The country went through important changes and while it didn't always act in respectable ways (FDR refused to sign an anti-lynching bill so he could keep southern support, there were Japanese internment camps, US pilots eventually terror bombed enemy cities, the US dropped atomic bombs, etc.), the Nazis were defeated, poor people received benefits to vastly improve their way of life, and the country remained intact. *This book was initially written in two volumes by David Kennedy. One called The American People in the Great Depression: Freedom from Fear, Part One and the other called The American People in World War II: Freedom from Fear, Part Two . I only wanted to read the first one on the Great Depression but the Philadelphia library system only has the combined book with both volumes. While I initially wasn't particularly thrilled with the prospect of 850 pages on this era, I found the parts on World War II to be more interesting than the first volume on the Great Depression, so I guess it worked out ok. Like all the Oxford series this book is part of, Kennedy's history of the Depression and WWII is excellent. It provides insights into Hoover and FDR, describing New Deal programs and battles with the right amount of detail, and even asking the right moral questions about the war and its conduct. And it's a delight to read, full of anecdote and fact, while never losing the major threads of the history being described. It is