The Crisis of Authority
The Youth Culture
The election of Richard Nixon in 1968 reflected a reaction against perceived threats to traditional American society and culture.
Nixon projected an image of dedication to traditional values.
The youth culture involved social and cultural protests by younger Americans driven by two main impulses:
Creating a new community to challenge elites, end the war, and promote justice.
Personal liberation through self-expression and challenging societal pressures.
The New Left
The New Left emerged from the racial crisis and the Vietnam War, radicalizing many American students.
In 1962, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) was formed, becoming the most prominent organization of the New Left.
The Port Huron Statement expressed disillusionment with existing society and a determination to create a new politics.
Student radicalism focused on issues related to the modern university.
The Free Speech Movement at the University of California at Berkeley in 1964 was the first major campus outburst.
Antiwar movement intensified campus turmoil, with demonstrations, riots, and building seizures becoming common.
Small groups like the Weathermen engaged in arson and bombings, causing destruction and loss of life.
Many supported SDS's stance on specific issues, especially the Vietnam War, leading to large antiwar demonstrations.
Opposition to the military draft fueled the antiwar movement, as deferments were gradually abolished.
Many draft-age Americans refused induction or fled to Canada and Sweden to avoid conscription.
The Counterculture
The counterculture was openly scornful of middle-class values and conventions.
Visible characteristics included long hair, unconventional clothing, and rebellious speech.
It promoted a more permissive view of sex and drugs.
The counterculture challenged the banality and artificiality of modern American society.
Hippies and social dropouts sought refuge in simpler, more "natural" existence in communes.
Personal fulfillment was sought through rejecting middle-class inhibitions and embracing personal instinct and desire.
Commitment to Personal Fulfillment
The counterculture reflected broader impulses within society.
Long hair, marijuana use, freer attitudes toward sex, and iconoclastic language spread beyond dedicated adherents.
Rock music became a pervasive element of the new youth society.
The Beatles' popularity in 1964 created a sensation and influenced rock music.
Rock music began to reflect iconoclastic values, with bands like the Beatles experimenting with mystical themes inspired by drugs and Eastern religions.
The Rolling Stones and others explored themes of anger, frustration, and rebellion.
Folk singers like Bob Dylan and Joan Baez expressed political radicalism.
Rock's rhythms and sensuality made it an appropriate vehicle for expressing social and political unrest.
Woodstock in 1969 symbolized the fusion of rock music and the counterculture, with 400,000 people gathering for a peaceful music festival.
Altamont in 1969 exposed a darker side of the youth culture, with violence and deaths occurring at the Rolling Stones concert.
The Mobilization of Minorities
African-American protest inspired other minorities to assert themselves and demand redress of grievances.
Indians, Hispanic Americans, gay men and lesbians, and others experienced growing self-expression and political activism.
Seeds of Indian Militancy
American Indians, or Native Americans, had deep grievances against the prevailing culture.
They were the least prosperous, least healthy, and least stable ethnic group and had been largely ignored.
Federal tribal policy aimed to incorporate Indians into mainstream American society through "termination."
The government withdrew official recognition of tribes and encouraged assimilation into white society.
These policies were largely disastrous, leading to resistance and the mobilization of Indian militants.
The National Congress of American Indians was revitalized.
Democratic administrations made modest efforts to restore tribal autonomy.
The Indian population rapidly increased, nearly doubling between 1950 and 1970, reaching approximately 800,000.
The Indian Civil Rights Movement
In 1961, the Declaration of Indian Purpose stressed the right to choose their own way of life and preserve their heritage.
The National Indian Youth Council promoted Indian nationalism and intertribal unity.
In 1968, the American Indian Movement (AIM) was established, drawing support from urban areas and reservations.
The Indian Civil Rights Act of 1968 guaranteed reservation Indians many of the protections accorded other citizens and recognized the legitimacy of tribal laws.
AIM and other groups were not satisfied, leading to clashes with officials and occupations of Alcatraz Island and Wounded Knee.
In 1969, Nixon appointed Louis Bruce as commissioner of Indian affairs and promised increased tribal self-determination and federal aid.
In 1972, demonstrators occupied the Bureau of Indian Affairs building in Washington.
In 1973, AIM members seized and occupied Wounded Knee, South Dakota, demanding changes in reservation administration and honoring treaty obligations.
The Indian civil rights movement helped tribes win new legal rights and protections.
Latino Activism
Latinos, or Hispanic Americans, were the fastest-growing minority group in the United States in the 1970s.
Large numbers of Mexicans had entered the country during World War II and remained in the Southwest and the Pacific Coast.
By 1960, Los Angeles had a larger Mexican population than any place except Mexico City.
In 1960, the census reported slightly more than 3 million Latinos living in the United States. By 1970, that number had grown to 9 million and by 2000 to 35 million. Hispanics constituted more than a third of all legal immigrants to the United States after 1960.
Large numbers of Puerto Ricans migrated to eastern urban areas, particularly New York.
South Florida's Cuban population began with middle-class refugees fleeing the Castro regime in the early 1960s.
In 1980, a second, much poorer wave of Cuban immigrants arrived in Florida.
Later in the 1980s, immigrants arrived from Central and South America.
Latinos strengthened their ethnic identification and organized for political and economic power.
Hispanics in Miami filled influential positions.
La Raza Unida exercised influence in southern California and elsewhere in the Southwest.
César Chávez created the United Farm Workers (UFW) in California.
Mexican Americans and others were slow to develop political influence.
Hispanics formed one of the poorest segments of the United States population.
Gay Liberation
Gay men and lesbians sought to win political and economic rights and social acceptance.
Homosexuality had been a generally unacknowledged reality throughout American history.
By the late 1960s, liberating impulses mobilized gay men and lesbians to fight for their rights.
The Stonewall Riot in 1969 marked the beginning of the gay liberation movement.
New organizations like the Gay Liberation Front sprang up.
Public discussion and media coverage of homosexuality increased.
Gay activists challenged the assumption that homosexuality was aberrant behavior.
The gay liberation movement transformed the outlook of many gay men and lesbians.
By the early 1980s, the gay liberation movement had made remarkable strides.
The AIDS epidemic affected the gay community disastrously but failed to halt the growth of gay liberation.
By the early twenty-first century, gay men and lesbians had achieved many milestones.
Backlash against Gay Liberation
Backlash against gay liberation emerged.
President Bill Clinton's 1993 effort to end the ban on gay men and lesbians serving in the military met criticism.
Conservative voters approved referendum questions outlawing civil rights protections for gay men and lesbians and voted state bans on gay marriage.
Antigay violence continued periodically.
The New Feminism
Women constitute over 50 percent of the United States population.
During the 1960s and 1970s, women renewed demands for liberation.
The Rebirth
The 1963 publication of Betty Friedan's The Feminine Mystique is cited as the first event of contemporary women's liberation.
Friedan interviewed women who had been graduated with her in 1947.
These women were frustrated and unhappy with no outlets for their intelligence, talent, and education.
Kennedy had established the President's Commission on the Status of Women.