Which era is most associated with the expansion of the administrative state and regulatory agencies?

• A. The Progressive Era.
• B. The New Deal era.
• C. The Great Society.
• D. The Civil War era.

Answer: (B)

The main idea here is the rise of a permanent, rulemaking bureaucracy to manage the economy and society. The New Deal era is where this becomes most evident: in response to the Great Depression, the federal government created a broad array of agencies and programs—such as the Securities and Exchange Commission, Social Security, the National Labor Relations Board, and many others—giving the national government new powers to regulate markets, provide welfare, and oversee daily economic life. This built the modern administrative state, with specialized agencies that write rules, enforce them, and administer nationwide programs. The other periods did broaden government in different ways, but the scale and institutional design of a large regulatory bureaucracy are most closely associated with the New Deal.