Comparing Domestic & Foreign Policy in the 1940s, 1950s, & 1960s

Harry Truman / Dwight Eisenhower / John F. Kennedy / Lyndon Johnson / Richard Nixon
Years in office & elections won / 1945-1953
(1948) / 1953-1961
(1952, 1956) / 1961-1963
(1960) / 1963-1969
(1964) / 1969-1974
(1968, 1972)
Political Party? / Democrat / Republican / Democrat / Democrat / Republican
Foreign Policy Philosophy? / Containment & Truman Doctrine / Brinksmanship/
Massive Retaliation / Flexible Response / JFK-Style
Flexible Response / Détente
3 Most Important Foreign Policy Decisions or Events of their Presidency /
  • Potsdam Conference
  • 1st atomic bomb
  • Creation on Containment:
  • Truman Doctrine
  • Marshall Plan
  • NATO
  • Berlin Blockade./Airlift
  • Loss of China
  • Korean War begins
  • NSC-68
/
  • Ended Korean War
  • New look: nuclear missiles
  • Sputnik & space race
  • Eisenhower Doctrine in the Middle East
  • CIA-sponsored coups in IranGuatemala
  • Proposed nuclear disarmament
  • Supported France in Vietnam independence
/
  • Hoped to gain first-strike capability; expansion of nuclear weapons
  • Peace Corps
  • Space race to the moon
  • Berlin Wall
  • Bay of Pigs
  • Cuban Missile Crisis
  • Assassination of Diem
/
  • Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
  • Commitment of troops to Vietnam
  • Tet Offensive
  • CIA-sponsored coups in Latin America
/
  • Vietnamization & “peace with honor” in Vietnam in 1973
  • “Knockout blow” in Vietnam: LaosCambodia
  • Recognition of China
  • SALT with USSR
  • End to Yom Kippur War in Middle East
  • CIA covert ops

Domestic Policy Philosophy? / Fair Deal / Modern Republicanism / New Frontier / Great Society / New Federalism
3 Most Important Domestic Policy Decisions, Acts, or Events of their Presidency? /
  • Reorganization of Gov’t in 1947:
  • CIA
  • Dept of Defense (Air Force)
  • National Security Council (NSC)
  • End of racial segregationin the military
  • Failed attempt to made the New Deal more equitable
/
  • FHA, Depts of Health, Education, & Welfare
  • Federal Highway System
  • Ended McCarthyism
  • Creation of NASA
  • National Defense in Education Act
  • Warned of Military-Industrial Complex
  • Central High in Little Rock
/
  • Tax cut in 1963
  • Bolstered Civil Rights Committee, Dept of Justice
  • Laid foundation for Civil Rights Act of 1964
  • Expansion of NASA
/
  • War on Poverty: Job Corps, Office of Econ Opportunity
  • Medicare & Medicaid
  • Improved funding for schools
  • Environmental protection
  • National Endowment for the Arts & Humanities
  • Civil Rights
  • 24th Amendment
  • Civil Rights Act
  • Voting Rights Act
/
  • Shifted responsibility for social programs from to state gov’ts
  • Named 4 conservative S.C. justices
  • EPA & OCHA
  • Ended gold standard
  • 90-day freeze on wages & prices (Great Nixon Turn-around)
  • Watergate scandal

Identify 2 significant social aspects of this era /
  • Baby Boom
  • Suburbs & consumerism
  • Rock n roll, youth culture, juvenile delinquency
  • Beginning of Civil Rights Movement (Brown v BOE)
  • Red Scare (McCarthyism)
/
  • Victory of nonviolent protest in achieving Civil Rights for African-Americans
  • Counter-culture, Free Speech (SDS) movement,
  • Student protest of Vietnam; KentState & JacksonState
  • Pink power, black power, brown power, rainbow power, yellow power movements
  • Rise of the Sunbelt region of the USA
  • Public distrust of the gov’t after Watergate; Rise of the media as a 4th branch of gov’t