Chapter 36 Study Guide

The Causes and Consequences of the post-WWII economic boom:

  • Initially, many Americans feared the end of the war would bring back the Great Depression.
  • In an effort to prevent an economic downturn, the Truman administration did all of the following:
  • Created the President’s Council of Economic Advisers.
  • Sold war factories and other government installations to private businesses at very low costs.
  • Passed the Employment Act, which made it government policy to promote maximum employment.
  • Passed the GI Bill of Rights.
  • The boom was fueled by military spending and low energy costs, which lasted into the 1970s.
  • The consumer economy didn’t pick up until 1950.
  • Americans did see the boom in the years 1945-1949.

Population:

  • An outcome of the boom was the expansion of the home-owning middle class- Levittown, NY.
  • All of the following encouraged Americans to move to the suburbs:
  • Home-loan guarantees from the Federal Housing Authority and the Veteran’s Administration.
  • The refusal of the FHA to grant home loans to blacks contributed to driving many blacks into public housing.
  • Government-built highways.
  • Tax deductions for interest payments on home mortgages.
  • “White flight” from racial changes throughout the country.
  • Baby boom
  • The continued growth of suburbs led to an increase in urban poverty.
  • The population distribution after the war followed a pattern of an urban-suburban segregation of blacks and whites in major metropolitan areas.
  • Baby Boom reached its peak by the end of the 1950s.
  • The baby boom contributed to the popular youth culture of the 1960s.
  • This strengthened the traditional forms of family.
  • Parents relied on parenting books for child-rearing.
  • Shifts in population- the two regions that gained the most in population and new industries were the South and West aka the Sunbelt.
  • The federal government played a large role in the growth of the Sunbelt through its financial support of the aerospace and defense industries.

Veterans:

  • GI Bill of Rights is officially known as Servicemen’s Readjustment Act.
  • The passage of the GI Bill was caused in part by fear that the labor markets could not accommodate millions of veterans coming home.

Taft-Hartley Act of 1947:

  • Was passed to check the growing power of labor unions.
  • The growth of organized labor was slowed by all of the following:
  • Taft-Hartley Act
  • Rapidly growing number of service-sector workers.
  • Failure of Operation Dixie.
  • Growing number of part-time workers.

Truman:

  • His most valuable qualities as a leader:
  • Courage
  • Authenticity
  • Sense of responsibility for big decisions.
  • Honesty
  • His background included:
  • Store owner
  • WWI artillery officer
  • Judge in Missouri
  • U.S. Senator
  • Truman Doctrine:
  • Originallydeveloped because of the dangerous communist threat to Turkey and Greece.
  • Containment idea came from Truman and George Kennan:
  • Soviet expansion should be blocked by firm but not aggressive military and diplomatic strength.
  • We based the policy of containment on the assumption that the Soviet Union was expansionist but cautious.
  • The pledge of the U.S. was to support the countries and peoples who were resisting subjugation by communists.
  • His domestic legislative plan was dubbed the Fair Deal.

Cold War:

  • Main causes include:
  • The Americans and Soviets had both been relatively isolated from world affairs before WWII.
  • The U.S. call for an open world clashed with the Soviets’ insistence on controlling a sphere of interest and influence in Eastern Europe.
  • The Americans and Soviets both had a missionary ideology that tried to spread their ideas to other nations.
  • U.S. -Democracy
  • S.U. – Communism
  • The Soviets were resentful of America’s slowness in opening a second front and abrupt cancellation of lend-lease.
  • A crucial early development of the Cold War occurred when Germany was divided into an East Germany under the Soviet control and a pro-American West Germany.

United Nations:

  • Unlike the League of Nations, the UN was established in a spirit of cooperation before the actual end of WWII.
  • Structural differences between the LON and the UN: that the UN gave veto power in the Security Council to the five Great Powers.
  • The earliest and most serious failure of the UN involved its inability to control atomic energy, especially in manufacturing weapons.
  • UN successes include:
  • Preventing war over Kashmir and Iran.
  • Creating Israel.
  • Guiding former European colonies to independence.
  • Enhancing global health, food production, and cultural development.

Marshall Plan:

  • George C. Marshall’s plan to help Europe recover from WWII.
  • The plan succeeded in reviving Europe’s economy and thwarting the large internal Communist parties threatening to take over Italy and France.

National Security Act of 1947:

  • Joint Chiefs of Staff
  • Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)
  • Department of Defense

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO):

  • The fundamental purpose of NATO was to defend Europe against the Soviets.
  • The NATO alliance represented an historic departure from traditional American foreign policy because it committed the U.S. to a permanent military alliance with other nations.
  • America’s membership in NATO did all of the following:
  • Strengthen the containment of the Soviet Union.
  • Help reintegrate Germany into the European family.
  • Reassure Europeans that the U.S. would not abandon them.
  • Strike a major blow to American isolationists.

Post WWII Trials:

  • Both Japan and Germany had leaders put on trial for war crimes.

Israel:

  • The Jewish state was created in 1948.
  • Truman risked American access to Middle Eastern oil supplies to make it happen.

Japan:

  • General Douglas MacArthur helped to establish a new Japanese government in 1946 by including:
  • It pledged itself to providing women’s equality.
  • It introduced a Western-style democratic constitution.
  • It paved the way for a spectacular economic recovery.
  • It renounced militarism.

China:

  • Chiang Kai-shek and the Nationalist government lost the Chinese Civil War to the communists and their leader Mao Zedong because Kai-shek lost the support and confidence of the Chinese people.
  • American Republicans used the Communist victory in China to claim that pro-Communist elements in the Truman administration had prevented Kai-shek from winning.

Communism in America:

  • Truman established the Loyalty Review Board in an effort to detect communists within the federal government.
  • There was an increasing domestic anticommunist uproar that included:
  • Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were executed as spies.
  • The House Un-American Activities Committee successfully exposed the State Department’s Alger Hiss as a Communist agent.
  • Conservative local politicians used communism to attack changes in sexual and cultural values.
  • Teachers and other employees in many states were forced to sign loyalty oaths.
  • The postwar hunt for communists was supposedly aimed at rooting out American communists from positions in government and education.
  • Senator Joseph McCarthy’s anticommunist crusade was first directed primarily against the alleged employment of communists within the U.S. government.
  • His great power and capacity to destroy careers finally collapsed when he attacked the U.S. Army.
  • Eisenhower’s attitude and policy toward McCarthy was to privately loathe him but publically be unwilling to even challenge him.
  • Eisenhower let McCarthy control personnel policy in the State Department since he was convinced that dozens of known communists worked within the State Department.
  • McCarthy’s State Department crusade led to a loss of a number of Asian specialists who might have helped steer a wiser course throughout the Vietnam years.
  • His most outrageous claim was that General George C. Marshall was part of a procommunist conspiracy to betray America.

NSC-68:

  • Key U.S. government memo that militarized American foreign policy and indicated national faith in the economy’s capacity to sustain large military expenditures.
  • Basically it called for a massive increase in military spending.
  • The document reflected the American belief in the limitless capabilities of the American economy and society.

Politics in the late 1940s:

  • Politically the Democratic Party was hurt by southern Democrats splitting from the party to support Governor Strom Thurmond believing President Truman took too strong a stand in favor of civil rights.
  • 1948 Presidential campaign:
  • Strom Thurmond- States’ Rights
  • Henry Wallace- Progressive
  • Harry Truman- Democratic
  • Thomas Dewey- Republican
  • Almost everyone expected Governor Thomas Dewey to win because President Truman seemed unpopular and the Democrats had split three ways.

Korea:

  • Truman’s action upon hearing of the invasion of South Korea by communist North Korea illustrated his commitment to a foreign policy of containment.
  • UN troops were sent to Korea, led by MacArthur.
  • Truman fired MacArthur when MacArthur began to openly criticize Truman refusing to use nuclear weapons against China.
  • The war ended with a stalemated armistice and the continued hostile division of North and South Korea.
  • Divided to this day at the 38th parallel.

Chapter 37 Study Guide

Labor:

  • The changes in the workforce in the 1950s included:
  • Science and technology driving economic growth.
  • White collar workers outnumbered blue collar workers.
  • Labor unions reached a peak and then began to decline.
  • Job opportunities were opening for women in the white collar work force.
  • Most women cared for their families and did not work outside the home, though.

Religious Revival:

  • The impact of mass media on religion was reflected in the rise of televangelists like Billy Graham and Oral Roberts.
  • The rise of TV and other forms of entertainment did not undermine the cultural influence of religion and religious leaders.

Mass Media Culture:

  • Critics like David Riesman and William Whyte believed that Americans had become affluent conformists unable to think for themselves thanks to the mass media culture.
  • The primary force shaping this culture was television.

1952 Presidential Election:

  • Eisenhower chose Richard Nixon as is vice-presidential running mate as a concession to the hard-line anticommunists.
  • The effective use of television by the Eisenhower-Nixon campaign demonstrated the power of the new medium to bypass older political structures.
  • In terms of politics, TV did all of the following:
  • Threaten the traditional role of political parties.
  • Apply the standards of show business and commercialism to political messages.
  • Allow politicians to address voters directly.
  • Encourage reliance on short slogans and sound bites.
  • Richard Nixon gave a famous speech called Checkers during the 1952 campaign, which demonstrated the new power of television and kept him on the Republican ticket because he made his opponent Democrat Adlai Stevenson look soft on Communism.
  • Eisenhower promised the American people that he would personally go to Korea to help end the Korean War.
  • Eisenhower’s greatest asset as president was his enjoyment of the affection and respect of the American people.
  • He enjoyed great popularity by presenting a leadership style of reassurance, sincerity, and optimism and with the goal of social harmony.

Civil Rights:

  • Efforts to overturn Jim Crow laws led to African Americans using the following methods:
  • Economic boycotts
  • Legal attacks on the underpinnings of segregation in the courts
  • Mobilization of black churches on behalf of black rights.
  • Use of the nonviolent tactics of Gandhi.
  • The Supreme Court began to advance the cause of civil rights because Congress and the presidency had largely abdicated their responsibilities by keeping their hands off the issues.
  • The Supreme Court’s decision in Brown v. Board in 1954 declared that the concept of “separate but equal” facilities for blacks and whites was unconstitutional and that segregated school systems inherently unequal was also unconstitutional.
  • European criticism of widespread American racism and segregation was especially strengthened by the U.S. government’s mistreatment of black artists like Paul Robeson and Josephine Baker.
  • Swedish writer, Gunnar Myrdal wrote An American Dilemma, and it argued that America’s racial segregation was a hypocritical contradiction of its democratic ideals.
  • Eisenhower’s attitude toward racial justice was to not promote integration, especially in the armed forces.
  • Eisenhower’s policies toward Native Americans included a return to the assimilation goals of the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887.

MLK, Jr.:

  • The precipitating event that led to the rise of Martin Luther King, Jr. as the most prominent civil rights leader was the Montgomery bus boycott.
  • His own civil rights organization (SCLC) rested on the institutional foundation of black churches.
  • The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) was an outgrowth of the sit-in movement launched by young southern blacks.

Eisenhower’s domestic policies:

  • Put the brakes on military spending and turn toward dynamic conservatism.
  • Keep most New Deal programs but cut spending on them.
  • He promoted public works projects and the interstate highway system was a larger and more expensive project than what the New Deal saw under FDR.
  • He embraced deficit spending.
  • The Eisenhower administration’s massive roundup and deportation of nearly a million illegal Mexican immigrants in 1954 was nicknamed Operation Wetback.
  • During his second term, Eisenhower took a more active, personal role in governing.
  • When he left the presidency in 1961, he remained an extraordinarily popular figure.

Eisenhower’s foreign policies:

  • Secretary of State= John Foster Dulles, a vehement anticommunist.
  • “New Look” foreign policy called for open skies over both the U.S. and the Soviet Union.
  • Greater reliance on air power and the deterrent power of nuclear weapons than on the army or navy.
  • When the French fortress of Dien Bien Phu was about to fall to the North Vietnamese communists under Ho Chi Minh in 1954, Eisenhower refused to permit any American military involvement.
  • When Hungary revolted against continued domination by the Soviet Union, Eisenhower did nothing to help defeat the communists.

Suez Canal:

  • 1956, Eisenhower used America’s great oil power to force Britain, France, and Israel to withdraw their troops from Egypt.
  • The Soviets threatened the Middle East’s oil, so the CIA staged a coup to overthrow the Iranian government and install Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlevi as dictator.
  • The CIA also engineered a coup in Guatemala.
  • The Suez crisis marked the last time in history the U.S. could use its oil weapon to make foreign policy demands.
  • Eisenhower Doctrine of 1957 empowered him to extend economic and military aid to nations of the Middle East that wanted help to resist communist aggression.

Vietnam:

  • The leader of the nationalist movement in Vietnam since WWI was Ho Chi Minh.
  • 1955 Geneva Conference called for the two Vietnams to hold elections within two years.
  • The U.S. first became involved by providing economic aid to the French colonists fighting Ho Chi Minh.

Sputnik:

  • A satellite launched by the Soviet Union in 1957.
  • The U.S. government responded by beginning to spend millions of dollars to improve American science education
  • Sputnik fueled American criticism of the educational system and led to federal funding for advancing science and foreign languages in schools.

Paris Summit Conference:

  • Originally scheduled in 1960 but did not occur due to the U-2 incident.
  • U-2 was a high-flying American spy plane, whose downing in 1960 heightened Cold War tensions.

Latin America:

  • By the end of the 50s, Latin American anger toward the U.S. had intensified because Washington, D.C. had done all of the following:
  • Extended massive aid to Europe and very little to Latin America.
  • Continued to intervene in Latin American affairs.
  • Supported bloody dictators who claimed to be fighting communism.
  • Sponsored the CIA-directed coup in Guatemala.
  • A strict embargo on all trade with Cuba was precipitated by Castro’s confiscation of American property for his land reform program.

John F. Kennedy:

  • The factor that may have tipped the electoral scale for JFK in the election of 1960 was his televised debates with Richard Nixon.
  • Appearance and attractiveness was taken into consideration.
  • He was able to neutralize the issue of his Roman Catholicism during the election.
  • JFK’s principal issue against Nixon in the campaign was that the U.S. had fallen behind the Soviet Union in prestige and power.

Literature of the Cold War:

  • Two post-WWII fiction writers who explored the problems and anxieties of affluence were John Updike and John Cheever.
  • WWII sparked and great literary outpouring of absurdity, not realism.
  • Post-WWII literature was enriched by African American novelists like Ralph Ellison and Jewish novelists like Saul Bellow.
  • Ralph Ellison’s novel Invisible Man refers to African Americans whose supposed supporters are unable to see him as a real man.
  • Jewish writers tended to be satirical and comical in their novels.
  • Betty Friedan’s 1963 book that launched a revolution against the suburban cult of domesticity was named The Feminine Mystique.