The Red Summer and the "Roaring" '20s - Notes

The Red Summer and the "Roaring" '20s - Notes

Great Migration and Black Military Service

  • Early 20th century: Over six million African Americans moved from the South to urban centers in the North and West.

  • Changed concentration of Black population from around 90% in the South to a more even distribution.

  • Black people continued to face intense discrimination.

  • 300,000+ Black troops served in WWI and were deployed overseas; many returned home with new global perspectives.

“The Red Summer”

  • Term coined by James Weldon Johnson to describe the wave of race riots and white supremacist terrorism in the summer of 1919.

  • Elaine Massacre: One of the most violent racial killings in U.S. history, with well over 100 Black people killed.

  • Other riots occurred in urban centers like Chicago, St. Louis, and Washington.

  • Roughly 60 total incidents.

Further Terrorism and the Tulsa Massacre

  • Racial violence was not limited to the "Red Summer."

  • The Tulsa Massacre of 1921: Number of dead is uncertain (ranging from a few dozen to as many as 300); 100,000+ displaced, lost livelihoods, millions in property damage, dozens of blocks destroyed, no reparations.

“The Roaring ‘20s”/Jazz Age

  • Time of tremendous social innovation, new forms of personal expression.

  • F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby stands as both a product and representation of the era, the "Lost Generation."

  • The Jazz Singer introduces the “talkie” movie, reflecting the proliferation of American film.

  • Jazz emerged as a prominent cultural art form.

Harlem Renaissance

  • Harlem becomes a predominantly Black neighborhood in Manhattan from 1910 (~10%) to 1930 (~70%).

  • Harlem’s population is predominantly middle-class, and it becomes a hotbed for politics and artistic production.

Gay Culture in the Early 20th Century

  • "Gay" and "homosexual" are terms that are first popularized in the early 20th century to contrast with the new normative formings for gender and sexual identity.

  • Gay people form largely open communities in urban centers like New York.

Consumer Culture

  • The ‘20s becomes an early era of mass consumption.

  • Cars, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, department stores/supermarkets begin to transform how some people live.

  • Entertainment becomes increasingly commercialized to mass markets.

‘20s Politics

  • Warren Harding wins the presidency off of “Return to Normalcy” campaign.

  • Calvin Coolidge replaces Harding in 1923 after his passing amongst the Teapot Dome corruption scandal.

  • Both enjoy Republican Congresses.

1920 Election

  • Harding (R) wins 76% of the electoral vote and 60% of the popular vote against James M. Cox (49.2% turnout).

1924 Election

  • Coolidge (R) wins 72% of the electoral vote and 54% of the popular vote against John W. Davis and Robert LaFollette (48% turnout).

1928 Election

  • Herbert Hoover (R) wins 84% of the electoral vote and 58% of the popular vote against Al Smith (57% participation).

Prohibition

  • 18th Amendment, passed in 1919, bans the sale and transport (but not consumption!) of alcohol.

Immigration and Nativism

  • Johnson-Reed Act of 1924 radically alters U.S. immigration policy, installing much stricter quotas on European immigration, practically banning all Asian immigration, and founding the U.S. Border Patrol.

  • KKK membership rises, and it expands its ideology towards general nativism and the growing pseudoscience of eugenics.

First Red Scare

  • Capitalist fears expand beyond communists; socialists, anarchists, atheists, and radicals in general are viewed with apprehension.

  • “Palmer Raids” arrest and deport many radicals; J. Edgar Hoover becomes director of Bureau of Investigation in 1924, a position he would hold for nearly half a century.

How Do We Explain the 1920s?

  • The United States had been largely untouched by WWI but reaped many of the Allies’ rewards.

  • Increased anxiety over threats of change.

The Great Depression

  • The largest economic depression since the start of the 20th century.

  • Unemployment rose to nearly 23%.

Herbert Hoover’s Response

  • Hoover was not a military or elected official; instead, a “self-made” businessman.

  • Does make some investments (like the Hoover Dam) but generally is hands-off save for protective tariffs.

Why Was The Depression So Great

  • No FDIC insurance, no regulation or oversight for banking and stocks.

  • Extreme consumer debt (sometimes caused by banks’ speculative investments, insider trading, etc).

  • Rising unemployment and wage stagnation.

  • Smoot-Hawley Tariff harms trade, cuts off sources of debt relief.

The Bonus Army and Hoovervilles

  • WWI veterans form one large protest site in Washington DC, demanding the early payment of their military service bonuses.

The Dust Bowl

  • An ecological disaster that impacted much of the nation’s “bread basket”.

  • Mostly man-made; farmers were not cognizant that they were over-extracting resources, not utilizing crop rotation, and risked wind erosion.