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 a product of the Enlightenment. People are not frozen in place by birth. Society can create fluid systems so people are not crushed by economic or governmental power