A-level History, Paper 1 - Topic 1B (1929-80)

What was Herbert Hoover’s ideology of “rugged individualism”?

Rugged individualism meant:

• Individuals should solve their own problems

• The government should avoid welfare provision

• Businesses should remain unregulated

• Federal intervention should be limited

• America should remain isolationist

Significance:

This ideology shaped Hoover’s response to the Depression and contributed to the collapse of confidence in Republican leadership by 1932.

What happened during the Wall Street Crash (1929)?

• 24 October 1929 → panic selling began in the NY stock exchange
  29 October 1929 → 16,410,030 shares sold

• Losses - $30 billion wiped out

What were the economic effects of the Great Depression by 1933?

• Unemployment rose from 3% (1929) → 25% (1933), 13–17 million unemployed

• GNP fell from $203.6bn → $144.2bn

• 5,500 banks closed

• 20,000 companies went bankrupt

• Car sales fell from 4.5 million → just over 1 million

What were the social effects of the Great Depression?

• Marriage rate fell from 1.23 million → 982,000

• Birth rate fell from 21.2 → 19.5 per thousand

• Homelessness increased, 1–2 million unemployed people became “hoboes”

• States were forced to close schools and cut services

Why did Hoover’s response to the Depression lose public support?

Reasons:

• refused direct federal relief initially
  relied on voluntarism
  prioritised business recovery over individuals
  claimed “prosperity is just around the corner”

Result:

public humiliation:

shanty towns labelled “Hoovervilles”
newspapers used as blankets by homeless, “Hoover blankets”

What measures did Hoover take to combat the Depression?

• Agricultural Marketing Act (1929) - created Federal Farm Board with funds of $500m

• Hawley-Smoot Tariff (1930) - raised tariffs to 40%, foreign countries did not import American goods with international trade falling by $500m between 1929-30

• Moratorium on war debts (1931) - paused repayments on loans for 18 months

• Reconstruction Finance Corporation (1932) - loaned up to $2bn to banks/businesses

• Emergency Relief and Construction Act (1932) - allowed $1.5bn loans to states

• Voluntarism - tried to persuade businessmen and state governments to solve the problems of the Depression through their voluntary efforts

Why did the Bonus Army incident damage Hoover politically?

15,000–20,000 veterans marched on Washington (1932) demanding early payment of WWI bonuses

Response:

• The army led by Gen. Douglas MacArthur used tear gas to disperse the Bonus Army

• camp was destroyed

• two babies died

Impact:

• Americans were horrified at the treatment of the veterans and Hoover was blamed. He became the most hated man in America

• major electoral damage before 1932 election.

Why did Roosevelt win the 1932 election?

Reasons:

Failure of Hoover policies
promise of New Deal reforms
support for unemployment insurance
support for pensions
promise to repeal Prohibition
effective radio communication (“fireside chats”)

Significance:

Beginning of Democratic dominance 1933–72

How did the New Deal change the role of the federal government?

Federal government now:

• created jobs
  regulated banks
  supported farmers
  introduced welfare provision
  protected trade unions

Ended laissez-faire tradition

Established a modern liberal presidency

Why did Roosevelt’s presidency mark the rise of the “imperial presidency”?

• expanded executive agencies
  used emergency legislation
  communicated directly with voters
  challenged Supreme Court authority
  served four terms (1933–45)

What were some New Deal policies Roosevelt implemented?

Emergency Banking Act (1933):

• Closed all banks temporarily (“bank holiday”)

• Only reopened financially secure banks

• Restored public confidence in banking

Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) (1933):

• Paid farmers to reduce production

• Raised crop prices

• Reduced agricultural overproduction

• Farm incomes rose by about 50% between 1932–1935

Works Progress Administration (WPA) (1935) - Largest New Deal employer

• Created jobs building:

  • schools

  • bridges

  • roads

  • hospitals

  • Employed about 8.5 million people

Social Security Act (1935)

• Created the first national welfare system:

  • old-age pensions

  • unemployment insurance

  • disability support

  • aid for dependent children

How did the New Deal reshape the Democratic Party coalition?

Support came from:

• working-class voters
  trade unions
  African Americans (shift from Republicans)
  immigrant communities
  Southern whites
  urban voters

Result:

• long-term Democratic electoral dominance until late 1960s.

What was the opposition to the New Deal?

Opposition from the Supreme Court:

• The Supreme Court struck down key New Deal legislation as unconstitutional.

• Examples:

  • National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA) declared unconstitutional (1935)

  • Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) declared unconstitutional (1936)

Opposition from Republicans and Conservatives:

• Republicans argued that New Deal policies:

  • expanded government too much

  • increased taxes

  • threatened free enterprise

  • moved America toward socialism

Opposition from radical critics (the New Deal didn’t go far enough):

• Huey Long, who proposed a “Share Our Wealth” programme

• Father Charles Coughlin

What were the successes of the New Deal?

Employment:

• New Deal agencies directly created jobs:

  • Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) employed 3 million young men

  • Works Progress Administration (WPA) employed 8.5 million people

  • Public Works Administration (PWA) funded large infrastructure projects

  • Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) created regional employment

Role of Government:

• New Deal saw the American government take on a new role, in which it had the responsibility to look after the welfare of its citizens

• Government became more directly involved in the lives of the public

Welfare:

• The Social Security Act (1935) introduced

• farm income support (AAA)

Role of President:

• Roosevelt restored the morale of the nation. His ‘fireside chats’ showed his compassion for the American people

• The Office of the President started to become more powerful in the formation of policy and legislation.

What were the limitations of the New Deal?

• NRA – could be argued that this did more harm than good by attempting to enforce industrial relations by legislation.

• Housing – no solution found for the housing shortage

• Women – Nothing done to encourage the changing role of women. The NRA said men should be paid more than women.

• Black and Mexican Americans - about 200,000 blacks and Mexicans were employed by New Deal agencies but they were discriminated against

  • Roosevelt did not pass a law to stop lynching in both 1934 and 1937 because he feared losing the support of the Southern Democrats.

How did WWII transform the role of the federal government?

Government:

• controlled production
  directed labour
  expanded military spending
  mobilised the economy fully

Result:

• ended unemployment

What were the economic impacts of WW2?

• Farm income grew by 250%. -

• Unemployment stood at only 1.2% in 1944

• By the end of the war, 60% of women were employed.

• Between 1940-1945, 5 million black Americans moved to cities, getting jobs in defence plants.

• GNP rose from $91.3 billion in 1939 to $166.6 billion by 1945

• Roosevelt spent double what any other US government had done over the previous 150 years.

What were the social impacts of WW2?

• 15 million servicemen and women were called up into the American armed forces.

• Japanese-Americans - there were calls for the internment of Japanese Americans. 10 relocation centres were set up in the West of the USA where 100,000 Japanese Americans were forcibly sent.

• African-Americans – Roosevelt issued Executive Order 8802 to ban discrimination in defence plants and set up the Fair Employment Practices Committee to ensure it was carried out.

• Women – not subject to conscription, and so employers like to employ them e.g many black women worked in the defence plants.

How did WWII strengthen presidential leadership?

President became:

• Commander-in-Chief of the global war effort
  director of economic mobilisation
  leader of alliance diplomacy

• Established expectation of a strong wartime presidency.

How did the Cold War change the role of the presidency after 1945?

President is now responsible for:

nuclear policy
global alliances
containment strategy
military interventions abroad

Examples:

• Korea
  Vietnam
  arms race diplomacy

What was the Second Red Scare?

• Late 1940s–1950s

• Causes:

Cold War tensions
fear of Soviet espionage
Communist victory in China (1949)

What were the effects of the Second Red Scare

Federal Loyalty Boards:

• March 1947, Truman issued an Executive Order which established Federal Loyalty Boards, which allowed the removal of federal employees if they had been disloyal.

• Between 1947-1951 3,000 government employees were forced to resign and 300 were fired.

HUAC (House Un-American Activities Committee):

• After the Second World War in 1947 the HUAC was revived and began to hold hearings against those suspected of subversive activities.

• HUAC investigation of Hollywood became infamous between 1947 and 1951.

Hollywood Ten:

• October 1947: Ten writers and directors were interrogated by the HUAC and asked if they had ever been members of the Communist Party.

• refused to answer by taking the Fifth Amendment (right to silence). The ‘Hollywood Ten’ were sent to prison for 1 year and sacked from their jobs.

Rosenberg Case:

• In 1949, the Soviet Union had developed its own atomic bomb. The American government had not expected this to happen for a few more years, and there was a strong suspicion that Americans had given away atomic secrets to the Soviets.

• This led eventually to the married couple Ethel and Julius Rosenberg (scientists) being arrested on suspicion of spying and giving atomic secrets to the Soviet Union.

• The Rosenbergs were sentenced to death and placed on death row for two years until their execution by electric chair at Sing Sing prison in June 1953.

What role did anti-communism play in domestic politics after 1945?

McCarthyism 1950-1954:

• 9th February 1950, Republican Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin claimed to have a list of 205 names of Communists who worked for the State Department.

• McCarthy was believed because America was not doing well in the war against North Korea, and so it was believed that Communists were working for the American government.

• Led to a growing anti-communist sentiment among the American public.

• McCarthy created a climate of fear in America, and people still spied on their neighbours long after he had died.

• There was a significant curb on civil liberties.

• FBI saw an increase in its power e.g to tap telephones, bug homes, offices and hotels

How did the Korean War impact American domestic policy?

Expansion of presidential war powers:

• President Harry S. Truman committed US troops to Korea in 1950 without a formal declaration of war from Congress.

• This strengthened the precedent that presidents could:

  • deploy troops abroad

  • act quickly in Cold War crises

  • bypass Congress in military decisions

Increased defence spending and militarisation:

• US defence spending rose from about $13 billion (1950) → $50 billion (1953)

Strengthened support for:

• loyalty investigations

• anti-communist policies

• political figures like Joseph McCarthy

• Increased global responsibility of the presidency

Why did the Vietnam War weaken confidence in the US government and presidency?

The “credibility gap” between government claims and reality:

• Government leaders such as Lyndon B. Johnson repeatedly claimed the war was being won.

• Television coverage showed:

  • heavy casualties

  • destroyed villages

  • lack of military progress

• Tet Offensive (1968) - Although a military setback for North Vietnam, it shocked Americans because it proved the enemy remained strong.

Rising American casualties:

• Over 58,000 Americans died in Vietnam and hundreds of thousands were wounded.

• Many Americans began questioning:

  • Why the USA was fighting
    whether victory was possible
    whether containment justified the cost

The draft (conscription) created domestic resentment:

• The Selective Service draft forced young men into military service.

• Problems:

  • working-class Americans disproportionately drafted
    University students could delay service
    minorities drafted at higher rates

• Major student protests across universities, e.g. large demonstrations at Kent State University in 1970, ended when National Guard troops shot protesters, killing four students.

Media coverage brought the war into American homes:

• Americans regularly saw:

  • combat footage
    civilian casualties
    burning villages

• Coverage of the My Lai Massacre shocked the public and damaged America’s moral reputation.

Economic pressures weakened domestic support:

• Vietnam War spending contributed to:

  • inflation
    budget strain
    reduced funding for domestic reforms

• This weakened support for Johnson’s Great Society programmes.

• Americans increasingly questioned government priorities.

What was the counterculture movement?

Youth-led cultural movement rejecting:

• materialism
  traditional authority
  Cold War politics
  Vietnam War
  racial inequality

• e.g. Woodstock festival, emergence of hippie culture

Associated with:

• civil rights activism
  student protest
  anti-war movement

• Challenged traditional political values.

Why did counterculture provoke conservative backlash?

Conservatives believed it threatened:

• religion
  family values
  patriotism
  law and order

Led to support for:

• strong policing e.g. religious groups held campus campaigns to offer an alternative to the hippie counter-culture
  traditional morality
  anti-protest policies

• Bill Bright’s 1967 ‘Campus Crusade for Christ’ which visited many university campuses, including the radical Berkeley in California.

Prepared ground for conservative revival - 3rd November 1969, Republican Richard Nixon was elected President.

Why did public confidence in government decline between 1968–80?

Economic Problems:

• By 1968, the Vietnam War was costing the United States $3 billion dollars a month, and the federal budget skyrocketed to $179 billion.

• Great Inflation- huge price increases took place in the 1970s because of the Vietnam War

• The oil crisis brought to an end an era of cheap energy.

• High inflation had many negative effects on the American economy. It wiped out many families' savings.

• 1970s, 30 million American jobs disappeared.

• By 1979 inflation had climbed to 13.3 percent under Jimmy Carter.

• By November 1982, unemployment hit 10.8 percent.

Role of the Press:

• By 1966, 93% of American homes had televisions. Therefore, the press had a huge impact

• By 1967, 90% of the evening news was devoted to the war, and roughly 50 million people watched television news each night

How did political scandals weaken presidential authority in the 1970s?

Watergate scandal - Nixon’s attempt to cover up his administration’s illegal actions unravelled in 1973.

Consequences:

• resignation of president
  investigations into executive power
  greater congressional oversight

Significance:

• major turning point in decline of presidential prestige.