Hist Final

Front 1

Freedom Train

Back 1

- On anniversary of signing Constitution, opened to public in PA containing 133 historical documents
- Headed by American Heritage Foundation, led by Winthrop W. Aldrich, chairman of Chase Bank
- Hardly contained documents relating to organized labor or 20th century social legislation
- Did not segregate visitors
- Intended to contrast American freedom with Nazi tyranny, but eventually got caught up in struggle with communism

Front 2

Marshall Plan

Back 2

- Freedom > anticommunism
- Envisioned New Deal for Europe, extension to Roosevelt's wartime Four Freedoms
- Focus on prosperity and political stability more
- Soviet Union refused to participate; further separated U.S. and Soviet

Front 3

"To Secure These Rights"

Back 3

- Called on federal gov't to abolish segregation and ensure equal treatment in housing, employment, education, and the criminal justice system
- By Commission on Civil Rights appointed by the President

Front 4

NSC-68

Back 4

- By National Security Council
- Approved call for permanent military build up to enable U.S. to pursue global crusade against communism
- Cold War = Struggle for the survival of the free world
- Spurred dramatic increase in military spending

Front 5

Taft-Hartley Act

Back 5

- Against organized labor
- Authorized president to suspend strikes by ordering 80 day "cooling-off period"
- Banned sympathy strikes and secondary boycotts (not at an employer but those doing business with him)
- Outlawed the closed shop, which required a worker to be a union member when taking a job
- Authorized states to pass "right-to-work" laws
- Forced union officials to swear that they were not communists

Front 6

House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)

Back 6

- Held hearings about communist influence in Hollywood
- Celebrities said movie industry was holding many communists
- Hollywood 10 didn't answer the committee's questions about their political beliefs or to name anyone b/c it violated 1st Amendment
- Had to go to jail for 6 months to a year
- Hollywood blacklisted them and 200 others who were accused and refused to name names

Front 7

Army-McCarthy Hearings

Back 7

- McCarthy claimed army harbored communists
- He intimidated witnesses and made insane accusations w/o proof
- Ended with him questioning loyalty of lawyer Welch

Front 8

Levittown

Back 8

- Built by William and Alfred Levitt
- 1,200 acres of potato fields on Long Island
- Most famous suburban developers
- 10,000+ houses for 40,000 people

Front 9

Baby Boom

Back 9

- Women saw marriage as the most important goal
- During 1950s, men and women married younger, divorced less frequently, and had more children (3.2 per family)
- Even with low immigration, population rose by nearly 30 million (20%)
- Reflected that Americans lived longer than in past b/c of "miracle drugs" to fight against infections

Front 10

Milton Friedman

Back 10

- Economist who published "Capitalism and Freedom" (identified free market as necessary for individual freedom)
- Not uncommon, but he went further
- Called for turning over all government functions to the private sector
- Called for repealing minimum wage laws, the graduated income tax, and the Social Security system.
- Said gov't should not be involved in economy nor individual conduct
- Progress and personal autonomy

Front 11

The New Conservatism

Back 11

- Convinced that Free World needed to arm its minds, not just militarily, for the battle against communism
- Weaver's "Ideas Have Consequences" warned that the West suffered from moral decay and called for return to a civilization based on values grounded in the Christian tradition
- Understood freedom as a moral condition
- Said gov't should not be involved in economy, but should in individual conduct
- Tradition, community, and moral commitment

Front 12

Sputnik

Back 12

- First artificial earth satellite
- By Soviets
- Led to National Defense Education Act: Direct federal funding for higher education

Front 13

The Beats

Back 13

- Small group of poets and writers who rejected mainstream culture
- Rejected work ethic ("desperate materialism" of the suburban middle class), the militarization of American life by the Cold War
- Celebrated impulsive action, immediate pleasure (often w/ drugs), and sexual experimentation
- Insisted personal and political repression, not freedom, were hallmarks of American society (despite Cold War)

Front 14

Little Rock Crisis

Back 14

- Governor Orval Faubus of Arkansas used National Guard to prevent court-ordered integration of Little rock's Central high School
- Eisenhower dispatched federal troops, who escorted nine black children into the school
- Showed that federal gov't would not allow violation of court orders

Front 15

Cuban Missile Crisis

Back 15

- Soviet Union installing missiles in Cuba which could reach United States
- Kennedy imposed blockade or quarantine of island and demanded the missiles' removal
- Khrushchev agreed to withdraw missiles
- U.S. agreed not to invade Cuba and remove Jupiter missiles from Turkey which could reach Soviet Union

Front 16

Fannie Lou Hamer

Back 16

- Important in grassroots civil rights organizing for women

Front 17

Young Americans for Freedom (YAF)

Back 17

- Conservative students emerged into politics
- Sharon Statement: Issued by 90 young people who gathered at the estate of conservative intellectual William F. Buckley in Sharon, Connecticut to establish YAF
- Said that: Free market underpinned "persona freedom", gov't must be strictly limited, and "international communism" must be destroyed
- Initially wanted to control the Republican Party from leaders who agreed with the New Deal and wanted to coexist with communism

Front 18

Hart-Celler Act

Back 18

- Abandoned old system of immigration that excluded Asians and severely restricted southern and eastern Europeans
- Established racially neutral criteria for immigration
- Established limit on newcomers from the Western Hemisphere (120,000)
- Created category of "illegal aliens" from the Americas
- Set quota for rest of the world at 170,000
- Now annual number of immigrants was less than old quotas
- Resulted in explosive rise in immigration from Latin America, the Carribean, and Asia (more than from Europe)

Front 19

Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)

Back 19

- Offshoot of socialist League for Industrial Democracy
- Port Huron Statement: 60 college students adopted a document
- 4/5 criticized political parties to corporations, unions, and the military-industrial complex.
- 1/5 offered new vision of social change
- Sought a democracy of individual participation, in which individual shares in those social decision determining the quality and direction of his life.
- "Participatory democracy"

Front 20

Cesar Chavez

Back 20

- Led nonviolent protests to pressure growers to agree to labor contracts with the United Farm Workers union (UFW)
- Mobilized Latino communities in Southwest and drew national attention to very low wages and oppressive working conditions of migrant laborers

Front 21

Silent Spring

Back 21

- Author: Rachel Carson
- Exposed environmental costs of economic growth

Front 22

The Bakke decision

Back 22

- Court overturned an admissions program of University of California at Davis, which reserved 16/100 spots in the medical school for minority students
- Fixed affirmative action quotas
- Higher education may consider race in admissions decisions

Front 23

Detente

Back 23

- "Cooperation"
- Nixon (U.S.) and Brezhnev (Soviet) agreed to disarmament (SALT and ABMT)
- Peaceful coexistence between the two nations to replace hostility of Cold War

Front 24

Watergate

Back 24

- Five former employees of Nixon's reelection broke in at Democratic Party headquarters in the Watergate apartment complex in Washington, D.C.
- Eventually linked it to Nixon, Supreme Court unanimously ordered him to provide them with copies of the taped recordings of conversations in his office

Front 25

Iran Hostage Crisis

Back 25

- Khomeini's followers invaded the American embassy in Tehran and seized 53 hostages
- Hostages did not regain freedom until President Carter's term ended

Front 26

Phyllis Schlafly

Back 26

- Organized opposition to ERA
- Insisted that the "free enterprise system" was the "real liberator of women" since labor-saving home appliances offered more genuine freedom than "whining about past injustices" or seeking fulfillment outside the home
- Basically women were more free inside their homes

Front 27

Ronald Reagan / Election of 1980

Back 27

- Carter's approval rating fell to 21%
- Reagan's campaign brought together conservatism
- Pledged to restore the country's dominant role in the world and confidence in itself
- Emphasized states' rights
- Included opposition to federal intervention oh behalf of civil rights
- Repeatedly condemned welfare "cheats", school busing, and affirmative action
- Began to oppose ERA (Equal Rights Amendment)
- Popular vote was close (Reagan: 51% vs. Carter: 41%), while Reagan swept electoral votes (Reagan: 91% vs. Carter: 9%)
- Left (Liberals) --> Right (Conservatives)