Unit 8 Key Terms (31 from class activity.)

baby boom

A term that refers to the sharp U.S. population increase between 1946 and 1964 resulting from the end of World War II, postwar economic prosperity, improvements in health care, and a trend toward marriage at a younger age.

Beats

A small group of young poets, writers, intellectuals, musicians, and artists who challenged mainstream American politics and culture in the 1950s.

Berlin Airlift

The large-scale transport of food and supplies to West Berlin by the U.S. and British governments during the Soviet blockade of Berlin from 1948 to 1949. The Berlin Airlift was responsible for breaking the Soviet blockade of West Berlin.

Central Intelligence Agency (CIA)

The intelligence organization established by the 1947 National Security Act. The CIA is part of the executive branch and is responsible for gathering information and conducting espionage in foreign nations. It was originally created to counter Soviet spying operations.

Cold War

The political, economic, and military conflict, short of direct war, between the United States and the Soviet Union between 1945 and 1991.

containment

The U.S. strategy to prevent the spread of communism and Soviet influence around the world. First outlined by U.S. diplomat George Kennan in 1946, containment became a key element of U.S. Cold War policy.

Dennis v. United States

The 1951 Supreme Court decision upholding the conviction of communist leaders on the grounds they posed a “clear and present danger,” despite the absence of any evidence of an immediate uprising or plot.

Dixiecrats

The nickname of Southern Democrats who created a segregationist political party in 1948, the States’ Rights Democratic Party, as a response to federal extensions of civil rights. Dixiecrats advocated a state’s right to legislate segregation. They ran Strom Thurmond in an unsuccessful bid for the presidency in 1948 against Truman.

Federal Employee Loyalty Program

A program established by President Truman in 1947, via executive order, to investigate federal employees suspected of disloyalty, communist ties, suspicious personal behaviors, and homosexuality. Hundreds of employees were terminated from their positions as a result of the investigations.

House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC)

A committee in the U.S. House of Representatives established in 1938 to investigate and combat domestic communism. After World War II, HUAC conducted highly publicized investigations of communist influence in government and the entertainment industry.

iron curtain

A term coined by Winston Churchill in a 1946 speech to describe the ideological and political divide between the communist Soviet Union and the non-communist Western world.

Korean War

A three-year conflict (1950–1953) that began when communist North Korea, supported by the U.S.S.R. and China, launched an invasion of anticommunist South Korea, supported by the United States and the United Nations. Despite enormous destruction, large loss of civilian lives, and involvement of both U.S. and Chinese troops, fighting stopped with a cease-fire rather than a peace treaty at a similar border between the two countries.

Levittown

The first mass-produced suburban housing developments, Levittowns were widely emulated by other developers and provided affordable housing for middle-class families, even as they used racially restrictive covenants to exclude Blacks.

Marshall Plan

A package of economic aid developed by U.S. Secretary of State George Marshall. The plan helped to rebuild Western Europe physically and economically, buffering it from communist influence and serving U.S. political and economic interests in the process.

McCarran Internal Security Act

The 1950 act that required communist organizations to register with the federal government, established detention camps for radicals, and denied passports to American citizens who had communist affiliations.

McCarran-Walter Immigration Act

The 1952 legislation that made it possible for Japanese noncitizens to become U.S. citizens. However, the act still maintained a race-based system of discriminatory national-origin quotas. Also known as the Immigration and Nationality Act of 1952.

McCarthyism

A term used to describe the harassment and persecution of suspected communists and other political radicals during the Cold War. Named after Senator Joseph McCarthy, a prominent government figure who helped incite anticommunist panic in the early 1950s.

National Security Council (NSC)

The council created by the 1947 National Security Act to advise the president on military and foreign affairs. The NSC consists of the national security adviser and the secretaries of state, defense, the army, the navy, and the air force.

North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)

A Cold War military alliance and security pact intended to enhance the collective security of the United States and Western Europe. Originally consisting of twelve nations in 1949, as of 2023, thirty-one NATO member nations operate under the principle of “an attack against one member is considered as an attack against all.”

NSC-68

A document issued by the National Security Council in 1950 that advocated intensification of the policy of containment both at home and abroad and a massive buildup of the U.S. military. NSC-68 defined U.S. nuclear policy, peacetime military spending, and a policy of anti-Soviet propaganda overseas and vigilance against the communist threat at home.

Second Red Scare

Mass fears of communist influence infiltrating the United States and threatening national security from the late 1930s through the 1950s. Such fears resulted in the creation of government-controlled programs and entities such as the House Un-American Activities Committee and the Federal Employee Loyalty Program.

Servicemen’s Readjustment Act (GI Bill)

An act that provided college and vocational tuition, low-interest mortgage loans, and unemployment insurance to World War II veterans. Known as the GI Bill, the 1944 law spurred college enrollment, home ownership, and overall economic growth.

Smith Act

A law signed by Franklin Roosevelt in 1940, which prohibited teaching or advocating the destruction of the U.S. government.

Sun Belt

The southern and western parts of the United States, to which millions of Americans moved after World War II. Migrants were drawn by the region’s climate and jobs in the defense, petroleum, and chemical industries.

Taft-Hartley Act

The 1947 law that curtailed unions’ ability to organize. It prevented unions from barring employment to non-union members and authorized the federal government to halt a strike for eighty days if it interfered with the national interest.

totalitarianism

A form of government in which all aspects of political, economic, social, and cultural life are controlled by the state, typically in the hands of a single political party. During the Cold War, the United States often described its communist rivals as inflicting a totalitarian system on the countries where they held power.

Truman Doctrine

The U.S. pledge during the Truman administration to provide political, military, and economic aid to all democratic countries under threat of communism from internal or external sources. Truman issued the doctrine in response to perceived communist threats to Greece and Turkey.

Warsaw Pact

A military alliance of the Soviet Union with its seven satellite nations in response to the U.S. Marshall Plan and establishment of NATO. The pact, formed in 1955, was dissolved in 1991 at the end of the Cold War.

Yates v. United States

The 1957 Supreme Court ruling establishing that the Justice Department could not prosecute someone for merely advocating an abstract doctrine favoring the violent overthrow of the government. The ruling was seen as a severe blow to the enforcement of the 1940 Smith Act.

federal housing administration

This revolutionized American housing by insuring private loans, lowering down payments, and promoting long-term, amortized mortgages. It saved the housing industry, boosted homeownership, but also codified segregation through racist "redlining" practices that restricted loans in minority areas.

imperial presidency

Term coined by historian Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. in 1973 to describe a U.S. presidency that has exceeded its constitutional limits, becoming uncontrollable and unaccountable, particularly through excessive war powers and domestic policy initiatives.