Chapter 29 Key Terms - Unit 15 - 1950s and early Civil Rights Movement

Taft-Hartley Act - 1947

Act that provides balance of power between union and management by designating certain union activities as unfair labor practices; also known as Labor-Management Relations Act.

Fair Deal - 1949

An economic extension of the New Deal proposed by Harry Truman that called for higher minimum wage, housing and full employment. It led only to the Housing Act of 1949 and the Social Security Act of 1950 due to opposition in congress.

Peace Corps - 1961

An agency established in 1961 to provide volunteer assistance to developing nations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America

Bretton Woods - 1944

Representatives from 44 countries met in New Hampshire to design a new international monetary system; resulted in the establishment of the IMF and the World Bank.

Veterans Administration - 1930

A federal agency that assists former soldiers. Following World War II, the VA helped veterans purchase new homes with no down payment, sparking a building boom that created jobs in the construction industry and fueling consumer spending in home appliances and automobiles.

Beats - 1950

This cultural group/movement supported bohemianism and harsh critiques of U.S. society; strong influence on 1960s counterculture

Baby Boom - 1946

The period of time when the number of annual births exceeded 2 per 100 women (or approximately 1% of the total population size) in the United States.

National Interstate and Defense Highways Act - 1956

Act that provided funds for construction of 42,500 miles of roads throughout the US

Sunbelt

States in the south and southwest that have a warm climate and tend to be politically conservative

Kerner Commission - 1967

created in July, 1967 by President Lyndon B. Johnson to investigate the causes of the 1967 race riots in the United States

Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) - 1942

Civil rights organization started in 1942 and best known for its "freedom rides," bus journeys challenging racial segregation in the South in 1961.

American GI Forum - 1948

A group founded by World War II veterans in Corpus Christi, Texas, in 1948 to protest the poor treatment of Mexican American soldiers and veterans.

Brown v. Board of Education - 1954

The Supreme Court overruled Plessy v. Ferguson, declared that racially segregated facilities are inherently unequal and ordered all public schools desegregated.

Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) - 1957

Group founded by Martin Luther King Jr. to fight against segregation using nonviolent means using peaceful forms of protest.

March on Washington - 1963

To show support for the Civil Rights Bill in Congress. Martin Luther King gave his famous "I have a dream..." speech. 250,000 people attended the rally

Civil Rights Act of 1964

This act made racial, religious, and sex discrimination by employers illegal and gave the government the power to enforce all laws governing civil rights, including desegregation of schools and public places.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

Echoed 15th Amendment, States prohibited from using any test or device, such as a literacy test, to prevent citizens from voting.

Miles Davis

Most commercially successful jazz musician, Merged jazz and rock to create fusion

Allen Ginsberg

A leading member of the Beat movement whose writings featured existential mania for intense experience and frantic motion.

Jack Kerouac

A key author of the Beat movement whose best selling novel, On the Road helped define the movement with it's featured frenzied prose and plotless ramblings.

Dr. Benjamin Spock

Was a 1950's doctor who told the whole baby boom generation how to raise their kids. He also said that raising them was more important and rewarding than extra $ would be.

William J. Levitt

Built new communities in the suburbs after WWII, using mass-production techniques.

James Farmer

Civil rights leader who founded the Congress of Racial Equality

Cesar Chavez

Organized Union Farm Workers (UFW); help migratory farm workers gain better pay & working conditions.

Thurgood Marshall

American civil rights lawyer, first black justice on the Supreme Court of the United States. Marshall was a tireless advocate for the rights of minorities and the poor.

Rosa Parks

United States civil rights leader who refused to give up her seat on a bus to a white man in Montgomery (Alabama) and so triggered the national civil rights movement (born in 1913)

Martin Luther King Jr.

U.S. Baptist minister and civil rights leader. A noted orator, he opposed discrimination against blacks by organizing nonviolent resistance and peaceful mass demonstrations. He was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Nobel Peace Prize (1964)