problem of existence, and an equally great number toil with little return. Only a foolish optimist can deny the dark realities of the moment.

How does the excerpt from President Hoover’s press conference differ from President Roosevelt’s inaugural address?