American History Notes

Unit ZERO: American Ideals

  • Democracy: American people elect their own leaders.
  • Liberty: Freedom to pursue happiness, make choices, and control one's life.
  • Equality: Everyone has the same rights and liberties, regardless of differences.
  • Opportunity: People should have a chance to succeed and have basic needs met through employment.
  • Rights: Freedoms enjoyed by Americans, preventing government control.
  • Justice: Wrongs will be punished, and good deeds rewarded.
  • Constitution: Establishes central laws through 27 amendments.
  • Bill of Rights: First ten amendments, guaranteeing major rights (speech, religion, arms, protection from unjust punishments).
  • Declaration of Independence: Declared separation from Great Britain, outlined British wrongs, and named founding ideals.

How America Has Fallen Short

  • Slavery: Millions of Africans enslaved; laws and political system upheld slavery; chattel slavery (children born to enslaved parents were also enslaved).
  • Reconstruction: Post-Civil War effort to establish citizenship and political rights for African Americans, enforced with military occupation. Ended with a corrupt bargain in 1876.
  • Segregation: After Reconstruction, Southern politicians created unequal treatment through Jim Crow laws, segregating public spaces (separate but equal doctrine).
  • **Settler Colonialism: ** * American settlers violated treaties with Native Nations, took land, and removed Native Americans.
    • Indian Removal Act of 1830, Trail of Tears: Forced removal of Native Americans.
    • Assimilation was forced, and massacres occurred (Sand Creek Massacre, California Genocide, Wounded Knee).

Creating Change in America

  • Legislative Branch:
    • Senate & House of Representatives create laws through votes.
    • Senate elected at the state level; congresspeople represent districts.
    • Capable of impeaching the president.
  • Executive Branch:
    • President and cabinet (e.g., State Department, Justice Department).
    • Elected through Electoral College.
  • Judicial Branch:
    • Supreme Court and lower courts decide law constitutionality and interpret laws.
    • Appointed for life by the president, confirmed by the Senate.
  • Cultural Movement:
    • Change through culture (art, music, literature, theater).
    • Influences thinking and draws attention to issues (e.g., 1960s counterculture).
  • Political Movement:
    • Political organization uniting around goals.
    • Can become a political party, competing in elections.
  • Journalism:
    • Spreading information through newspapers, media organizations, and the Internet.
    • Exposes issues and injustices.
    • Example: Ida B. Wells’ pamphlet on lynchings.
  • Litigation: Taking legal action against opponents in court through lawsuits.

UNIT ONE: Rapid Industrialization

  • What Made It Possible:

    • Homestead Act: Free land in the West.
    • Civil War increased infrastructure development (railroads).
    • Civil War led to standardized national currency.
    • Telegraph (invented in 1840s) enabled rapid communication.
    • Unequal benefits: Land taken from Native Americans, often denied to Black people.

  • Economic Changes and Opportunities:

    • Development of electricity, steel, and oil.
    • Electricity powered machines and lighting.
    • Steel used for equipment, architecture, ships.
    • Oil fueled transportation.
    • Bessemer process: Quickly and easily developed steel.
    • Telephone and typewriter: Easy communication and faster writing.

  • Factory System:

    • Manufacturing in large buildings (factories).
    • Goods produced on a larger scale, cheaper, and faster.

  • Wealthy Industrialists:

    • John D. Rockefeller (oil).
    • Andrew Carnegie (steel and railroads).
    • Cornelius Vanderbilt (railroads).
    • Supported charitable causes.

  • Gilded Age: Appearance of wealth despite widespread poverty.

  • Population and Lifestyle Changes:

    • Push factors (Europe/Asia to the US): poverty, overpopulation, repression, disasters.
    • Pull factors (to the US): job opportunities, education, social mobility.
    • Urbanization: Rural population decreased; urban population increased.
    • Immigrants arrived at Ellis Island (NYC) and Angel Island (San Francisco).
    • Found jobs in factories, living in tenements (overcrowded apartments).
    • Ethnic enclaves formed in cities.

Big Businesses and Political Power

  • Political Machines:

    • Rich “bosses” paid voters for political favors.
    • Expected favors from elected politicians.

  • Scandals:

    • Credit Mobilier scandal: Railroad company inflated costs and bribed politicians.

  • Spoils System:

    • Victorious politicians appointed friends to civil service positions.
    • Assassination of President Garfield led to Pendleton Act meritocracy.

  • Inequality's Impact:

    • Discrimination remained rampant despite immigration, emancipation, and opportunities for women.

  • African Americans:

    • Difficulties after emancipation.
    • Jim Crow laws segregated public places and prevented voting.
    • Lynching was widespread.

  • Women:

    • New job opportunities, but paid less than men.
    • Expected to marry rather than pursue careers.

  • Immigrants:

    • Irish: Stereotyped, discriminated against, later seen as white.
    • Italians: Discriminated against, held low-paying jobs, sometimes lynched.
    • Chinese: Treated terribly, dangerous jobs; Chinese Exclusion Act outlawed immigration.

Environmental Impacts

  • Factories produced air, ground, and water pollution.
  • Pollution contributed to illnesses like cancer and respiratory disease.
  • Lower-income communities were disproportionately affected due to housing near industry and lack of infrastructure.

UNIT TWO: Progressivism

  • Belief in improving the human condition through government, education, technology, etc.

  • Emerged in the late 1800s as a response to inequality created by industrialization.

  • Muckrakers: Journalists revealing corruption and injustice (e.g., Ida B. Wells on lynching).

  • Government's Role in Consumer Fairness:

    • Consumers buy goods and services.
    • Laws mandate quality goods produced cleanly.
    • Upton Sinclair's The Jungle exposed meat industry issues, leading to regulations and the FDA.
    • Ida Tarbell exposed Standard Oil’s monopolistic practices.

  • Worker Protection:

    • Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire led to laws mandating fire safety measures.
    • Sinclair’s The Jungle led to investigation of meatpacking working conditions.

  • Labor Unions:

    • Organized in response to poor conditions during industrialization.
    • Demanded better pay and working conditions.
    • Early unions struggled with internal disagreements and boss interference.
    • Disputes over who could join (radical vs. exclusive unions).
    • Strikes: Protests where workers refused to work.

  • Women's Suffrage:

    • Seneca Falls Convention in 1848.
    • Early groups worked with abolitionists.
    • Later groups sought direct change (e.g., getting arrested for voting).
    • NWP focused on constitutional amendment (national suffrage).
    • NAWSA focused on individual states.

  • NAACP Methods:

    • Litigation (lawsuits against discrimination).
    • Awareness campaigns and journalism to document offenses like lynching.
    • Proactive approach contrasted with Booker T. Washington's gradual approach.

  • Eugenics and Inequality:

    • Belief that genetics determine abilities, reproduction should be regulated.
    • Forcible sterilization of disabled people.
    • Reinforced segregation and xenophobia.
    • Attributed actions like criminality to genetic causes.

  • Black Nadir:

    • Retreat of Federal Government from the South.

  • Jim Crow Laws:

    • Segregated Black people from white society.
    • Undermined Reconstruction Amendments:
      • Convict leasing and anti-vagrancy laws (13th Amendment).
      • “Separate but equal” doctrine (14th Amendment).
      • Literacy tests, grandfather clauses, voter intimidation (15th Amendment).

  • Racial Violence:

    • Lynching was common.
    • Targeted labor organizers, Jewish, Chinese, Hispanic, or Italian people, mainly to Black men
    • Enabled by the rise of the second Ku Klux Klan.

UNIT THREE: American Expansion

  • Spanish-American War:

    • U.S. intervened in Cuban rebellion against Spain in 1898.
    • Acquired Philippines, Guam, and Puerto Rico.
    • Protected Cuban rebels but sought control of sugar industries.
    • Set up protectorate over Cuba, colonies in Philippines and Puerto Rico.
    • Major example of American Imperialism.

  • Panamanian Revolution:

    • U.S. sponsored rebellion in Panama against Colombia.
    • Gained land for canal between Pacific and Atlantic oceans.
    • Ensured Panama's independence and purchased canal land.

  • World War I:

    • Started due to a combination of militarism, nationalism, imperialism and alliances between nations
    • Austria-Hungary attacked Serbia, so Russia declared war on Austria, then Germany declared war on Russia, and France declared war on Germany and Austria-Hungary, and then Britain did the same with France
    • Central Powers: Germany, Austria-Hungary, Ottoman Empire
    • Entente: Russia, Britain, France

  • U.S. Role in WWI:

    • Initially loaned money to Britain and France.
    • Reluctant to get involved due to immigrant populations.
    • Britain cut transatlantic telegraph cable to control news.

  • U.S. Neutrality Breakdown:

    • Targeted by German submarines due to trade with Britain.
    • Continued trade led to sinkings of passenger ships (Lusitania).
    • Germany promised to stop sinking ships but broke the promise.
    • Germany sent Mexico a telegram offering assistance in reconquering southwestern U.S. if Germany and the US went to war
    • Declared war on Germany in 1917 to make the world “safe for democracy.”

  • Patriotism and Dissent:

    • Espionage and Sedition Acts limited dissent.
    • Anti-war activists arrested.
    • Forbidden from speaking positively about opponents or negatively about President Wilson.
    • Charles Schenck case: Protesting against the draft

  • Impact on Women and African Americans:

    • Jobs opened up for women in agriculture, factories, and stores.
    • Increased economic power.
    • Women’s Land Army mobilized women in agriculture.
    • African Americans took up jobs, e.g., Ford Motor Company (equal pay).
    • Army was segregated, and Black soldiers faced continued discrimination.
    • Women were paid unequally.

  • Treaty of Versailles

    • Britain and France however took the lead on the peace deal, imposing the Treaty of Versailles on Germany which established that it was guilty for beginning the war and made it pay reparations to Britain and France and other countries it had fought, despite actual blame for the war being unclear
    • These consequences were very unpopular in Germany, later leading to the rise of the Nazi Party and ultimately the second world war

  • League of Nations:

    • Wilson sought to establish the League of Nations for international cooperation.
    • U.S. Senate refused to join, weakening the League.
    • Arms limitations talks (Washington Naval Treaty) failed, leading to a second arms race.

UNIT FOUR: 1920s Challenges

  • Challenging the Status Quo:

    • Changes in gender roles as women's power increased.
    • Evolution gained popularity.

  • Consumer Revolution:

    • New products (cars, radios, telephones).
    • Advertised in magazines and radio.
    • Lower prices due to improved production techniques.
    • Access enhanced by credit cards and loans.

  • Jazz Age and Harlem Renaissance:

    • African Americans moved north from the South in search of new economic opportunity.
    • Settled in Northern cities like Chicago and New York City’s Harlem neighborhood
    • Prosperous communities enabled advances in literature and music.
    • Langston Hughes and Zora Neale Hurston (literature).
    • Blues and jazz artists.
    • Jazz impacted society with looser social rules.

  • Post-War Fears and Anxiety:

    • Red Scare: Fear of communism.
    • Palmer Raids: Arrest of communists, socialists, and anarchists.
    • Returning soldiers faced unemployment, riots, and strikes.
    • Increased racial and ethnic hatreds.
    • Immigrants became targets of suspicion and deportation.

  • Prohibition:

    • Banning of alcohol (1920-1933).
    • Driven by religious concerns and domestic violence.
    • Law was not respected, drinking continued.
    • Control of alcohol trade shifted to the black market.

UNIT FIVE: Economic Downfall

  • Consumerism and Overconfidence:

    • Rampant stock market speculation; buying stocks on the margin
    • The stock market was unregulated
    • People did not invest on actual knowledge of businesses but rather on hope that they could turn a profit.

  • Laissez-Faire and Economic Decline:

    • Government, led by Hoover, implemented Laissez-Faire policies.
    • Belief that government should not assist people.

  • Dust Bowl:

    • Frequent dust storms negatively impacted farmers.
    • Caused by poor farming practices, drought, and windy conditions.
    • Forced many farms to shut down, forcing many to flee from the states

  • Impact of the Great Depression:

    • Savings and income wiped out.
    • Bank failures due to investment losses.
    • Business closures and increased unemployment.

  • Vulnerable Groups:

    • Worse impact on marginalized groups, including African-Americans.
    • Low employment rates, particularly in the South.
    • Lynching continued.
    • Scottsboro Boys trial.

  • HBCUs:

    • Acronym for Historically Black Colleges and Universities, founded throughout the century between abolition and the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which provided an education to many ambitious African-Americans including Martin Luther King Jr

UNIT SIX: The New Deal

  • What was the New Deal?

    • After winning the presidency against Herbert Hoover in 1932 (3 years into the depression), Franklin Delano Roosevelt implemented the New Deal, a series of programs with three objectives: relief, recovery, and reform.
    • Relief programs directly aided those who had been hurt by the great depression, recovery sought to get the economy back on track in order to raise employment rates and lower inflation, and reform sought to address problems that caused the depression in the first place, such as a lack of regulations for stock trading.

  • Effectiveness of the New Deal

    • The New Deal was effective in establishing a system of government support for people, but it did not succeed in fully bringing up levels of employment to pre-depression levels.
    • Nonetheless, the relief brought by programs like social security (which established welfare in America) made Roosevelt extremely popular.
    • The New Deal brought together groups of people that would become the basis of the democratic party until the election of Donald Trump in 2016 - African-Americans, labor union members, intellectuals and

  • African-American Activism:

    • Alliance between labor activists and the NAACP.
    • Ensuring fair working conditions.

  • Government Response:

    • Roosevelt worked to address concerns of African-Americans.
    • Formed a “Black cabinet” of advisors.
    • Too concerned about maintaining control in the South to take aggressive measures for civil rights.

  • Segregation:

    • Housing Act of 1937 led to redlining.
    • Refusal to issue mortgages to African-American homeowners.
    • Confined to small portions of existing communities and public housing projects.