1. Which of the following changes is needed in the first paragraph?

A) Part 2: Change “it’s” to “its.”

B) Part 3: Remove quotation marks.

C) Part 4: Change “They” to “The American people.”

D) Part 5: Move “only” to follow “half.”

1. The correct choice is A.

The contraction "it’s" is a replacement for "it is" and, if read that way in sentence 2, would be clearly incorrect.

• "outside it is borders" is obviously wrong.

• "outside its borders" is correct.

The corrected sentence is shown below in red.

(1) In the 1930s the entire world was in a state of turmoil. (2) The United States, however, had very little energy to pay attention to problems outside it’s borders. (2) The United States, however, had very little energy to pay attention to problems outside its borders. (3) Franklin D. Roosevelt became President in March 1933 and pledged himself to “a new deal for the American people.” (4) They certainly needed something new. (5) National income and productivity were only half what they had been just four years earlier. (6) The disappearance of so many jobs and the terrible dust storms in the Midwest contributed to the 12 million people who were unemployed and living in crippling poverty. (7) _________________________________.

(8) Roosevelt began by restoring confidence in the banking system. (9) ____, he closed all the banks; ______, he reopened only the solvent ones, after instituting new rules about required reserves. (10) He also put many of the unemployed to work on federal projects. (11) Many of today’s schools and parks, for example, were constructed during this period. (12) On the farm front, Roosevelt got production of some crops limited so that prices would naturally rise. (13) In fact, so popular was the New Deal that Roosevelt was reelected in 1936 by a plurality of more than 9 million votes.