APUSH Reading Quiz 9 :(

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Hundred Days

• The first months of FDR’s administration

• Congress enacted fifteen major bills focusing on banking failures, agricultural overproduction, the business slump, and soaring unemployment

Welfare State

• Refers to an industrial democracy that adopts various government-guaranteed social-welfare programs

Keynesian economics

• Argued that government intervention could smooth out the highs and lows of the business cycle through deficit spending and the manipulation of interest rates, which determined the money supply

Dust Bowl

• Between 1930 and 1941, a severe drought plagued OK, TX, NM, CO, AZ, and Kansas

• Many “Okies” headed to CA

• Government agencies sought to teach farmers to better manage their land

  • Soil Conservation Service tought farmers to prevent soil erosion by tilling hillsides

  • Encouraged (and sometimes paid) farmers to take certain commercial crops out of production and plant soil-preserving grasses instead

• Shelterbelts

Mexican Americans under the ND

• The federal government under Hoover and FDR promoted the deportation of Mexican Americans

• Mexican Americans generally benefitted from the ND

  • Took jobs with the WPA and the CCC or received relief

• Aligned themselves with the Democratic party because of the Democrats’ commitment to ordinary people

African Americans under the ND

• New Deal tended to benefit African Americans– held 18% of WPA jobs despite constituting 10% of the population

• Believed the White House cared about their plight, leading them to shift to the Democratic party

• Roosevelt appointed a number of black people to federal office and had an informal “black cabinet” of prominent black intellectuals who advised ND agencies

• However, Roosevelt declined to go much further in supporting black rights because of his own conservatism and his need for white southern votes

• Were hurt by the AAA– many landowners collected subsidies but refused to distribute them, instead choosing to force black families off the land

Eleanor Roosevelt

• Worked to expand positions for women in political parties, labor unions, and education

• Pushed her husband to do more for the disadvantaged

  • Descended into coal mines to view working conditions, met with African Americans seeking antilynching laws, and talked to people in breadlines

Women under the ND

• ND measures generally enhanced women’s welfare, but few addressed their specific needs and concerns

• Roosevelt welcomed women into the ranks of government in greater numbers than any previous president

  • Female appointees often worked to open up other opportunities in government for other talented women

• Were often marginalized by ND policies

  • NRA employment rules set a lower minimum wage for women; only 7% of workers in the Civil Works Administration were female; the CCC excluded women entirely

Rural Electrification Administration

• Founded in 1935

• Promoted nonprofit farm cooperatives that offered loans to farmers to install power lines

• Electricity brought relief from the drudgery and isolation of farm life

• Brought commodities such as electric irons, vacuum cleaners, washing machines, and radio

Works Progress Administration

• Founded in 1935

• Employed 8.5 million Americans between 1935 and 1943

• Workers constructed or repaired 651,087 miles of road, 124,087 bridges, 125,110 public buildings, 8,192 parks, and 853 airports

• Reached only about 1/3rd of the nation’s unemployed

Share Our Wealth Society

• Founded in 1934; led by Huey Long

• Believed that inequalities in the distribution of wealth prohibited millions of ordinary factories from buying the goods that kept factories in business

• Advocated a complete tax on all income over one million and on all inheritances over five million

Huey Long

• Democratic governor of Louisiana

• Increased taxes on corporations, lowered the utility bills of consumers, and built new highways, hospitals, and schools by seizing near-dictatorial control of the state government

Southern Tenant Farmers Union

• Founded in 1934

• A biracial organization that was founded to protect black farmers against the effects of the AAA

Securities and Exchange Commission

• Founded in 1934

• Created to regulate the stock market; had broad powers to determine how stocks and bonds were sold to the public, to set rules for credit transactions, and to prevent stock sales by those with inside information about corporate plans

Old Age Revolving Pension Plan/Townsend Plan

• First proposed in 1933

• Proposed by Francis Townsend

• The plan would give $200 a month to citizens over the age of sixty if they retired

• Retired workers would open positions for younger workers

Tennessee Valley Authority

• Established in 1933

• Viewed by Roosevelt as the first step in modernizing the South

• Integrated flood control, reforestation, electricity generation, and agricultural and industrial development

• Dams and hydroelectric plants provided cheap electric power for homes and factories as well as ample recreational opportunities for valley residents

• An integral part of the Roosevelt administration’s effort to keep farmers on the land by enhancing the quality of rural life

National Association of Manufacturers

• A lasting opponent of the New Deal

• Launched a probusiness publicity campaign to “serve the purposes of business salvation”

• Promoted free enterprise and unfettered capitalism

American Liberty League

• Made up of Republican business leaders and conservative Democrats

• Fought “reckless spending” and the “socialist” reforms of the New Deal

Civilian Conservation Corps

• Created in 1933

• Mobilized 250,000 young men to do reforestation and conservation work

• “CCC boys” build thousands of bridges, roads, trails, and other structures in state and national parks

Federal Emergency Relief Administration

• Provided federal funds for state relief programs

National Recovery Administration

• Created in 1933 by the National Industrial Recovery Act

• Created through the National Industrial Recovery Act

• A government agency that set up self-governing private associations in six hundred industries

• The associations regulated industries by agreeing on prices and production quotas

National Industrial Recovery Act

• 1933

• Set up the National Recovery Administration, which set up self-governing private associations in six hundred industries

• The associations regulated industries by agreeing on prices and production quotas

Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation

• Created in 1933 by the Glass-Steagall Act

• Insured deposits up to $2500

Glass-Steagall Act

• Passed in 1933

• Restored public confidence by creating the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which insured deposits up to $2,500

• Prohibited banks from making risky, unsecured investments with the deposits of ordinary people

Bonus Army

• 1932

• A group of between 15,000-20,000 unemployed WWI veterans traveled to Washington to demand immediate payment of pension awards that were due to be paid in 1945

• Hoover deployed army troops to evict the marchers and burn their encampment to the ground

• The incident further damaged Hoover’s reputation

FDR in the GD

• Attended Harvard and Columbia; born into a wealthy family

• Served as assistant secretary of the navy during WWI

• Worked as the governor of NY

• Wished to maintain the nation’s economic institutions and preserve its social structure and save capitalism while easing its worst downturns

• Believed in a balanced government budget and extollled the values ot hard work, cooperation, and sacrifice

Herbert Hoover

• Believed that economic outcomes were the product of individual character– people’s fates were in their own hands and success went to those who deserved it

• Also believed that through voluntary action, the business community could right itself and recover from economic downturns without relying on government or regulation

• Adhered strictly to the gold standard, fearing that anything else would weaken the value of the dollar

  • Ended up discouraging investment and preventing growth

• Adhered strongly to principles of limited government

Federal Art Project

• Part of the WPA; gave work to many young artists who would become the twentieth century’s leading artisans

• The Federal Music Project and Federal Writers’ Project employed 15,000 musicians and 5,000 writers

• The FWP collected oral historeis, including two thousand narratives by formerly enslaved people

Fair Labor Standards Act

• Passed in 1938

• Outlawed child labor, made the 40-hour workweek the national standard, mandated overtime pay, and established a federal minimum wage

Roosevelt recession

• 1937-1938

• Acting on the assumption that the worst of the GD had passed, Roosevelt slashed the federal budget

• Congress cut the WPA’s funding in half, causing layoffs of about 1.5 million workers

• The Federal Reserve raised interest rates

• Unemployment jumped to 19%

• Roosevelt quickly backtracked, spending his way out of the recession by boosting funding for the WPA and resuming public works projects

FDR’s SC plan fails

• 1937

• The future of the New Deal rested in the hands of a few elderly, conservative-minded judges

• FDR attempted to reduce their influence by adding a new justice to the Court for every member over the age of seventy

  • Would have added six new judges to the bench

• Roosevelt’s suggestion was ultimately rejected

Election of 1936

• FDR elected

• FDR had support from many who had benefitted from New Deal programs

• Roosevelt could also count on organized labor, midwestern farmers, white ethnic groups, northern African Americans, and middle-class families concerned about unemployment and old-age security

• Republicans nominated Landon, who accepted the legitimacy of many New Deal programs but criticized their inefficiency and expense

Congress of Industrial Organizations

• 1935

• Promoted “industrial unionism”-- organzing all the workers in an industry, from skilled machinists to unskilled janitors, into a single union

AAA voided

• 1935

Social Security Act

• Passed in 1935

• Propelled into motion due to pressure from the Townsend and Long movements, along with children’s welfare advocates

• Provided old-age pensions for workers, a joint federal-state system of compensation for unemployed workers, and a program of payments to widowed mothers and the blind, deaf, and disabled

• A milestone in the creation of an American welfare state

Wagner Act/National Labor Relations Act

• 1935

• Established the right of workers to organize and bargain collectively with employers

• Outlawed many practices that employers had used to suppress unions, such as firing workers for organizing activities

• The National Labor Relations Board had the authority to protect workers from employer coercion and would guarantee collective bargaining

National Labor Relations Board

• Created by the Wagner Act in 1935

• Had the authority to protect workers from employer coercion and would guarantee collective bargaining

Schechter v. US

• 1935

• The Court unanimously ruled the NIRA unconstitutional because it delegated Congress’ lawmaking power to the executive branch and extended federal authority to intrastate commerce

Banking Act of 1935

• Authorized the president to appoint a new Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, which placed control of interest rates and other money-market policies in a federal agency rather than in the hands of private bankers

Indian Reorganization Act

• 1934

• Organized by Collier, who understood that the government’s decades-long policy of forced assimilation, prohibition of Indian religions, and confiscation of Native lands had left most tribes poor, isolated, and without basic self-determination

• Reversed the Dawes Act by promoting Indigenous self-government through formal constitutions and democratically elected tribal councils

• Through this law, Native Americans won a degree of religious freedom and tribal governments regained their status as semisovereign dependent nations

• For some people, the act imposed a model of self-government incompatible with tribal traditions and languages

• The BIA and Congress discontinued interfering in internal Indigenous affairs and retained financial control over reservation governments

Federal Housing Act of 1934

• Created the Federal Housing Administration and put it in charge of refinancing home mortgages

• Permanently changed the mortgage system and set the foundation for the broad expansion of home ownership post-WWI

Federal Housing Administration

• Created in 1934 by the Federal Housing Act

• Put it in charge of refinancing home mortgages

Civil Works Administration

• 1933

• Created by Roosevelt

• At its peak, the CWA provided jobs for 4 million Americans on repairing bridges, building highways, and constructing public buildings

• Short term– collapsed after 1934 due to Republican opposition

Public Works Administration

• 1933

• A construction program established by Congress

Agricultural Adjustment Act

• 1933

• Becan direct governmental regulation of the farm economy; hoped that farm prices would rise as production fell

• The AAA provided cash subsidies to farmers who cut production of seven major commodities: wheat, cotton, corn, hogs, rice, tobacco, and dairy products

• By giving cash to farmers, the AAA briefly stabilized the farm economy, although unequally

  • Subsidies went primarily to the owners of large and medium-sized farms, who often cut production by reducing the amount of land they rented to tenants and sharecroppers

  • Most black sharecroppers recieved meager dollars in relief payments

FDR removes the gold standard

• 1933

• The gold standard constrained economic policymaking– vulnerable when large financiers withdrew their investments and demanded gold payments; made the international monetary system inflexible at the moment wen maximum flexibility was needed

• Removing the gold standard allowed the Federal Reserve to lower interest rates

Emergency Banking Act

• 1933

• The day after his inauguration, FDR declared a national “bank holiday”, closing all the banks

• Congress passed the Emergency Banking Act, which permitted banks to reopen if a Treasury Department inspection showed they had sufficient cash reserves

• Roosevelt reassured citizens that their money was safe through fireside chats

• When banks reopened, calm prevailed and deposits exceeded withdrawals, restoring stability

Scottsboro case

• 1931-1937

• Nine young black men were accused of rape by two white women on a freight train

• Although the women’s stories were inconsistent, eight of the Scottsboro Boys were sentenced to death

• This case inspired solidarity within African american communities

Reconstruction Finance Corporation

• 1931

• Established by Hoover to provide federal loans to railroads, banks, and other businesses

• Lent money too cautiously; wasn’t aggressive enough to alleviate the depression

Smoot Hawley Tariff

• 1930

• Supported by Hoover and other Republicans

• Intended to stimulate American manufacturing through taxes on imported goods

• Ended up triggering retaliatory tariffs in other countries, hindering global trade and worsening economic contraction

CA in WWII

• Experienced the largest share of wartime migration

• Welcomed 2.5 million new residents and grew by 35% during the war– “The Second Gold Rush Hits the West”

• Turned out one-sixth of war materials; one-tenth of all federal dollars spent on the war flowed into CA

LGBTQ communities WWII

• Wartime migration to urban centers created new opportunities for queer individuals to establish communities

  • Included cities such as NY, SFO, LA, Chicago, and even Kansas City, Buffalo, and Dallas

• These communities became centers of the gay rights movement

• Gay culture within the military

Women in the military (WWII)

• Women’s Army Corps

• Women Accepted for Volunteer Emergency Service

• Women’s Airforce Service Pilots (WASPs)

Code talkers

• Native Navajo speakers communicated orders to fleet commanders

• Japanese intelligence could not decipher the code because it was based on the Navajo language, which fewer than fifty non-Navajos in the wrold understood

• Instrumental in battles such as the battle for Iwo Jima– code talkers worked around the clock, sending and receiving more than eight hundred messages without error

• No Axis nation ever broke these codes

Soldiers in WWII

• Came from every economic station and region

• The nearly one million black soldiers were segregated– were purposely assigned menial duties

• Ethic of patriotism further advanced the children of immigrants into mainstream American life

Bracero Program

• To meet wartime labor demands, the US government brought tens of thousands of Mexican contract laborers into the US

• Braceros were paid little and treated poorly

• The Bracero Program continued past the end of WWII

Women in WWII

• Government officials and corporations urged women to take jobs in defense industries, creating a new image of working women

• Many working women gladly abandoned low-paying “women’s jobs” as domestic servants or secretaries for higher-paying work in defense

• Hordes of women worked as airplane riveters, ship welders, and drill-press operators

  • Made up to 36% of the labor force by 1945

• Women still faced traditional expectations and limitations along with sexual harassment on the job and lower wages than men

• Were ushered back into the home after the war, but many married women refused or couldn’t afford to stay at home

Office of War Information

• Founded during WWII

• Disseminated news and promoted patriotism

• Urged advertising agencies to use patriotic ads to “invigorate, instruct, and inspire”

Civilians in WWII

• Civilians created defense committees and served on local rationing draft boards

• About twenty million backyard “victory gardens” produced 40% of the nation’s vegetables

• Many moved to take high-paying defense jobs or followed fathers to military bases or points of debarkation

  • About 15 million Americans changed residences during the war

War Production Board

• Awarded defense contracts, allocated scarce resources for military use, and persuaded busineses to convert to military production

  • Scarce resources included rubber, copper, and oil

• Often incentivized companies to switch to wartime production through generous tax advantages and approved “cost-plus” contracts that guaranteed corporations a profit and allowed them to keep newly constructed factories, etc.

• Usually involved large enterprises rather than small businesses

• The beginning of the “military-industrial complex”

America First Committee

• Isolationists who held rallies across the US, cautioning against American involvement in Europe

Committee to Defend America by Aiding the Allies

• A group of interventionists

Isolationists

• Most Americans had little enthusiasm for war

• Primarily conservatives, but a contingent of progressives (or liberals) opposed America’s involvement in the war on pacifist or moral grounds

• Some isolationists combined anticommunism, Christian morality, and even anti-Semetism in their cause

Popular Front

• The USSR instructed Communists in Western Europe and the US to join with liberals in a broad coalition opposing fascism

• The Popular Front drew from a wide range of groups, including the American Communist Party, African American civil rights activists, trade unionists, left-wing writers and intellectuals, and even some ND administrators

WWII migration

• The growth of war industries accelerated patterns of rural-urban migration

• Cities grew dramatically thanks to factories, shipyards, and other defenseplants drawing millions of citizens from small towns

• Led to the growth of city culture– bars, jazz clubs, dance halls, and theaters proliferated, fed by the ready cash of war workers

D-Day

• 1944

• The long-promised invasion of France– American, British, and Canadian soldiers hit the beaches of Normandy

• More than 1.5 million soldiers and thousands of tons of military supplies and equipment flowed into France over the next few weeks

National War Labor Board

• 1942

• Created by Roosevelt in exchange for a no-strike pledge from unions throughout the war

• The NWLB established wages, hours, and working conditions and had the authority to seize manufacturing plants that did not comply

Executive Order 9066

• 1942

• As residents began to fear spies, sabotage, and further attacks, local politicians and newspapers whipped up hysteria against Japanese Americans

• This order authorized the War Department to force Japanese Americans from their West Coast homes and hold them in relocation camps

Revenue Act of 1942

• Expanded the number of people paying income taxes from 3.9 million to 42.6 million

• Taxes on personal incomes and business profits paid half the cost of the war; the rest was borrowed by the government from wealthy Americans and ordinary citizens who invested in war bonds

Executive Order 8802

• 1941

• Randolph, head of the largest black labor union in the country, announced plans for a march on Washington, demanding that the government require defense contractors to hire more black workers

• To halt the protest, FDR issued Executive Order 8802

• Prohibited “discrimination in the employment of workers in defense industries or government because of race, creed, color, or national origin”

• Established the Fair Employment Practice Committee, which demonstrated commitment to black employment rights but could not enforce compliance with its orders

War Powers Act

• 1941

• Gave FDR unprecedented control over all aspects of the war effort

Atlantic Charter

• 1941

• Emerged from a meeting between Winston Churchill and FDR

• Called for economic cooperation, national self-determination, and guarantees of political stability after the war

• Drew from Wilson’s Fourteen Points and Roosevelt’s Four freedoms

• Provided the ideological foundation of the Western cause; became the basis for a new American-led transatlantic alliance after the war’s conclusion

• Provision for self-determination set up potential conflict in Asia and Africa

Lend-Lease Act

• 1941

• Authorized the president to “lend, lease, or otherwise dispose of” arms and equipment to Britain or any other country whose defense was vital to the security of the US

• Later extended to the Soviets once Hitler abandoned his nonaggression pact with Stalin

• Marked the unofficial entrance of the US into WWII

Four Freedoms

• 1941

• Roosevelt delivered this speech to persuade Congress to increase aid to Britain, whose survival he viewed as key to American security

• Defined “four essential human freedoms”-- freedom of speech, freedom of religion, freedom from want, and freedom from fear

• Cast the war as a noble defense of democratic societies; linked the fate of democracy in Europe with the new welfare state at home

• Outlined a liberal international order that had appeal to societies beyond its intended European and American audiences

Munich Conference

• 1938

• Britain and France agreed to let Germany annex the Sudetenland in exchange for Hitler’s pledge to seek no more territory

• Chamberlain was satisfied with the agreement, calling it a “peace for our time”

• Hitler concluded that the Allies were pushovers and would let him do as he pleased

Neutrality Act of 1937

• Imposed a “cash-and-carry” requirement– if a warring country wanted to purchase nonmilitary goods from the US, it had to pay cash and carry them in its own ships

Neutrality Act of 1936

• Congress banned loans to belligerents

Neutrality Act of 1935

• Intended to prevent the nation from being drawn into another overseas war

• Imposed an embargo on selling arms to warring countries and declared that Americans traveling on the ships of belligerent notions did so at their own risk

Vietnam

• After WWII, the Vietminh– the nationalist movement that had led the resistance against the Japanese– seized control in the north

• France moved to restore its control over the country, backed by the US and Britain, rejecting Vietnamese self-determination

• The Vietminh resumed their war of liberation

• Eisenhower used the domino theory to guide US policy

• The French were later defeated, resulting in the 1954 Geneva Accords, which partitioned Vietnam temporarily at the 17th parallel and called for elections within two years to unify the nation

• The US undermined the Geneva Accords, setting up a pro-American government in South Vietnam

• The US supported Diem with funds and an aid contingent of military advisors

• Diem’s authoritarian regime made a dilemma for American observers– containing communism required Diem in power, but his repression made him unpopular

Egypt

• Led by Nasser, who sought an independent route: pan-arab socialism designed to end the Middle East’s colonial relationship with the West

• When negotiations over a hydroelectric dam failed with the US, Nasser nationalized the suez Canal, cutting off Western Europe’s oil

• Britain and France, in alliance with Israel, attacked Egypt and seized the canal

• Western nations later backed down, but Egypt reclaimed the Suez Canal and build the Aswan Dam on the Nile with Soviet support

Peace Corps

• Created by Kennedy

• Embodied a call to public service: thousands of citizens devoted two or more years as volunteers for projects such as teaching English to Filipino schoolchildren or helping African villagers obtain clean water

• A low-cost Cold War weapon– an extension of American “soft power”

Cuban Missile Crisis

• 1962

• US reconnaissance spotted Soviet-built bases for intermediate-range ballistic missiles in Cuba

• Kennedy announced that the US would impose a “quarantine on all offensive military equipment” bound for Cuba

• Negotiations– Kennedy pledged not to invade Cuba, and Khrushchev promised to dismantle the military bases

• Led to a slight thaw in US-Soviet relations with both sides having come close to nuclear war

Bay of Pigs

• 1961

• Kennedy dispatched Cuban exiles to launch an anti-Castro uprising, which was quickly crushed

Election of 1960

• Republicans nominated Eisenhower’s vice president, Richard Nixon

• Kennedy attracted votes from Catholics, African Americans, and labor unions; his VP helped bring in southern Democrats

• Very close election– Kennedy won by only 0.2%

Eisenhower Doctrine

• 1957

• Stated that American forces would assist any nation in the region that required aid “against overt armed aggression from any nation controlled by International Communism”

• Further evidence that the US had extended the global reach of containment

Warsaw Pact

• 1955

• A military alliance for Eastern Europe that included Albania, Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, Hungary, Poland, Romania, and the USSR

McCarthy hearings on army subversion

• 1954

• McCarthy launched an investigation into subversive activites in the US army

• The hearings were broadcast on television, bringing McCarthy’s tactics into the nation’s living rooms, causing support for him to plummet

• The Senate later censured McCarthy for unbecoming conduct

McCarthy’s list

• 1950

• Senator McCarthy of WI delivered a bombshell during a speech, declaring that he had a list of names that were made known to the Secretary of State as being members of the Communist Party

• McCarthy never released any names or proof, but he gained widespread attention

• McCarthy’s charges almost always targeted Democrats as he launched a virulent smear campaign

• McCarthy’s credibility waned with the public as he failed to identify a single Communist in the government

NSC-68

• 1950

• Described the USSR as a nation with “fanatic faith” that sought to “impose its absolute authority”

• Case Soviet ambitions as nothing short of “the dominion of the Eurasian landmass”

• Proposed “a bold and massive program of rebuilding the West’s defensive potential to surpass that of the Soviet world”

  • Included the development of a hydrogen bomb

• Also called for dramatic increases in conventional military forces

• Promoted higher taxes on Americans to support the military program; compelled Americans to accept whatever sacrifices were necessary to achieve national unity of purpose against the enemy

Korean War

• 1950-1953

• At the end of WWII, Truman and Stalin had agreed to jointly occupy the Korean peninsula and divide it at the 38th parallel

• The Soviets supported a Communist government in North Korea, and the US backed a right-wing Nationalist in South Korea

• The two sides had waged a low-level war since 1945

• North Koreans launched a surprise attack

• Truman persuaded the UN Security Council to authorize a “peacekeeping force”; Truman ordered US troops to Korea

• MacArthur ambitiously attempted to push South Korean troops all the way to the Chinese border, causing a retalliation by Chinese troops, which forced UN forces to retreat back down the peninsula

• An eventual armistice was signed, leaving Korea divided at the original demarcation line

• Truman’s decision to commit troops set a precedent for future undeclared wars

• The Korean War expanded American involvement in Asia, transforming containment into a global policy

• Began a start to a major military buildup

Fair Deal

• 1949

• Truman suggests national health insurance, civil rights legislation, aid to education, a housing program, and a new agricultural program

• Had an emphasis on civil rights, reflecting the growing influence of African Americans in the Democratic Party

• A conservative coalition blocked Truman’s proposal

NATO

• 1948

• Twelve nations– Belgium, Canada, Denmark, France, Great Britain, Iceland, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, and the US– agreed that “an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all”

• Also agreed to the creation of West Germany, which joined NATO in 1955

Berlin Airlift

• 1948

• The Western allies consolidated their three zones of Germany in 1947, hoping to establish an independent federal German republic

• In response, Stalin blockaded all traffic to West Berlin

• Over the next year, American and British pilots improvised the Berlin Airlift, which flew 2.5 million tons of food and fuel into the Western zones of the city

• Stalin backed down by 1949

Marshall Plan

• 1948

• Europe was sliding into economic chaos– people were starving, wages were stagnant, and the consumer market had collapsed

• For both humanitarian and practical reasons, American advisors felt compelled to act

• A global depression loomed in the future if the largest market for American goods could not recover

• Communism could take hold in Europe if the unemployed and dispirited joined the Communist Party

• The Marshall plan was a pledge of financial assistance nearly unanimously supported by Congress

• The US contributed nearly $13 billion to a highly successful recovery effort that benefitted both Western Europe and the US

• European industrial production increased by 64% and the appeal of Communist parties waned in the West

• Markets for American goods grew stronger and fostered economic interdependence between Ruepe and the US

• Marshall Plan intensifies Cold War tensions– harshly rejected by Stalin

Loyalty-Security Program/Executive Order 9835

• 1947

• Permitted officials to investigate any employee of the federal government for “subversive” activities

• The order was broad enough to allow anyone to be accused of subversion for the slightest reason

• More than a thousand gay men and lesbians were dismissed from federal employment in the 1950s, victims of an obsessive search for anyone deemed “unfit” for government work

• Many state and local governments, universities, political organizations, churches, and businesses undertook their own antisubversion campaigns

House Un-American Activities Committee

• 1947

• Launched by Congressman Martin Dies of TX

• Helped spark the Red Scare by holding widely publicized hearings on alleged Communist infiltration in teh movie industry

• Hundreds of actors, directors, and writers whose names had been mentioned in the HUAC investigation were blacklisted by industry executives

Truman Doctrine

• 1947

• Truman asserted an American responsibility to “support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures”

Containment outlined

• 1946

• The US feared the USSR methodically expanding its reach

• The US aimed to counter USSR expansion by limiting Soviet influence in Eastern Europe while reconstituting democratic governments in Western Europe

• Proposed by American diplomat Kennan– aruged that the West’s only recourse was to meet the Soviets “long-term, patient but firm and vigilant containment of Russian expansive tendencies”

• Kenan argued that the Soviet system was unstable and would eventually collapse

Potsdam conference

• 1945

• Truman takes Roosevelt’s place

• Truman had no power to shape events in Eastern Europe, where Soviet-imposed governments could not be eliminated by Truman’s bluster

Yalta conference

• 1945

• Roosevelt, Churchill, and Stalin met in Yalta

• The fate of Eastern Europe divided the Big Three– Stalin insisted that Russian national security required pro-Soviet governments in Eastern Europe, while Roosevelt pressed for self-determination and democratic elections in Eastern Europe

• FDR was forced to accept a lesser pledge from Stalin– to hold “free and unfettered elections” at a future time

• Committed to dividing Germany into four zones, each controlled by one of the four Allied powers

Agreed to establish the United Nations