Download unit eighteen: the post-world war ii blues, 1945

UNIT EIGHTEEN: THE POST-WORLD WAR II BLUES, 1945-2000
I. The Origins of the Cold War
A. The roots of the Cold War lay in the distrust that existed between the Western allies (United States
and Britain) and their ally in the East, the Soviet Union. The extent of this distrust became evident
during the wartime conferences between the leaders of these three nations to plan war aims and
strategies. These conferences included:
1) Teheran Conference (November 28-December 1, 1943).
2) Yalta Conference (February 4-February 11, 1945).
3) Potsdam Conference (July 17-August 2, 1945)
B. Following the dropping of atomic bombs first on Hiroshima and then on Nagasaki, WWII at last
came to an end. Relations between the United States and the Soviet Union rapidly deteriorated.
Even as the Western Allies moved to implement their part of the Yalta agreements the Soviets did
not. Stalin, alarmed by the West's nuclear monopoly, angered by Secretary of State James
Byrne's clumsy efforts to use American nuclear superiority as a club, and fearful of a future
resurgent Germany, pursued an aggressive policy in Eastern Europe. In 1946-1947 Stalin imposed
communist regimes in Poland, Hungary, Rumania, and Bulgaria.
1) Despite their anger and alarm over Stalin's actions, in 1946 the United States, Britain, and
Canada (partners in developing the atomic bomb) proposed to the United Nations' Atomic
Energy Commission that an International Atomic Development Authority be given a
monopoly over nuclear weapons and atomic energy (Baruch Plan). The Soviets, fearing
Western domination of the commission and working on their own bomb, rejected the plan. They
proposed to make the manufacture and use of nuclear weapon illegal with the Security Council
responsible for enforcement. The Soviet opposition to any effective international inspection
protocol, however, killed this plan. The Soviets detonated their own atomic bomb in September,
1949.
2) In a speech delivered at Fulton, Missouri in 1946, Winston Churchill acknowledged the existence
of the Cold War when he declared that "an Iron Curtain has descended across the continent of
Europe" that divided the democracies of the West from the totalitarian communist states of the
East.
3) At about the same time, Stalin made a similar acknowledgement when he proclaimed
international peace an impossibility "under the present capitalistic development of the world
economy."
4) Confronted with Stalin's avowed hostility, American diplomat George F. Kennan warned his
government of the Soviets' fanatical commitment "to the belief that it is desirable and
necessary that the internal harmony of our society be disrupted, our traditional way of life
destroyed, the international power of our state be broken, if Soviet power is to be secure." A
year later, he anonymously outlined a policy of containment in Foreign Affairs. He saw such
a policy as the best means of dealing with the Soviet threat. He defined the policy as "a long
term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansionist tendencies." Over time,
Kennan thought, Soviet ideology would moderate and more normal relations between the two
countries might be possible. With some foresight he suggested that "Soviet power ... bears
within the seeds of its own decay, and that the sprouting of those seeds is well advanced."
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II. Cold War Foreign Policy: Containment in Action, 1947-1995
A. Containment, as employed by the United State represented a multifaceted policy.
1) On one level it reflected a commitment to assist governments threatened by communist
insurgencies.
a) Harry Truman first gave voice to this idea in the Truman Doctrine (March, 1947).
i) Events in Turkey and Greece compelled Truman to assert this doctrine.
aa) The Soviets, seeking access to the Mediterranean, had begun to pressure
Turkey to grant them rights for naval bases in Turkish territory.
bb) Of greater significance, the financially strapped British government informed
the United States that it could no longer support assist the Greek government in
its war against communist rebels.
ii) Truman, warning that the United States must sustain free peoples resisting
communist domination, requested and received from Congress $400 million in
military and economic aid for Greece and Turkey.
b) President Dwight D. Eisenhower elaborated on the ideas of the Truman Doctrine in
January, 1957, when he enunciated the Eisenhower Doctrine. Confronted with Soviet
efforts to gain a foothold in this vital oil-producing Middle East, Eisenhower warned that
the United States would employ military force to block any Soviet incursion into the region.
Under the Eisenhower Doctrine, U.S. marines occupied Beirut, Lebanon in July, 1958, to
maintain stability during a change of government. The marines were withdrawn a few
months later.
c) In response to the Vietnam War, President Richard Nixon announced the Nixon Doctrine
in 1969. During a speech delivered in Guam, he informed America's Asian allies that,
while the United States would honor its treaty commitments by providing economic and
military assistance, they would be expected to provide the troops for their own defense.
He did promise that American military power would respond to any nuclear threat against
its allies.
d) In 1980, President Jimmy Carter felt compelled to elaborate on the Eisenhower Doctrine.
Fearful that the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan might be a prelude to an advance into the
oil-rich Persian Gulf region, the Carter Doctrine avowed that the United States would
respond to any such assault as it would to an attack on its own territory. Carter provided
his doctrine with teeth by establishing a Rapid Deployment Force (RDF) and extending
economic aid to Oman in exchange for military bases. Later the Pentagon renamed the
RDF Central Command (Centcom) and expanded its size. It also stockpiled military
supplies in the Persian Gulf region ready for use in an emergency.
e) President Ronald Reagan reasserted America's commitment to assist those threatened by
communism in 1985. Prompted by a desire to reverse the isolationist trend that had gripped
the United States following its embarrassment in Vietnam, the Reagan Doctrine asserted
that the United States would support anticommunist forces wherever they sought "to defy
Soviet-supported aggression." Even before declaring this policy early in his second term,
Reagan had already put it into operation with support for the anticommunists in El Salvador,
the anticommunist Contras in Nicaragua, and in the invasion of Grenada.
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2) Economic assistance for the reconstruction of a war-torn world figured prominently in
containment policy.
a) The Marshall Plan (1948-1951) to rebuild Europe best represented this aspect of
containment.
i) Officially designated by Congress as the European Recovery Program, the
Marshall Plan provided some $12.5 billion dollars to reconstruct war-ravaged Europe.
ii) Although offered to all European nations, neither the Soviets nor their Eastern Bloc
puppets agreed to participate. Instead, the Soviets established the Council of
Mutual Economic Assistance to rebuild Eastern Europe. Lacking America's
economic resources, the Soviet aid proved limited and recovery in Eastern Europe
lagged far behind that of the West.
iii) The non-communist nations of Europe welcomed this opportunity for "recovery, not
relief." The United States allowed the participating nations to define their own needs
through the Council of European Economic Cooperation (CEEC). (As early as
July, 1944, at the Bretton Woods Conference representatives from Europe and the
United States had agreed to create an international bank and a World Monetary
Fund to stabilize international currencies and rebuild the economies of war-torn
nations.)
iv) While motivated in part by a desire to restore a Europe that Winston Churchill had
labeled "a rubble heap, a charnel house, a breeding ground of pestilence and hate,"
the United States also acted from the conviction that a ruined Europe would be far
more susceptible to the Sirens' call of communism than a Europe undergoing
reconstruction and burgeoning prosperity.
b) The Point Four Program (1949) embodied President Truman's policy of extending
technical assistance to help developing nations in Latin America, the Middle East, Africa,
and Asia increase agricultural and industrial output, improve government administration,
promote public health, and advance education.
c) In the Food for Peace Program (1954), President Eisenhower made outright gifts or lowcost sales of American surplus food products to help developing nations.
d) Through the Alliance for Progress (1961), President John F. Kennedy substantially
increased aid to Latin American nations in hopes of improving living conditions for the
masses of people there.
e) President Kennedy also created the Peace Corps (1961). This agency sent volunteers to
developing nations that requested aid in implementing programs of technical assistance.
f) Concern about growing communist insurgencies in Latin America prompted President
Reagan to announce the Caribbean Basin Initiative (1982). Warning that the United
States must act "decisively in the defense of freedom" or risk the emergence of "new
Cubas" throughout the hemisphere, Reagan proposed a broad plan of economic and
technical assistance to improve the well-being of 28 nations in or bordering the Caribbean.
3) Military confrontations and wars also played a significant role in the policy of containment.
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a) Alliances played a significant role in this military process.
i) In 1948, the industrial democracies of the West became alarmed by aggressive Soviet
moves in Central Europe that included the takeover of Czechoslovakia by local
communists, Soviet pressure on Finland to accept a mutual assistance pact, and the
Berlin Blockade. The western nations responded by forming the North Atlantic
Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949.
aa) In the North Atlantic Pact the members of NATO pledged to treat an attack on
any one of them as an attack on all of them.
bb) The original 12 members included Britain, France, Belgium, Holland,
Luxembourg, Denmark, Iceland, Italy, Norway, Portugal, Canada, and the United
States. Later, membership was extended to Greece and Turkey in 1952, West
Germany in 1955, and Spain in 1982.
cc) In 1950, NATO members established a NATO army with each country
contributing personnel and equipment. The NATO army's headquarters are in
Belgium and its commander has always been an American.
dd) The Soviets responded to NATO's admission of West Germany by forming the
Warsaw Pact in 1955.
ii) In the years that followed the United States forged similar alliances with more than 40
nations. These include:
aa) Australia-New Zealand-United States (ANZUS) Pact.
bb) Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO).
b) Direct confrontations between the western allies and their Soviet opponents represented the
most dangerous aspect of the Cold War and Containment.
i) One of the earliest such confrontations came in Berlin in 1948-1949.
aa) The Berlin Crisis began when Britain, France, and the United States announced
plans to unite their zones of control to form the German Federal Republic
(West Germany).
bb) Outraged by this announcement, Stalin resolved to expel the western allies from
Berlin which lay deep inside the Soviet zone of control – despite agreements
which guaranteed their right to be there. He sought to do so by severing the
surface routes that connected West Berlin with West Germany.
cc) To thwart the Soviet blockade of Berlin, President Truman and other western
leaders resolved to keep the inhabitants of West Berlin supplied with necessities
by means of the massive Berlin Airlift (Operation Vittles). Unable to halt the flow
of supplies without shooting down the planes and precipitating war, in 1949, the
Soviets lifted the blockade.
ii) Berlin, however, remained a serious – potentially deadly – source of discord between
the Cold War foes.
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aa) In 1958, Premier Khrushchev repeated the Soviet Union's determination to expel
the western allies from Berlin. The allies vowed to remain, but agreed to
negotiations. When the negotiations produced no results, the Soviets did not
attempt to force the allies out.
bb) Another crisis emerged in 1961 over Berlin following the unsuccessful
American backed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba. President Kennedy called up
reserve and National Guard units and requested increased defense funds from
Congress. Khrushchev responded by ordering the border between East and
West Berlin closed by construction of the Berlin Wall.
iii) Yet Berlin was not the only point at which the allies and the Soviets came into direct
conflict.
aa) When communist rebels under Fidel Castro overthrew Fulgencio Batista and
seized control of Cuba in 1959, President Eisenhower authorized the Central
Intelligence Agency (CIA) to train an army of 2,000 Cuban refugees to
invade the island. Kennedy inherited this army and the CIA's plan. In 1961, he
allowed the planned invasion to go forward. This Bay of Pigs invasion proved a
complete fiasco and chiefly served to encourage the Soviets in their belief that
Kennedy could be pushed around.
bb) Seeking to gain an advantage in the Cold War balance of power, the Soviets
used the potential of another American-backed invasion of Cuba as an excuse
for deploying nuclear missiles there.
cc) The Cuban Missile Crisis erupted in October, 1962, when United States U-2
spy planes brought back photographs of missile sites under construction in
Cuba.
dd) After considering and rejecting military strikes against the missile sites, Kennedy
blockaded the island. (Kennedy described this as a “quarantine” because a
blockade is an act of war.)
ee) The world waited anxiously to see if Khrushchev would challenge Kennedy by
attempting to violate the blockade. He did not. Instead, he withdrew the
missiles. Kennedy lifted the blockade. He also promised not to invade Cuba
and to remove some obsolete American "Jupiter" missiles from Turkey.
ff) Following this dangerous crisis – which had brought the world to the brink of
nuclear war – the United States and Soviet Union established a "hot line"
telephone linking the Kremlin and the White House to facilitate communication
in future crises.
c) Although the Cold War belligerents succeeded in avoiding war in Europe and America,
they did not prove so successful in Asia. Here, the Cold War turned "hot" more than
once.
i) In Asia, the United States and its allies confronted not just the Soviets and their
puppet states, but also Communist China. Communist China remained an ally of the
Soviets until these two chief communist powers ended their alliance in 1963 after a
bitter dispute.
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aa) During and immediately after WWII, the United States lent its diplomatic and
economic support to the Nationalist Chinese under Chiang Kai-shek.
President Truman sent General George C. Marshall to negotiate a
settlement between the Nationalists and the communists under Mao Tse-tung.
American efforts were frustrated by the corruption and incompetence of the
Chiang regime. In 1949, Mao's forces defeated the Nationalists and drove
them from the mainland to the island of Formosa (Taiwan/Nationalist
China). Mao then established the People's Republic of China (Red China)
on the mainland. (The issue of who "lost" China would figure large in American
politics and foreign policy for many years to come.)
bb) In 1955, Sino-American relations were further complicated by the issue of
Quemoy and Matsu – two islands between Taiwan and the mainland.
Occupied by the Nationalists but claimed by the communists, Mao ordered the
islands shelled by artillery in a bid to drive the Nationalists away. The
Eisenhower administration sought and secured congressional permission to
use American military force to defend Taiwan and related areas – including
Quemoy and Matsu. (These islands proved a major topic in the 1960 televised
presidential debate between Kennedy and Nixon.
ii) China's significance in the Asian Cold War became readily apparent during the
Korean Conflict.
aa) At the end of WWII, Korea (a former Japanese colony) was divided along the
38th parallel. Soviet troops occupied the North; American troops the South.
The Soviets frustrated all attempts to reunite Korea under free elections.
Instead, they established a communist regime under Kim Il-Sung and built up a
powerful army. In the South, the Americans established a democratic
government.
bb) In January, 1950, Secretary of State Dean Acheson failed to mention South
Korea when defining American security interests in the Pacific. This statement
may have encouraged the North Koreans to conclude that the United States
would not go to war to protect South Korea.
cc) In June, 1950, the North Korean communists launched an unprovoked surprise
attack on South Korea. The United Nations Security Council – with the Soviet
Union boycotting the organization – called on UN members to furnish military
assistance to South Korea. Although some 15 nations participated, the United
States provided the bulk of the forces. President Truman committed these
troops without a congressional declaration of war. General Douglas
MacArthur commanded.
dd) After suffering initial setbacks, MacArthur's forces began to drive back up the
Korean Peninsula. When the United Nation's forces approached too near the
Chinese border, China entered the war on the side of the North Koreans. They
pushed the UN forces back until the lines stabilized near the 38th parallel.
ee) MacArthur publicly complained that Truman would not allow him to win the
war (possibly with nuclear weapons) by carrying the fight into China. The
president, fearing that such a strategy would provoke war with the Soviets, fired
him for insubordination.
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ff) The Korean War ended with a truce in 1953 after two years of negotiation.
The key issue holding up agreement involved repatriation of prisoners. The
UN objected that many captured North Koreans did not wish to return to a
communist regime. The North Koreans demanded the forced repatriation of all
prisoners. Finally, the two sides agreed to grant all prisoners freedom of
choice. Although the American people rejoiced at the return of peace, the
continued division of Korea into a communist North and a democratic South
prompted a belief that America had not won the war.
d) No aspect of containment, however, inflicted a deeper wound on the American psyche than
the Vietnam War.
i) The French colony of Indochina (Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam) had fallen under
Japanese control during WWII. Following the war, France attempted to reassert its
control over the region. To facilitate this process, the French promised partial
independence to the three component states of Indochina. The communistcontrolled Vietminh, led by the Moscow-trained Ho Chi Minh, rejected the offer.
The Vietminh won popular support by promising to drive out the French and
redistribute land to the peasants. For eight years (1946-1954) civil war raged in
Indochina with the United States underwriting much of the French military effort.
Following their defeat in the decisive battle at Dien Bien Phu, the French could
fight no longer. President Eisenhower considered a unilateral American military
intervention to rescue the French, but rejected the idea. The French then abandoned
their efforts to subdue the region.
ii) In 1954, at the Geneva Conference, the major European powers and the countries
of Indochina drafted the Geneva Accords. Neither the United States nor South
Vietnam signed the accords. These Geneva Accords provided for:
aa) the independence of Laos and Cambodia.
bb) the division of Vietnam at the 17th parallel into a communist North with Hanoi
as its capital and a non-communist South with Saigon as its capital.
cc) the vote by the people of both North and South Vietnam by mid-1956 for a
single all-Vietnam government.
iii) In North Vietnam, Ho Chi Minh established a communist dictatorship and used
extensive aid from both the Soviet Union and China to strengthen his army. Ho
and his communists were determined to control all of Vietnam.
iv) In the strongly anti-communist South, the government of Ngo Dinh Diem rejected
all plans for the proposed unifying election. It insisted that honest elections
represented an utter impossibility in the communist North. The Diem government
faced a massive campaign of communist subversion in the form of guerilla war
executed by local communists organized as the Viet Cong. The Viet Cong used
terrorism and murder to gain control over large portions of rural South Vietnam.
Diem's government turned increasingly repressive as it attempted to confront this
communist challenge.
v) Hard-pressed, the government of South Vietnam sought aid from the United States.
Fearing that the fall of South Vietnam to communism might result in the fall of
neighboring countries as well – the domino theory – the United States responded
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favorably. It also intervened diplomatically to block the planned 1956 election.
vi) Until 1964, the American aid consisted of economic assistance, military supplies,
and military advisors. By 1963, however, these 17,000 American advisors had
begun to participate in the fighting.
vii) In 1964, American destroyers (Maddox and Turner Joy) running covert
operations off the coast of North Vietnam came under attack by North
Vietnamese gunboats. A few days later the destroyers reported a similar attack.
Although later analysis raised questions about the accuracy of the second report,
President Johnson used the Gulf of Tonkin Incident as justification for ordering
air strikes against targets in North Vietnam. Congress overwhelmingly endorsed
this presidential action in the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution which authorized the
president to take any needed actions to protect American interests in the region.
Although repealed in 1970, the Vietnam War was fought under the authority of this
resolution.
viii) President Johnson's decision to use the Gulf of Tonkin Incident to escalate the war
– despite knowing the incident had not occurred – reflected a mixture of motives.
aa) Like all Cold War presidents, Johnson felt compelled to convince the Soviets
and Chinese that he would stand firm against communist expansionism.
bb) Yet, domestic politics also contributed to his fateful decision. Facing an
election and determined to win the presidency in his own name, Johnson
feared that his conservative Republican opponent, Barry Goldwater, might tar
him as "soft on communism." His demonstration of firmness against North
Vietnam effectively undermined all such charges.
ix) Following a February, 1965, Viet Cong attack on Pleiku, Johnson ordered the first
sustained bombing of North Vietnam in an operation designated Rolling Thunder.
He then dispatched combat troops to Vietnam under the command of General William
C. Westmoreland. From this point, American involvement in the war expanded until
more than 500,000 troops were deployed there and Americans assumed responsibility
for the bulk of fighting. The war also included a massive bombing campaign against
North Vietnam. As American involvement increased, so too did Sino-Soviet support
for Ho and the North.
x) Although most Americans supported the war in its early stages, it began to divide the
country almost from the beginning. Hawks argued for the necessity of the war as a
means of halting aggression and containing communism. Doves countered with
arguments that the United States had no vital interests in the region and was losing
American lives in defense of a South Vietnamese government that did not command
the loyalty of its own people.
xi) Almost as soon as he began escalating the war, President Johnson began making offers
to negotiate a settlement. The North Vietnamese refused all such overtures. As
Johnson's predictions of victory rang increasingly hollow with both the press and then
the public, he was said to suffer from a "credibility gap." In many instances, the
president felt compelled to be less than honest because he feared the war would
deprive his Great Society program of popular and congressional support. The
credibility gap became a chasm after the Tet Offensive of early 1968. Although Tet
proved a military disaster for the Viet Cong, inaccurate reporting by the American
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press – through both ignorance and maliciousness – turned it into a public relations
triumph for the communists. It so undermined public support for Johnson that he
soon resolved not to seek another term in 1968. The North Vietnamese responded to
his announcement by agreeing to open negotiations. The two nations began talks in
Paris, but the negotiations soon reached an impasse.
xii) Following the election of 1968, the Nixon Administration assumed responsibility for
Vietnam. Determined not to be driven out of the war by either North Vietnam or
protestors in American streets, Nixon sought "peace with honor." He attempted to
achieve this objective through a policy of Vietnamization – the transfer of
responsibility for the fighting from American troops to South Vietnamese troops. By
1972, he had withdrawn more than 500,000 American soldiers. Only 27,000
American troops remained.
xiii) Nixon’s efforts to end the war were slowed by the anti-war movement. Like Johnson,
he understood that no president could afford to be stampeded by unruly mobs in the
streets. It would undermine United States credibility both at home and abroad. The
largest of the anti-war protests came in 1969 with the two-day Moratorium which
brought several hundred thousand protestors flooding into Washington. News reports
of the massacre of Vietnamese civilians by American troops commanded by
Lieutenant William Calley at My Lai further stirred doubts about the war. Nixon
continued his policy of troop withdrawals, but also implemented a lottery system to
make the draft more equitable (1970). In 1973, he abolished the draft and established
the all-volunteer army.
xiv) Even as the war wound down for Americans, Nixon found it necessary to expand the
war into the neighboring countries of Cambodia (1970) and Laos (1971). Although
these limited "incursions" were aimed at communist bases being used by the North
Vietnamese, they produced outrage among the doves at home. Indeed, reports of the
Cambodian incursion prompted the confrontations which led to the shootings at Kent
State in Ohio.
xv) Nixon, working through National Security Advisor Henry Kissinger, opened secret
talks in Paris with the North Vietnamese representative, Le Duc Tho. In October,
1972, a draft agreement for peace had been completed and just days before the
presidential election of 1972 Kissinger asserted that “peace was at hand.” In
December, however, convinced the North Vietnamese were not acting in good faith,
Nixon ruthlessly resumed bombing of North Vietnam. In January, 1973, the two sides
finally reached an agreement. The agreement represented a compromise with neither
side getting all that it wanted. The United States did not secure a withdrawal of
communist forces from the South, but neither did the North secure a nationwide
communist government. The Paris Peace Agreement included the following terms:
aa) all sides agreed to a cease-fire.
bb) North Vietnam and the Viet Cong agreed to return all prisoners of war (POWs)
and to help account for all missing in action (MIAs).
cc) all foreign troops would be withdrawn from both Cambodia and Laos.
dd) no more troops and military supplies to be introduced into South Vietnam.
ee) reunification of Vietnam was to be carried out only by peaceful means, and the
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people of South Vietnam alone would determine their own political future
through free elections.
xvi) Following the American withdrawal, communist rebels – with the assistance of the
North Vietnamese – seized control of Cambodia (Khmer Rouge) and Laos (Pathet
Lao) in 1975. That same year, the North Vietnamese launched a massive offensive
against the South. Although the United States helped evacuate many who had
cooperated with American forces during the war, the Ford Administration had no
intention of being dragged back into Vietnam and the communists seized control of
South Vietnam. In each of the three countries the communist regimes implemented
brutal pogroms and "re-education" labor camps. Millions died and thousands fled
into neighboring countries or took to the ocean as "boat people" seeking refuge
overseas.
xvii) The Vietnam War cost the United States over $140 billion and over 50,000 dead. An
additional 300,000 Americans were wounded. It scars still remain.
aa) In the Nixon Doctrine, the United States warned its allies in Asia not to expect
American troops to fight their wars for them.
bb) In committing American troops to Vietnam, three presidents – Kennedy,
Johnson, and Nixon – had acted as commander-in-chief without securing a
congressional declaration of war. Seeking to prevent such actions in the future,
Congress adopted the War Powers Resolution over President Nixon's veto in
1973. This resolution requires the president to inform Congress within 48 hours
if he commits troops to combat. If the president expects them to remain in
combat for more than 90 days, he must secure congressional permission. If he
fails to do so, Congress can order the troops home by means of a concurrent
resolution – not subject to a presidential veto.
cc) The Vietnam experience exerted a long-term impact on foreign affairs as well. In
1975, when Congress learned of the Ford Administration's covert assistance to
anti-communist forces in Angola, it ordered him to stop out of fear that it might
lead to a Vietnam-like situation. During the Reagan Administration in the 1980s,
Congress used the Boland Amendment to frustrate the president's desire to
assist anti-communists in both El Salvador and Nicaragua.
e) Containment continued during the Carter and Reagan administrations.
i) When the Soviet Union invaded Afghanistan in 1979, President Carter responded by
imposing a variety of economic and political sanctions including suspension of grain
sales and a boycott on American participation in the Moscow Olympic games. He
further requested that the Senate suspend consideration of the SALT II Treaty. The
United States also made covert arms shipments to Islamic rebels resisting the invasion.
ii) Reagan began his administration taking a hard line toward the Soviet Union which he
denounced as an "evil empire." His views towards the Soviets moderated, however,
following Mikhail Gorbachev's rise to power. Despite this moderation in his views,
President Reagan remained firm in his decision to prevent the further spread of
communism – particularly in Central America.
aa) In El Salvador, where a right wing government was locked in a struggle with leftist
guerillas, he increased aid to the government.
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bb) In Nicaragua, the Reagan Administration organized a force of Nicaraguan guerrillas
(the Contras) to oppose the Sandinista communist regime that had taken over the
country from dictator Anastasio Somoza.
cc) The Democratic Congress objected to both of these policies and used the Boland
Amendment to prohibit further aid to the Contras. Determined not to allow
Congress to usurp presidential authority in foreign policy, Reagan turned to his
national Security Agency for assistance – particularly John Poindexter and Oliver
North. They devised a plan to win support of Iranian moderates in freeing
American hostages in Lebanon by selling them weapons. They further proposed to
divert the profit from these sales to the Contras in Nicaragua. Although the plan did
contribute to the release of some American hostages and enabled the Contras to
continue to fight the Sandinistas, when details of the plan leaked out it resulted in
the Iran-Contra Scandal that sullied much of Reagan's second term.
f) Between the end of WWII and the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, every presidential
administration pursued the policy of containment. Only the Eisenhower Administration, with
Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, talked as if it might deviate from this policy. Dulles
boldly spoke of liberating those areas of Eastern Europe that had fallen to the communists
after Roosevelt's "betrayal at Yalta" by "rolling back communism." Yet, when anticommunists in Poland and Hungary rebelled against Soviet domination, the United States did
nothing. For all Dulles talk of "massive retaliation" and "brinkmanship," containment
remained America's Cold War foreign policy.
III. The Cold War Thaws
A. During the Eisenhower Administration the tensions of the Cold War temporarily eased.
1) Joseph Stalin finally died in 1953. His death sparked a two-year power struggle in the Kremlin
which ended when Nikita Khrushchev emerged as premier. Although the new Soviet leader
occasionally ranted about burying capitalism, he also spoke hopefully of "peaceful coexistence"
with the free world.
2) Seeking to ease Cold War tensions, President Eisenhower met with British Prime Minister
Anthony Eden, French Premier Edgar Faure, and co-leaders of the Soviet Union Nikita
Khrushchev and Nikolai Bulganin in Geneva in July, 1955. Although their discussions of
disarmament and German reunification at the Geneva Summit produced no concrete results,
they did inspire hopes for peace.
3) As a result of improving Soviet-American relations, Eisenhower and Khrushchev agreed to halt
atmospheric tests of nuclear weapons in October, 1958. The following year, Vice President
Richard Nixon visited the Soviet Union and Vice Premier Anastas Mikoyan visited the United
States.
4) The thaw in Soviet-American relations abruptly ended in 1960 when an American U-2 spy
plane piloted by Francis Gary Powers was shot down over the Soviet Union. Convinced by
the CIA that Powers had not survived, Eisenhower denied any American knowledge or
responsibility for the flight. Powers, however, had been captured and, when confronted with
this fact, Eisenhower acknowledged his personal culpability. Khrushchev angrily cancelled a
scheduled Paris Summit.
B. During the Kennedy Administration, the Cold War probably entered its most dangerous period. The
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combination of crises in Berlin and Cuba brought the world to brink of nuclear holocaust.
1) After the failed Bay of Pigs Invasion of Cuba and a disastrous Vienna Summit (June, 1961) in
which Khrushchev bullied an ailing and inexperienced Kennedy, the Soviet leader wrongly
concluded that Kennedy would not stand up to him.
2) In August, 1961, Khrushchev increased tensions by beginning construction of the Berlin Wall.
The following month he announced a resumption of nuclear weapons tests. Kennedy reluctantly
resumed underground nuclear tests of American weapons.
3) Following the Cuban Missile Crisis in October, 1962, both leaders recognized the need to step
back from the brink of destruction.
a) They agreed to establish a "hot line" linking the White House and the Kremlin.
b) In 1963, all the major powers except China and France agreed to a Nuclear Test Ban
Treaty which prohibited all atmospheric testing of atomic weapons.
C. While the Vietnam War precluded any significant improvement in Cold War relations during the
Johnson Administration, the conflict in Southeast Asia did little to hinder the Nixon
Administration's policy of detente – a relaxation of tensions between governments – with both the
Soviets and the Chinese.
1) The first opportunity for improved relations came with China. Following the Sino-Soviet
rupture of 1963, the Chinese began to seek more normal relations with the United States.
a) In July, 1971, Henry Kissinger made a secret trip to China to discuss the possibility of
extending American recognition to mainland China.
b) In February, 1972, Nixon personally visited China to make the recognition of China official
and public. Ironically, it was Nixon, the old Cold Warrior who had condemned the State
Department for "losing" China in 1949, who had accomplished what his more liberal
predecessors could not. Commentators noted that “only Nixon could go to China.”
Essentially, they meant that only a strident anti-communist could be trusted to deal safely
with the United States’ communist opponents.
2) Nixon's adept playing of the "China card" facilitated detente with the Soviet Union. The
Soviets, worried by the Sino-American agreements and now virtually the equal of the United
States in its nuclear arsenal, also eagerly sought a relaxing of tensions.
a) In May, 1972, Nixon again surprised the world when he visited Moscow for discussions with
Premier Leonid Brezhnev.
b) This meeting resulted in the Strategic Arms Limitations Treaty (SALT) which placed
upward limits on intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs) and sharply restricted the
development of antiballistic missile systems (ABMs). While the agreement placed no
restrictions on short or medium range nuclear weapons, both sides agreed to work towards a
complete nuclear weapons freeze.
c) Significantly, Nixon achieved these results even as the Vietnam War still raged.
D. Nixon's policy of detente continued during the Carter years.
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1) In 1979, Carter ended America's official recognition of Taiwan and extended full recognition to
the People's Republic of China – despite conservative complaints of a sell-out.
2) The Carter Administration also concluded SALT II, but the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan and
objections to the restrictions included in the treaty led to its overwhelming rejection by the
Senate.
E. The Reagan Administration took a hard line towards the Soviet Union. He ordered medium range
cruise missiles deployed in Europe despite considerable opposition from doves at home and abroad.
When the Soviets protested that they could no longer abide by the informal SALT II agreements,
Reagan began to upgrade America's nuclear arsenal. Seeking to move beyond the old Cold War
nuclear doctrine of mutually assured destruction (MAD), he also proposed the Strategic Defense
Initiative (SDI/Star Wars). Ultimately, the Soviets agreed to a treaty restricting medium range
nuclear missiles and the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks (START). The Soviet Empire collapsed
shortly after Reagan left office and the Cold War was over.
IV. The Cold War At Home, The Second Red Scare
A. Even as “Cold Warriors” waged the war against communism abroad, they also waged it at home.
Following World War II, many Americans began to fear that their government and society had been
infiltrated by communist agents. The government responded to these fears with both legislation
and investigations.
1) In 1947, the Truman Administration (under pressure from Republicans) established the Loyalty
Review Board. Over the next four years, the Board investigated the background of millions of
government employees. Thousands of federal workers resigned or were fired as a result of this
probe.
2) The Truman Administration also utilized the Smith Act of 1940 to incarcerate leaders of the
American Communist party for advocating the overthrow of the United States government.
The Smith Act made it illegal to advocate the violent overthrow of the of the government or to
belong to any organization that did so. In Dennis et al. v. United States (1951), the Supreme
Court upheld the constitutionality of the Smith Act.
3) In 1950, Congress overrode a Truman veto to enact the McCarran Internal Security Act.
This legislation:
a) made it unlawful to advocate or support the establishment of a totalitarian government.
b) restricted the employment and travel rights of those joining Communist-front
organizations.
c) authorized the establishment of detention camps for the incarceration of subversives.
4) In 1939 the House of Representatives had established the House Un-American Activities
Committee (HUAC) to seek out Nazis. The House now revived HUAC with a mandate to
root out Communists working within the government. Moreover, HUAC possessed the
authority to investigate groups such as the Boy Scouts and the Hollywood film industry for
Communist influence. HUAC summoned writers, directors, and actors to testify. Refusal to
comply with committee demands for information could result in trials on charges of contempt
of Congress or blacklisting. (Blacklisting involved the refusal of Hollywood production
companies to hire individuals labeled Communists.) The American Civil Liberties Union
(ACLU) protested the actions of HUAC and the other internal security matters as unwarranted
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violations of the First Amendment, but without much success.
B. American fears of a “hidden enemy” did not lack merit, as two widely publicized espionage cases
demonstrated.
1) In 1948, Whitaker Chambers, and editor at Time magazine and self-confessed former
Communist testified to HUAC that Alger Hiss, a State Department official who had assisted
FDR at Yalta, was a Soviet spy. Hiss vehemently denied the charges and even denied knowing
Chambers. He sued Chamber for libel. President Truman denounced Chambers’ accusation as
a “red herring” intended to distract the public from Republican failures. Richard Nixon, a
young California congressman, spearheaded the HUAC investigation of the Chambers-Hiss
affair. Under further questioning Chambers asserted that Hiss had passed him top-secret
government documents for delivery to other Soviet agents for delivery to Moscow. Chambers
further acknowledged that additional government documents supplied by Hiss could be found in
a hollowed out pumpkin in his garden. These so-called “Pumpkin Papers” seriously
undermined the Hiss denials. Because the statute of limitations for espionage had expired, Hiss
could only be charged with perjury. His first trial in 1949 resulted in a hung jury. A second
trial led to his conviction and a term in prison. While most American liberals viewed Hiss as an
innocent victim of an anti-Communist hysteria, most Americans viewed the case as further
illustrated the need to secure the country from internal subversion. (The opening of the archives
of the former Soviet Union since the fall of Communism has led to proof that Hiss had indeed
been a spy.)
2) The Rosenberg case reinforced American concerns about internal security. In 1949, the Soviet
Union shocked the Free World when it detonated an atomic bomb. The Soviet Union had been
thought far from developing this capacity and the detonation prompted an explosion of
suspicion that spies had assisted them in stealing atomic technology from the United States. In
1950, Klaus Fuchs, a British scientist who had worked on the Manhattan Project, confessed
to providing nuclear secrets to the Soviets. Fuchs’ confession prompted an FBI investigation
that resulted in the arrest and conviction of Fuchs’ American associate Harry Gold. Further
investigation led to the arrest of Julius and Ethel Rosenberg. Ultimately the Rosenbergs
were convicted (1951) and executed (1953) for nuclear espionage. (Again, liberals protested
that the Rosenbergs were victims of an anti-Communist hysteria; again, the subsequent
declassification of documents has demonstrated their guilt.) While the Rosenbergs did not rate
as major Soviet assets, their actions and those of others like them certainly hastened the Soviet
Union’s development of nuclear weapons.
C. In 1950, Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin emerged as the best-known leader of the antiCommunist crusade. In a speech to the Women’s Republican Club of Wheeling, West Virginia,
he claimed to have a list of names of Communists currently employed by the State Department.
The Secretary of State, he charged, knew of this Communist infestation and allowed these
subversives to continue shaping American policy. McCarthy lacked evidence to support his
accusations – indeed many doubt that he even had a list of names – but following the revelations
regarding Hiss and the Rosenbergs, many Americans proved willing to embrace the senator’s
cause.
1) Buoyed by his new-found popularity, McCarthy launched a series attacks against prominent
members of the American foreign policy establishment. When his targets indignantly denied
his charges, the senator responded with more extreme accusations. Eventually, he went so far
as to slander Secretary of State George C. Marshall, claiming that he was party to a
“conspiracy so immense and an infamy so black as to dwarf any previous venture in the
history of man.” Most historians now agree that McCarthy relied on the “big lie” technique to
convince the public of nefarious influences within the government. (It is worth noting,
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however, that many of those identified by McCarthy as Soviet agents have been proven to be
so through the release of the top-secret Verona Intercepts and the opening of KGB files
following the collapse of the Soviet Union.) He also benefited from his broad base of public
support. (One measure of the popular fear of internal subversion can be found in the
production of Hollywood films such as The Thing from Outer Space and Invasion of the
Body Snatchers.) Many prominent Americans failed to challenge his reckless behavior for
fear that he might turn his accusations in their direction. For instance, President Eisenhower
failed to come to the defense of his old friend and mentor George C. Marshall in the face of
McCarthy’s attacks. Republicans also tolerated McCarthy’s actions because they hurt the
Democratic party.
2) McCarthy held sway for four years. In 1954, however, a Senate committee held televised
hearings into charges of Communist infiltration into the army. Eisenhower quietly authorized
the army to confront McCarthy. In the subsequent exchanges, the senator came across as a
bully who was angered by the army’s failure to give preferential treatment to one of his
staffers. In the aftermath of the hearings, McCarthy’s public support began to wan.
Republican and Democratic senators now joined in adopting a motion of censure against
McCarthy. The “witch-hunt” for Communists had run its course.
IV. Post-War Domestic Politics
A) Harry Truman assumed the presidency following the death of FDR in April, 1945. Shortly after the
end of WWII, he proposed a sweeping program of liberal reforms including expansion of
unemployment insurance, a higher minimum wage, a permanent Fair Employment Practices
Commission, slum clearance, low income housing, regional development programs, and a public
works program. Congress blocked every proposal.
1) During the balance of his first term Truman continued to struggle with both the issues arising
from the end of WWII and with the Congress.
a) In 1946 Congress passed the Employment Act of 1946. The legislation established a
Council of Economic Advisors to advise the president and a Joint Congressional
Committee to demonstrate Congress’ commitment to full employment.
b) Congress also established the Atomic Energy Commission in 1946. Truman welcomed this
particular legislation which established civilian control over nuclear development and
granted the president sole authority over the use of nuclear weapons.
c) Truman vetoed a congressional effort to continue the wage and price controls of the war
years. His veto effectively ended all wartime wage and price controls and prices quickly
jumped 6%. Congress promptly passed a new bill which Truman signed. He used its
powers inconsistently, however, and drew considerable consumer ire when he lifted all price
controls on beef. In late 1946, he lifted price controls on all items except rents, sugar, and
rice.
d) Truman also confronted the issues of post-war demobilization. By 1947 the total armed
forces only numbered 1.5 million – down from a peak of some 8 million during the war.
Unlike the chaotic demobilization that followed WWI, however, the transition from war to
peace for returning veterans was eased by the Serviceman’s Readjustment Act (G.I. Bill of
Rights) of 1944 which provided $13 billion in aid ranging from education to housing.
e) The post-war years also witnessed labor unrest.
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i) In early 1946, the United Auto Workers, under Walter Reuther launched a strike
against General Motors and the steelworkers, under Philip Murray, struck U.S. Steel.
Both groups demanded wage increases. Truman suggested an hourly wage increase
and then allowed U.S. Steel to raise its prices to cover the cost. This arrangement
provided the model for settlements in other industries.
ii) When John L. Lewis’ United Mine Workers went on strike and the mine owners
refused to negotiate, Truman seized the mines and then granted the union’s demands.
iii) Truman averted a railway strike by seizing the railroads and threatening to draft the
workers into the army.
iv) In November, 1946, the Republicans won control of Congress. They moved quickly to
limit the growing power of unions by passing the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947. Truman
vetoed the legislation, but Congress overrode the veto. This act:
aa) made the closed shop illegal (labor unions could not force employers to hire only
union members).
bb) permitted the union shop (newly-hired workers could be required to join the
union).
cc) required an eighty day cooling-off period for strikes in key industries.
dd) prohibited employers from collecting union dues.
ee) prohibited secondary boycotts.
ff) prohibited political contributions.
gg) required all union leaders to take an anti-communist oath.
v) The Taft-Hartley Act slowed efforts to unionize the South and, by 1954, 15 states had
enacted “right to work” laws which prohibited union shops. Truman’s efforts to
block the law through the use of his veto, however, did win broad union support for
the Democratic party.
f) The Republican-controlled Congress also passed the National Security Act of 1947. This
legislation created the National Security Council, the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and the
Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). These agencies received authority to coordinate the
armed services and intelligence agencies.
g) The Presidential Succession Act of 1947 placed the speaker of the house and the president
pro tempore of the Senate ahead of the secretary of state and after the vice president in the
line of succession. The 22nd Amendment (ratified 1951) limited the president to two terms.
h) In 1946, Truman appointed the President’s Committee on Civil Rights. This group
produced a document, To Secure These Rights, which called for the elimination of racial
segregation. Acting on his presidential authority, Truman banned racial discrimination in
federal hiring and ordered the desegregation of the armed forces.
2) Truman managed to win the Democratic presidential nomination in 1948, but led a badly
fragmented party. The left wing of the party broke away to form the Progressive Party and
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nominated former vice president Henry Wallace for the presidency. Simultaneously, southern
Democrats – offended by Truman’s civil rights policies – broke away to form the State’s
Rights Party (Dixiecrats). The Dixiecrats selected Senator Strom Thurmond of South
Carolina as their presidential nominee. The Republicans, hoping to exploit divisions among
the Democrats nominated Governor Thomas E Dewey of New York. Although many voters
complained that “to err is Truman” and the polls indicated that Truman was heading for a
sound defeat, he mounted a vigorous “whistlestop campaign.” in which he condemned the
“Republican do-nothing Congress.” By election night he had put together an improbable
victory.
a) Truman had labeled his platform for the election the Fair Deal. Essentially, he hoped to
expand the programs of FDR’s New Deal. He called for legislation to increase the
minimum wage, extend Social Security to more people, maintain rent controls,
build public housing, provide more money to the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA),
secure civil rights for blacks, create national health insurance, provide federal funds
for education, and to repeal the Taft-Hartley Act. A coalition of Republicans and southern
Democrats blocked every proposal. In the face of this determined opposition, Truman
barely preserved existing New Deal programs.
b) Following the war, farmers continued to confront the problem of overproduction. Secretary
of Agriculture Charles F. Brannan proposed a program of continued price supports for
storable crops and guaranteed minimum incomes for farmers of perishable crops. Again,
Congress blocked the proposal. Surpluses of agricultural products continued to pile up.
B) In the election of 1952, Republican Dwight D. Eisenhower competed with Democratic nominee
Governor Adlai E. Stevenson of Illinois for the presidency. Millions of American voters decided
that “I Like Ike!” and swept the former general and hero of WWII into office by a landslide.
1) Eisenhower initially described his brand of Republicanism as “dynamic conservatism,” but
eventually began to reference his approach to government as “progressive moderation.”
Regardless of the name, he meant a willingness to accept existing economic and social
programs while attempting to balance the budget and reduce taxes. During his first term,
Eisenhower oversaw the abolition of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, ended all
wage and price controls, and further reduced farm price supports. He also succeeded in
reducing government expenditures. In 1954 he convinced Congress to lower corporate taxes
and reduce the top individual tax rates. His hopes of balancing the budget, however, were
frustrated by an economic slump. Despite his desire to limit the size of government,
Eisenhower did oversee the expansion of government in some areas.
a) In 1954 and again in 1956, Social Security was extended to cover an additional 10 million
people – including professionals, clerical workers, domestic workers, farm workers, and
members of the armed forces. In 1959, Social Security benefits were increased by 7%.
b) In 1955, Eisenhower agreed to an increase in the minimum wage from 75 cents to $1 per
hour.
c) He became involved in the issue of farm surpluses. In 1954, the government began
financing the export of farm surpluses in exchange for foreign currencies. Later, he
authorized the distribution of surpluses to feed needy nations, authorized the use of surplus
milk for school children, and allowed the needy to exchange government-issued food stamps
for agricultural surpluses.
d) He also embarked on an ambitious building program. In 1954, he secured congressional
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funding for the joint United States-Canadian construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway
which opened the Great Lakes to ocean-going ships. Two years later, he secured
congressional approval for construction of the Interstate Highway System. Under this plan
the federal government would provide 90% of the funding and the states 10%. (Construction
of the Interstate Highways further undermined the viability of the nation’s railroads.)
2) The Democrats tried their luck with Stevenson again in 1956 with even worse results.
Eisenhower carried all but seven states. During his second term, Eisenhower continued to find
himself pushed by events into a more activist role than he would have preferred.
a) In October, 1957, Americans were stunned to learn that the Soviet Union had launched an
unmanned satellite – Sputnik. Both government leaders and the general public feared that
the United States might be falling behind their rivals scientifically and technologically.
Although the United States launched Explorer I just three months later, the concerns
remained. Consequently, Congress established the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration (NASA) and passed the National Defense Education Act of 1958 which
extended federal aid to fund science and math programs in schools.
b) Civil rights proved even more difficult for Eisenhower. He willingly supervised completion
of the desegregation of the armed forces and oversaw the desegregation of public
services in Washington DC, federal naval yards, and veterans hospitals. Yet he disagreed
with the Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown v Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas (1954)
as a futile effort to force the races together. Nevertheless, when Governor Orville Faubus
of Arkansas defied federal authority in a bid to block desegregation of Central High School
in Little Rock, Eisenhower felt compelled to uphold the authority of the judiciary. He
dispatched 10,000 National Guardsmen and 1000 paratroopers to insure that black students
could safely enroll. He maintained a token force at the school for the balance of the year.
Eisenhower also signed the Civil Rights Act of 1957. This legislation established a
Civil Rights Commission and created a Civil Rights Division in the Justice Department to
secure voting rights for African-Americans. Three years later, Congress passed and
Eisenhower signed the Civil Rights Act of 1960 which authorized the federal courts to
register African-Americans to vote.
3) During the second Eisenhower administration the Republican Congress built on the legacy of the
Taft-Hartley Act when it enacted the Lundrum-Griffen Labor-Management Act of 1959.
This legislation attempted to regulate unfair union practices.
4) Eisenhower’s second term was marred by some relatively minor skullduggery known as the
Sherman Adams Scandal. Adams, the White House chief of staff was forced to resign when it
was revealed that he had accepted gifts in the form of a fur coat and an oriental rug in exchange
for assisting a Boston industrialist deal with the federal bureaucracy.
C) The election of 1960 pitted Eisenhower’s vice president Richard Nixon against the Democrat
Senator John F. Kennedy of Massachusetts. Kennedy selected Senate majority leader Lyndon B.
Johnson of Texas as his running mate. Kennedy’s Catholicism emerged as a central issue early in
the campaign. He largely negated it as a concern, however, when he assured a group of Protestant
ministers in West Virginia that he believed in the separation of church and state – and that he
would not take orders from the Pope. Another key moment came in the first televised presidential
debate. Those who watched the debate on television found Kennedy attractive and compelling.
(Those who listened to the debate on radio preferred Nixon.) The two men debated the future of
Quemoy and Matsu, as well as Kennedy’s charge that a “missile gap” had developed between the
United States and Soviet Union that favored the Soviets. Kennedy blamed the Eisenhower
administration for this vulnerability. In reality, the missile gap that did exist favored the
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Americans, but Nixon could not prove it without revealing classified sources. Kennedy also
succeeded in portraying himself as the spokesman for a new generation who could unite the
country through a sense of renewed purpose. In one of the tightest elections in American
presidential history, Kennedy eked out a narrow victory.
1) Kennedy took office by challenging Americans to “ask not what your country can do for you,
but ask what you can do for your country.” He called his program the New Frontier. It
consisted of proposals that sounded very much like Truman’s Fair Deal. He urged Congress to
enact federal aid to education, urban renewal, medical care for the aged, and creation of a
Department of Urban Affairs. As had happened to Truman, a coalition of Republicans and
southern Democrats blocked the entire plan. Unusual for a liberal, Kennedy also proposed tax
cuts for both individuals and corporations. He did secure passage of the Housing Act of 1961
which allocated nearly $5 billion over four years for the preservation of open urban spaces, the
development of mass transit, and the construction of middle class housing. He also convinced
Congress to raise the minimum wage and to expand its coverage to 3 million additional
workers.
2) Like Eisenhower, Kennedy found himself compelled to become involved in the issues of
desegregation and civil rights.
a) Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy actively supported the cause of racial justice. In
May, 1961, the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) sponsored a group of “Freedom
Riders” to travel via bus from Washington DC to New Orleans. The purpose of the trip
was to test federal enforcement of regulations prohibiting discrimination. The mixed group
of blacks and whites encountered violence in Alabama, but continued on to their
destination. Robert Kennedy now spearheaded federal efforts to desegregate interstate
transportation and schools. He also made securing voting rights for blacks a priority.
b) In 1962, Governor Ross Barnett of Mississippi defied a federal court order requiring the
admission of James Meredith, an African-American, to the University of Mississippi.
When a white mob drove off federal marshals attempting to enforce the court order
President Kennedy reluctantly mobilized the Mississippi National Guard to insure his
enrollment. After two deaths and numerous injuries, Meredith was registered as a student
the next day.
c) The following year, Kennedy introduced a comprehensive civil rights bill to Congress. The
bill:
i) banned racial discrimination in public accommodations.
ii) gave the attorney general the power to bring suits on behalf of individuals for school
integration.
iii) withheld federal funds from state-administered programs that practiced
discrimination.
d) When Southern Democrats blocked the bill in Congress, 200,000 people marched in its
support in Washington DC. During this demonstration, Martin Luther King, Jr.
delivered his “I Have a Dream Speech.”
3) On November 22, 1963, Lee Harvey Oswald assassinated President Kennedy in Dallas,
Texas. Two days later, Jack Ruby, murdered Oswald in the basement of the Dallas Police
Department. The new president, Lyndon Johnson, appointed Chief Justice Earl Warren to
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head a commission investigating the assassination. The Warren Commission Report
concluded that Oswald had acted alone in killing the president. While true, conspiracy
theorists have not yet ceased concocting murder plots that include the CIA, Fidel Castro, the
Mafia, and Lyndon Johnson. In an interview following her husband’s death, Jacqueline
Kennedy related that he had loved the musical Camelot. Thereafter, the Kennedy years came
to be referred to by that name.
D) Lyndon B. Johnson brought extensive practical political experience to the presidency. He had
served several terms in the House of Representatives and in the Senate where he served as Majority
Leader. A Texan, he was the first southerner to occupy the White House since Woodrow Wilson.
Aware of the public grief over the dead president, Johnson resolved to keep Kennedy’s cabinet in
place and to make Kennedy’s program – which continued to languish in Congress – his own.
Johnson labeled his program The Great Society by which he meant a society resting on
“abundance and liberty for all. The Great Society demands an end to poverty and racial injustice,
to which we are fully committed in our time.” In the word of one historian, “It was liberalism
triumphant.”
1) Johnson moved to initiate his program through a War on Poverty and a campaign for
passage of Kennedy’s proposed civil rights bill.
i) With Johnson’s support, Congress enacted Kennedy’s proposed $10 billion tax cut in
1964. The economy boomed.
ii) The Civil Rights Act of 1964 prohibited racial discrimination by employers and unions,
created the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission to enforce the law, and
eliminated the remaining restrictions on African-American voting.
2) In the election of 1964, the Republicans turned to Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona. A
staunch conservative, Goldwater accused the Democrats of being soft on Communism and urged
a more vigorous military effort in Vietnam – including more extensive bombing – questioned the
value of social security, and – although he opposed segregation – he voted against the Civil
Rights Act of 1964 on constitutional grounds. Effectively, he managed to frighten or offend
most American voters. Johnson won more than 60% of the popular vote. With the election
behind him, Johnson turned his main attention to building his Great Society. Over the next four
years Johnson pushed more than 400 pieces of legislation through the Congress. The most
significant of these included:
i) The Medicare Act of 1965 which combined hospital insurance for retired people with a
voluntary plan to cover physicians’ bills. The legislation also included Medicaid which
provided grants to the states to provide medical care for the poor below retirement age.
ii) In the area of education, the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965
provided $1.5 billion to school districts to improve education for poor children. Head
Start sought to prepare educationally disadvantaged children for elementary school.
iii) The Immigration Act of 1965 discontinued the national origin system established in the
1920s with one based on skills and the need for political asylum.
iv) In 1965, Congress passed the Housing and Urban Development Act which provided $2.9
billion for urban renewal and funds for 240,000 housing units. In 1966, Congress followed
up by approving rent supplements for low-income families and creating the Department of
Housing and Urban Affairs. Johnson selected Robert B. Weaver to head the new
department, making him the first African-American cabinet member.
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v) In 1965, Martin Luther King, Jr., announced plans for a voter registration drive in
Alabama. He planned a march from Selma to Montgomery to dramatize the event. After
violent assaults by Alabama police at the Edmund Pettis Bridge on Bloody Sunday, the
federal courts intervened to protect the marchers. Johnson, who had previously resisted
proposing further civil rights legislation, now pushed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. The
subsequent legislation authorized the attorney general to dispatch federal examiners to
register voters. The act also prohibited literacy tests and other devices commonly used to
defraud African-Americans of their voting rights. Just as it seemed that the civil rights
movement stood on the verge of achieving its objectives, the Watts section of Los Angeles
exploded into a violent and bloody race riot. Suppressing the outbreak required 15,000
National Guardsmen. The riot ultimately resulted in 34 dead and 850 injured. Over the
next year, racial violence rocked numerous cities including New York, Chicago, Newark,
and Detroit. The Commission on Civil Disorder, headed by Governor Otto Kerner of
Illinois (Kerner Commission), concluded that the riots had been directed at a social
system that denied African-Americans economic opportunity and crowded them into
ghettos. The Black Power Movement, headed by Stokley Carmichael and H. Rap
Brown, sprang from this rage and the belief that the peaceful methods of Dr. King would
not work for them. King’s assassination in Memphis, Tennessee at the hands of James
Earl Ray in April, 1968, appeared to confirm this belief. More than 60 American cities
erupted in race riots.
3) Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society died in the jungles of Vietnam and the streets of America’s
burning cities. Nearly broken by his burdens, LBJ was abandoned by the American people who
no longer believed his promises of victory in the war or the prospects of a better way of life for
all. Already confronted with the loss of popular support, news reports about the Tet Offensive
convinced the president that he probably could not win another term in 1968.
a) In November, 1967, Senator Eugene McCarthy had announced his intention to challenge
Johnson for the Democratic nomination on a peace platform. When McCarthy ran a close
second against Johnson in the New Hampshire primary, Robert Kennedy announced his
candidacy as well.
b) A few weeks later, Johnson – told by his advisors that he would suffer a humiliating defeat in
the Wisconsin primary – publicly announced his decision not to seek reelection. Johnson’s
vice president, Hubert Humphrey soon announced his own candidacy.
c) In June, just after defeating Humphrey and McCarthy in the California primary and assuming
leadership of the anti-war wing of the Democratic Party, Robert Kennedy was assassinated
by Sirhan Sirhan. Sirhan, a Palestinian, acted out of resentment for Kennedy’s support for
Israel. With Kennedy’s death, Humphrey emerged as the default candidate for the
Democrats.
d) Chaos reigned at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago. In the streets Mayor
Richard Daley’s Chicago police battled anti-war students and hippies and led by Tom
Hayden, Abbie Hoffman, and Jerry Rubin. In the convention hall the delegates scarcely
behaved better. Hubert Humphrey emerged as the nominee, but the images of violence and
disorder that Americans had witnessed significantly cheapened the value of the nomination.
e) The Republicans, on the other hand, met in a peaceful and smoothly run convention in
Miami. There, they nominated Richard M. Nixon for president and Spiro T. Agnew for
vice president.
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f) The political picture became even more confused when Governor George C. Wallace of
Alabama declared himself a candidate for president under the banner of the American
Independent Party. Wallace appealed to those Americans angered by left-wing protestors
and fearful of big government. Resentment of the civil rights movement also inspired some
of Wallace’s support.
g) Nixon enjoyed a comfortable lead for most of the race. His emphasis of stability and public
order appealed to the majority of American voters. In October, however, President Johnson
announced an end to bombing of North Vietnam and Humphrey endorsed the decision. On
the impetus of this October Surprise, Humphrey surged in the polls. By election day the
race was neck and neck.. Nixon eked out a tiny win in the popular vote (less than 1%), but
carried a more comfortable margin in the electoral college. Wallace carried 13.5% of the
popular vote – the best showing for a third party since Robert LaFollete in 1924.
E) Nixon’s election signaled a conservative reaction to the upheavals that had beset the nation for
nearly a decade. Yet both houses of Congress remained firmly in Democratic hands. No new
president since 1849 had faced such a challenge. By definition, his domestic policies would
amount to a holding action against the ongoing march of liberal programs. Nevertheless, Nixon had
sought the presidency as the representative of the “forgotten Americans” and the “Silent
Majority” – the great middle class of the country.
1) He called his program the New Federalism and urged Congress to devolve many of the
functions assumed by the federal government since the New Deal back to the states. At the
heart of his proposal was a five-year plan (adopted by Congress in 1972) to distribute $30
billion in federal revenues to the states.
2) Other major legislation of the Nixon years included voting rights for 18-year-olds (1970),
extension of Social Security benefits (1970), funding for food stamps (1970), the Occupational
Safety and Health Act (1970), the Clean Air Act (1970), regulation of water pollution (1970,
1972), and the Federal Election Campaign Act (1972). All were passed by a Democratic
Congress and all were opposed by the Nixon Administration.
3) The Nixon Administration also took a negative view of much of the civil rights legislation
adopted in the Johnson years. Noting that the nation contained groups who favored “instant
integration” and others who favored “segregation forever,” Nixon called for a middle way
between the two. His positions – part of what came to be called Nixon’s “Southern Strategy”
– appeared to favor the latter viewpoint more than the former.
a) Nixon attempted to hinder court-ordered desegregation in Mississippi as well as in urban
areas.
i) Nixon attempted to delay desegregation of schools in Mississippi, but was frustrated
by the Supreme Court. In 1969, the Court, in its first ruling under Chief Justice
Warren Burger, – a Nixon appointee – ordered a quick end to school segregation in
Alexander v Holmes County Board of Education.
ii) Nixon also attempted to block desegregation in urban areas as well, but with no
greater success. In Swann v Charlotte-Mecklenburg Board of Education (1971)
the Burger Court decreed that cities must bus children to schools outside their
neighborhoods to achieve desegregation. Following the Swann Decision much of
the anti-busing anger shifted from the South to the North. Angry northern parents
damned busing as an unwarranted intrusion and a threat to “neighborhood schools.”
Violence followed. Nixon seized upon this anger to push for anti-busing
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legislation. The House, fearing voter backlash, went along. In the Senate, however,
Senators Walter Mondale of Minnesota and Jacob Javits of New York mounted a
filibuster and spiked the legislation. Ultimately the Supreme Court – partly as a
result of additional Nixon appointees – began to moderate its position. In Milliken v
Bradley (1974) the Court declared plans to bus students from inner city Detroit into
schools in the suburbs unconstitutional. Then, in Bakke v Board of Regents of
California (1978), the Court struck down the use of quotas to achieve racial
balance. The Bakke Decision marked the transition of the civil rights struggle from a
crusade for simple justice to a more complex task of sorting through a thicket of
competing group and individual rights.
b) Nixon also urged Congress to block renewal of the Voting Rights Act. When Congress
ignored him and passed the bill, he vetoed it. Congress promptly overrode Nixon’s veto.
4) The economy struggled during the Nixon years. Unemployment reached 6% in 1970, the GDP
(Gross Domestic Product) declined in 1970, and the United States slipped into a trade deficit in
1971. By 1974, inflation had risen to 12%. High inflation and stagnant growth came to be
termed “stagflation.”
a) The underlying causes of the economic distress mostly preceded Nixon’s administration.
These causes included:
i) Lyndon Johnson’s policy of “guns and butter.” The costs of waging war in Vietnam
while funding his Great Society programs without a tax increase had resulted in large
federal budget deficits.
ii) Rising international business competition from West Germany and Japan.
iii) Rising energy costs. These costs became most manifest during the Arab Oil Boycott
of 1973. Following the Arab-Israeli War of 1973 (Yom-Kippur War), Arabs
staged the boycott to drive Western nations into forcing Israel to withdraw from
territories it had occupied since the Six Day War of 1967. Henry Kissinger, now
Secretary of State, embarked on a process of “shuttle diplomacy” whereby he moved
between the various Arab capitals and Tel Aviv. (Although he failed to find a
comprehensive solution to the Arab-Israeli conflict, he did lay the groundwork for the
Camp David Accords of the Carter Administration.) He negotiated a partial Israeli
withdrawal and the Arabs lifted the embargo. Nonetheless, the Organization of
Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) raised the price of oil from $3 per barrel
to almost $12. Gas prices in the United States doubled and inflation exploded.
b) Nixon and Congress largely proved erratic and ineffectual in coping with the economic
malaise. Initially, Nixon urged Congress to reduce spending and raise taxes. When
Congress balked at these proposals, the president embraced the ideas of Milton Friedman,
the conservative economist at the University of Chicago, and urged the Federal Reserve
Board to wring inflation out of the economy by reducing the money supply through higher
interest rates. The stock market responded to this proposal with a steep drop and the
economy worsened People began to speak of a “Nixon Recession.” In 1970, Congress
granted the president authority to control wages and prices. After initially declaring his
opposition to wage and price controls, Nixon reversed course in August, 1971, and
implemented a 90-day price and wage freeze. He also took the United States off the gold
standard. At the conclusion of the 90-day period, he established mandatory guidelines for
wage and price increases. When the economy continued to founder, he resorted to voluntary
wage and price controls except for health care, food, and construction. These too proved
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ineffective and inflation continued unabated. Finally, the president reduced government
spending by impounding funds already appropriated by Congress.
5) As the election of 1972 approached, it was by no means certain that Nixon could win a second
term. The state of the economy certainly hurt him, but the issues he had fought for still
appealed to the mass of the American people – the “Silent Majority – and he benefited from
the likelihood of peace in the Vietnam War. Even better, the Democrats had embarked on a
path that would make Nixon’s campaign an easy one. The Democrats nominated George
McGovern a left-wing senator from South Dakota for president and Senator Thomas
Eagleton of Missouri for vice president. Shortly after the convention, the press revealed that
Eagleton had been treated for psychological problems. Initially, McGovern declared his
unwavering commitment to Eagleton, but eventually he reversed course and dumped him.
Sergeant Shriver, a member of the Kennedy clan, then joined the ticket. George Wallace again
campaigned on the American Independent Party ticket. In May, 1972, however, while
campaigning at a Maryland shopping center Arthur Bremer (21) attempted to assassinate
Wallace. Although he recovered from his wounds, the attack left him paralyzed from the waist
down. Nixon and Agnew swept to a landslide victory, receiving 521 electoral votes to
McGovern’s 17.
6) Swept to victory by a massive majority, Nixon’s second term came to grief early as the
president found his administration awash in the Watergate Scandal.
a) The path to Watergate actually began in May, 1970, when the New York Times published
classified information about the United States secret bombing of Cambodia. Nixon
authorized illegal wiretaps on journalists and government employees suspected of leaking
the information to the press. The publication of the so-called Pentagon Papers in the
Times in 1971 prompted the Nixon Administration to take more vigorous actions. The
papers consisted of classified documents that revealed the extent to which the Johnson
Administration had misled Congress and the public about its actions in Vietnam. Daniel
Ellsberg, a Pentagon analyst and war opponent, had leaked the documents in hopes of
further undermining support for “a wrongful war.” Although the documents only revealed
secrets of the Johnson Administration, their publication alarmed Nixon. He feared that his
still secret negotiations with China and the Soviet Union might be made public and thus
derailed. He ordered Attorney General John Mitchell to request that the Times cease
publication. When the Times, declined Mitchell secured a cease and desist court order
against both the Times and the Washington Post which had begun running its own series of
stories based on additional papers provided by Ellsberg. In New York Times Company v
United States, the Supreme Court overturned the injunction and publication resumed.
b) Determined to prevent further leaks, Nixon authorized the formation of a group of security
specialists – the plumbers. Besides trying to prevent future leaks, presidential advisor
John Ehrlichman concluded that the group should seek out information to discredit
Ellsberg by breaking into his psychiatrist’s office. By the spring of 1972, Ehrlichman
headed up a group of ‘dirty tricksters” that embarked on a campaign of sabotage against
potential Democratic nominees. Their activities included spreading rumors of sexual
improprieties against Hubert Humphrey and Senator Henry “Scoop” Jackson, forging press
releases, setting off stink bombs, and associating opposition candidates with racist remarks.
Funding for these “pranks” came from illegal transfers of money from the Committee to
Re-elect the President (CREEP) to White House staffers.
c) The Watergate crisis began in the early morning, June 17, 1972. James McCord, a
security officer at CREEP and a team of Cuban-born burglars broke into the Democratic
national headquarters in the Watergate Apartment Complex. Police captured the men in the
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act of going through Democratic files and planting listening devices in the offices. In truth,
the Nixon Administration had little to fear from the Democrats at this point, but wanted to
know if the Democrats were planning another “October Surprise.” Five days later, Nixon
assured the American people that his administration had nothing to do with the break-in.
d) Four of the five burglars pleaded guilty and remained silent. James McCord, however,
elected to stand trial. Following his conviction, McCord wrote a letter to presiding judge
John J. Sirica charging that high Republican officials had known of the burglary in
advance and that various individuals had committed perjury during the trial. In the
subsequent investigations by a grand jury and by a Senate Watergate Committee headed
by Senator Sam Erwin of North Carolina, the extensive White House involvement
became clear. Republican Senator Howard Baker of Tennessee asked the vital question
of the investigation: “What did the President know and when did he know it.” First,
Jeb Stuart Magruder, head of CREEP, and John Dean, Nixon’s attorney, acknowledged
their involvement in the break-in or subsequent attempts to conceal administration
involvement. Dean then went on to testify before Erwin’s Watergate Committee that
Nixon had been involved in covering up the incident almost from the beginning. Over the
next several months, the extensive involvement of administration figures in the break-in
and cover-up became clear – including payments of “hush money” to the burglars,
destruction of FBI records (FBI Director L. Patrick Gray resigned for his role in this
activity), forgery of documents, and wiretapping. Nixon fired Dean as well as his two
closest White House aides, John Ehrlichman and H. R. Haldeman. Attorney General
Richard Kleindienst resigned. Nixon continued to declare his own innocence, however,
and used claims of executive privilege to block Senate attempts to investigate White
House documents.
e) Under growing public and political pressure, Nixon agreed to appoint a special
prosecutor, Archibald Cox of Harvard Law School, to carry out an investigation.
f) Unfortunately for Nixon’s survival, White House aide Alexander Butterfield revealed in
testimony to the Watergate Committee that Nixon had installed a recording system in the
Oval Office. When Cox subpoenaed the tapes Nixon refused to turn them over. When the
administration appealed the subpoena, an appellate court rejected its motion. Nixon now
ordered his Attorney General Elliot Richardson to fire Cox. Both Richardson and his
deputy William Ruckelshaus resigned rather than carry out the order. It fell to Solicitor
General Robert Bork to carry out the presidential order. This “Saturday Night
Massacre” provoked outrage and further undermined Nixon’s remaining popular and
political support. The House Judiciary Committee, chaired by Peter Rodino, began to
investigate articles of impeachment. Nixon, knowing he had overplayed his hand, agreed
to surrender the tapes to Judge Sirica and to appoint Leon Jaworski as new special
prosecutor. It soon became clear that some of the tapes were missing and a portion of
another had been erased.
g) In the midst of the Watergate crisis, Vice President Spiro Agnew was accused of income
tax fraud and bribery during his tenure as a Maryland official. He resigned the vice
presidency in October, 1973. Under the provisions of the newly ratified 25th Amendment,
Nixon selected Congressman Gerald R. Ford of Michigan as the new vice president.
Nixon himself had tax problems at this time and was forced to pay $500,000 in back taxes
and interest.
h) In March, 1974, a grand jury indicted Haldeman, Ehrlichman, former Attorney General
John Mitchell, and four other White House aides. The grand jury also named Nixon as an
unindicted coconspirator.
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i) The following month, Nixon released edited transcripts of the White House tapes. Their
content prompted additional calls for Nixon’s resignation. It also prompted Jaworski to
demand 64 additional tapes. Nixon again refused and the case went to court.
j) Meanwhile, in a televised debate, the House Judiciary Committee adopted three articles of
impeachment, charging the president with obstructing justice, abusing presidential power,
and failing to obey committee subpoenas.
k) Before the House began to debate impeachment, the Supreme Court (United States v
Nixon) ordered the president to release the subpoenaed tapes to the special prosecutor. On
August 5, Nixon, under pressure from his advisors, released the tape of June 23, 1972, to
the public. This tape, recorded within a week of the break-in, revealed Nixon conspiring
with his aides to use the CIA to keep the FBI from investigating the case. Nixon resigned
on August 9.
l) Congress followed up Nixon’s resignation by adopting limits on contributions and
expenditures in presidential campaigns. It also strengthened the 1966 Freedom of
Information Act by requiring the government to act promptly when asked for information
and to prove its case for classification when attempting to withhold information on grounds
of national security.
F) Gerald Ford, unlike Nixon, proved well liked and free from scandal. He sparked considerable
controversy and probably doomed his chance of being elected president in 1976 when, in
September, 1974, he offered Nixon a full pardon. Nixon accepted the pardon, although he refused
to acknowledge wrongdoing and had not actually been charged with a crime. Ford asserted then
and later that it was time to end “the long national nightmare.” Most observers now agree with
his assessment.
1) The economic woes of the Nixon years had not disappeared during the Watergate crisis and
economic concerns consumed much of Ford’s attention. Convinced that inflation represented
the core problem, he called for voluntary restraints and urged citizens to wear “Whip Inflation
Now” (WIN) buttons. When the economy dropped further, he called for tax cuts to stimulate
business and reduced spending for social programs. When New York City approached
bankruptcy in 1975, Ford resisted federal aid to the city, but reversed course when Senate and
House Banking Committees guaranteed the loans. In his 15 months as president, Ford vetoed
39 bills.
2) Ford retained Henry Kissinger as Secretary of State. The Ford Administration attempted to
continue Nixon’s policies of stability in the Middle East, rapprochement with China, and
détente with the Soviet Union.
a) In 1974, Ford met with Leonid Brezhnev at Vladivostok, Siberia. The two agreed to a
negotiating format for what would become SALT II.
b) Meanwhile, Kissinger’s “shuttle diplomacy” produced an agreement between Cairo and
Tell Aviv. Israel agreed to return much of the Sinai territory taken from Egypt in the 1967
war and the two agreed to rely on negotiations rather than force to settle future disputes.
c) These accomplishments, however, faded in comparison to the disaster that overtook South
Vietnam. Correctly reading the mood of the Congress and the American people, the North
Vietnamese launched a full-scale assault on the south in March, 1975. The South
Vietnamese government pleaded for United States assistance and President Ford urged
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Congress to authorize additional arms shipments. Regardless of the damage to national
honor or the eventual death toll and dislocations of the South Vietnamese people, Congress
turned its back.
d) Ford did briefly commit troops to Southeast Asia when Cambodian communists captured
an American merchant vessel, Mayaguez, and took its crew hostage. Ford ordered the
Marines to rescue the crew. The assault proved successful, but it was then revealed that the
Cambodians had already agreed to release the hostages. The Marine casualties had been
sustained for nothing.
3) In 1976 Ford faced a powerful challenge for the Republican nomination from Ronald Reagan,
a former actor and former governor of California. Reagan represented the emerging
conservative wing of the party. Ford narrowly turned back the Reagan challenge. The
Democrats, pleased at the dissatisfaction with Ford within Republican ranks, anticipated an
easy victory. They turned to a former naval officer – turned peanut farmer – and former
governor of Georgia, James Earl “Jimmy” Carter. A relative unknown, Carter touted his
integrity and lack of Washington experience as the justification for his candidacy. He selected
Senator Walter Mondale of Minnesota as his running mate. Carter succeeded in putting
together the old Democratic New Deal coalition of African-Americans, southern whites, urban
labor, and ethnic minorities. This provided the rather narrow margin of victory of Carter, but
nearly half the eligible voters chose to just stay home.
G. Jimmy Carter was overwhelmed by the presidency and never learned how to get on top of the job.
He attempted to conduct the presidency on democratic and moral principles. He frequently misread
political sentiment on Capitol Hill and just as often misread the mood of the public. He typically
proposed complex programs and then failed to support them through the legislative process. He
then tended to blame others for his failures.
1) Carter approached the nation’s ongoing economic struggles inconsistently. Like his
predecessors, he continued to press voluntary wage and price guidelines but excluded oil,
housing, and food. He then appointed Paul A. Volcker as chairman of the Federal Reserve
Board. Volcker, determined to ring inflation out of the economy, tightened the money supply.
This step caused interest rates to go up, which in turn caused sales of homes and automobiles to
plummet. High interest rates and declining sells led to an increase in unemployment. By the
end of Carter’s term in 1980, unemployment stood at 7.5 %, interest rates at 20%, and inflation
at 12%. During the presidential campaign of 1976 Carter had used the concept of the “misery
index” (computed by adding the unemployment rate and the inflation rate). He had asserted
that under Ford the misery index had reached 13.57%. Carter stated that no man responsible
for giving a country a misery index that high, had a right to even ask to be President. After
four years under Carter, the misery index had reached an all-time high of 21.98%.
2) On other aspects of domestic policy, Carter enjoyed some minor successes.
a) He appointed a task force to study the issue of draft-dodgers of the Vietnam era who
had fled to other countries, and then declared an amnesty allowing them to return home.
b) He reformed the civil service to make it merit based.
c) He oversaw the establishment of the Department of Energy and the Department of
Education.
d) He also established a “superfund” for the clean-up of chemical waste dumps, established
controls over strip mining, and protected 100 million acres of Alaskan wilderness from
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development.
3) Carter’s efforts to develop a national energy policy further revealed his lack of political and
leadership skills. Borrowing a phrase from philosopher William James, Carter declared
that solving the nation’s energy problems represented “the moral equivalent of war.”
Carter then submitted what he called “a comprehensive energy program” that would
guarantee victory. Carter then left the bill to the mercy of special interests in Congress,
because he had no interest in “stroking” congressmen or wheeling and dealing. The
subsequent energy legislation that Congress adopted reflected the eviscerated corpse of
Carter’s original plan.
4) Carter also proposed the deregulation of the oil industry in the expectation that it would
increase prices and hence encourage more domestic production. In order to insure that oil
company profits did not get too high, he also proposed a “windfall profits tax.” Liberals
hated the idea because increased prices would harm consumers. Conservatives hated the
proposed windfall profits tax. The law that Congress finally adopted pleased no one.
Carter possessed such limited political skills that he could neither discipline unruly
Democrats nor work with them effectively. In 1979, renewed violence in the Middle East
produced further gasoline shortages and long lines at gas stations.
5) By 1979, public opinion polls revealed that Carter possessed a public approval rating of
26% (worse than Nixon at his lowest point). Confronted with his own unpopularity,
Carter summoned his chief advisors to a 10-day retreat at Camp David. He emerged from
the retreat to tell the American people in a televised speech that they were the cause of
most the country’s problems because they were caught up in a “crisis of confidence” and
needed a “rebirth of the American spirit.” Although the word appeared nowhere in the
speech, it quickly received the name “The Malaise Speech.”
6) Carter avowed that United States foreign policy should emphasize human rights, but his
critics on the left observed that he inconsistently applied the principle and those on the
right complained that he paid too little attention to America’s vital national interests.
a) Carter’s Panama Canal Treaty illustrated this dilemma. The Panamanians wanted
control of the canal both for its financial benefits and as a matter of sovereignty. Carter
understood that the canal could not be operated, maintained, or defended without the
consent of Panama. Consequently, he negotiated an agreement with Panama to transfer
ownership of the canal to Panama in 1999. While the treaty probably represented sound
policy – the canal could no longer accommodate America’s largest war or merchant
vessels – Carter had failed to appreciate the sentiment of the American people who took
pride in the achievement the construction of the canal represented. Moreover, as
Ronald Reagan noted, Americans believed the Canal Zone to be sovereign American
territory legally purchased during Theodore Roosevelt’s administration. The Senate
ratified the treaty by a paper thin margin (two votes more than the required two-thirds
majority).
b) Carter’s China policy drew similar criticisms. In 1979, he officially ended recognition
of Taiwan and extended recognition of the Beijing regime as the legitimate government
of China. Conservatives denounced the abandonment of Taiwan as a “sell-out” of a
longstanding ally.
c) Carter’s attempts to build upon the SALT negotiations begun under Nixon and
continued under Ford proved a miserable failure. In 1979, Carter signed SALT II with
Soviet Union. The treaty set a ceiling of 2,250 bombers and missiles for each side. It
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also set limits on warheads and new weapons systems. Conservatives denounced the
treaty for giving the Soviets a nuclear advantage in land-based missiles and questioned
the whole concept of détente. Carter responded with proposal for the MX Missile
System which would mount nuclear missiles on a rail system. This mobility would
render accurate targeting of American missiles by the Soviets nearly impossible.
Liberals, however, denounced the proposal as a blending “Disneyland and
Armageddon.” They complained that Carter was stepping sideways rather than away
from the risk of nuclear war. The treaty appeared doomed to defeat and when the
Soviets invaded Afghanistan he decided not to send the treaty to Senate.
d) Beyond SALT II, relations with the Soviet Union grew cooler under Carter. His
criticisms of Soviet violations of human rights – particularly restrictions on political
freedom and Soviet reluctance to permit dissidents and Jews to emigrate – offended
Soviet leaders. In December, 1979, the Soviets invaded Afghanistan. Carter’s
response proved symbolic and ineffectual. He stopped the shipment of grain and
technology to the Soviet Union, withdrew his support for SALT II, and banned
Americans from competing in the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics.
e) The Camp David Accords represented Carter’s greatest achievement as president. In
September, 1978, Carter brought Anwar Sadat, president of Egypt, and Prime Minister
Menachem Begin of Israel to the presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland. Carter
hoped to end the war that had characterized relations between the two countries for 30
years. In exchange for an Israeli promise to withdraw from occupied territories in Sinai,
Egypt agreed to extend diplomatic recognition to Israel. An agreement to negotiate a
resolution to the Palestinian refugee problem proved ineffective. (Sadat was assassinated
by Islamic radicals as punishment for negotiating with Israel.)
f) Carter’s greatest humiliation also came in the Middle East. In 1978, an Islamic revolution
toppled the Shah of Iran – an American client ruler – and forced him to flee the country.
The religious leader, Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, emerged as the ruler of
revolutionary Iran. Because of previous American support for the Shah, the Iranian
revolutionaries hated the United States and denounced it as the “Great Satan.” In
October, 1979, Carter permitted the exiled Shah to enter the United States to receive
cancer treatment. Iranian revolutionaries retaliated by storming the American embassy in
Teheran and taking the occupants hostage. They demanded that the Shah be returned to
Iran to be put on trial and his wealth be returned to Iran as well. Carter refused.
Instead, he froze all Iranian assets in the United States and imposed a trade embargo on
Iran. He also appealed to the United Nations and the World Court. The Iranians
attempted to gain a public relations victory by eventually releasing the African-American
and women hostages, but retained the 52 white men. In April, 1980, Carter ordered the
Marines to attempt a rescue. Attempting to micro-manage the operation from Washington,
Carter oversaw a disastrous failure. Several helicopters broke down and eight Marines
died when another crashed during a refueling stop. The rescue force never got close to
Teheran and Americans had to watch Iranians gloating over the remains of the dead
Marines on television.
7) With Carter’s approval rating hovering at about 25%, the Democrats faced the election with
some trepidation. Senator Ted Kennedy of Massachusetts mounted a strong challenge
against Carter which he carried all the way to the national convention. Ultimately, Carter’s
control of the party apparatus enabled him to withstand the Kennedy challenge. The
Republicans nominated Ronald Reagan of California, who had narrowly lost the party’s
nomination to Gerald Ford in 1976. Reagan represented the leading spokesman of American
conservatism. He selected George H.W. Bush of Texas as his vice presidential candidate.
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One of Reagan’s Republican opponents, John Anderson of Illinois continued his campaign
as a third-party candidate.
a) During the campaign, Carter attempted to defend his abysmal record. Reagan lambasted
him for his ineffectual leadership, poor management of the economy, and weak foreign
policy. Reagan also declared his support for increased defense spending, overall
reductions of government spending, and lower taxes. He called for the transfer of more
power from the federal government to the states and advocated greater respect for
traditional values – family, religion, hard work, and patriotism. He benefited from the
rising power of the “Religious Right,” which the Reverend Jerry Falwell and the Moral
Majority represented. Reagan won a large electoral victory and the Republicans won
control of the Senate. The also increased their strength in the House of Representatives.
b) After extensive negotiations with Iran – assisted by Algeria – Carter agreed to release
frozen Iranian assets in exchange for the release of the American hostages. The Iranians
held up the release until January 20, 1981 – just after Reagan had taken the oath of office.
(Later a member of the Carter Administration, Gary Sick, concocted a conspiracy theory
that Reagan and his advisors – fearing an “October Surprise” that would benefit Carter –
had secretly negotiated with the Iranians to insure that the hostages would not be released
until after the election. After millions of dollars had been wasted in investigations, it
became clear that Sick’s claims amounted to nothing more than a tissue of lies propagated
by a bitter bureaucrat.)
H. Ronald Reagan, an ideological but pragmatic conservative, acted promptly and forcefully to change
the direction of government policy. He deemed tax reduction a priority. He based his policy on
“supply side economics” – the idea that if government left more money in the hands of the people
they would invest rather than spend the extra money on consumer goods. The results would be
greater production, increased employment, and greater prosperity. These benefits would result in
increased government revenues despite lower tax rates. Reagan’s supply side beliefs were soon
referred to as “Reaganomics.” (During the campaign for the Republican nomination Reagan’s
future vice president, George Bush, had denounced Reaganomics as “Voodoo Economics.”
Reagan’s opponents also denounced his ideas as “trickle down economics.”)
1) In pursuit of these objectives, Reagan proposed the Economic Recovery Tax Act. He called for
a 30% tax cut. Despite congressional fears that the Reagan plan would spark another round of
inflation, in August, 1983, Congress approved a 25% cut spread over three years. Everyone
received the same percentage tax cut. Critics complained that the cuts most benefited the
rich. Capital gains taxes, inheritance taxes, and gift taxes were all reduced as well to encourage
investment. Moreover, the law permitted anyone with earned income to invest up to $2,000 per
year in an Individual Retirement Account (IRA), deferring all taxes on both the principal and
its earnings until retirement.
2) Reagan also advocated reductions in government spending. The Budget Reconciliation Act of
1981 cut $39 billion from domestic programs including education, food stamps, public housing,
and the National Endowments for the Arts and Humanities. While cutting domestic spending,
Reagan secured a $12 billion dollar increase for the defense budget.
3) Confronted with rising deficits, Reagan and Congress attempted to increase government
revenues by raising taxes in various ways. The Tax Equity and Fiscal Responsibility Act of
1982, eliminated concessions made to business the previous year. Social Security benefits
became taxable income in 1983. In 1984, the Deficit Reduction Act increased taxes by an
additional $50 billion, but deficits continued to rise. Nevertheless, by 1983, a major economic
recovery was underway.
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4) Reagan also ended anti-monopoly suits against IBM and AT&T. He thus fulfilled his pledge to
reduce government interference with business.
5) Although Reagan appointed Sandra Day O’Connor as the first woman on the Supreme Court,
he appointed fewer women and African-Americans to high positions than had Carter. His
administration also opposed extension of the Voting Rights Act of 1965.
6) On March 31, 1981, John Hinckley, a demented young man attempting to impress actress Jodie
Foster shot Reagan in the chest. He also severely wounded two others including James Brady,
the president’s press secretary. The president nearly died, but his courage under danger (he
walked into the hospital before collapsing from blood loss), his composure (he quipped to the
surgeon just before surgery to save his life that “I hope you’re a Republican.”), and his rapid
recovery all worked to boost his popularity.
7) Unable to undermine Reagan’s popularity or block his programs, Democrats resorted to
accusing members of his administration of improprieties. Most of these accusations proved
unfounded or involved very minor issues.
8) In foreign affairs, Reagan took a hard line regarding the Soviet Union. He termed it an “evil
empire,” and overrode opposition from the nuclear freeze movement in the United States and
Europe to deploy new and more accurate medium range cruise missiles in Europe. When the
Soviets cracked down on the Solidarity union movement in Poland, Reagan denounced
“Communist imperialism,” but accepted that his reaction must be restricted to protests.
a) Reagan also perceived a communist threat emerging in Central America and he resolved to
confront it directly. In El Salvador a corrupt and repressive regime confronted a communist
insurgency. Reagan did not dispatch troops, but did supply weapons and military advisors to
sustain the regime. His critics accused him of playing into the hands of the communists by
making the rebels the embodiment of Salvadoran nationalism. Reagan’s supporters
countered with a Central American “domino theory” and recalled Carter’s weak reaction
when Cuban-backed communists – the Sandinistas – had overthrown the corrupt Somoza
regime of Nicaragua.
b) Reagan also demonstrated a willingness to use direct military force against Marxist regimes
in this hemisphere. The island nation of Grenada fell under the control of Marxist leader
Maurice Bishop. Although Bishop had pledged to create a “People’s Provisional
Government,” he soon banned all political parties but his own New Jewel Movement and
began to rule by decree. He also moved to establish friendly relations with Castro’s Cuba.
When the Bishop government began constructing a new airport with Cuban assistance, the
Reagan administration charged that it exceeded commercial requirements. He charged
that Bishop, Castro, and the Soviets intended to use it as a hub for shipping weapons and
supplies to communist insurgents throughout the region. He denounced the airport as a
threat to American security. When Bishop was deposed and murdered, the island began to
slide into chaos. The Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) appealed to
the United States, Barbados, and Jamaica for assistance. This request – as well as the
threat to American medical students on the island – provided Reagan with sufficient cause
to launch Operation Urgent Fury. The operation proved a success and order was
restored to Grenada under a democratically elected government.
c) During his first term, Reagan attempted to break free of the MAD Doctrine by proposing the
Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI). The press promptly dubbed the proposal “Star Wars.”
Under Reagan’s plan, SDI would destroy incoming enemy missiles while still in space.
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Skeptical about the plan’s technological feasibility and fearful of its enormous costs,
Congress reduced funding for SDI during Reagan’s second term.
d) Reagan also attempted to intervene in Lebanon in 1983, when civil war erupted following
the Israeli invasion in 1982. Reagan committed a contingent of United States Marines to
participate in a multinational force. In October, 1983, suicide bombers driving large trucks
smashed into the barracks of the Marines and French Paratroopers. The explosions killed
241 Marines and 58 Paratroopers. A group called Islamic Jihad claimed responsibility for
the attack. Elements of this group eventually formed the Iranian-backed organization
Hezbollah. Although President Reagan, Vice President Bush, Secretary of War Caspar
Weinberger, and French President Francois Mitterrand all avowed a determination to
continue the mission, within a matter of months the entire multinational force had been
withdrawn. The United States launched no retaliatory strikes.
9) In the election of 1984, the Democrats nominated Carter’s former vice president Walter
Mondale of Minnesota. He selected Congresswoman Geraldine Ferraro of New York as
his vice presidential candidate. Mondale criticized Reagan for the budget deficit, high
unemployment, high interest rates, and reduced social spending. He also pledged to raise taxes.
Reagan cruised first to renomination and then to reelection. He retained his support from the
Religious Right, but also broke apart the old New Deal coalition of industrial workers, farmers,
and the poor. Large segments of these groups broke from the Democratic Party to support
Reagan. They came to be called “Reagan Democrats.” Reagan won 60% of the popular vote.
His success did not help other Republican candidates, however, and the Republicans lost two
Senate seats. Like Nixon in 1972, Reagan experienced “a lonely landslide.”
10) Foreign affairs emerged as a dominant concern early in Reagan’s second term.
a) When Muammar al-Qadhafi, anti-American leader of Libya, claimed Libyan
sovereignty over the Gulf of Sidra, Reagan ordered the Sixth Fleet into the disputed waters.
When Libyan gunboats challenged the American vessels, American planes destroyed them
and then bombed installations on the shore. Not long afterward, terrorists bombed a West
German nightclub popular among American servicemen. The bomb killed two soldiers and
one civilian. More than 200 suffered injuries. When evidence tied the bombing to Libyan
agents, Reagan authorized an air strike by American planes based in Britain against Libyan
bases in April, 1986. France and Spain denied the American planes over flight rights over
their territory, making the raid more difficult. Most European nations condemned it as well.
Encouraged by the European reaction, Qadhafi – who had long funded terrorist
organizations – stepped up his support for such groups. Abu Nidal, one such group,
retaliated for the raid by murdering two British citizens and an American who were being
held hostage in Beirut, Lebanon. In January, 1988, Libyan agents smuggled a bomb onto
Pan Am 103. The plane blew up over Lockerbie, Scotland, killing 270 people. Initially,
investigators suspected Iran, but eventually the evidence shifted responsibility to Libya.
After protracted negotiations and the imposition of United Nations sanctions, Qadhafi
surrendered the agents suspected of organizing the attack, one of whom was convicted.
b) In March, 1985, Mikhail S. Gorbachev became the premier of the Soviet Union.
Gorbachev’s more flexible approach toward domestic and foreign affairs – manifested in
Perestroika and Glasnost – prompted Reagan to soften his own anti-Soviet views
somewhat. When Gorbachev vowed to abide by the unratified SALT II agreement,
Reagan observed that the Soviets had not abided by it thus far. Consequently, he
continued to press for the expansion and modernization of the American defense system.
Still, both men seemed committed to finding a path towards nuclear arms reductions. The
two met in Geneva, Switzerland in 1985 and again the following year in Reykjavik,
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Iceland. Agreements proved elusive as Reagan refused to abandon his plan for SDI and
Gorbachev refused to make any agreement that left the United States free to pursue SDI.
Finally, in December, 1987, at the Washington Summit, the Strategic Arms Reduction
Talks (START) produced definitive results when the two countries agreed to eliminate
medium-range missiles from Europe.
c) Regardless of improving relations with the Soviets, Reagan did not soften his
determination to block the spread of communist regimes in the western hemisphere.
Nicaragua emerged as the focus of his efforts in this area during the second term. The
administration formed a group of anti-communist rebels – the Contras – to overthrow
the Marxist Sandinista regime headed by Daniel Ortega. The Democrat-controlled
Congress, however, sought to block funding for the Contras via the Boland Amendment.
Undeterred, the Reagan Administration sought to circumvent the Boland Amendment.
William Casey, CIA Director, Lieutenant-Colonel Oliver North of the National
Security Council, Admiral John Poindexter, national security advisor, and Robert
McFarlane, former national security advisor, devised a plan to sell weapons to
“moderate” Iranians in hopes that they would use their influence to secure the release of
American hostages in Lebanon. They then diverted profits from these sales to fund the
Contras. Details of the operation began to leak out in late 1986. Ultimately, Reagan was
forced to appoint a special prosecutor and acknowledge his authorization of much of the
operation. Congress also held extensive hearings on the Iran-Contra Scandal. Despite
all of these problems, Reagan declined to support a peace plan signed by five Central
American nations in 1987, but the following year the Sandinistas and the Contras agreed
to a cease-fire.
11) During his second term, Reagan continued to pursue his goals of lower taxes and reduced
government.
a) The Tax Reform Act of 1986 lowered tax rates. It reduced the highest rate on personal
income from 50% to 28% and on corporate taxes from 46% to 34%. It also eliminated
many tax shelters and tax credits. The law significantly limited the concept of
progressive taxation – the idea that tax rate percentages should increase as income
increased. The act established two tax rates – 15% on incomes less than $17,850 for
individuals and $29,750 for families and 28% on incomes above that amount. The ability
of the government to use the tax system to effect social policy had been sharply restricted.
b) Overall, the economy continued to rally. Unemployment dropped to 6.6% in 1986 and
inflation dropped to 2.2%. The stock market was bullish through mid-1987.
c) The improving economy, however did not represent good news for all segments of
American society. Slowing inflation and declining world agricultural prices left many
farmers in financial peril. By the mid-1980s many farmers slid into bankruptcy. As
farmers failed, so to did the rural banks that had loaned them money. Reagan attempted
to ease the difficulty by renewing grain sales to the Soviet Union, but – in keeping with
his desire to limit the scope of government – he simultaneously reduced agricultural
price supports and opposed debt relief legislation passed by Congress.
d) The federal deficit continued to grow as well. By 1985, it stood at $179 billion.
Simultaneously, the United States suffered from trade deficits of more than $100 billion
annually. The trade deficit sprang in part from a decline in American management and
engineering skills relative to Germany and Japan, but also because the United States
represented an open market to foreign businesses. In the mid-1980s the United States
became a debtor nation for the first time since World War I. Consumer debt also rose
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from $300 billion in 1980 to $500 billion in 1986.
e) Wall Street fell victim to “Black Monday” on October 19, 1987. The Dow Jones
Industrial Average plummeted 500 points or over 20% of its value. Between August 25
and October 20, the market lost over a trillion dollars in paper value. Fearing that this
drop signaled the beginning of a recession, Congress cut taxes by an additional $30
billion.
f) The explosion of the space shuttle Challenger shortly after launch in February, 1986,
damaged NASA’s credibility and raised questions about the feasibility of the complex
technology required to implement SDI. All aboard perished including New Hampshire
school teacher Christa McAuliffe.
g) Reagan also reshaped the Supreme Court. In 1986, he replaced Chief Justice Warren
Burger with Associate Justice William H. Rehnquist – probably the most conservative
member of the Court. Congress and liberal special interest groups, however, blocked
Reagan’s attempt to appoint Robert Bork as associate justice by means of a
mean-spirited smear campaign. Reagan did secure Court appointments for other
conservatives including Sandra Day O’Connor, Antonin Scalia, and Anthony
Kennedy.
12) As the election of 1988 approached, Democrat front-runner Senator Gary Hart of
Colorado became caught up in a sex scandal that involved an appropriately named yacht –
The Monkey Business. With Hart out of the race, Governor Michael Dukakis of
Massachusetts, emerged as the victor over Jesse Jackson. Dukakis selected Senator
Lloyd Bentsen of Texas as his running mate. In the Republican primaries George H. W.
Bush, Reagan’s vice president, emerged triumphant after getting off to a slow start. He
selected Senator Dan Quayle of Indiana as his running mate. Although Bush beat
Dukakis easily, the Republicans made no gains in Congress.
I. The first challenge of the Bush Administration involved the looming deficit. Shortly after Bush
took office in January, 1989, the government estimated that a budget deficit of $143 billion for
1990. With projected deficits continuing to rise, Bush held a “budget summit” with leaders of
Congress in May, 1990, and their discussions continued throughout the summer. In September,
the administration and Congress agreed to increase taxes on gasoline, tobacco, and alcohol.
They also agreed to impose excise taxes on luxury items and to raise Medicare taxes. They
further agreed to make cuts in Medicare and other domestic programs. With the 1991 deficit
now projected at $290 billion, Congress enacted the agreement with hopes that $500 billion
might be cut from the deficit over a five-year period. The Democrat-controlled Congress also
voted to shift the power to decide whether new tax and spending proposals violated the deficit
cutting agreement to the Congressional Budget Office (CBO). This authority had previously
rested with the White House Office of Budget and Management. Ultimately, this agreement
failed to produce the desired deficit reductions, because Congress refused to curtail its spending.
It also proved a political disaster for Bush. Bush had based much of his campaign for the
presidency on the pledge “Read my lips. No new taxes!” His violation of that pledge alienated
much of his political base – and ultimately cost him reelection.
1) Other aspects of the economy also proved troublesome.
a) The savings and loan industry was in desperate shape as a result of bad real-estate loans.
Bush proposed to close or sell 350 of the most insolvent institutions. He proposed to
cover the cost through the sale of government bonds. In July, 1989, he signed legislation
creating the Resolution Trust Corporation to oversee the closure and merging of
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savings and loans. The legislation allocated $166 billion over ten years to cover bad
debts. Estimates of the total cost of the bailout ultimately topped $300 billion.
b) Scandals in the financial markets further undermined faith in business and the overall
economy. Charges of insider trading, stock manipulation, and falsification of records
resulted in Drexel Burnham Lambert, a major securities firm, pleading guilty to six
violations of federal law. The company filed for bankruptcy. Michael Milken – the
company’s “junk bond king” (junk bonds are bonds with a substandard rating which
because of their risk generally carry a 2-3 % interest advantage) – pleaded guilty to
conspiracy and other charges and was sent to prison in 1990. Simultaneously, federal
prosecutors indicted 46 futures traders at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange for
racketeering.
c) Under the pressure of federal deficits, the savings and loan debacle, and criminal
activity, the economy began to slow. The increase in the Gross National Product
(GNP) slowed from 4.4% in 1988 to 2.9% in 1989. Unemployment also crept up to a
three-year high of 6.8% in March, 1991. Every economic sector except for medical
services slumped, and every region of the country suffered. The “Big Three”
automakers (Ford, General Motors, Chrysler) posted record losses. Pan Am and Eastern
Airlines entered bankruptcy proceedings. In September,1991, the Federal Reserve
attempted to bolster the economy by reducing interest rates.
2) Important legislation of the Bush Administration included:
a) The Clean Air Act of 1990. This legislation updated a 1970 law and mandated that the
level of emissions be reduced 50% by the year 2000. The act called for the development
of cleaner gasoline, reductions in urban ozone, and nitrogen oxide emission reductions.
b) The Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990. This legislation barred discrimination
against people with physical or mental disabilities.
c) The Civil Rights Act of 1991. Bush vetoed this legislation in 1990, because it imposed
racial quotas. The 1991 legislation had been slightly modified, but still required
employers in discrimination cases to prove that their hiring practices were not
discriminatory. Essentially, the law imposed racial and gender quotas via a legal
backdoor.
3) Bush continued to shape the Supreme Court in a conservative direction with the appointment
of Associate Justice David Souter to replace retiring Justice William J. Brennan. Two
years later, upon the retirement of Thurgood Marshall, he appointed Clarence Thomas, a
conservative African-American. The NAACP and other liberal groups opposed the
nomination and attempted to “Bork” Thomas just as they had Robert Bork during the
Reagan years. A final desperate attempt to derail the nomination came with charges of
sexual harassment leveled by Anita Hill, a University of Oklahoma law professor Her
charges led to additional hearings by the Judicial Committee. Thomas likened this televised
inquisition to an “electronic lynching.” Despite these efforts, the senate narrowly
confirmed Thomas in October, 1991.
4) Scandal rocked the Democrat leadership of the Congress in 1989, when the House Ethics
Committee released a report charging that Speaker Jim Wright had violated rules regulating
the acceptance of gifts and outside income. A short time later, Tony Coelho, the Democrat
whip in the Senate resigned over misuse of campaign funds.
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5) A major environmental disaster occurred with the wreck of the Exxon Valdez. The wreck
spilled 240,000 gallons of oil into Prince William Sound. In October, 1991, Exxon agreed to
pay $1.025 billion dollars in fines and restitution for the accident which had resulted from
negligence on the part of the ship’s captain.
6) President Bush, a former diplomat and director of the CIA, pursued an activist foreign policy.
a) From the beginning of his term, Bush had been concerned with the activities of
Panamanian dictator Manuel Noriega, because he was suspected of providing a link in
the drug traffic between South America and the United States. After economic sanctions,
diplomatic efforts, and an October, 1989, coup failed to oust him, Bush ordered 12,000
troops into Panama on December 20. The United States installed a new government
under Guillermo Endara. Noriega eventually surrendered to American troops. He was
transported to the United States where he was convicted on drug-trafficking charges in
1992 and sentenced to 40 years in prison.
b) In China, the death of reformer Hu Yaobang – former general secretary and chairman of
the Chinese Communist party – prompted students to begin pro-democracy marches in
Beijing. By mid-May, 1989, more than one million people had gathered in Tiananmen
Square and elsewhere in China. They demanded political reform. The government
responded by imposing martial law and firing on the demonstrators. Estimates of the
death toll range from 500 to 7,000. In July, 1989, National Security Advisor Brent
Scowcroft and Deputy Secretary of State Lawrence Eagleburger met secretly with
Chinese leaders. They met again in December and there revealed details of their earlier
meeting. Bush faced a storm of protest over his policy of “constructive engagement”
with China. The president relented to the extent that he imposed sanctions in 1991 by
banning the sale of high technology satellite parts to the Chinese. Nonetheless, he
continued to support renewal of China’s most favored nation trading status.
c) Relations between the United States and Soviet Union continued to improve. The grip of
communism on Eastern Europe had begun to loosen and then it had fallen away
altogether. Bush and Gorbachev met in Malta in early December, 1989. There, they
agreed that the Cold War was over. In May, 1990, the two men met in Washington to
discuss the possible reunification of Germany and to sign a trade agreement between
their countries. The two met again in Helsinki, Finland on September 9 to discuss
strategy for the emerging Persian Gulf Crisis. In July, 1991, Gorbachev attended the
meeting of the G-7 (“Group of 7” – Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the
United Kingdom, and the United States) to seek financial aid for the Soviet Union. Just
days later, Bush and Gorbachev met in Moscow to sign the Strategic Arms Reduction
Treaty (START). This agreement reduced the nuclear arsenals of the United States
and Soviet Union by 30%. The two leaders also called for Middle Eastern talks.
d) The most significant foreign policy challenge of Bush’s term came with the Persian Gulf
Crisis.
i) In July, 1990, Saddam Hussein of Iraq charged that Kuwait had conspired with
the United States to suppress oil prices. He began to mass troops along the
Kuwait border. He had long declared to Kuwait to be a break-away province of
Iraq.
ii) On August 2, 1990, Iraq invaded Kuwait. Bush denounced the invasion as “naked
aggression.” Within 24 hours, Hussein had 100,000 Iraqi soldiers poised south
of Kuwait City, near the Saudi Arabian border. The United States immediately
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banned trade with Iraq, froze Iraqi and Kuwaiti assets in the United States, and
dispatched aircraft carriers to the Persian Gulf. The United Nations Security
Council denounced the invasion of Kuwait on August 6. Bush followed up the
U.N.’s denunciation by deploying air, sea, and land forces to Saudi Arabia in
Operation Desert Shield. By month’s end 100,000 American troops had
deployed to Saudi Arabia.
iii) Even as American troops flowed into Saudi Arabia, Bush had begun the task of
building an anti-Hussein coalition. He secured Egyptian support by forgiving
Egypt’s debt to the United States. He also secured pledges of financial support
from Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, Japan, and other nations to help defray the costs of
the operation.
iv) On October 29, 1990, the U.N. Security Council warned Hussein to withdraw
from Kuwait or face further consequences.
v) In November, Bush authorized an increase in American forces in Saudi Arabia to
more than 400,000. On November 29, the U.N. set January 15, 1991 as the
deadline for an Iraqi withdrawal from Kuwait.
vi) On January 9, Iraq’s foreign minister, Tariq Aziz, rejected a letter written by
Bush to Hussein. Three days later, after an extensive debate, Congress
authorized the use of military force in the Gulf. On January 17, an international
force including the United States, Britain, France, Italy, Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait
launched an air and missile attack on Iraqi forces in Iraq and occupied Kuwait.
The United States designated this effort Operation Desert Storm. Under the
overall command of General H. Norman Schwarzkopf, the operation emphasized
mobility and high-technology weapons such as Tomahawk Cruise Missiles and
Patriot Anti-missile Missiles. Beginning on January 17, Hussein began to fire
SCUD missiles into Israel. He hoped to draw Israel into the war and thus disrupt
the American-Arab coalition. On January 22 and 23, the Iraqi forces set fire to
Kuwaiti oil fields and opened the spigots to flood the Persian Gulf with crude oil.
vii) On February 23, 1991, the coalition ground assault began. Four days later, the
president announced that Kuwait had been liberated and ordered offensive
operations to cease. The U.N. quickly established the terms for a cease-fire.
These included requirements that:
aa) Iraq rescind its annexation of Kuwait.
bb) Iraq accept liability for the war and return all stolen Kuwaiti property.
cc) Iraq end all military operations.
dd) Iraq identify mines and booby traps.
ee) Iraq release all captives.
viii) On April 3, the Security Council approved a resolution to establish a permanent
cease-fire. Iraq accepted these terms three days later. The next day, the United
States began to airlift food to Kurdish refugees on the Iraq-Turkey border who
were fleeing from a rebellion against Hussein. It is widely believed that the
Kurds had been encouraged in their rebellion by the United States, which
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declined to become militarily involved after the cease-fire went into effect. The
United States estimated that 100,000 Iraqis died in the war. The American
forces suffered about 115 deaths.
e) In February, 1991, the United States had set out its postwar goals for the Middle East.
These included regional arms control and security arrangements, international aid for
reconstruction of Iraq and Kuwait, and resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.
Immediately after cessation of the Persian Gulf conflict, Secretary of State James
Baker toured the Middle East attempting to win support for a conference to address the
problems in the region. Eventually, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Jordan, Lebanon and Israel
had accepted the United States proposal for an Arab-Israeli peace conference. Despite
continuing points of conflict – including U.N. inspections of Iraqi nuclear capabilities
and new Israeli settlements in disputed territory – which kept the conference agreement
tenuous, the nations met in Madrid, Spain in late October. Bilateral talks between the
Arabs and Israelis in early November concentrated on procedural issues.
f) The Soviet Union began to break up in 1990 when Lithuania declared its independence.
Later that year, hard-line Communists attempted to depose Gorbachev by means of a
coup. Although the plot failed and Gorbachev returned to power, other Soviet republics
followed Lithuania’s lead. For the United States, the collapse of the Soviet Union meant
that the Cold War truly had ended. The United States now stood as the world’s sole
super-power. In September, 1991, President Bush announced that the United States
would carry out the unilateral removal and destruction of ground-based tactical nuclear
weapons in Europe and Asia, removal of nuclear-armed cruise missiles from American
ships and submarines, immediate destruction of intercontinental ballistic missiles
covered by the START Treaty, and an end to 24-hour alert for strategic bombers which
the Strategic Air Command (SAC) had maintained for years. The following month,
Gorbachev matched Bush’s announcement and announced plans to reduce the Soviet
military by some 700,000 troops.
g) Even as the Cold War wound down, however, new foreign policy challenges emerged.
Yugoslavia slipped into brutal civil war between Serbs, Bosnians, Croatians, and others.
This struggle posed a risk to the peace and stability of Europe. The retention of nuclear
weapons by several of the former Soviet Republics raised the specter of nuclear conflict
and nuclear proliferation.
J. As the election of 1992 approached, the Republicans renominated George H. W. Bush for the
presidency. The Democrats selected William Jefferson Clinton, governor of Arkansas and a
self-defined moderate, from a crowded field of possible candidates. The race was rendered more
complex by the candidacy of H. Ross Perot, a Texas billionaire, as an independent candidate.
While Bush mounted a campaign that emphasized traditional values and his foreign policy
successes, Clinton and Perot focused on economic issues. Clinton blamed Bush’s economic
policies for the recession gripping the country. “It’s the Economy Stupid” became the unofficial
mantra of the Clinton campaign. He pledged to cut defense spending, reduce taxes on the middle
class, and demanded a huge package of economic aid for the former republics of the now defunct
Soviet Union. He did not stipulate how he would fund either his tax cuts or aid to the former
Soviet republics. His heavy reliance on public opinion polls, his willingness to pander to special
interest groups, and the facility with which he flip-flopped on controversial issues prompted the
nickname “Slick Willy.” For his part, Perot railed against both Democrats and Republicans for
their failure to pursue national interests rather than partisan concerns. He often compared the two
major parties to two people looking helplessly at a broken down car. Perot insisted that he knew
how “to get under the hood” and fix the vehicle. He particularly condemned the deficit
spending by the federal government. In the election, Clinton won 43% of the popular vote, Bush
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won 39%, and Perot 18%. Although Clinton had fallen far short of a popular majority, he won
370 electoral votes and the presidency.
1) Clinton’s first term in office proved a blend of political successes and failures mixed
with personal scandals.
a) One of Clinton’s first actions as president involved an attempt to lift the ban on
homosexuals in the military. This proved a serious mistake as it provoked a storm of
protest from the military and the public. Ultimately, Clinton backed down and settled for a
vague policy of “don’t ask, don’t tell.”
b) He abandoned his campaign pledge to reduce taxes on the middle class. Determined to
reduce the federal deficit without damaging the economy, he now proposed a combination
of tax increases on corporations and individuals in the higher tax brackets and spending
reductions. Simultaneously, he called for additional spending or “investments” in public
works and “human capital” (education, health care, and welfare). Unpopular with both
Republicans and fiscally conservative Democrats, the bill finally limped through Congress
with a two vote majority in the House and a 51-50 vote in the Senate. (Vice president
Al Gore cast the tie-breaking vote.)
c) The Democrat-controlled Congress also rebuffed Clinton’s effort to remake the nation’s
health care system. Hillary Clinton headed up the administration team that had drafted
the legislation and hence it was often referred to as “Hillary Care.” It proposed a
government-funded system of universal coverage for all citizens and legal immigrant. The
funds currently being used for Medicaid and “sin taxes” on tobacco (and possibly
alcoholic beverages) would be used to pay for the program. Strongly opposed by the
pharmaceutical industry, private insurance companies, and much of the public, Republican
Senators mounted a successful filibuster to defeat the bill.
d) These political failures were complicated by controversy, scandal, and tragedy.
i) Almost from the beginning of his term, the Clintons were embroiled in a scandal
involving a questionable Arkansas land deal with developer Jim McDougal called
Whitewater. Eventually, this scandal resulted in the appointment of an independent
counsel – Kenneth Starr – to investigate the accusations. Although no criminal
wrongdoing ultimately could be proven against the Clintons, fifteen participants in
the activities including Jim and Susan McDougal and Hillary’s former law partner
and Associate Attorney General Webster (Webb) Hubbell did receive prison
sentences. Susan McDougal’s refusal to testify before a grand jury investigating the
Clintons earned her an additional eighteen months in prison for contempt of court.
Clinton pardoned her just before leaving office.
ii) Hillary Clinton was soon accused of wrongdoing in the dismissal of employees from
the White House travel office (Travelgate). Critics charged that she had been
instrumental in using the FBI to justify the firing of long-term White House
employees so as to replace them with Arkansas cronies. Once investigations began,
critics accused her of lying to investigators. Subsequently, investigators concluded
that she had made “factually false” statements under oath, but failed to meet the
requirements for a perjury charge.
iii) Soon it was revealed that Hillary had turned an initial investment of $1000 into
$100,000 through futures trading with the assistance of James B. Blair. Blair
acknowledged that at his behest Hillary had received special consideration in her
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trades. He insisted however, that he had been motivated by friendship rather than
seeking special favors for his client Tyson Foods – an Arkansas-based corporation
subject to regulation by Bill Clinton. In this case, hypocrisy rather than actual
criminality fueled the criticism. During the campaign, Hillary had routinely
denounced the Reagan-Bush years as “a decade of greed” even as she had been using
special favors to build a small fortune during that period.
iv) Filegate involved the White House acquisition of confidential FBI security clearance
files on numerous (400-900) former Republican White House employees.
v) The suicide of Clinton deputy White House counsel Vince Foster sparked a host of
conspiracy theories including charges of a romantic liaison with Hillary and murder.
Foster, a former law partner and friend of Hillary suffered from clinical depression
and found the pressure-cooker of Washington too much to bear. In a resignation
letter/suicide note found torn up in his brief case he lamented "I was not meant for
the job or the spotlight of public life in Washington. Here ruining people is
considered sport."
vi) Paula Jones, a former Arkansas state employee, accused Bill Clinton of sexual
harassment. These charges not only proved damaging in their own right, but
reminded the public of a Clinton’s affair with Gennifer Flowers, a Little Rock
singer. The affair had been revealed during the presidential campaign. After
initially denying it, Clinton had been forced to confess to mistakes in his marriage
after Flowers released tapes of phone conversations between Clinton and herself.
e) Not surprisingly, Clinton’s public approval numbers plummeted. (They dropped twenty
percentage points during his first two weeks in office.) In the congressional elections of
1994, American voters repudiated the Clinton Administration and gave the Republicans
control of both houses of Congress. Much credit for the Republican success went to Newt
Gingrich of Georgia and his Contract with America. The contract included promises of
reduced spending, smaller federal government, and more power for the states. The
Republicans rewarded Gingrich by electing him Speaker of the House. Clinton
acknowledged that “the era of big government is over.” Although Gingrich and the
Republicans lacked sufficient majorities to enact their entire agenda, they did force through
bills that made members of Congress subject to the same laws that applied to ordinary
Americans; that stopped unfunded federal mandates on state or local governments; that
increased defense spending; and that imposed stiff penalties for child abuse and
pornography. They also forced Clinton to move seriously towards a balanced budget.
f) Clinton did achieve some of his domestic objectives.
i) Before losing control of Congress the Democrats had adopted a number of
Clinton-supported measures. These included:
aa) legislation establishing a five-day waiting period for handgun purchases.
bb) an anti-crime bill that emphasized community policing.
cc) a Family Leave Act that required large companies to provide up to twelve weeks
of unpaid leave to workers for family and medical emergencies.
ii) The most important legislation of Clinton’s entire presidency came after the
Republicans won control of Congress. Clinton had campaigned in 1992 for welfare
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reform. With Gingrich and the Republicans he found willing allies for the endeavor.
The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996 fundamentally
altered the welfare system that had begun under FDR during the New Deal. The
measure shifted primary responsibility for welfare to the states with federal grants to
help fund it. It limited the length of time an individual could receive welfare
payments and included work provisions for many recipients of welfare. It
significantly reduced funding for food stamps and excluded legal immigrants from
most welfare programs. Although Clinton objected to the exclusion of legal
immigrants and cuts to the food stamp program, he signed the legislation into law.
Liberal Democrats complained that the president had abandoned the party’s long-held
social agenda to improve his chances of reelection.
F) In foreign affairs, the Clinton years witnessed the same mixture of success and failure.
i) In 1991, the government of Somalia (in the northeastern horn of Africa) collapsed.
The subsequent anarchy and violence led to starvation and a burgeoning human
tragedy. President Bush secured UN approval for a humanitarian relief operation to
be led by the United States military. Its purpose was to restore order and deliver
food to the country. This operation proved successful for the most part. Following
Clinton’s election, the new president was convinced by the UN to embark on a
program of “nation building” in Somalia. In October, 1993, the Clinton
administration approved an operation to capture or kill Mohamed Farrah Adid in
Mogadishu, the Somali capital. Adid, a local warlord, had recently engaged
Pakistani troops that made up part of the UN forces. Twenty-four Pakistanis had
been killed in the fighting. Some of the dead were skinned by Adid’s troops.
Although the Clinton administration approved the raid, Secretary of Defense Les
Aspin denied military requests for Bradley Armored Fighting Vehicles and fire
support by a C-130 Gunship. Instead, the American troops embarked on the raid in
unarmored Humvees and helicopters. The raid proved an unmitigated disaster in
which eighteen Americans were killed and more than seventy wounded. Somali
casualties numbered in the hundreds. The news footage of the naked bodies of dead
Americans being dragged through the streets by celebrating Somalis stunned the
American people. Aspin resigned and Clinton soon ordered American forces
withdrawn from Somalia.
ii) Clinton enjoyed greater success in Haiti. There, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, a popular
priest, had won a democratic election in 1990 following a period of coups and chaos.
When Aristide was toppled by an army general, Clinton declared he determination to
return Aristide to power. He sought the support of the UN. Following lengthy
negotiations, it became clear that a peaceful resolution appeared unlikely. Clinton
secured a UN resolution authorizing the use of armed force as a last resort. With
war likely, former president, Jimmy Carter visited the island and convinced the
military to yield power back to Aristide.
iii) Clinton also sought to facilitate the peace process between Israel and the
Palestinians. He continued the Bush policy of fostering “patient negotiations
between Arabs and Israelis.” In 1993, secret negotiations between the Israelis and
the Palestinians in Oslo, Norway, had produced a draft agreement called the Oslo
Accords. This agreement established Palestinian self-rule in the Gaza Strip and
Jericho on the West Bank. In September, 1993, Clinton hosted a White House
summit between Israeli Prime Minister Itzhak Rabin and Yassir Arafat, chairman
of the Palestinian Liberation Organization (PLO) where the agreement was
signed. The peace process received a severe set back when an Israeli Jewish zealot
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angered by the negotiations with the PLO assassinated Rabin at a peace rally in Tel
Aviv in 1995. Soon, conservative hardliner Benjamin Netanyahu defeated United
States-backed Shimon Perez in the election for a new prime minister.
Nevertheless, in October, 1998, Clinton hosted a summit between Netanyahu and
Arafat at Wye Mills, Maryand. The two sides agreed to the Wye Accords under
which Israel agreed to yield territory in exchange for security guarantees from the
Palestinians. For the most part, these agreements have produced few improvements
as extremist groups are committed to frustrating the peace process.
iv) The Clinton Administration also played an important role in establishing a peace
settlement in the war-torn former Yugoslavia by committing military forces and
through diplomacy.
v) Clinton embraced the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) which
as of January 1994 eliminated most trade barriers with Mexico and Canada and
made North America the largest free trade area and the world. Clinton and NAFTA
supporters argued that free trade would open up foreign markets to American
goods. Opponents of the agreement such as Ross Perot (whom Rush Limbaugh
once likened to “a hand grenade with ears”) and organized labor favored the
barriers against cheaper foreign goods. Perot warned that enactment of NAFTA
would be accompanied by a “giant sucking sound” of American jobs rushing south
the Mexico. Organized labor shared his concern. Although many Democrat
congressmen and senators abandoned Clinton, the solid support of Republicans
enabled him to secure passage of the agreement.
2) In 1996, Clinton easily won renomination as the Democrat candidate. The Republicans turned
to Senator Robert Dole of Kansas. Perot returned to the presidential contest – this time as
the nominee of the Reform Party. A combination of economic prosperity and lackluster
competitors enable Clinton to win reelection with 49% of the vote. This made him the first
Democrat to win reelection since FDR in 1936. The Republicans, however, retained control
of Congress.
a) Clinton’s only achievements during his second term came in the area of foreign affairs
such as the Wye Accords and the settlement in the former Yugoslavia. He played an
important role in bringing about a peace agreement in Northern Ireland.
b) By the middle of his second term, it had become clear that Clinton’s personal character
failures rivaled whatever political successes he might achieve. Kenneth Starr’s
investigation into Whitewater had led to revelations of an Oval Office affair between the
president and White House intern Monica Lewinsky. As he had done when news of his
affair with Gennifer Flowers first broke, Clinton initially denied the affair and insisted to
television cameras that “I did not have sex with that woman.” Hillary blamed the story
on a “vast right wing conspiracy.” Ultimately, secretly taped conversations between
Lewinsky and Linda Tripp about the affair and DNA from a stained blue dress proved
that the president had lied. (He also settled the Paula Jones’ sexual harassment lawsuit
out of court by paying her sizeable damages.) Based on Clinton’s serial lies under oath
about his serial philandering, the House of Representatives voted to impeach him in
December, 1998. His trial in the Senate in January and February, 1999, resulted in his
acquittal. Although acquitted and still popular with the public, Clinton attempted no
major initiatives during his final year in office. Historian George Tindall provides an
excellent assessment of the Clinton presidency. “Politically astute, charismatic, and wellinformed, Clinton had as much ability and potential as any president. Yet he was also
shamelessly self-indulgent. The result was a scandalous presidency punctuated by
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dramatic achievements in welfare reform, economic growth, as well as foreign affairs.”
V. Society and Culture: A Nation in Transition
A. The Gross National Product (GNP) – today called the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) –
nearly doubled between 1945 and 1960. Inflation remained under 2% annually throughout the
1950s. Defense spending fueled much of the growth and military-related research helped create
or expand the new industries of chemicals, electronics, and aviation. Moreover, the United
States enjoyed a virtual monopoly over international trade, because of the destruction wrought in
WWII. Technological innovations contributed to productivity, which jumped 35% between 1945
and 1955.
1) Following the Great Depression and WWII, Americans wanted to consume.
a) Home ownership grew by 50% during the fifteen years between 1945 and 1960. These
new homes required appliances such as refrigerators and washing machines. By far,
however, the television represented the most popular consumer item. The number of
televisions exploded from 7,000 sets in 1946 to 50 million sets by 1960. TV Guide
became the fastest growing magazine and advertisers found television a very congenial
medium. Televisions and automobiles emerged as “must have” consumer items for most
American households.
b) Much of the post-war consumption depended upon consumer credit and the sacrifice of
long-term saving. Between 1945 and 1957, consumer credit expanded by 800%; the
savings rate dropped to about 5% of income.
c) Shopping expanded as a form of entertainment and the number of shopping centers
increased from eight in 1945 to 3,840 in 1960. Marketers especially targeted teenagers
who emerged as an important consumer group. Teen purchases made “rock n’ roll
music” a major industry with Elvis Presley as its first star in the 1950s.
2) Not only did Americans want to consume, they also wanted to make babies. The American
population grew by some 30% (more that 28 million people) – largely because of the “baby
boom.” Dr. Benjamin Spock’s The Commonsense Book of Bay and Child Care sold an
average of 1 million copies a year between 1946 and 1960.
a) Much of the population growth occurred in urban and suburban areas and continued the
urbanization that had begun late in the 19th century.
i) The suburbs grew six times faster than cities in the 1950s. William Levitt
pioneered mass-produced housing development when he built 10,000 houses
(Levittown) on Long Island in 1947. Other developers copied this model all across
the country.
ii) The Federal Housing Administration encouraged this growth. It helped builders
by insuring up to 90% of construction loans and home buyers by insuring their
mortgages.
iii) The government’s support for road construction – especially development of the
interstate highway system during the Eisenhower Administration – spurred the
growth of automobile production. Auto production increased from 2 million in
1946 to 8 million in 1955. More widespread availability of cars also encouraged
the growth of “suburbia.”
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iv) Large numbers of African-Americans abandoned the South during this period to
seek better lives in northern and mid-western cities. As their numbers increased,
however, large numbers of whites abandoned urban areas for the suburbs in a
process known as “white flight.” About 20% of the American population changed
its residence every year.
b) The development of air conditioning facilitated population booms in Florida, California,
and the Southwest. California grew rapidly and, by 1963, it had emerged as the most
populous state. The Northeast, however, remained the most densely populated region of
the country.
3) The middle class more than doubled in size during this period – 5.7 million in 1947 to over
12 million by the early 1960s. The nature of employment also changed as the number of
farm workers dropped from 9 million to 5.2 million between 1940 and 1960. By 1960 more
Americans had white collar than blue collar jobs. Conformity became an important part of
American life.
a) In post-war America, employees tended to work for large organizations. By 1960, 38% of
American workers were employed by organizations with over 500 employees. Such work
environments encouraged the managerial personality and corporate teamwork rather
than individualism.
b) Observers saw the rise of the middle class as the cause of the increased emphasis on
homogeneity and conformity.
i) David Reisman argued in The Lonely Crowd (1950) that Americans were moving
away from an inner-directed to an outer-directed orientation.
ii) William Whyte’s The Organization Man (1956) saw corporate culture as
emphasizing the group rather than the individual.
iii) Sloan Wilson’s The Man in the Grey Flannel Suit (1955) offered a similar
critique in fictional form.
iv) Ultimately, these critiques underestimated the lingering effects of wartime unity
and regimentation – especially for veterans. The also underestimated the effects of
the Red Scare. During this period, people routinely identified quotes from the
Declaration of Independence as originating in a subversive document.
c) The post-war years also witnessed the standard work week shrink from six days to five.
The additional leisure time was largely spent watching television – the number of
broadcast stations increased to more than 530 by 1961. Paperback books also increased
in sales annually.
d) In 1940, fewer than half of Americans belonged to a church. Beginning in WWII, church
membership began to rise until by 1960 it reached 65%. Catholic Bishop Fulton J.
Sheen had a popular weekly television show Life Worth Living, while Baptist evangelist
Billy Graham held huge “Crusades for Christ.” Norman Vincent Peale best
represented the tendency of religion to emphasize reassurance with his best-seller The
Power of Positive Thinking. Critics noted the relative shallowness of such religion. In
Protestant-Catholic-Jew (1955), Will Herberg complained that popular religiosity lacked
both conviction and commitment. Reinhold Niebbuhr, the leading neo-orthodox
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theologian, criticized the self-centeredness of popular religion and its failure to recognize
the reality of sin.
B. Yet even as conformity and materialism established a firm hold on most Americans, a
counter-movement began to take shape.
1) Intellectuals and artists became increasingly critical of American life in the 1950s.
a) John Kenneth Galbraith in The Affluent Society (1958) argued that the public sector
(areas of society funded through the government) was under funded. John Keats, in The
Crack in the Picture Window (1956), criticized the homogeneity of suburban life in the
new mass-produced communities. James Conant, The American High School Today,
questioned the adequacy of American education.
b) Arthur Miller’s Death of a Salesman (1949) explored themes of loneliness and the
other-directed person. Novelists such as J. D. Salinger (The Catcher in the Rye), James
Jones (From Here to Eternity), Joseph Heller (Catch-22), Saul Bellow (The Adventures
of Augie Marsh), and John Updike (Rabbit, Run) all investigated the conflict between
the individual and society.
c) Painter Edward Hopper portrayed isolated, anonymous individuals in works such as
Nighthawks and Morning Sun. Jackson Pollack, Robert Motherwell, and Willem de
Kooning led the abstract expressionism school, in which they attempted spontaneous
expression of their subjectivity.
d) The Beats, a group of young men alienated by twentieth century life, originated in
Greenwich Village, New York. Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs,
and Neal Cassady initiated the movement. They embraced alcohol, drugs, sex, jazz,
Buddhism, and a vagabond lifestyle. They saw the exploration of each of these as vehicles
for the subjectivity of their art. Ginsberg’s poem Howl (1956) and Kerouac’s novel On
the Road (1957) represent the most important literary works to come out of the Beat
movement.
2) The criticism of the 1950s gave way to an explosion of discontent in the 1960s.
a) By far, the civil rights movement embodied the most important crusade in the United
States during the twentieth century.
i) The modern civil rights movement had its origins in the early years of the twentieth
century.
aa) The Great Migration of southern blacks to northern cities played a significant
role in the movement. Lured by the promise of better economic opportunity and
a less rigorous form of racism, African-Americans abandoned sharecropping in
the South and headed North. The invention of the mechanical cotton picker in
the 1940s accelerated the migration. In the North, African-Americans
encountered racism and segregation, but they also experienced the freedom in
places like Harlem and Chicago's South Side to begin to develop a common voice
of protest.
bb) In 1906, W.E.B. DuBois and other black leaders met at Niagara Falls. Meeting
on the Canadian side of the falls because no hotels in New York would rent
rooms to African-Americans, this group launched the Niagara Movement. This
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movement called for the encouragement of black pride and demanded full civil
and political equality for African-Americans.
cc) Although the Niagara Movement soon faded, its members drifted into the
National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (1909). DuBois
soon assumed editorial duties of the NAACP's newspaper The Crisis.
*) The NAACP launched an anti-lynching campaign. Although southerners in
Congress blocked any anti-lynching legislation, the public scrutiny applied to
the practice by The Crisis helped reduce the number of lynchings.
**) In the 1910s, the NAACP devised its most successful strategy for attacking
Jim Crow. It began to file court cases challenging the system on
constitutional grounds. Over the next four decades this strategy slowly
undermined the legal underpinnings of Jim Crow (segregation) as the
Supreme Court began to rule in favor of civil rights. This strategy culminated
in 1954 with the case of Brown v. The Board of Education of Topeka,
Kansas. With its ruling in this case, the Court overturned the "separate but
equal" doctrine handed down in Plessy v Ferguson (1896) for public
education.
ii) The South responded to the Brown decision with a strategy of massive resistance.
This strategy included violence by a revived KKK and legal and political resistance
by White Citizens Councils. Determined not to yield on this point, Southern
governors such as George Wallace of Alabama, Ross Barnett of Mississippi, and
Orval Faubus of Arkansas acted on the doctrine of state interposition to frustrate
the ruling of the Court. Violence occurred in all three states – and elsewhere – and
Presidents Eisenhower (Little Rock, Arkansas) and Kennedy (Mississippi and
Alabama) were compelled to deploy federal force to enforce the Brown ruling. In
1959, state and federal courts overturned Virginia laws which prohibited state funds
from going to integrated schools. These rulings marked the beginning of the end for
massive resistance to school desegregation.
iii) Despite southern protests, Congress lent its support to the civil rights cause.
aa) The Voting Rights Act of 1957 made the federal government responsible for
protecting the voting rights of African-Americans, but lacked adequate
provisions for enforcement.
bb) The Civil Rights Act of 1964 banned all discrimination in public
accommodations.
cc) The Voting Rights Act of 1965 greatly strengthened the enforcement provisions
of the Voting Rights Act of 1957.
iv) Not surprisingly, African-Americans took an active role in winning their civil rights.
aa) In December, 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks – a black woman –
refused to surrender her bus seat to a white passenger. She was arrested. Local
African-Americans promptly organized the Montgomery bus boycott and
formed the Montgomery Improvement Association with the Reverend Dr.
Martin Luther King as its leader. In Montgomery, King and other AfricanAmerican leaders perfected their method of non-violent resistance – of meeting
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hate with love; physical force with "soul force." After winning a victory in
Montgomery, King formed the Southern Christian Leadership Conference
(SCLC) and emerged as the most prominent leader of the civil rights movement.
King and his followers helped pressure both the government and individuals to
tear down the Jim Crow system of legal segregation. King outlined his dream
for a harmonious desegregated society in his "I Have a Dream Speech."
bb) Other African-Americans challenged segregation as well through organizations
such as the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student
Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC). Young blacks and whites
challenged the system of segregation in interstate travel by embarking on
"freedom rides" and engaging in “sit-ins” at segregated lunch counters. The
first of the sit-ins occurred at the Woolworth’s lunch counter in Greensboro,
North Carolina in 1960.
v) With the passage of the Voting Rights Act of 1965, it appeared that race relations in
America were approaching a peaceful and just solution. The explosion of major
American cities into violent racial riots – beginning with the Watts Riot in L.A. –
signaled the beginning of a series of "long hot summers" as black rage over
festering economic and social injustice exploded. Many blacks turned to the "Black
Power Movement" and the leadership of more aggressive angry black leaders like
Stokley Carmichael, H. Rap Brown, and Malcolm X. The assassination of Dr.
King in April, 1968 further poisoned racial relations in the United States.
vi) White Americans, alarmed by the violence of race riots and the demands of black
power leaders, began to turn away from further civil rights initiatives. They began to
focus more on law and order issues and turned to political candidates who espoused
such doctrines – such as Richard Nixon. They also reacted against perceived and
actual "quota systems" as the government sought to enforce amends for past
discriminatory policies through affirmative action programs. This reaction began to
appear most clearly in the 1990s. In 1995 the Supreme Court ruled against drawing
election districts specifically to create African-American or Hispanic majorities. In
Adarand Contractors v. Pena (1995) the Court limited a program that gave special
benefits to minority owned businesses to instances where such benefits served a
“compelling national interest.” In 1996, the Fifth Circuit Court ruled in Hopwood
v. Texas that considering race to achieve student diversity at the University of Texas
did not constitute “a compelling interest under the Fourteenth Amendment.” That
same year, voters in California adopted Proposition 209 which prohibited use of
race, gender, ethnicity, or national origin as the basis for granting preference to any
group.
b) The “New Left” emerged during the 1960s. The movement proved especially popular
among college students. It embraced both liberal and radical movements. The
New Left movement largely derived from the original progressive movement. The term
“New Left” can be traced to an open letter written in 1960 by sociologist C. Wright
Mills entitled “Letter to the New Left.” Mills argued for “a new leftist ideology,
moving away from the traditional (“Old Left”) focus on labor issues, towards more
personalized issues such as opposing alienation, anomie, and authoritarianism.”
Essentially, Mills called for a shift away from traditional leftism and urged the left to
adopt the values of the Counterculture. The New Left opposed the prevailing authority
structures in society, which it termed “The Establishment.” The New Left no longer
sought to recruit industrial workers, but rather focused on a social activist approach to
organization. Adherents of the New Left believed that this change in focus and
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organization “could be the source for a better kind of social revolution.” In the United
States New Left thought “both influenced and drew inspiration from black
radicalism, particularly the Black Power movement and the more explicitly left-wing
Black Panther Party. The Panthers in turn influenced other similar militant groups, like
the Young Lords, the Brown Berets and the American Indian Movement.”
i) Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) emerged as one of the main voices of
the New Left. Founded by Tom Hayden and Al Haber at the University of
Michigan in 1960, Hayden’s Port Huron Statement (1962) called for
“participatory democracy, direct action, radicalism, and student power.”
ii) The Free Speech Movement at the University of California, Berkley, also
represented a significant aspect of the New Left. It began as student “sit-ins” in
1964 to protest the prohibition of political canvassing on campus. Led by Mario
Savio, the movement changed from emphasizing student rights to a critique of the
bureaucracy of American society. When police broke up a sit-in at Berkley,
protests spread to other campuses around the nation.
iii) Gradually, student discontent began to focus on the Vietnam War and the draft. In
1967, 500,000 attended an anti-war protest in Central Park (New York City). At
the protest, a number of male students burned their draft cards. Around the same
time, SDS became more militant and more prone to violence. It increasingly
embraced communist revolutionaries as its intellectual heroes. In spring, 1968,
more than 200 large campus demonstrations occurred. SDS activists organized
"Ten Days of Resistance" on college campuses across the country. Students and
some faculty participated “in rallies, marches, sit-ins and teach-ins.” The Ten
Days of Resistance culminated in a one-day strike on April 26. About a million
Students stayed away from classes that day – the largest student strike in the
history of the United States.
aa) The strike was ignored for the most part by “the New York City-based
national media.” Rather, the media concentrated its coverage on the
Columbia Student Revolt which disrupted operations at Columbia
University in New York. The mass coverage of the revolt, led by an
interracial alliance of Columbia SDS chapter activists and Student Afro
Society activists, made SDS “a household name in the United States for a few
years” and spurred and upsurge in SDS membership during the 1968-69
academic year.
bb) Oftentimes, applications of “direct action” by SDS ended in violent
confrontations with the police as the riot outside the 1968 Democrat
National Convention in Chicago demonstrated. Although police violence
against the student demonstrators angered some, more viewed the students
“as unappreciative of their opportunities and unpatriotic.” Most Americans
opposed the violence in the streets and saw it as “the fruits of liberalism.” In
November, 1968, they responded by electing Richard Nixon to the
presidency.
cc) Even as the country rejected the New Left, the anti-war movement slid into
disarray. Advocates of violence and non-violence divided and proponents of
violent resistance coalesced into the Weather Underground Organization
(Weathermen). This group launched a terrorist campaign of planting bombs.
Tom Hayden abandoned SDS at this point.
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dd) By the early 1970s, the New Left had lost political influence – although it
retains bastions in academia, groups such as MoveOn .org, and the Democrat
Party – having abandoned its commitment to democracy and nonviolence.
c) Like the New Left, the founders of the Counterculture rejected bureaucracy, materialism,
and the Vietnam War. Unlike the New Left, however, they turned away from politics in
favor of an alternative society. In many respects, they were the heirs of the Beats.
i) The counterculture of the 1960s began as a reaction against the social norms of the
1950s, segregation in the Deep South, and the Vietnam War. White middle class
youth, for the first time since the Great Depression of the 1930s, had sufficient
leisure time to raise concerns about social issues – especially civil rights, the
Vietnam War and women's rights. The far-reaching changes that began during the
late 1960s and early 1970s affected many aspects of society, creating a social
revolution in many industrialized countries. The effects of the 1960s and1970s
counterculture also significantly affected voters and institutions.
ii) During the 1960s, widespread generational tensions developed in American society
on issues such as “the war in Vietnam, race relations, sexual mores, women's rights,
traditional modes of authority, experimentation with psychedelic drugs and a
predominantly materialist interpretation of the American Dream.”
iii) The Hippies embodied the largest countercultural group in the United States. They
demanded “racial equality, women's rights, sexual liberation (including gay rights),
relaxation of prohibitions against recreational drugs, and an end to the Vietnam
War.” Hippie culture was best embodied by the new genre of psychedelic rock
music and the artists who exemplified this era, such as Jefferson Airplane, The
Grateful Dead, Jimi Hendrix, The Doors, The Rolling Stones, The Beatles, Bob
Dylan, and Janis Joplin.
iv) The pop-art culture led by Andy Warhol and Edie Sedgwick also played a
prominent part in the social change in the United States by redefining the meaning of
"art." His mass-produced monographs and silk-screens, such as the iconic
Campbell's Soup Cans, challenged the notion that art is only about certain subjects
– i.e. wealthy patrons or pretty landscapes, or that art is a singular creation. Warhol
expressed views of glamour, art, and drugs very prominently through his paintings,
films, and music (through his sponsored bands The Velvet Underground and Nico,
and his Factory).
v) Many young people, seeking to participate in this movement, formed communes in
places such as San Francisco’s Haight-Ashbury District or in rural areas. Most such
groups, however, proved incapable of establishing a self-sustaining lifestyle.
Philosophical leaders of the Counterculture included Timothy Leary (“Turn on.
Tune in. Drop out.”), Theodore Roszak, and Charles Reich.
vi) The counterculture in the United States reached its peak between 1965 and the mid1970s. It eventually waned for several reasons – mainstream America's backlash
against its excesses, many notable countercultural figures died, the civil rights
movement achieved its main goals, and the Vietnam War ended.
d) The aftermath of WWII witnessed a renewal of the cult of feminine domesticity. Maryina
Farnham and Ferdinand Lundberg published Modern Woman: The Lost Sex (1947).
Farnham suggested that science supported the idea that women could find fulfillment only
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in the home. Countless magazine articles echoed this notion that “a woman’s place was in
the home.” Popular television shows of the 1950s – Ozzie and Harriet, Father Knows
Best, and Leave It to Beaver further reinforced the image of the domesticated woman.
This image did not long survive the 1950s.
i) In 1963, Betty Freidan published The Feminine Mystique. She argued that middleclass society stifled women and denied them the opportunity to develop their talents
Not surprisingly, she attacked the cult of domesticity. With this work she launched
the Women’s Liberation Movement (Women’s Lib). Active participants in the
movement called themselves feminists. Their opponents often denounced them as
“militant feminists” and – later – as femi-nazis.
ii) Gloria Steinem echoed Freidan in the pages of her women’s liberation magazine Ms.
iii) Freidan and other feminists formed the National Organization for Women (NOW)
in 1966. By the early 1970s the organization had expanded to include 100 chapters
and more than 10,000 members – mostly white, middle-class professional women.
NOW sought to win “full equality for women in America in a truly equal partnership
with men.” In pursuit of that goal, they demanded equal employment opportunities
and “equal pay for equal work.”
iv) Although the 1964 Civil Rights Act prohibited discrimination on the basis of gender,
the proponents of the women’s liberation movement demanded adoption of a
constitutional amendment to guarantee equal rights for women. In 1972, Congress
overwhelmingly voted to send an Equal Rights Amendment (ERA) to the states for
ratification. The amendment stated that “equality of rights under the law shall not be
abridged by the United States or by any state on account of sex..”
aa) Feminists celebrated. They argued the amendment would assure women equal
treatment with men in conducting business, in receiving similar pay for similar
work, in setting the stage for attaining legal adulthood, and in gaining admission
to tax-supported educational institutions.
bb) Opponents of the amendment – including many women – argued the ERA would
end the preference given to women in child-custody cases arising out of
divorces, would make women subject to any military draft and combat duty, and
would prohibit state laws extending special protections to women. Phyllis
Schlafly emerged as the most effective leader of the opposition to ERA.
cc) ERA required ratification within seven years by three-fourths (38) of the
states. By early 1979, with the seven-year deadline approaching, ERA had
only 35 ratifications. Congress arbitrarily extended the deadline until 1982,
but support for the amendment had faded and the amendment died.
C. Significant social and cultural trends characterized the last two decades of the twentieth century..
1) In 1981, scientists identified the Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS). The
disease proved prevalent among homosexuals and intravenous drug users. Besides public fear,
AIDS also resulted in a temporary upsurge of homophobia. A vigorous debate followed
between gay rights groups who insisted that the epidemic be treated as a civil rights issue and
those who insisted that it be treated as a public health crisis. This debate was never entirely
resolved. By the 1990s, the development of drugs such as AZT helped slow or prevent the
onset of symptoms of those who were HIV-positive. Also in the 1990s, the demographic
makeup of those infected by the epidemic shifted from mostly white gay men to African
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Americans, Hispanics, and women – especially those who were poor, intravenous drug users,
or the sex partners of drug users. By 1998, the Center for Disease Control (CDC) estimated
that between 400,000 and 600,000 Americans were HIV-positive.
2) Throughout the 1980s and early 1990s, terrorism affected much of the world. Although
Americans abroad were often the targets of these attacks, most Americans believed that they
need not fear terrorism on their own soil. That illusion was shattered in February, 1993, when
militant Islamic terrorists detonated a car bomb in the underground parking deck of the
World Trade Center. Six people were killed and more than a thousand injured. Ultimately,
four terrorists received sentences of 240 years each.
a) The Clinton administration elected to treat terrorism as a criminal issue, rather than a
national security threat and strengthened limitations on the sharing of information
between the CIA and the FBI. Even after other attacks against American targets at the
Khobar Towers in Saudi Arabia (19 killed, 342 injured) in 1996, the car bomb attacks
against United States embassies in Kenya and Tanzania (258 killed, more than 5000
injured) in 1998, and the suicide bombing attack against the USS Cole (17 killed,
39 injured) in 2000, the Clinton administration declined to change its approach. It even
passed up a number of opportunities to kill or capture the man believed to be responsible in
some way for all these attacks – Osama Bin Laden.
b) Although the Clinton administration did fire some cruise missiles into Afghanistan
following the embassy bombings, their ineffectual response to the foreign terrorists
helped set the stage for the worst terrorist attack in history – September 11, 2001. The
“aerial jihad” involved crashing hijacked airliners into both towers of the World Trade
Center and the Pentagon. More than 3,000 died – many of them firemen, police, and
rescue workers who raced into the buildings in a desperate bid to save the injured and the
trapped. The attack was planned and carried out by Osama Bin Laden and his Al Qaeda
organization.
3) Nor could the United States escape the threat of domestic terrorism during the 1990s.
Increasing numbers of Americans grew alarmed by the persistent expansion of government
power and the increasing frequency of government intrusions into their lives. Many of these
people joined a rapidly growing militia movement. Although denounced by liberals as
representatives of “the paranoid and populist strain in cultural politics,” those who embraced
the militia movement had very real fears concerning the threat posed by government power to
individual liberties. To be sure, some of these individuals did embrace extremist ideas and
violent reactions. FBI actions at Ruby Ridge, Idaho and at the Branch Davidian
Compound at Waco, Texas, however, appeared to confirm their worst fears.
a) The siege at Ruby Ridge grew out of an attempt by agents of the Bureau of Alcohol,
Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) to entrap Randy Weaver with a weapons charge and then
turn him into an informant against the Aryan Nation. Weaver and his family had
purchased twenty acres at Ruby Ridge and built a cabin. Their goal was to escape what
they viewed as a godless and corrupt government and to survive the apocalypse that they
believed God had in store for mankind. Weaver’s wife Vicki was the spiritual head of the
family. Confusion over Weaver’s court date – largely resulting from bureaucratic
incompetence and Weaver’s own distrust of the government – ultimately led to a show
down.
i) The siege began on August 21, 1992, when six United States marshals wearing
camouflage and with M-16 rifles trespassed onto Weaver’s property seeking a
chance to ambush and capture him. One marshal threw rocks at the Weaver’s cabin
to determine how much noise it would take to rouse the family’s dogs. The dogs
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responded almost immediately. Initially, the marshals retreated but eventually took
up “defensive” positions. Weaver’s thirteen year old son Sammy, his friend Kevin
Harris, and one of the dogs soon approached the marshals. All present were armed
and firing soon erupted. Although the marshals insisted that young Weaver and
Harris fired first, it seems likely that one of the marshal fired first killing the
Weaver dog. Sammy and Harris then returned fire. When the gunfire ended one of
the marshals and Sammy Weaver (shot in the back as he retreated) lay dead. The
Justice Department investigation later concluded it was not possible to determine
who had fired first, but acknowledged that the manner in which law enforcement
officials handled the marshals in the aftermath of the shooting created at least the
appearance of a cover-up.
ii) The FBI was called in and assumed responsibility for conducting the actual siege.
The subsequent Justice Department report on the incident indicated that the FBI
arrived determined that the Weavers would “be taken down hard and fast.” FBI
snipers received rules of engagement stating that they “could and should” use
deadly force against armed men outside the cabin. One FBI sniper later testified
that the agency’s approach was “if you see ‘em, shoot ‘em.” Justice Department
investigators concluded that these rules of engagement “flagrantly violated the U.S.
Constitution” and extended to law enforcement “a license to kill.”
iii) By 5:00 pm on August 22, FBI snipers had surrounded the Weaver cabin. By 6:00
pm, “every adult in the cabin was either dead or severely wounded – though they had
not fired a shot at any FBI agent.” When Weaver, his sixteen year old daughter
Sara, and Harris had gone out to the shed where the family had stored Sammy’s
body, they came under fire from the FBI. As they raced back to the cabin, a sniper
Lon Horiuchi shot Weaver in the back. As Sara and Harris struggled to assist
Weaver back to the cabin, an unarmed Vicki Weaver stood in the doorway holding
her ten-month old baby. Horiuchi now fired through the door striking Vicki Weaver
in the head – killing her instantly. After exiting her skull, the bullet struck Kevin
Harris in the chest, severely wounding him. The FBI attempted to justify the
shootings by claiming that Weaver and Harris had fired at a helicopter carrying FBI
officials. The FBI’s own investigation acknowledged the absence of any evidence
for this claim. The Justice Department report suggested that the use of the helicopter
“invited the accusation” that the FBI had intended to draw Weaver and Harris out of
the cabin where they could be killed.
iv) After twelve days the siege ended when the FBI permitted sympathetic civilian
negotiators to arrange the family’s surrender. Weaver and Harris were arrested, but
eventually acquitted on all charges relating to the Ruby Ridge incident. Weaver was
also acquitted on the initial weapons charge, but convicted of failing to appear for
his trial on that charge. He was sentenced to eighteen months in prison, but released
after four months. Weaver, Harris, and each of the surviving Weaver children
received large cash settlements from the government following a civil suit. Horiuchi
was indicted for manslaughter in Idaho, but the federal government insisted that the
case be moved into federal court. There, the judge dismissed the charges on grounds
of “sovereign immunity.”
b) The tragedy at the Branch Davidian Compound in Waco unfolded less than a year later.
The Branch Davidians, an apocalyptic sect headed by David Koresh (Vernon Howell)
were suspected by the ATF of stockpiling illegal weapons. There were also rumors false
imprisonment, child abuse, and violation of immigration laws. The ATF secured a
warrant and resolved to raid the compound. Although they insisted that Koresh remained
ensconced in his compound and could be apprehended in no other way, the local sheriff
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insisted that if the ATF simply called Koresh, he would come in for questioning.
Moreover, locals were well aware that Koresh routinely ran on the roads surrounding the
compound and ate in restaurants weekly. Koresh later voiced the belief that the ATF had
adopted its aggressive stance because the government planned to repeat the strategy it had
used at Ruby Ridge against his followers.
i) The ATF launched their raid on Sunday, February 28, 1993. The agents planned to
approach the compound in cattle trailers pulled by trucks owned by individual
agents. Everything hinged on surprise, but surprise had been lost before the raid
began. The ATF had tipped off a reporter about the raid. The reporter got lost on
the way to the compound and asked a mail carrier for directions. The mail carrier
was Koresh’s brother-in-law. Alerted to the ATF’s approach, Koresh informed an
ATF agent who had infiltrated the compound of the impending raid. The agent
alerted his superiors of the situation, but they decided to continue the operation.
ii) Gunfire erupted almost as soon as the agents emerged from the cattle trailers. Each
side accused the other of firing first, but as at Ruby Ridge the shooting of compound
dogs by the agents might have precipitated the exchange. A double metal door at
the entrance of the compound might well have proven who had fired first, but the
FBI “lost” it shortly after taking it into evidence. Frantic calls from inside the
compound to local law enforcement pleading for a cease fire began almost as soon
as shooting began. The local sheriff could not get through to the ATF, because the
communications officer on the raid had turned off his radio. When the shooting
finally stopped, four ATF agents and two Davidians lay dead. Twenty or so people
had been wounded.
iii) The following day, the FBI took over the siege. The FBI waged psychological
warfare against the Davidians for the next fifty-one days. These efforts proved
ineffective. Koresh had long preached an apocalyptic vision that included the
assault on the Davidians by the government. As pressure from the ATF increased,
his sermons had included increasingly dire warnings of coming destruction. The
FBI rejected advice from religious scholars that they change their tactics and
respond with greater sensitivity to the Davidians’ beliefs. On April 19, Attorney
General Janet Reno authorized an assault on the compound with armored vehicles
and tear gas. In the ensuing chaos, the compound erupted in flames (probably set by
the Davidians). Koresh and more than seventy of followers – including twenty-five
children perished.
c) The tragic conclusion to these events came two years later on April 19, 1995. On the
second anniversary of the assault at Waco, Timothy McVeigh detonated a massive truck
bomb outside the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City. The blast caused the
front of the nine-story building to collapse, killing 169 and wounded more than 600.
Nineteen children at a day-care center housed in the building were among the dead.
McVeigh and fellow conspirator Terry Nichols were both militia members and sought to
avenge events at Ruby Ridge and Waco. McVeigh was ultimately executed and Nichols
sentenced to prison.
4) During the last two decades of the twentieth century, the United States population expanded
by 20% (50 million people) to reach a total of 275 million. The “Sunbelt” in the South and
the West continued to lure residents from the Northeast and Midwest. Indeed, 90% of the
nation’s population growth occurred in the Sunbelt. The move from farm to town that had
begun following the Civil War continued and by 2000 less than 2 million people still resided
on farms.
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a) Opportunities for women continued to improve. In 1970, women comprised 38%
of the American workforce. By 2000, almost 50% of American workers were women. In
1970, 4% of new doctors were women; 8% of new lawyers were women; and less than 1%
of new dentists were women. In 2000, those percentages had soared to 33%, 40%, and
23% respectively.
b) These same decades, however, witnessed the continuing decline of the traditional family
unit – two parents with children. In 1970, 85% of white children and 67% of black
children lived with both parents. By 2000, those numbers had dropped to 65% and 32%
respectively. The number of single mothers increased by 35% and the number of children
born out of wedlock skyrocketed. These numbers too hit African-American children
hardest and contributed to profound societal problems. In the year 2000, homicide
represented the leading cause of death among young black males (15-24 years); more than
25% of black males (20-29 years) were in prison, on parole, or on probation – only 4%
were enrolled in college. Some 40% of adult black males were functionally illiterate.
c) During the closing decades of the twentieth century, the United States also experienced a
shift in its ethnic and racial composition. Some 30% of the American people claimed
African, Asian, Hispanic, or Native American ancestry. These four groups saw their
numbers swell at a rate twice what it had been in the 1970s. This increase stemmed
mainly from a new wave of immigration with more than 10 million legal immigrants
arriving in the 1990s. This number does not include the millions of illegal immigrants
who flooded into the country during that same period. Unlike past waves of immigration,
however, most of the immigrants in the 1980s and 1990s did not come from Europe.
Rather, they came from Asia, Latin America, and Africa. Mexicans proved the most
numerous of both the legal and illegal immigrants.
d) Personal technology became an increasingly important part of the American lifestyle in the
1980s and 1990s. Although computers had been developed during WWII, the development
of the microchip in the 1970s made the concept of the personal computer feasible. Ed
Roberts developed a personal computer prototype in 1975 – the Altair 8800. Roberts ‘
machine was too limited in power and functionality to be useful. Bill Gates, however, a
Harvard sophomore, built on Roberts’ work. He formed Microsoft and by 1977 had
Turned the personal computer concept into reality. The advent of the computer chip, the
personal computer, and the myriad inventions that followed helped facilitate worldwide
communication and made “globalization” possible. This globalization, in turn, helped
spur the economic prosperity of the 1980s and 1990s.
5) During the final years of the twentieth century, the United States experienced a period of
great prosperity. Characterized by low inflation, low unemployment, declining federal
budget deficits, improvements in productivity, and globalization, the period witnessed record
profits and a soaring stock market. People began to speak of a “new economy” that would
avoid the previous “boom and bust” nature of the “business cycle.” (As the brief recession
that followed 9/11 and the current economic downturn demonstrate, such talk was infinitely
silly.) Large corporations such as GE and IBM became international in scope and
encouraged moves toward ever greater free trade such as NAFTA. American companies also
found it easier to “outsource” jobs to countries with lower labor costs. Labor unions
declined in size and power and corporations resorted to “downsizing” to improve their profit
margins further.
a) “Blue-collar” workers lost ground economically as production jobs moved overseas.
American businesses increasingly preferred to hire part-time workers and thus avoid the
expense of benefits packages that went to full-time employees.
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b) The number of “white-collar jobs” (salaried executives) increased dramatically, but
workers found themselves working at a progressively more frantic pace. The “new
economy” demanded ever more work and efficiency from executives. Overwork became
the norm in “the white-collar sweatshop.” By 2000, Americans averaged working 350
more hours per year than Europeans. The new technologies made it possible to work 24/7
whether in the office or at home. Fatigue and burnout became common as the American
Medical Association reported that the average executive got “60 to 90 minutes less sleep
[per night] than needed.” Not surprisingly, job dissatisfaction and divorce rates exploded
among the professional classes. Nonetheless, according to one Gallup poll, 44% of
Americans proclaimed themselves “workaholics.”
6) Environmentalism also emerged as a major social and political movement in the
second half of the twentieth century.
a) Concern about the preservation of environmental quality and natural resources can be
traced as far back as 1739 when Benjamin Franklin and other Philadelphia residents,
citing "public rights," petitioned the Pennsylvania Assembly to stop waste dumping and
remove tanneries from Philadelphia's commercial district. These environmental concerns
expanded during the 1800s as people sought to protect the natural resources of the West.
Individuals such as Henry David Thoreau and John Muir offered philosophical support
to these efforts. In his book Walden, Thoreau urged people to live close with nature.
Muir argued that nature itself possessed inherent rights. He successfully lobbied for the
creation of Yosemite National Park and founded the Sierra Club. Ultimately,
conservationism and the concept that nature possessed inherent rights provided the
foundation for the modern environmental movement.
b) The plight of once numerous and iconic American species fueled the growth of the
conservation movement in the early twentieth century. The actual extinction of the
passenger pigeon and the near extinction of the American Bison prompted an increasing
commitment to preserving endangered species. President Woodrow Wilson gave these
efforts a boost through the establishment of the National Park Service in 1916.
c) By mid-century the conservation movement began to grow in intensity and to transform
into modern environmentalism. Aldo Leopold published A Sand County Almanac in
1949. Similar to Thoreau and Muir, he argued that humans possessed a moral obligation to
respect the environment and that people behaved unethically whenever they harmed it.
(The book is sometimes called the most influential book on conservation.)
d) Between 1950 and 1970, photographers with an environmental interest made effective use
of their artistic medium in service of their cause. The Sierra Club Exhibit Format Series
– founded by David Brower, Ansel Adams, and Nancy Newhall – sparked widespread
public environmental awareness and spurred the growth of both the Sierra Club and the broader
environmental movement. Photography, combined with effective advertising, lobbying, books, letterwriting campaigns, and fund-raising efforts resulted in a new activist movement – environmentalism.
Working in conjunction with other single-interest groups such as The Wilderness Society, the
movement focused on preserving wilderness areas in the 1950s and 1960s. During the 1960s,
however, these groups broadened their focus to include issues such as air pollution, water pollution,
and population control.
e) This shift in focus could be seen with the publication in 1962 of Rachel Carson’s book,
Silent Spring. A biologist by training, Carson charged that the use of DDT in particular
and other pesticides in general posed an immediate threat to wildlife – particularly birds
(hence the title of her book referencing some future spring without birds). She also
claimed that these pesticides posed a cancer risk to humans. Public alarm over her claims
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led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970. This agency
banned the use of DDT in the United States two years later. Building on the public
awareness generated by Carson’s book, other environmentalists hastened to form new
groups such as Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth.
f) By the mid-1970s an apocalyptic vision had taken hold of the movement and adherents
became increasingly convinced that humanity stood poised on the brink of an
environmental disaster that would be characterized by exhaustion of natural resources,
over-population, nuclear war, nuclear winter, massive starvation, and a new ice age. Some
adherents of these fears turned to the back-to-the-land movement – a mélange of
environmentalism, anti-Vietnam War sentiment, and a host of other leftist political issues.
Theodore "Ted" Kaczynski (aka The Unabomber) emerged as the best-known practitioner of this
philosophy. This apocalyptic view continues to characterize much of the environmental movement
today.
g) More mainstream environmentalists continued to work within the system to secure passage
of legislation intended to further their agenda such as the Endangered Species Act of
1973 and the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna
and Flora (CITES) in 1975.
h) The publication in 1979 of James Lovelock’s Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth posited
that life on earth can best be understood as a single organism. This concept fueled further
the division between more radical adherents of the “green” ideology and more mainstream
environmentalists.
i) In more recent years the environmentalist movement has embraced a crusade against
genetic engineering and global warming (aka climate change).
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