USA 1919–1930s: Race, Immigration, and Civil Rights

Vocabulary flashcards covering 1920s American history: immigration quotas, the Red Scare, Jim Crow segregation, the Great Migration, the Ku Klux Klan, Native American policies, and historical examination techniques.

1917 Literacy Tests

An immigration restriction requiring incoming migrants to prove they could read and write a short passage in English, which many failed.

1921 Emergency Quota Act

Immigration law limiting new arrivals to $3\%$ of the total number of people from that nationality already living in America as recorded in the 1910 census.

1924 National Origins Act

Legislation reducing the immigration quota to $2\%$ of the 1890 census figures, designed to favor Northern European immigrants.

1929 Immigration Act

A law capping annual immigration at $150{,}000$, allocating $85\%$ of entry visas to Northern and Western Europeans, and banning Asian immigrants entirely.

'Soviet Arc'

A ship used by American authorities during the Red Scare to deport several hundred suspected Russian radicals from the country.

WASPs

White Anglo-Saxon Protestants; the descendants of 'old immigrants' who dominated American politics, the presidency, and held the top $10\%$ of the population owning $90\%$ of the country's wealth.

Isolationism

The post-World War I foreign policy stance in which the USA sought to isolate itself from European affairs and conflicts.

Red Scare (1917–1919)

A period of public hysteria and intense fear of communism, anarchism, and revolutionary ideas in the USA following the 1917 Bolshevik Revolution in Russia.

Xenophobia

The irrational fear or hatred of foreigners, which expanded significantly in the United States during the Red Scare.

Palmer Raids

Federal operations sparked by the bombing of Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer's home, leading to the arrest of $6000$ suspected communists across $36$ cities and attacks on Socialist parades on May Day 1920.

1919 Strikes

A series of $3600$ labor strikes protesting poor working conditions and low wages, including the Boston Police strike and the Seattle General Strike led by the Industrial Workers of the World.

Plessy v Ferguson (1896)

The landmark Supreme Court decision establishing the legal doctrine of 'separate but equal', which constitutionally legalized segregation under Jim Crow laws.

Jim Crow Laws

State and local laws in the American South mandating racial segregation in schools, parks, hospitals, transport, and swimming pools, while denying Black citizens voting rights and fair treatment.

The Great Migration

The movement of nearly $1{,}000{,}000$ Black Americans from the rural South to Northern cities between 1916 and 1920 in search of higher wages, better standards of living, and an escape from Jim Crow laws.

Red Summer (1919)

A period of violent race riots in over $20$ American cities that resulted in $62$ deaths, including $38$ fatalities ($15$ white, $23$ Black) and $537$ injuries in Chicago.

Harlem Renaissance

A major cultural, literary, and artistic explosion centered in Harlem, New York, marked by the growth of Black theatre and the national fame of jazz icons such as Louis Armstrong and Bessie Smith.

Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA)

An organization founded in 1914 by Marcus Garvey to celebrate Black pride, strengthen links with Africa, and promote independent Black nationhood, growing to roughly $250{,}000$ members at its peak.

Marcus Garvey

Black nationalist leader who founded the UNIA, popularized the 'Back to Africa' slogan, and inspired the later 1960s Black Power movement with the message that 'black is beautiful'.

National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP)

A civil rights organization established in 1910 by W. E. B. Du Bois to challenge segregation and white supremacy legally, promote voting rights, and campaign against Southern lynchings.

W. E. B. Du Bois

Civil rights leader who founded the NAACP in 1910, advocating for full equality, constitutional rights, and public exposure of Southern lynchings.

Ku Klux Klan (KKK)

A white supremacist, anti-communist, anti-Black, anti-Jewish, and anti-Catholic group originally formed in the 1860s and revived in 1915 following the release of the film 'The Birth of a Nation'.

Hiram Wesley Evans

A dentist who served as the Imperial Wizard (national leader) of the Ku Klux Klan during its 1920s revival, when membership peaked at over $5{,}000{,}000$.

David Stephenson

A Ku Klux Klan leader whose conviction for the rape and mutilation of a woman on a train led him to provide evidence of illegal Klan activities, severely discrediting the organization after 1925.

George Arnwood

A Black man lynched in 1933 after being accused of assaulting an $83$-year-old white woman; he was dragged from jail, beaten to death, hanged from a tree, and burned.

1924 Indian Citizenship Act

Federal legislation that granted full United States citizenship to all Native Americans.

Americanisation Policy

The government assimilation strategy that forced Native American children into special boarding schools to strip them of their culture, native language, and identity while converting them to Christianity.

1928 Meriam Report

A federal investigation revealing that Native American boarding schools were severely underfunded, harshly run, and educationally ineffective, recommending a curriculum that balanced urban skills with indigenous traditions.

Pull Factors (Immigration)

Attractive conditions drawing immigrants to the USA, such as vast space, cheap land, massive natural resources (oil, timber, minerals), high industrial wages, and freedoms guaranteed by the 1791 Bill of Rights.

Push Factors (Immigration)

Negative circumstances compelling Europeans to leave their home countries, including rural overcrowding, lack of class mobility, unemployment from mechanization, and political or religious persecution.

Pogroms

Organized, violent massacres and attacks regularly carried out against Jewish communities in late 19th-century Russia and Eastern Europe, serving as a major push factor for immigration.

SPEND

An exam technique mnemonic for 5-mark 'Describe/outline' questions, requiring three points supported with specific factual details.

CO DAMP

An exam technique framework for comparing two sources using Content, Own Knowledge, and DAMP (Date, Author, Medium, Purpose).

CO DAMP D Judge

An exam structure for answering 20-mark two-sided evaluation questions: Content, Own Knowledge, DAMP analysis, Disagree (historians' challenges), and a final Judgement.