truman timeline ⛏️

1945 12th Apr

FDR dies

1945 8th May

Germany surrenders

1945 17th Jul

Potsdam Conference begins

1945 6th Aug

Hiroshima bombing

1945 14th Aug

Japan surrenders

1945 6th Sep

Truman’s 21-point plan is presented to Congress. He outlines his plans for reconversion.

1946 Jan

Inflation peaks at 25%, the winter sees over 4,985 strikes

1946 20th Feb

Employment Act of 1946. A watered-down bill is passed, it places increased responsibility for economic stability on the federal government.

1946 22nd Feb

Kennan’s Long Telegram

1946 5th Mar

Churchill’s Iron Curtain speech

1946 2nd Apr

Congressional hearings on Truman’s plans for a national healthcare service. The AMA successfully blocks the plan, labelling it socialised medicine.

1946 5th Nov

Republicans gain control of Congress in the midterms. They campaign on ‘Had Enough?’ and a poor US economy under Truman.

1946 5th Dec

Truman establishes a President’s Committee on Civil Rights

1947 12th Mar

Truman Doctrine speech to Congress

1947 21st Mar

Federal Employee Loyalty Programme / EO 9835. Aimed to ensure loyalty against communism in the federal government.

1947 9th Apr

CORE organises its two-week ‘Journey of Reconciliation’ testing Morgan v Virginia.

1947 15th Apr

Jackie Robinson integrates baseball

1947 5th Jun

Marshall Plan announced

1947 23rd Jun

Taft-Hartley Act passed over Truman’s veto

1947 29th Jun

Truman address the NAACP, the first POTUS to do so

1947 26th Jul

National Security Act. This reconfigures the national security state. NSC, CIA, Department of Defense are all formed.

1947 29th Oct

To Secure These Rights is published

1947 30th Oct

GATT is signed, reducing trade barriers

1948 2nd Feb

Truman encourages Congress to pass legislation to support civil rights, he fails to get anything of substance.

1948 2nd Apr

Marshall Plan passed. The communist coup in Czechoslovakia convinces Congress to support the plan. By 1952, $13bn will have been sent to European countries.

1948 14th May

Israel recognised by the US

1948 24th Jun

The USSR blocks land access to Berlin

1948 26th Jul

EO 9981 desegregates the armed forces, but splits the Democrat Party

1948 2nd Nov

Truman triumphs in a surprise victory over Dewey in the presidential election

1949

The US economy produces half the world’s manufactured goods

1949 5th Jan

Truman proposes ‘Fair Deal’

1949 4th Apr

NATO formed

1949 12th May

Berlin Blockade ends, the airlift is successful in transporting goods across 272,000 flights.

1949 15th Jul

Housing Act. 810,000 new homes promised in the next six years, but this target is missed.

1949 4th Aug

State Department issues its White Paper on China, justifying current policy towards the country

1949 23rd Sep

USSR detonates its first atomic bomb

1949 1st Oct

PRC established under Mao, the Nationalist government flees to Taiwan

1949 26th Oct

Congress raises minimum wage from 40 cents to 75 cents an hour

1950 9th Feb

McCarthy claims there are communists in the State Department. Speech in Wheeling, West Virginia.

1950 14th Feb

Sino-Soviet alliance

1950 1st Mar

Klaus Fuchs is convicted of spying for the Soviets. Fuchs had been part of the successful Manhattan Project.

1950 7th Apr

NSC-68

1950 5th Jun

Henderson v United States. Segregation on railroad dining cars was illegal. McLaurin v Oklahoma State

Regents. Black students could not be physically separated from white students at the university.

1950 25th Jun

North Korea invades South Korea

1950 28th Aug

Social Security coverage is expanded

1950 15th Sep

US & UN troops counterattack at Inchon

1950 23rd Sep

Revenue Act increases corporation and income taxes

1950 26th Nov

Chinese troops launch a massive counteroffensive in North Korea

1950 16th Dec

Truman declares a state of emergency, imposing wage and price controls

1951 5th Apr

Julius and Ethel Rosenberg are sentenced to death following espionage convictions

1951 11th Apr

Truman dismisses MacArthur for making his own offer to meet the Chinese, bypassing the POTUS

1951 10th Jul

Armistice talks begin in Korea. They continue for two years during which 45% of US casualties occur.

1951 10th Oct

Mutual Security Act. Truman authorises more than $7bn for foreign economic, military and technical aid.

1952 29th Mar

Truman declines to run in the presidential election

1952 8th Apr

Truman seizes control of the steel industry. He sought to avoid a strike and not compromise the war effort in Korea. 43% of Americans disapproved of the seizure.

1952 2nd Jun

The Supreme Court rules Truman’s seizure unconstitutional in a 6-3 vote.

1952 27th Jun

McCarran-Walter Immigration Act is passed over Truman’s veto. It reinforces quotas from specific areas.

1952 1st Nov

US successfully test its first H-bomb

1952 4th Nov

Eisenhower elected, defeating Adlai Stevenson