HIST 17C Final Identification review

Brown vs. Board of Education (1954)

A landmark Supreme Court Case in which the court unanimously ruled (9-0) that racial segregation in public schools was unconstitutional

Linda Brown of Topeka is the main plaintiff, who was denied admission to an all-white school

It overturned the 1896 Plessy v. Ferguson doctrine of "separate but equal," with Chief Justice Earl Warren declaring that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal."

Brown II (1955) was a follow-up ruling that was in response to the intense local backlash of the first ruling. It was an order of desegregation to proceed "with all deliberate speed."

It was significant because it served as the primary legal catalyst that launched the modern Civil Rights Movement.

Southern Manifesto

A document written and signed by 101 Southern congressmen in 1956.

It directly protested the Supreme Court's landmark 1954 ruling in Brown v. Board of Education.

The signers claimed the Supreme Court committed a "clear abuse of judicial power," and encroached on states' rights under the 10th Amendment.

Significance: It helped fuel the campaign of "massive resistance" across the South, encouraging local governments to block school integration and deepening the political realignment of Southern Democrats.

Ella Baker

Highly influential, pioneering African American civil rights organizer and activist

Had leadership roles in the NAACP and SCLC but then broke away to help students found the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee in 1960.

Advocated for grassroots organizing and participatory democracy, famously believing that a movement should develop "leadership among other people" rather than relying on a single charismatic leader-> They take away from the main focus of the movement.

empowered women and youth within the Civil Rights Movement and advisor behind the direct-action campaigns like the lunch counter sit-ins.

National Interstate and Defense Highways Act of 1956

National security has become the stated reason for a variety of projects and public policies. (this one being an example of it)

A massive infrastructure law signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower that authorized $25 billion to build a 41,000-mile nationwide highway system

justified under the lens of Cold War National security, arguing that a uniform highway grid was vital for speedy military troop transport and the quick evacuation of major target cities in case of an atomic attack.

This was significant because it heavily accelerated suburbanization (the growth of suburbs), cutting through and destroying low-income and minority urban neighborhoods.

National Defense Higher Education Act of 1958

A landmark piece of federal legislation signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower that pumped over $1 billion of federal funding into the Ameican School system

This was a direct and panicked reaction to the soviet union's surprise launch of Sputnik, the first artificial satellite

It provided low-interest student loans, graduate fellowships, and massive funding directly targeted at improving science, mathematics, engineering, and foreign language education. -> improving the foundation for education as a way to get better discovery of scientific findings that will benefit the gov

It holds much historical significance because it brought the federal government directly into public education funding, which had previously only been seen as a strict states' rights issue.

Perfect example of Military Keynesianism

Federal Reserve

The central banking system of the United States was created by Congress through the Federal Reserve Act of 1913 under President Woodrow Wilson

Following the Panic of 1907, to prevent systemic bank runs, financial panics, and volatile currency shortages

It controls the nation's monetary policy (managing interest rates and money supply), regulates and supervises banking institutions, and acts as a lender of last resort to maintain economic stability.

The Civil Rights Act of 1964

A legislative achievement of the Civil Rights Movement, signed into law by President Lyndon B. Johnson following the assassination of JFK

Completely banned segregation in public spaces (hotels, restaurants, theaters) and outlawed employment discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, or national origin

It created the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission and gave the federal government the power to withhold federal funds from any state program that practiced discrimination.

Significance: It legally ended the Jim Crow era of state-sanctioned segregation and shattered the legal defense of "states' rights" used by signers of the Southern Manifesto.

Also caused permanent realignment of the American electorate, driving white Southern Conservatives out of the Democratic Party and into the Republican Party.

McCarthyism/Second Red Scare

A period of intense, widespread anti-communist paranoia and political repression in the late 1940s and 1950s, stemming from the reckless allegations of Senator Joseph McCarthy

The climate was fueled by the House Un-American Activities Committee, federal loyalty review boards, and Hollywood blacklists (ruined careers).

Historical Significance: It stifled domestic political dissent, forced a rigid conformity across American culture, and pressured politicians to support aggressive Cold War policies out of fear of being labeled "soft on communism."

restricted how people represented their politics

Showdown in Little Rock, 1957

A federal court orders Central High School to enroll 9 Black students.

Gov. Faubus orders the National Guard to surround the school.

Eisenhower is compelled to bring in the army.

Freedom Summer

A highly coordinated, nonviolent voter registration drive and education campaign launched in Mississippi during June 1964

Organized by a coalition of civil rights groups—primarily the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC) Under the guidance of Ella Baker's grassroots philosophy

1,000 mostly white affluent Northern college students to volunteer alongside Black Activists -> a movement that grabbed media attention

Kennedy Presidency

From the outset of his Presidency, JFK emphasized the Cold War and viewed the globe through the prism of relations with the USSR.

Created the Peace Corps in order to improve the U.S.'s image abroad

JFK: the USSR "had hundreds of men and women, scientists, physicists, teachers, engineers, doctors, and nurses...prepared to spend their lives abroad in the service of world communism."

Thus, it is important "that our men and women, dedicated to freedom, can be missionaries, not only for freedom and peace, but to join in a worldwide struggle against poverty and disease and ignorance."

Port Huron Statement 1962

A 25,000-word manifesto written primarily by student activist Tom Hayden and adopted by the Students for a Democratic Society during a meeting in Port Huron, Michigan

It introduced and championed the concept of "participatory democracy," arguing that individual citizens should have direct, meaningful control over the political, economic, and social decisions affecting their lives

It called out the coldness of American bureaucratic institutions; the nuclear arms race of the Cold War; domestic racial segregation; and the alienating corporate consumer culture of the 1950s.

Its historical significance was that it sparked the rise of student activism, catalyzing the 1960s campus protest culture, mobilizing university students to fight for free speech, racial equality, and eventually, the massive anti-Vietnam War movement.

Young Lords 1968

A radical, revolutionary Puerto Rican nationalist and civil rights organization founded in Chicago in 1968 by Jose "Cha Cha" Jimenez, which quickly expanded to a highly influential chapter in New York City.

Originally a Chicago street gang, it transformed into a political activist group inspired by the Black Panther Party, adopting similar community defense tactics, berets, and socialist ideology

Wanted self-determination for Puerto Ricans (in the U.S and on the island) and fought against racial discrimination, police brutality, and urban decay in marginalized neighborhoods.

Historical significance: They gained national attention through high-profile, nonviolent occupations to demand social services, such as the 1969 "Garbage Offensive" (block city streets with trash to protest poor sanitation services) and hijacking a mobile X-ray truck to provide free tuberculosis screening.

Linda Taylor/ Welfare queen

Realized caricature popularized by Ronald Reagan during his 1976 presidential campaign, based on a real Chicago woman named Linda Taylor, who committed extensive welfare fraud

Reagan exaggerated her crimes to create a racially coded stereotype of a lazy, dishonest recipient living luxuriously off government handouts.

Historical significance: It successfully shifted public perception against the American welfare state. It delegitimized New Deal and Great Society safety nets, laying the political groundwork for future welfare cuts.

Voting Rights Act of 1965

A landmark piece of federal civil rights legislation signed by President Lyndon B. Johnson

It outlawed literacy tests, poll taxes, and other discriminatory voting practices used to disenfranchise Black voters. It established federal oversight for states with histories of voting discrimination

The historical significance of this was that it vastly increased Black voter registration and political participation across the South. It is widely considered the most effective federal civil rights law in U.S history

Reaganomics/Supply-Side Economics

The macroeconomic policies promoted by President Ronald Reagan during the 1980s are often called "trickle-down economics."

It focused on widespread tax cuts (especially for corporations and high earners), federal deregulation, reduced domestic spending, and tight monetary policy

This was significant because it fundamentally altered American fiscal policy, favoring corporate growth over government welfare. While it curbed inflation and stimulated growth, it drastically increased national debt and economic inequality.

4 pillars basically: reducing govt spending, lowering income and capital gains taxes, deregulating markets, tightening money supply to curb inflation -> theory that benefits would "trickle down."

The Great Society

A sweeping set of domestic policy initiatives was launched by President Lyndon B. Johnson. B. Johnson in the mid-1960s

It aimed to eliminate poverty and racial injustice by creating Medicare, Medicaid, Head Start, the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), and massive federal education funding.

It represented the high-water mark of mid-century American liberalism. It drastically reduced poverty rates but faced heavy conservative backlash over federal overreach and soaring costs during the Vietnam War.

The Great Society was put on hold, the "guns over butter" idea that government spending should be focused on the war effort instead of social security

Neoliberalism

A political and economic ideology that re-emerged globally in the late 1970s and 1980s, championing free-market capitalism.

David McNally- preached hostility to socialism, trade unions, and social welfare programs, all of which are alleged to 'interfere with the market.'

It advocates for minimal state intervention, deregulation, privatization of public services, free trade, and drastic cuts to government spending.

An economic philosophy that says society works best when businesses have more freedom and the government has less control.

This was significant because it dismantled the Keynesian consensus of the postwar era. It redefined the role of government, shifting the responsibility of social well-being away from the state and onto the individual and the private market. And it increases in social inequality, countries in debt, militarism, and policing.

PRWORA (1996) Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act

A two-party welfare reform law signed by President Bill Clinton that fulfilled his pledge to "end welfare as we know it."

It eliminated the New Deal-era Aid to Families with Dependent Children and replaced it with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families, which added strict work requirements and a lifetime assistance limit of five years.

Historical significance: it codified neoliberalism into social policy, shifting the focus from poverty alleviation to individual work compliance. It dramatically reduced welfare rolls but severely increased deep poverty among single-mother households

Stagflation (1970s)

An unprecedented economic crisis during the 1970s, characterized by stagnant economic growth, high unemployment, and high inflation, occurred simultaneously.

It was triggered by the 1973 OPEC oil embargo and soaring federal spending on the Vietnam War and the Great Society.

It was significant because it destroyed the public confidence in post-WWII Keynesian economic management. This failure cleared the political path for the rise of conservative, free-market policies like Reaganomics.

Freedom budget campaign ( A Freedom Budget for All Americans)

A progressive economic manifesto published in 1966, spearheaded by civil rights leaders A. Philip Randolph and Bayard Rustin, with input from Martin Luther King Jr. (scale up the legislative focus of the March on Washington movement).

The goal was to spend $185 billion over ten years to guarantee full employment, a living wage, affordable housing, universal healthcare, and a guaranteed minimum income for all citizens

Historical Significance: It explicitly linked civil rights with economic justice. It argued that legal desegregation was empty without the structural economic freedom necessary to escape poverty, though the proposal was ultimately sidelined by Vietnam War spending.

The Black Freedom Movement

A historiographical term used by scholars to describe the centuries-long, ongoing struggle of African Americans to achieve full citizenship, human rights, and self-determination

Encompasses the mid-century Civil Rights Movement, but extends far beyond to include the slave rebellions, Reconstruction politics, the Harlem Renaissance, Black power, and contemporary racial justice

It emphasizes that the struggle is continuous, global, deeply tied to economic justice, and driven by diverse grassroots strategies

Volcker Shock

A decision taken by the US Federal Reserve chairman, Paul Volcker, to defeat stagflation by dramatically raising interest rates in order to bring inflation down.

Volcker severely restricted the nation's money supply, forcing the federal funds interest rate to an unprecedented peak of 20% in 1981

The shock successfully broke the back of inflation, but at a massive cost--it triggered the deepest American recession since the Great Depression, devastated the manufacturing sector, and broke the power of industrial labor unions

The effort to stabilize inflation via high interest rates destabilized communities by helping produce high unemployment and deindustrialization

social citizenship (concept from the British sociologist T.H Marshall)

A political concept where "Social citizenship followed the emergence of first civil and then political citizenship, and it promised every member of a society basic economic security as well as access to other material and cultural resources generated by the society."

asserting that true citizenship requires more than just civil rights (free speech) and political rights (voting)—it demands a guaranteed baseline of economic security and social well-being.

This idea underpins the creation of modern welfare states, arguing that education, healthcare, and financial security during old age or unemployment are fundamental rights of all citizens.

Its significance is that it served as the philosophical backbone for the New Deal and the Great Society but was rolled back under neoliberal political philosophy.

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution (1964)

A joint resolution passed by Congress in direct response to alleged naval clashes between North Vietnamese torpedo boats and U.S destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin

It granted President Lyndon B. Johnson the authority to take "all necessary measures" to repel armed attacks and prevent further aggression in Southeast Asia

It allowed the president to massively escalate the Vietnam War into a full-scale conflict without an official declaration of war from Congress, severely damaging the constitutional balance of war powers

War Powers Act 1973

A federal law passed by Congress, over the veto of President Richard Nixon, was designed to check the executive branch's unchecked power to wage war

It mandates that the president must notify Congress within 48 hours of deploying military forces abroad and must withdraw those forces within 60 to 90 days unless Congress explicitly authorizes the use of military force or declares war

It was a direct, legislative rebuke to the executive overreach exposed by the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution and the secret bombings of Cambodia during the Vietnam War, though nearly every president since has contested its constitutionality.

Counterinsurgency (COIN)

A comprehensive military, political, and psychological strategy designed to defeat a domestic rebellion movement by simultaneously combating insurgents (rebels who revolt against a civil authority or an established government) and winning the support of the local civilian population

Served as the core strategic framework for early U.S. involvement in Vietnam. Programs like the Strategic Hamlet program forcibly relocated Vietnamese peasants into fortified villages to isolate them from communist Viet Cong guerrillas, a tactic that deeply alienated locals and ultimately failed.

The Vietnam War 1955-1975

A highly divisive Cold War conflict fought between the communist North Vietnam (supported by the Soviet Union and China) and the Capitalist South Vietnam (supported by the United States and its Western allies)

American intervention was driven entirely by the Domino Theory--the belief that if one nation in Southeast Asia fell to communism, neighboring countries would inevitably fall as well.

U.S forces struggled to fight an asymmetric war against the Viet Cong (VC), a communist rebel movement hidden within South Vietnam's civilian population, which relied on the dense jungle terrain and the Ho Chi Minh Trail supply line.

Black Panther Party (BPP)

A revolutionary political organization founded in Oakland, California, in 1966 by college students Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale. Established to challenge police brutality, systemic racism, and economic exploitation

They became famous for organizing armed citizens' patrols ("copwatching") to monitor police activity in Black neighborhoods, utilizing their Second Amendment rights.

The party operated under a manifesto that demanded land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice, peace, and an immediate end to the robbery of the Black community by capitalists.

Beyond their armed image, the Panthers created massive social safety nets. Their Free Breakfast for Children Program fed tens of thousands of hungry students daily

Heavily popularized the Black Power movement and the "Black is beautiful" cultural shift. Their organizational model and focus on self-determination directly inspired other radical civil rights groups of the late 1960s, including the Young Lords.

NAFTA (North American Free Trade Agreement)

An agreement for free trade between the United States, Canada, and Mexico. Negotiated by President George H.W Bush and implemented by President Bill Clinton in 1994

it systematically eliminated most tariffs and trade barriers on goods shipped among the three North American nations

It served to make items cheaper and boosted business trade. However, it also caused many US factories to close down because companies moved their manufacturing jobs to Mexico, where labor was cheaper.

9/11 and the War on Terror

The global military, geopolitical, and bureaucratic campaign launched by President George W. Bush following the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by al-Qaeda

It initiated prolonged, full-scale military invasions of Afghanistan (2001) and Iraq (2003), alongside the creation of the Department of Homeland Security and the passage of the Patriot Act.

Completely replaced the Cold War containment doctrine as the organizing framework for American foreign policy. Domestically, it triggered a massive expansion of executive war-making authority.

Occupy Movement 2011

A progressive, grassroots protest movement that began in Zuccotti Park in New York City's Wall Street financial district and rapidly spread into a global phenomenon

Protesters were angry that the government saved big banks during the 2008 financial crisis while regular people lost their homes. It popularized the phrase "the 99% vs. the 1%" to highlight economic inequality.

The Washington Consensus

A strict list of economic rules given to poor or struggling countries by powerful groups like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), if they wanted to borrow money

It forced these countries to cut spending on public services (like schools and healthcare) and sell off government businesses to private companies. Critics say it hurts poor people to help big global corporations.

PRWORA (1996) Welfare Reform

A law signed by President Bill Clinton that completely changed how the US government gives financial help to poor families

. This was significant because it guaranteed government cash aid. It added strict rules saying people must get a job to receive welfare, and it put a lifetime limit of five years on financial assistance

PACTCO Strike 1981

A strike where more than 11,000 government air traffic controllers walked off the job, demanding better pay and hours

President Ronald Reagan fired all of them for striking. This aggressive move crushed the workers' union and signaled to private companies that it was okay to break up unions, leading to a long decline in union power in America.

The Great Recession 2007-2009

The worst economic collapse since the Great Depression was caused by banks giving out bad home loans that they knew people couldn't afford.

The housing market crashed, millions of people lost their homes and jobs, and big banks went bankrupt. The government had to step in with billions of dollars to save the banks, which made the public furious.

Seattle Protests (1999)

A massive street protest where tens of thousands of activists blocked a major global trade meeting (the World Trade Organization) in Seattle.

It was the first time environmental groups, students groups, and labor unions fully teamed up to protest global corporate greed, showing the world that many people were angry about free-trade deals

Carter vs. Reagan 1980 Election

The presidential election in which conservative Republican Ronald Reagan easily beat the incumbent Democrat Jimmy Carter

Americans were tired of Carter because of a weak economy and high prices. Reagan's victory marked a massive shift in American politics toward conservatism, low taxes, and less government spending.

welfare state

The concept that a government is responsible for ensuring its citizens have a basic safety net, such as public education, food assistance, unemployment checks, and healthcare for the elderly.

It was built up during the 1930s (New Deal) and 1960s (Great Society). However, starting in the 1980s, politicians began cutting, privatizing, and reducing the scope of these programs to save government money.