APUSH Chapter 36 Key Terms

Civil Rights Act , 1964

A landmark act passed through congress under LBJ that banned discrimination based off of race or sex in most private places open to the public, discrimination in employment, and gave the government more power to desegregate the south.

Affirmative Action

Initially meant to discourage discrimination, the practice evolved into proactively hiring individuals from underprivileged groups to be more equitable. LBJ mandated this after the passing of the civil rights act and Nixon expanded it to favor minorities in government jobs.

War on Poverty

An initiative started by Johnson to tackle the issue that 20% of the U.S. population still lived in poverty. Proof of the massive amount of confidence the US had following WW2.

Gulf of Tonkin Resolution

A bill Johnson had passed through congress that basically gave him the right to escalate the war in vietnam as he saw fit. It covered “everything”

Office of Economic Opportunity

An organization created by LBJ in his war on poverty that was tasked with spending its allotted funds in a way to revive struggling regions like apalacia.

Medicare and medicaid

Granted privileges to the elderly and the poor to increase their access to health care.

Project Head Start

An 8 week summer program that cared for all of poor children's emotional, psychological, social, health, and nutritional needs to break the cycle of poverty. Part of LBJ’s war on poverty.

Voting Rights Act

An act passed by LBJ to crack down on practices in the south that restricted African Americans from voting like intimidation, poll taxes, and literacy tests. Explicitly outlawed literacy tests and sent federal voter registrars to the south to register voters.

Malcolm X

One of the men from the second generation of civil rights leaders who took on a more millitist, violent approach to pursue black separatism not racial harmony. An African Muslim.

Elijah Muhammed

The Black nationalist founder of the nation of Islam. Intense African separatists who regularly used violence. Some of his gunmen shot Malcolm X.

Black Panther Party

A millatist socialist party that was opperating chiefly in oakland California. Operated armed citizen patrols to counter police brutality while also doing humanitarian work like children’s breakfasts.

Operation Rolling Thunder

A series of full-scale carpet bombing raids over north vietnam to target viet-con fighters.

Domino Theory

The theory that if one nation fell to communism, its neighbors would soon follow. Used to justify investing so much into the vietnam war, lest cambodia and laos fall too.

Credibility Gap

The widening gap between the people and the government as the public increasingly felt they were being lied to and lost trust in the government.

Doves and Hawks

Anti-war and pro-war protestors respectively.

Tet Offensive

A coordinated attack on 27 south vietnamese cities by the Viet-con during the Vietnamese new year tet. Tho the rebels were not successful, it proved that the Viet-con were not as exhausted as Hawks wanted to believe, undermining the war effort.

George Wallace

3rd Party presidential candidate for the segregationist American Independent Party. Previous Alabama governor who advocated for forceful oppression of Blacks.

Stonewall Incident

A group of off duty cops attacked many gay men at New York’s Stonewall Inn, and of course they fought back.

Students for A Democratic Society

An action group that mobilized students to run anti-poverty and anti-war campaigns. Despite its good intentions, they demonstrations would get increasingly violent and eventually spawn a terrorist group called the weathermen.

Vietnamization

Nixon’s plan to slowly pull out the 540k American men from vietnam and instead give the south vietnamese government the guns and money to arm their own vietnamese soldiers, allowing the vietnamese to fight their own war.

Nixon Doctrine

The proclamation that the US in the future would honor its defense commitments by providing money, weapons, training, and advice but not large amounts of American ground troops.

My Lai Massacre

American troops in Vietnam slaughtered 300 innocent women and children in the village of My Lai.

Cambodian Invasion

A very sudden invasion of Cambodia to destroy Vietcong nests that were operating out of the country. The escalation resulted in momentous protest in the US that ended in the death of many student protestors, forcing Nixon to withdrawal the soldiers after only 2 months of fighting.

Daniel Ellsberg

The former pentagon official who leaked the pentagon papers to the New York TImes. This leaked to the public information about how both the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations provoked the North Vietnamese into attack, starting the vietnam war.

Henry Kissinger

Nixon’s Nation Security Advisor who secretly negotiated with North Vietnamese officials and paved the way for Nixon’s trips to China and Moscow in following years.Responsible for peace in Vietnam

Strategic Arms Limitation Talks

A deal mastermined by Nixon that put a freeze on the construction of long range missiles for 5 years to cool off the cold war. The first step towards slowing the arms race.

liberal Warren Court Decisions

Notable court rulings under Earl Warren include cases that granted greater sexual freedom, protected the rights of criminals, protected the practice of religions, bolstered civil rights, and improved political representation.

Warren Berger

The Nixon appointee to succeed Earl Warren. Once on the Bench was free to vote as he pleased and so upheld most liberal rulings and even voted in favor of Roe v Wade.

Rachel Carson, Silent Spring

A novel that exposed to the public the devastating effects pesticide use had on ecosystems. Bolstered the environmental movement and resulted in the banning of chemicals like ddt.

Nixon's Southern Strategy

Nixon’s goal to woo disillusioned white southern voters by appointing conservative judges, soft-pedalling civil rights, and opposing school bussing to achieve racial balance. Busses were a means of integrating whites and blacks by cramming both races in the same small cabin.

George McGovern

The democratic presidential candidate of 1972, the first to benefit from public primary elections. An ultra liberal dark horse candidate who was banking on the support of young people, racial minorities, feminists, and over leftists who didn’t end up voting at all.

War Powers Act

Required that the president would need to report to congress the commitment or expansion of combat troops in foreign countries. They would then only be authorized for 60 days unless congress agreed to extend it.

Arab Oil Embargo

OPEC’s embargo of the US and other allies of Israel following the soviet backed Egyptian and Syrian invasion of Israel. Made oil prices balloon.