The 1920s

  • 1920, Republican Warren G. Harding. Pres 1921-1923

    • Promised a “return to normalcy”

  • 1920 census: 50% urban, 50% rural

    • Had been a mostly rural area before

  • Economy was explosive

    • “Poverty will be over in a couple years”

  • 1923-1929: President Calvin Coolidge

  • Secretary of Treasury: Mellon

    • Mellons were among the top 5 families in the US
    • Tax cuts, especially for the wealthy

  • Cars

    • More Americans are starting to purchase cars 
    • GM innovation: GMAC. people can buy cars on credit

  • Houses were built

    • Generated and signified wealth

  • Radio introduced - consumer good, mass communication

  • Labor union membership dropped from 5M ➝ 3M

    • Corporations started to offer benefits to their employees ➝ could afford to bc of the economy

  • 1915: KKK comeback at Stone Mountain

    • Peak of membership in 1925
    • Targeted blacks
    • Also targeted immigrants, Catholics, and Jews
    • Highest membership rates were in Indiana and Oregon
    • Weren't many black people there - focused more on Jews, etc.

  • 1924 Immigration Act

    • Ideas of the Klan are now policy
    • “Only people here should have rights” ppl who’ve been there for a while. Nativism
    • Reduced immigration. Went from 1M down to 200K
    • Quotas on how many ppl could come from a certain country. Favored NE Europe (white people) and Mexico (for their workers)
    • Lasted until 1965

  • 1861: Charles Darwin

    • Published Origins of Species. Evolution and natural selection
    • More mainstream in 1900s
    • Protestants are Christians who attach a lot of significance to the Bible
    • Catholics have the authority of the Pope - final word
    • 1900s - public schools expanding
    • By 1920s, Protestants will have split because of Darwin
    • Evangelicals and mainline protestants
    • Division over how to interpret the bible bc of darwin
    • Evangelicals: literal understanding. Forget darwin
    • Mainline: a lot of the bible is myth. Incorporate science and religion
    • Two types: Baptists and Presbyterians
    • Had evangelical baptists and mainline baptists, etc.
    • Split the churches
    • originally evangelical and mainline baptists, and evangelical and mainline presbyterians
    • after the split, there were evangelical baptists, evangelical presbyterians, mainline baptists, and mainline presbyterians

  • By 1920s, 14 states banned the teaching of evolution in high schools

  • ACLU: started for freedom of speech

    • Believed religion shouldn’t shape the government

  • 1925 Scopes Trial

    • ACLU puts up ad in Tennessee for a teacher of evolution. Sacrifice: teach evolution and have trial
    • Potential for ACLU to overturn law
    • John Scopes (PE teacher) is the fall guy
    • ACLU brings in the best defense attorney: Clarence Darrow
    • Popular bc of radio
    • William Jennings Bryan
    • Hated the idea of Social Darwinism
      • Social darwinism: If ppl are more powerful in society, let them be. No government regulation
      • Antithesis of progressivism
    • Opposes corporation
    • Came to Tennessee to join prosecution
    • Wanted to take down evolution so he can take down social darwinism
    • Darrow puts Bryan on the stand and questions him on the Bible’s contradictions
    • Bryan looks a fool - hasn’t studied the bible
    • Scopes loses, pays $100 fine
    • Bryan died a week later
    • Scopes trial perpetuated idea of division between rural and urban areas
    • City: people are good science ppl
    • Rural: backwards christian (evangelical) ppl

  • 1968: Supreme Court declares all laws banning the teaching of evolution were unconstitutional