How did FDR become the champion of the common man? He pilloried the monied interests, the "economic royalists." The WPA hired 3 million in its first year and 8 million in its short life. The New Deal created new state institutions providing assistance to the elderly, disabled and poor. Liberalism is the product of the Rnlightenment. People are not frozen in place by birth. Society can create fluid systems so people are not crushed by economic or governmental power