Chapter 24 Cold War America S M I T H , ­Learning Outcomes J O S H U A After reading this chapter, you should be able to do6 the following: 8 24-1 Explain the causes of the Cold War between the United States and the Soviet Union, and discuss some of the9more serious incidents between the two superpowers. 0 the 1950s, 24-2 Describe American life as it developed during B Uand evaluate including social, economic, and political issues, the significance of the Cold War in these changes. 24-3 Explain the rise and effects of McCarthyism in American life. 24-4 Describe the breakthroughs forged by African Americans in the 1950s and the retaliatory movement that came to be called “massive resistance.” 428 C h apte r 21 The Continued Move West 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. “ Affluence and consumerism promoted a new style of life in America, as people moved to the suburbs, drove automobiles in massive numbers, and stayed home to watch television. ” Two impulses ran through the America that emerged from the Second World War. The first was the distrust, suspicion, and hostility engendered The United States was just as responsible as the Soviet by the Cold War. The Cold Union for starting the Cold War. War began when the United Strongly Disagree Strongly Agree S the States, without question 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 most powerful country in the  M world following World War II, tried to use its powerI to proclaim a new global order based on Cold War democracy and capitalism. T Meanwhile, the Soviet Union, which The postwar ideological, economic, and military undeniably bore the brunt of the fighting during the war, with an contest between the H astounding 23 million dead, rejected the American world order, United States and the favoring instead communism and a world revolution in the name , Soviet Union of the worker. It also more simply wanted to create a buffer of United Nations (UN) countries friendly to its communist system. After all, Germany International organization J Union twice in thirty years, and used that fosters discussions had invaded the Soviet among the world’s nations Poland and other countries of eastern Europe to do so. But where O and monitors the wellthe Soviets saw a protective barrier of friendly states, the United being of almost all indiS on a revolutionary march to dethrone viduals in the world States saw communism capitalism. The result was an ideological, economic, and military H contest known as the Cold War that shaped American politics, U its cultural and social developments throughout the 1940s, economic life, and even 1950s, and 1960s. A The second impulse running through postwar America was a far-reaching optimism that the world could be made a better, safer place and that the quality of life for most people in the world could 6 fulfill Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms, which had promised material and spiritual freedom after a decade and a half of struggle. In this optimistic spirit, the 8 Powers created the United Nations (UN) in 1945, an internaUnited States and its Allied tional organization that 9 would foster discussions among the world’s nations and monitor the well-being of almost all individuals in the world. The first meeting of the UN took 0 place in San Francisco on April 25, 1945. In 1948, the UN adopted its Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which B still today outlines the UN’s view of inalienable rights reserved for all people, including life, liberty, security of person, and equal protection of the law. It U also outlaws slavery, servitude, and torture. The UN was Franklin D. Roosevelt’s vision for extending the Four Freedoms throughout the world, and, after he died in office in 1945, his wife Eleanor helped shepherd through the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. On the home front, such optimism appeared less ideological and more material. Stoked by the rapid conversion to a peacetime economy and American consumers’ eagerness to devour more and more goods after fifteen years of depression and war, The Advertising Archives  What do you think? The decade-and-a-half after the Second World War witnessed a dramatic expansion of America’s car culture, > a German girl handing flowers of gratitude to an American soldier, in commemoration of the Berlin airlift, the first “battle” of the Cold War. 432 C h apte r 2 4 met in London to plan the economic reconstruction of their zones, and, on June 23, 1948, they announced the extension of the West German currency, the Deutschmark, into West Berlin in an effort to sew together the nation in the name of Western democracy and capitalism. Fearing too much Western influence, Stalin was not prepared to allow this currency into the heart of the Soviet zone, so on June 24, the Soviets blockaded West Berlin, preventing food and supplies from entering the non-Soviet sections of the city. This was the first “battle” of the Cold War. Breaking the Blockade The two sides were now directly opposed. But Truman had no desire to initiate actual fighting. He opted instead for a massive, peaceful air operation, authorizing an airlift of food and supplies for eleven months. In the end, the United States and its allies flew more than 200,000 flights over Berlin, dropping 4,700 tons of daily necessities. It was a major endeavor. It was also filled with tension. Truman knew that the Soviet Union would have a massive military advantage in any European conflict (the United States had largely demobilized its army after the Second World War). On the other hand, at the time of the blockade, the United States was still the only nation with the atomic bomb. Meanwhile, an embargo placed on eastern European goods by Western nations convinced the Soviets to back down. The Soviet Union ended the blockade of West Berlin in May 1949. Truman’s Berlin airlift had been a success. NATO The events of the Berlin Crisis pushed American allies to formalize their commitment to one another in order to counter the growing power of the Soviets. They did so through a pact called the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) in 1949. Its key provision, Article V, declared that an attack against one or more treaty partners “shall be considered an attack against them all.” NATO cemented an alliance of Western nations, a project that grew more urgent after Truman announced that the Soviet Union had successfully tested an atomic bomb of its own in 1949. Churchill’s “iron curtain” had fallen into place, and both sides were armed with nuclear weapons. Historians still debate which side bears the most responsibility for the advent of the Cold War. Some see Stalin’s aggressive stances in central Europe and Berlin as indications that Kennan’s predictions might have been correct and that the Soviet Union was on a long-standing aggressive march to defeat capitalism. Others see Stalin’s attempts to control Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. 20˚W Arctic Circle 0˚ 20˚E F I N L AN D N ORWAY $ IC EL AN D $ U.S. loan of $3.5 billion, 1946 Exploded first atomic bomb, 1952 Joined Common Market, 1973 Reykjavik $ Reykjavik 20˚W North Sea IRELAND $ Dublin Joined Common Market, 1973 B a ltic Copenhagen Sea Amsterdam NETHERLANDS $ Brussels BELGIUM AT L A N T I C $ Paris LUX. N WEST GERMANY $ $ Exploded first atomic bomb, 1960 Withdrew from NATO, 1966 F R A N CE $ Joined Common Market, 1986 Joined NATO, 1955 Bern SWITZ. Prague CZE CHO SL OVA Vienna Potsdam Zones of occupation ended, 1955 Participants in the Marshall Plan ROMAN IA Revolution, 1956 YU GOSL AV IA ITALY Rome Left COMECON, 1961 Withdrew from WP, 1968 J O Iron Curtain S H U Map 24.1. Europe in the Cold War A Member of the European Common Market, formed in 1958 Tiranë * North Atlantic Treaty Organization ** Council for Mutual Economic Assistance $ Cengage Learning . Cengage Learning 2014 Ms00464a Divided Europe 6 Trimcentral 51p0 x Europe 39p6 as understandable considering the Final: 9/3/09 8 They events of the first half of the twentieth century. instead see American actions as misguided 9 and overly reactionary. A subtler approach than armed 0 amicontainment, they say, might have led to more cable relations, without both nations having B to see the other as enemies. U 24-1e Conflicts in Asia Despite the continued debate, by 1949, the two sides had consolidated their positions on either side of the iron curtain. But after the Berlin Crisis, the Cold War stalled in Europe; the iron curtain was largely in place. Instead, the focus of the Cold War was Athens 400 Km. 200 Truman Doctrine, 1947 Joined NATO, 1952 Truman Doctrine, 1947 Joined NATO, 1952 Joined Common Market, 1981 a 0 40˚N TURKEY Sicily 200 S e a Ankara ALBANIA $ 0 Airport French zone B U LG A R IA Sofia G R E EC E e Soviet zone British zone B l a c k Danube R. Tito-Stalin schism, 1948 $ U.S. zone Bucharest Belgrade S Berlin Wall (1961–1989) Budapest H U N G A RY $ East Berlin West Berlin KIA n $ EAST GERMANY Communist coup, 1948 U.S.S.R. invasion, 1968 A U ST R IA $ S PORTUGAL M S PAI N $ Madrid Lisbon Corsica I Joined NATO, 1982 T Joined Common Market, 1986 Sardinia Balearic Is. H M editerr ane a , Member of NATO,* formed in 1949 Member of COMECON,** formed in 1949, and the Warsaw Pact, organized in 1955 BERLIN Warsaw East Berlin See inset EAST POLAND map GERMANY Bonn Moscow Exploded first atomic bomb, 1949 Berlin blockade, 1948–1949 West Berlin 40˚E UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS $ London OCEAN Stockholm DENMARK $ 60˚N Helsinki SWEDEN $ Joined Common Market, 1973 UNITED KINGDOM Oslo CYPRUS (Gr. Br.) Nicosia 400 Mi. shifted elsewhere. Asia was the first stop. Britain and France had huge colonial possessions in Asia Full page map and Africa, but after Bleeds top, right, leftWorld War II they no longer had thePosition money to maintain those Moreover, top map trim at top pageempires. trim theAlign Atlantic Charter had plotted thetrims Allied Powers left and right map trims on page at least rhetorically against colonialism. This fact allowed an opening for Soviet-backed revolutionary movements. Would these colonial holdings in Asia become communist? Would the United States allow them to? “Losing” China As nationalist battles in Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia threatened Western colonial power (and would later lead to the Vietnam War), more immediate issues loomed in China. Although China had been on the winning side in World War II, the war had damaged its stability, and immediately after the war the country fell into civil war between The Cold War 433 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. NSC-68 Chinese Communists (under Mao Zedong) and Chinese Nationalists (under Chiang Kai-shek). The United States funneled billions of dollars to the Nationalists even though America’s diplomats warned that a communist takeover was inevitable. In October 1949, Mao completed his conquest; China was now controlled by a communist ruler. Mao soon signed a treaty with Stalin, while the Chinese Nationalists were forced to withdraw to the island of Taiwan. The situation in China sent shock waves through the United States. Truman was accused of having “lost” China to comRead Mao munism, and some peopleS Zedong’s even hinted that there wereM account of the communist agents within Chinese Communist Party. the State Department. Mao’sI victory raised the stakes of containment. Not onlyT was communism potentially on the march, but it had taken over the largest Asian nation in theH world. It looked like the United States was losing, the Cold War. Classified paper written by American diplomats that portrayed an uncontrollably aggressive Soviet Union and recommended stopping the threat through a massive military buildup, the creation of hydrogen bombs, and the rooting out of all communists on American soil J O American leaders were determined to prevent other states from “falling.” In a classified paperS known as NSC-68, American diplomats portrayed H an uncontrollably aggressive Read excerpts Soviet Union whose pro-U from NSC-68. gram for “world dominaA 24-1f American Rearmament tion” required the “ultimate elimination” of any opposition. NSC-68’s sweeping recommendations to stop the threat included a6 massive military buildup, the creation of hydrogen bombs, and the rooting out of all communists on8 American soil. 9 To critics, NSC-68 seemed out of proportion to the threat. But on June 25, 1950, communist powers0 in North Korea invaded South Korea, thus begin-B ning the Korean War. Afraid of what this meant for U the march of communism, the National Security Council adopted NSC-68 as official policy. To prepare to impede communist progress, it embarked on a vast rearmament plan, increasing the 1951 defense budget from $13.5 billion to $48.2 billion. The Korean invasion had made the incredible—a worldwide communist takeover—suddenly seem plausible. 434 C h apte r 2 4 24-1g The Korean War Korea seemed an unlikely place for World War III to break out. It was remote, and it did not possess vital natural resources. But “losing” China had taken its psychological toll on American leaders. Plus, just as with Berlin, Korea, which had been controlled by Japan during the war, was divided between the Allies after the war, with the Soviets controlling the northern half and the United States controlling the southern half. The country was to be reunified in 1948, but the deadline passed without the nation coming together. Tensions between the north and the south simmered, and when North Korean forces (aided by Soviet planners) attacked and easily took the South Korean capital of Seoul, Americans felt the need to respond (see Map 24.2). The American Response Truman immediately ordered troops into Asia. He also ordered the development of the hydrogen bomb and secretly dispersed atomic bombs and shortrange missiles to American air and naval bases all over the world. At home, leaders drew up plans of what to do in case of nuclear war. With the Soviet Union now armed with a bomb of its own, the threat seemed imminently plausible. Despite these preparations, by late September 1950, things looked bad for the South Korean and American forces (who were led by the United Nations). Then a surprise attack led by the American general and UN commander-in-chief for Korea, Douglas MacArthur, at Inchon, a port near Seoul, helped turn the tide. Taking the North Koreans by surprise, UN troops cut their supply lines. The North Korean war machine collapsed, and UN forces recaptured Seoul. UN troops pursued the North Korean remnants all the way up the Korean peninsula, and by November they were positioned close to the Chinese border, along the Yalu River. Would they now invade China, almost certainly sparking World War III? China Intervenes As the UN troops approached the Chinese frontier, Mao grew concerned. Truman had decided against invading China, but Mao did not know this. On November 27, 1950, Chinese forces, officially called “volunteers” for the North Korean cause, crossed the Korean border and attacked UN forces. Caught by surprise, UN forces reeled southward, and on January 4, 1951, communist troops recaptured Seoul. As the situation worsened, Truman wondered aloud about using the atomic bomb. But as winter gave Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. way to spring, the UN troops again took the offensive, retaking Seoul in March 1951. United States and United Nations forces Stalemate Intervention by Chinese forces, Oct. 1950 R. u Chosan R. en Hyesanjin Kanggye Chosin Res. Farthest U.S. advance, Oct.–Nov. 1950 R. Angtung Sinuiju Unsan o Taed NORTH KOR EA Pyongyang Hungnam Sea of Japan (East Sea) Nan R. Armistice line, July 7, 1953 Kaesong 38°N 38th Parallel Panmunjom Inchon g din l a n 19 5 0 . S , U. . 15 pt Se Farthest Chinese/ North Korean advance, Jan. 1951 Seoul . U.N. advance, Sept.–Nov. 1950 jo Taejon 36°N Yongdok Pohang g Ye l l o w Sea SOU TH KOR EA Taegu R. the U.S. federal government’s belief that left-wing governments might be susceptible to communist influence, even if these governments had been democratically elected. The governments of Iran and Guatemala were both overturned covertly, and the United States repeatedly resisted getting involved in situations that would have to be made public. U kton Na 8 In this environment, one approach that maximized 9 the effectiveness of American foreign policy was 0 overthrowing uncooperative foreign governments through agencies like the CIA. The patternB was set in 1953, in Iran, and in 1954, in Guatemala. In both U countries, the CIA and its functionaries acted on Covert Operations CH Chongjin A R on open warfare and instead emphasized (1) covert operations, (2) formal alliances, and (3) the presence of nuclear weapons. 6 AN RI ng M ties (including both North Korean and South Korean casualties). J 24-1h A Cold War, Not a Hot OneO In the wake of the Korean War, many Americans S concluded that the United States could not afford H another land war against the Soviet Union and its U startallies. While still committed to containment, ing in the mid-1950s the United States relied less A m Tu n Ha S M In late July 1953, North Korea, exhausted by the high casualties associated with the stalemate,I agreed to an armistice. The armistice brought theTKorean War to an end almost exactly where it had begun— but only after 35,000 American deaths,H114,000 Chinese deaths, and roughly 300,000 Korean , fataliArmistice U.S.S.R. C H I N A 42°N Ya l Once UN forces reached the original dividing line between North and South (the 38th parallel), Truman halted the offensive. He was intent on avoiding an open conflict with China and the Soviet Union. General MacArthur, however, determined to carry the fight to China for a final showdown, publicly raged against the president, writing to congressional Republicans, “There is no substitute for victory.” In April 1951, Truman relieved MacArthur of command for his insubordination. Addressing the American people, Truman said, “We are trying to prevent a third world war.” A long stalemate settled along the 38th parallel, and many frustrated Americans treated MacArthur as a hero. North Korean forces Farthest North Korean advance, Sept. 1950 Pusan St Ko 34°N 0 0 50 ra it rea N 100 Km. 50 100 Mi. 126°E Map 24.2. 128°E The Korean War . Cengage Learning 2014 Cengage Learning Ms00469 There was a 1950–1953 negative side to these No covert The Korean War, bleedsoperations, Ms00469 however. For instance, the political instability that Trim 26p6 x 39p6 the CIA forced on these countries led to a forty-year Final: 4/25/08 civilOT: war in Guatemala and a twenty-five-year dictaFinal 5/16/08 Revision restore dotswas 7/13/09—cm torshipto in Irancity that so authoritarian during the Revision 7/29/09—cm: Sea of Japan (East Sea) Read the National Security Administration’s briefing book on the Iranian coup. period of American sponsorship that it generated the conditions of its own downfall. In 1979 these conditions would lead to a civil war The Cold War 435 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. that empowered the Islamic revolutionary Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Alliances Another approach the American government employed was the use of treaties. In Indochina, where the decline of European colonialism had led to tremendous political instability, the United States increased military aid to the new anticommunist state of South Vietnam and also helped create the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO). In this way, the U.S. government hoped to prevent a chain of “falling dominoes,” or neighboring countries inexorably succumbing to communism one at a time. Nuclear Weaponry The third approach was more frightening: hydrogen bombs. In January 1954 the United States articulated a strategy of “massive retaliation,” by which it meantS a substantial buildup of hydrogen bombs, each aM thousand times more powerRead John ful than an atomic bomb. ThisI Foster Dulles’s strategy had its strengths. ForT “Massive Retaliinstance, when the Chinese ation” speech. Communists in mainlandH China threatened the Chinese Nationalists on Taiwan, in 1954 and 1958, American threats of massive retaliation helped hold the Communists at bay. But this experience also prompted the Chinese to seek SovietJ aid in developing their own nuclear arsenal. From Arms Race to Space Race With time, hydrogen bombs were getting smaller and less complicated, meaning that smaller nations without bomber technology, such as Britain, France, and Israel, could develop atomic weapons systems. In August 1957, the Soviets tested the first intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), which could travel from one continent to another. Two months later, they launched the world’s first artificial satellite, Sputnik I, into orbit. These events inspired a wave of dread across America. The idea that the enemy had actually placed a device in space that was passing over the United States frightened the American public and ended confidence in American technological superiority. American war planners were alarmed as well, because the launch implied that the Soviets could now deliver nuclear warheads to U.S. territory O S Because of the fear of being outgunned and because H of the occasional usefulness of the idea of “massive retaliation,” an arms race began between the UnitedU States and the Soviet Union. America’s first hydroA gen bomb was tested on November 1, 1952. Within a year, the Soviet Union matched this achievement with a test of its own. American decision makers6 concluded that, if the United States was to continue to derive some advantage from the hydrogen bomb,8 it must stay ahead of the Soviets in numbers of9 bombs, destructive power, and the ability to deliver them swiftly. The Soviets responded in kind, with0 each side forcing the other to go higher and higher,B accelerating the potential for an ever more devastatU ing conflict. Eventually this policy came to be called “mutually assured destruction,” or MAD, because the policy behind the arms race suggested that an attack by one side would almost necessarily mean a destruction of both sides in the conflict. Some Americans, notably the scientists who worked on the first nuclear bombs, protested the arms race. But the escalation continued. 436 C h apte r 2 4 During the unsettling arms race, the American public turned >> to booklets like this one, offering such unlikely cure-alls as covering Image courtesy of The Advertising Archives The Arms Race Begins one’s head or ducking under furniture in the event of an atomic bomb blast. Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. in about half an hour. The United States matched the feat of Sputnik three months later, in January 1958, by placing Explorer I into orbit. Over the course of the following year, the United States made major investments in science initiatives and established the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) as a central body for space research. The Soviet challenge inspired American government leaders to attain a new level of technological mastery, one that would ultimately lead to a moon landing in 1969. But in the short term, it merely heightened the mistrust that characterized the Cold War. 24-2 The Cold War Home Front S life in The Cold War shaped American domestic many ways. For one thing, it helped keep the M economy hot despite the demobilization after World War I II. Fear of nuclear war also inspired both a second Red Scare (usually called McCarthyism, as explained T later in this chapter) and a religious revival. The Cold H War contributed to a tide of conservatism, as many politicians warned that communists had ,gained a foothold in American political and cultural life and any left-leaning initiative might be the secret work of covert communists. This conservatismJ diminished some of the momentum of postwarO liberals, who believed the rhetoric of World War II had given S them leverage to pass their pro-union, antidiscrimiH U A Rykoff Collection/CORBIS 6 8 9 0 B U Fair Deal nation agenda. (Despite this, Truman’s twenty-one-point the fight against fascism postwar plan that provided remained a point of rhetoric increases in the minimum wage, federal assistance for most civil rights liberals.) in building homes, federal Amid these uncersupport for education and tainties, many Americans health care, and jobs in public works; represented adjusted somewhat comforta renewal of the Fair ably to life in a Cold War, Employment Practices taking advantage of good Commission wages and the new luxury items that appeared by the truckload. These values were unaffected by the anxieties provoked by the Cold War, and in fact many Americans exerted their democratic freedoms through consumerism. Historians have for good reason called the period from 1945 to 1960 the Age of Affluence, even if that affluence was tempered by knowledge that, at any given moment, the Cold War might flash hot, and nuclear war might begin. 24-2a Truman and the Postwar Economy The Fair Deal At the end of World War II, Truman saw all the returning soldiers and feared that job shortages were imminent. With this in mind, in late 1945 he submitted a twenty-one-point plan, later called the Fair Deal, that sought to expand the welfare state initiated during the New Deal. The Fair Deal included increases to the minimum wage, federal assistance in building homes, federal support for education and health care, and an attempt to reach full employment through public works. Showing Truman’s commitment to civil rights, the Fair Deal also renewed the Read excerpts from Truman’s message to Congress. When the USSR launched >> the world’s first two artificial satellites in 1957 (Sputnik I and II, as represented in this Soviet postcard), many Americans were petrified that the Soviet Union was now literally hovering over the United States and that the state of American science was inferior to that of its Cold War adversary. The Cold War Home Front 437 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Taft-Hartley Act Fair Employment Practices Commission (FEPC), which Roosevelt had established to end racial job discrimination in federal jobs. Despite the Fair Deal’s breadth, Truman faced many obstacles. For one, he was not terribly popular as president. His reserved demeanor made him seem small compared to the charismatic Roosevelt. Moreover, Truman faced a hostile Congress: although controlled by Democrats, Congress was led by an informal coalition of conservatives from both parties. As a result, Truman had few domestic successes. Labor-Management Act of 1947 that banned the closed shop, outlawed collective bargaining within industries, and authorized the president to delay strikes by declaring a “cooling-off” period The Conversion Economy and Labor Unrest Truman’s problems were compounded by the truly tempestuous postwar economy. In the months afterS the war, the return of GIs pushed wages down, whileM inflation rose 25 percent during the first year. Labor organizers demanded increased wages to compen-I sate, but because there were more workers availableT than ever before, employers felt little pressure to capitulate. The result of this impasse was a remark-H able series of strikes. By the end of 1946, about, 5 million workers had walked off the job in more than 5,000 strikes across the country. Workers were shifting jobs rapidly, and security seemed a farawayJ promise. O Truman, generally a friend of labor but worried about the economy, soon grew intolerant of theS strikes. When two railroad unions went on strike in H May 1946, Truman requested that Congress draft the strikers into the military, which would then forceU them to work. Although the strike was soon settled A and the authority to draft strikers was never made law, union workers were angry at Truman for his threats. Meanwhile, conservatives complained that6 Truman had not taken stronger anti-union steps. That fall, a Republican slogan asked Americans if8 they had “Had Enough?” In November 1946, the pub-9 lic answered by sending a Republican majority to both houses of Congress for the first time since 1928.0 Taft-Hartley B U Republicans With their new power, pro-business attempted to scale back the role of the federal government, particularly with regard to labor disputes. Led by Senator Robert Taft, Congress passed the Labor-Management Act (better known as the Taft-Hartley Act) in June 1947. Taft-Hartley banned the closed shop, meaning that jobs could not be exclusively limited to union members only. It also 438 C h apte r 2 4 outlawed collective bargaining within industries and authorized the president to delay strikes by declaring a “cooling-off” period. Predictably, Truman vetoed Taft-Hartley, but Congress overrode his veto. Truman’s presidency seemed destined for oblivion. More importantly, the rights of labor, which unions had fought for so ardently since the 1930s, were dramatically curbed—and would remain so for the rest of the century. 24-2b Economic Growth After these initial flurries of uncertainty, however, the postwar economy picked up. Indeed, it grew red hot. From 1947 to 1960, the gross national product doubled. Wages went up, inflation stayed low, and leisure activities became accessible to more and more Americans. So did comforts like electricity, air conditioning, and indoor plumbing. Well more than half of all Americans were now considered “middle class.” Fears about a distressed economic picture melted away as the American nation successfully converted to a peacetime economy. Consumerism How did this happen so quickly? The change occurred because Americans were spending more due to higher wages, veterans’ benefits, and demand that had been restrained during wartime. American industries were meeting people’s desires by producing new products. Things like dishwashers, washing machines, and televisions rapidly moved from luxuries to necessities. Automation became a key word in the vocabulary of the American consumer. Fewer concerns about carrying debt helped as well, as credit cards became more popular in the 1950s. And the commitment to the Cold War meant that government dollars were continuously pouring into a variety of defenserelated industries. Out of the emerging strong economy, business leaders greatly curbed the postwar wave of strikes by offering benefits like health insurance and pensions to workers. Labor leaders like Walter Reuther were only marginally pleased with these offers. Certainly they liked the fatter paychecks, but Reuther and others felt that the burdens of health care and retirement should not be borne by an individual company because that made retirement plans dependent on the health of that particular company. Nevertheless, because they could not make much headway in crafting national health or retirement plans, Reuther and other labor leaders accepted the system whereby a single company provides a worker Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. with health care and retirement—the system on which most Americans depend today. Television and the Automobile Out of this expanded economy, two products transformed American life more than any others: (1) television and (2) the automobile. In the 1950s, the technology behind the television was perfected, and it immediately became immensely popular. Nine out of ten American families owned at least one set by the end of the decade. Television changed the way Americans relaxed and recreated. Rather than attend social forms of entertainment like movies or sporting events, people could be entertained while staying home. Initially, neighborhood social and political clubs emerged to replace more casual social gatherings, but by the end of the 1950s, memberships in social clubs were beginning to decline as S indelwell. Furthermore, television produced strong, ible images that were disseminated widely, Mcutting through regional differences and creating a genuine I national experience. The automobile also transformed American T life, and the 1950s were the years when cars were made accessible to many in the middle and lowerHclasses. Not only were more Americans wealthier , in the 1950s, but in 1956, the federal government passed National Interstate and the National Interstate and Defense Highways Act Defense Highways Act, The largest public works which authorized $25 bilproject in American history when it was passed; lion to build 41,000 miles of authorized $25 billion interstate highways over the to build 41,000 miles of following ten years. The largroads, greatly assisting the burgeoning car culture est public works in American of the 1950s history to that time, the act greatly eased suburbanization and car transportation. By the end of the decade, eight in ten Americans owned at least one car. Motels, drive-ins, and fast-food restaurants sprang up throughout the country, reflecting the dominance of this form of transportation. The suburbs expanded as well, in no small part because now nearly everyone could afford to drive to a job in the city. But Americans’ love of cars came at a cost: plans for extensive public transportation systems were put on hold. Rather than build train tracks or subway systems, the federal and state governments expanded the roads. 24-2c Suburban Nation The new interest in cars combined with a quirk in the GI Bill led to another change in American life: the dramatic growth of the suburbs. The GI Bill 6 8 9 0 B U Rather than attend social forms of entertainment like movies or sporting events, with TV, people could be entertained while staying home. >> This constituted a transformation in the way Americans lived, as they became increasingly private and joined fewer clubs and organizations. The Cold War Home Front Image courtesy of The Advertising Archives J O S H U A 439 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Kitchen Debate made loans available for new homes, but it did not finance the renovation of old homes. For this and other reasons, more and more Americans moved out of the cities to the green ring around them. Suburbs had been growing since the 1890s and especially since the 1920s, but they expanded even farther in the 1950s. By 1960, suburbs claimed a larger portion of the nation’s population than did the city, small town, or countryside. Most of this expansion was due to the work of developers like William Levitt, who transformed orange groves and empty fields on the outskirts of cities into large towns made of prefabricated homes. The rapid growth of the suburbs and the conformity that seemed to set in there had at least five important results: (1) theS sudden end to the experimental gender roles cre-M ated by World War II; (2) an increase in racial segregation; (3) a postwar religious revival; (4) a chorus ofI critics of conformity; and (5) a lasting environmentalT footprint outside America’s major metropolises. Discussion between Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev and Vice President Richard Nixon in 1959 debating the relative merits of capitalism and communism H , Gendered Spheres rtis The Adve urtesy of Image co ves ing Archi While women entered industrial and white-collar jobs during the war, the ethos of 1950s America suggested that women should stay home. BesidesJ enforcing age-old stereotypes, there was a social reaO son too: following the war, the twenty-somethings who had fought for the Four Freedoms wanted toS begin families. A baby boom resulted. After World H War II, 76 million children were born in less than U twenty years. In 1940, women were having, on average, 2.1 A children; in 1960, they were having 3.5 children. In the 1950s, the 6 domestic ideal of the 8 nuclear family became a dominant cultural image. 9 Childcare experts, televi0 sion, magazines, and politicians all propagated the B notion that women should U leave the work world and return home. For instance, according to many psychiatrists, caring for children was not simply a task, but was meant to be the central focus of women’s lives. The concept of the child-centered family 440 C h apte r 2 4 was popularized by Dr. Benjamin Spock, a pediatrician and expert on child development whose enormously popular manual, Baby and Child Care (1946), sold more than 50 million copies. Meanwhile, Ebony, a magazine for African Americans, celebrated the prosperity that allowed some black women to become primarily wives and mothers and no longer domestic servants. Black or white, domesticity was the presumed feminine ideal. American politicians promoted women’s roles as mothers and homemakers as well. In 1959, Vice President Richard Nixon proudly told Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev that Read a transcript American women prided of the Kitchen themselves on stocking Debate. their kitchens with the latest appliances. Debating the relative merits of capitalism versus communism, Nixon reasoned that American women were fueling the economy by spending, rather than by marching off to industrial jobs as Soviet women did. The exchange between the two leaders became known as the Kitchen Debate. Though suburban domesticity was promoted throughout American life as a desirable ideal, the reality was somewhat harsher than portrayed. Because many mothers had two or three children, their days were demanding. New suburban homes required a great deal of upkeep as well. Even with new household inventions, many of which were advertised as “time-saving,” the amount of time women spent on housework actually increased during the 1950s. If women did have free time, they were encouraged to channel it into caring for their families. For the women who did remain in the employment sector, there was an increase in occupational segregation between the sexes. With men returning from military service, working women were forced into an employment niche in the service sector. For the most part, they worked as secretaries, teachers, nurses, and waitresses. Most women’s jobs offered few possibilities for career advancement. Childcare experts, tele>> vision, magazines, and politicians all propagated the notion that women should leave the work world and return home. Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. During the 1950s, African American women made some gains, moving out of primarily domestic service and agricultural work and into clerical work, nursing, and teaching. In 1960, 58 percent of all African American women worked outside the home. Many Japanese American and Hispanic women also worked outside the home to support their families. Racial Segregation The physical distance of suburbia hardened racial segregation. As millions of white Americans left the cities for the suburbs, millions of black Americans were moving from the South to the cities of the North or West. In New York City, about half a million Puerto Ricans moved into what had been the Italian American neighborhoods of East Harlem. As a symbol of what was happening elsewhere, during the 1950s, a majority of Italian Americans S York’s moved out of East Harlem, favoring New suburbs instead. These types of migrationsM created many racially defined urban ghettos. White realI worse tors and politicians frequently made matters by excluding black people from certain neighborT hoods or making home loans impossible for African H afford Americans to obtain. Even when they could it, black people were routinely barred by covenant , or custom from many neighborhoods. The federal government refused to insert protections against such practices in federal housing bills. As J a result, the new suburbs were overwhelmingly white, and O the cities housed higher populations of racial minorities. S H UminorIf segregation was the rule concerning racial ities, religious minorities—Catholics and Jews— A Religious Revival developed a new kind of pluralism in these years. Previously denied access to many social arenas in American life, these minority groups took6 advantage of a 1950s consumerism to move more fully 8 awakinto the mainstream. More importantly, fears ened during the Cold War, the baby boom,9and the move to the suburbs all led to a dramatic religious 0 God” revival in the 1950s. This was when “Under was added to the U.S. Pledge of AllegianceBand “In God We Trust” was added to U.S. currency. What U distinguished this religious revival from all previous ones was that Catholics and Jews were included; it was not solely a Protestant revival. As Catholics and Jews earned allowances for their public displays of religion, they expanded the scope of American religious life, moving it beyond the Protestantism of yesteryear. This transition to acceptable pluralism led to many debates about the place of religion in American life, especially when Catholics sought federal funds for parochial schools and Jews sought to ensure protection by emphasizing the separation of church and state. Critics of Conformity Life in the suburbs, with its stereotype of two cars, husband at work, wife at home, and children in the yard, seemed to many to be both refreshing after the uncertain depression years and boring because of its homogeneity. Focusing on this conformity, critics derided what they saw as The Lonely Crowd (1950), to use sociologist David Reisman’s title, which described a society in which people were aware of the world around them, but the substance of the individual was never acknowledged or explored. Films such as Invasion of the Body Snatchers (1956) and Rebel Without a Cause (1955), novels like J. D. Salinger’s The Catcher in the Rye (1951), the poetry of a youthful group of poets called the Beats, and sociological tracts like The Lonely Crowd and William H. Whyte’s The Organization Man (1956) all focused on the supposed blandness of American suburban life at mid-century. Historians have noted how these critics understated the continued diversity of American life and the very real psychological problems of living in a world shrinking because of mass communications and unimpeded transportation. Furthermore, these critics overlooked other, perhaps more serious problems such as poverty, environmental destruction, and persistent racism. But they tapped into a psychological sentiment that was shared by many Americans who, supposedly living the American Dream, found themselves bored by it or excluded from it. The Large Environmental Footprint Postwar suburban living, with its large detached houses, unwieldy yards, dependence on the automobile, and incursion into wild lands and wetlands, greatly enlarged the size of the average American’s environmental footprint. As Americans left dense cities behind, they encroached on lands that had lain undisturbed for years. In doing so, they were also relying on goods and services that were not easily reclaimable by the earth, like petroleum for automobiles. 24-2d Postwar Domestic Politics As American social life changed in the 1950s, so did national politics, drifting toward conservatism and propelled by persistent fears of Soviet influence in the United States. The Cold War Home Front 441 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Truman’s Decline Viewing Truman as a spent force after his labor troubles in 1947, the Republicans eagerly anticipated the presidential election of 1948. Their chances seemed dramatically improved by internal dissension among Democrats. First, Truman’s support for civil rights (for example, his 1948 order to end segregation in the armed forces) antagonized southerners, who had been vital members of Roosevelt’s New Deal coalition and loyal Democrats for nearly eighty years. Truman also put a civil rights plank in the 1948 party platform. In protest, southern delegates literally walked out of the Democratic National Convention and formed their own party, the States’ Rights Democratic Party, then selected their own candidate for president. These so-called “Dixiecrats” threatened to disrupt the Democratic hold on the South that dated back to Reconstruction. Second, Truman had alienated many liberalsS when he fired Henry Wallace from his cabinet. FormerM vice president Wallace had openly criticized Truman’s I Cold War policies and advocated greater cooperation with the Soviets. Wallace’s followers formed theT Progressive Party and nominated Wallace as their H candidate. Truman was under assault from the right and the left, and this was just within his own party. , Truman’s Resurgence For their part, Republicans nominated Thomas E.J Dewey, indicating that they had made peace withO S H U A some elements of the New Deal legacy. Dewey advocated several liberal policies, hoping to appeal to the middle of the political spectrum. In July 1948, however, Truman cleverly called Congress back into session and demanded that the Republicans pass an agenda based on their own party platform. When congressional Republicans refused to act, Truman attacked the “do-nothing Republican Congress.” This made it appear as if they were making election-year promises that they did not intend to keep. Many union workers also returned to the Democratic fold, encouraged by Truman’s veto of Taft-Hartley and by his calls for the nation to strengthen the New Deal (although he still lost union-heavy Michigan, New York, and Pennsylvania). Farmers came out particularly strong for Truman as well, giving him all but six states west of the Mississippi. In November 1948, Truman pulled off a stunning upset, defeating Dewey and helping recapture both houses of Congress for the Democratic Party. Democratic Eclipse Truman viewed his election as a mandate for the Fair Deal. He was wrong. Upon starting his second term, Truman resubmitted the proposals in his platform, but, once again, a watertight coalition of conservative southern Democrats and northern Republicans meant that few of Truman’s proposals became law. Southern Democrats continued to reject civil rights laws, and, in 1950, interest in Truman’s domestic agenda was overshadowed by the Korean War. Frustrated and becoming increasingly unpopular, Truman decided not to seek reelection in 1952. The country, he felt, was moving to the right. Republicans Return © Bettmann/Corbis 6 8 9 0 B U 442 C h apte r 2 4 It was. In the fall of 1952, World War II hero Dwight D. Eisenhower became the Republican candidate and easily won the presidential election, outdistancing by a wide margin the Democratic nominee, Illinois governor Adlai Stevenson. Republicans gained majorities in the House and Senate as well. The New Deal, the Fair Deal, and twenty years of Democratic power in Washington seemed to have run its course. But, like Dewey, Eisenhower, while rhetorically favoring smaller government, did not fundamentally oppose Dewey defeats Truman in one of the most >> notorious journalist mistakes in American history, a fact attested to by Truman’s giant grin. Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. AP Photo/Bill Allen Stokes S M I T H , >> The World War II hero Gen. Dwight Eisenhower served as president from 1953 to 1961, overseeing both an economic boom and the growth and expansion of the Cold War. While many Americans “liked Ike,” many others thought he represented a bland, conformist culture. J O the New Deal. And Cold War concerns would, in the long run, provide a new impetus for expanding S the government, which in fact grew during his presiH dency. Eisenhower was a folksy conservative who U averse was friendly to big business, but he was not to pouring money into the economy, especially A for national defense. He defined national defense broadly, employing it as a pretext to fund the giant interstate project that built most of the nation’s 6 highways, as well as several housing projects. He 8 stratalso oversaw the development of the Cold War egy of crafting covert operations, forming alliances, 9 and building up the nation’s nuclear weapon supply. 0 in no The economy was good during his presidency, small part because of the tremendous amount B of federal spending Eisenhower poured into it, and the U good Cold War remained cold. Lots of people had reason to “Like Ike.” By the end of his presidency, Eisenhower began to express reservations about these expenses. In his 1961 farewell address, he himself sounded the alarm against the “military-industrial complex” that tied the military too closely to the economy and jeopardized American democracy. But during his presidency, Eisenhower had not been shy about expanding the federal government, and indeed much of his success had depended on it. 24-3 The Second Red Scare All this politicking took place with dramatic background music: the second Red Scare. For those caught in its sweep, it was more than just background music. The Red Scare was a crusade against communist influence within the United States. Its scope was wide and deep, curtailing civil liberties and quelling political dissent from the top levels of national politics to lowest neighborhood school board meeting. 24-3a Loyalty Oaths The second Red Scare began almost as soon as World War II ended; its prominence paralleled the progress of the Cold War. Fearful of allegations that there were communists working in his government, in 1947 Truman established the Federal Loyalty-Security The Second Red Scare 443 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Program, which investigated the backgrounds of all federal employees and barred hiring anyone who was deemed a security risk. Meanwhile, Truman’s attorney general, Tom C. Clark, compiled a list of hundreds of organizations that were considered potentially subversive. The organizations were then subjected to investigations. Many state and city governments and private companies emulated the loyalty program and required Read Truman’s employees to sign loyalty 1947 loyalty oaths. Between 1947 and oath. 1965, roughly 20 percent of all working people in the United States were required to take an oath. 24-3b Nixon, Hoover, and McCarthy With fingers pointing everywhere, leading Americans grew worried about an insidious conspiracy toS overthrow the government. Congressman RichardM Nixon, FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, and Senator Joseph McCarthy of Wisconsin were at the center ofI T H , Image courtesy of The Advertising Archives J O S H U A 6 8 9 0 B U Even Marvel Comics’ Captain America, now billed as >> “Captain America . . . Commie Smasher!”, became a crusader against communism. 444 C h apte r 2 4 this storm. For his part, Nixon propelled himself to fame in 1948 by charging former State Department official Alger Hiss with espionage. Although the evidence of his association with communists at first appeared shaky, Hiss was convicted of lying about his Soviet contacts in 1950. Decades later, his guilt is still debated by historians, although most now conclude that Hiss was in fact a spy. Meanwhile, Hoover insisted that communists were everywhere, “even at your front door,” and he instructed the FBI to keep tabs on people who might be associated with communism. In general, his investigations extended to any group that challenged conformity, including liberals, labor activists, civil rights workers, and especially homosexuals. But it was Senator Joseph McCarthy who best leveraged the supposed threat of communism to launch himself into prominence. His speeches were shrill and bombastic as he publicized his communist purges. In an infamous 1950 speech, the senator declared that the State Department was “thoroughly infested with communists.” He claimed to have a list of more than two hundred communists, but he did not allow the press to confirm his evidence. In the end, McCarthy’s demagoguery, which destroyed Read McCarthy’s lives and led to many a speech warning ruined career, was based on of the commufalse accusations. His influnist threat. ence reached deeply into American culture, though, so much so that the aggressive tactics of the Red Scare became known as “McCarthyism.” With Truman, Hoover, and McCarthy all asserting the presence of communists in the United States, Americans began pointing fingers at each other. Regardless of the evidence against them, once someone was labeled a subversive, his or her life was often dramatically altered. These individuals found it difficult to find work, became socially isolated, and had a hard time recovering their reputation. This was most dramatically illustrated by accusations against Hollywood actors. The congressional House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) focused on Hollywood beginning in 1947. HUAC members believed that the movie industry was teeming with communists; they also knew that a formal investigation of Hollywood would generate considerable publicity. As part of the anticommunist purge, writers, directors, actors, and film executives were called to testify about their political beliefs and also those of their family, friends, and colleagues. Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Hollywood Ten Group of screenwriters and directors accused of being members of the Communist Party blacklist © Bettmann/Corbis Collection of names of hundreds of people deemed “subversive” whom Hollywood executives agreed not to hire to mobilize their forces for what would become the civil rights movement. S Sen. Joseph McCarthy used bombast and smear tactics to >> fight what he saw as homegrown communism. M I In 1947, a group of screenwriters and direcT tors known as the Hollywood Ten appeared before HUAC and refused to answer any questions, H citing their right to freedom of speech. The Supreme , Court, however, denied them protection under the First Amendment. The members of the group, many of whom were or had been members of the J Communist Party in the 1930s, were each charged O to a with contempt, fined $1,000, and sentenced year in jail. More damningly, they were S also put on a blacklist, which contained names of people Hexecudeemed “subversive” and whom Hollywood tives agreed not to hire. The blacklist expanded U to include hundreds of Hollywood professionals A between 1947 and 1965. 6 8 9 Despite the tendency toward McCarthy-inspired conservatism during these years, minorities 0 achieved significant breakthroughs. Indeed, many Bminorities used the language of freedom inspired by the U rights. Cold War to push for their own increased 24-4 Civil Rights Breakthroughs European immigrant groups, which had faced discrimination before the war, were generally assimilated into American culture during the war. They became accepted in social groups and the workplace in ways that would have been unthinkable just two decades prior. And African American groups began 24-4a D  esegregation in the Military President Truman displayed an early example of this new consideration for minorities. Truman was the first president to address the NAACP at its national convention. More importantly, in 1946, Truman formed the first Committee on Civil Rights to assess the state of citizenship rights across the country. The committee issued a report, To Secure These Rights, that recommended “the elimination of segregation, based on race, color, creed, or national origin, from American life.” Based on these recommendations, Truman ordered the desegregation of the U.S. armed forces in 1948. The process was slow and laborious, and not complete until 1954. But it was a monumental accomplishment that brought black and white Americans together in the close confines of the U.S. military. Desegregating the armed forces also sent a clear signal that the federal government was willing to challenge segregation in its own ranks. The armed forces became a model example that interracial desegregation could work, something that was not generally accepted before the 1940s (and, for many Americans, not until much later than that). That same year, Truman endorsed a plank in his party’s platform at the Democratic National Convention that supported civil rights for all Americans, regardless of race, creed, or color. Though many Democrats expressed outrage, civil rights had entered the national dialogue. 24-4b Desegregation in Sports Professional baseball featured another popular example of civil rights liberalism. In April 1947, Civil Rights Breakthroughs 445 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. rule cannot be allowed “to Mob override the decisions of our courts. ” Board of Education (1954), in Jackie Robinson, a World which the Supreme Court War II veteran, made his ruled that separate educamajor league baseball debut tional facilities for black and with the Brooklyn Dodgers. white people were “inherAware that his presence ently unequal.” This was a would generate hostil—President Dwight D. Eisenhower, major breakthrough, overity, Robinson vowed not September 24, 1957 turning nearly sixty years of to retaliate against racist legal segregation that began taunts. As expected, fans with Plessy v. Ferguson (1896). threw debris at him, rival But it was slow to trigger changes. For one thing, players attacked him, and he was often barred from President Eisenhower believed that states rather eating with his teammates on the road. Despite than the federal government should deal with civil these stressful hardships, Robinson flourished. He rights, and he refused to endorse the decision. For won the National League Rookie of the Year award in another, the Court decreed in 1955 that desegrega1947 and the league’s Most Valuable Player award in tion of southern schools should proceed “with all 1949, and later he became the first African American deliberate speed,” which was vague enough to allow inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame. Within a few southern states leniency in enforcing the new law. years, a number of other stars of the Negro Leagues Another near breakthrough came with Eisenentered the historically white major leagues, suc-S hower’s assistance. In September 1957, nine black cessfully integrating “America’s pastime,” a highlyM students were selected to integrate Central High visible aspect of the nation’s cultural life. I School in Little Rock, Arkansas. When classes Brown v. Board T began, the students Read the deciwere met by angry, racLegal challenges to segregation were meeting with sion in Brown H ist mobs threatening viosome success as well, especially those led by the v. Board of lence, as well as by the NAACP’s legal team. The landmark case is Brown v., Education. © Bettmann/Corbis J O S H U A 6 8 9 0 B U Elizabeth Eckford endures the taunts of classmates as troops ensure African Americans’ entry into Little Rock’s Central High School. When >> the federal troops left a month later, the taunts and jeers reappeared, and Gov. Orval Faubus closed Little Rock’s public schools the following year in order to prevent integration. 446 C h apte r 2 4 Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Read Eisenhower’s response to the Little Rock crisis. Arkansas National Guard, which had been ordered by Arkansas Governor Orval Faubus to prevent integration. Believing he had little choice but to uphold the Supreme Court’s order in Brown, Eisenhower sent a thousand troops from the U.S. Army’s 101st Airborne Division to Little Rock to protect the black students. They stayed for a month before being replaced by the Arkansas National Guard, which looked on as white students taunted and tortured the African American students for the remainder of the school year. The following year, Faubus chose to close all of Little Rock’s public schools in order to prevent further integration. 24-4c Massive Resistance and the Black Response S Faubus was not alone. In the South, black advances M were almost always met by massive resistance I from the dominant white population. Certainly some white southerners supported racialTintegration, but the loudest and most agitated did not. H symAfrican American activists and their white pathizers were beaten, picketed, and generally , maltreated, sometimes even killed. The Brown decision itself had led to the creation of several White Citizens’ Councils, which were organized to J defend segregation. The Ku Klux Klan also experienced a O revival in the middle 1950s, especially in the South. And parts of the South, such as PrinceSEdward County, Virginia, chose to close their public school H system and their public pools rather than be forced U to integrate. Emmett Till A One of the most-discussed acts of racist violence occurred in 1955, when a fourteen-year-old 6 Chicagoborn African American boy named Emmett Till was 8 beaten and murdered for supposedly whistling at a white woman who worked at a grocery9store in Money, Mississippi. The woman’s husband and his 0 murhalf-brother were arrested for kidnapping and der, and the American public closely followed B their trial in newspapers and on television, especially U after Till’s mother allowed reporters to photograph Till’s badly beaten body. Although several African Americans testified that they had seen and heard the beating, the jury found the two men innocent. The world press also followed the story closely, leading one German newspaper to report, “The Life of a Negro Isn’t Worth a Whistle.” The communist presses also picked up the Till case and other massive resistance civil rights abuses in order A campaign and policy to make a statement about begun by politicians in the hypocrisy of the United Virginia to craft laws and do whatever possible to States’ claims to be fightresist racial integration; ing for freedom in the Cold spread throughout the War. Although lynching was South still, evidently, permissible in White Citizens’ the Deep South, the case of Councils Emmett Till provoked outCommittees organized in the 1950s and 1960s to rage, leading many northdefend segregation in the erners who had been cool on South civil rights to see the depth bus boycott of segregation still extant in A campaign to boycott the South and making white an area’s buses until southerners aware that the change is instituted; used frequently during the civil world was watching their rights movement actions; the two men acquitted of Till’s murder were later ostracized by their local white society. Many later civil rights activists saw the murder of Till as a turning point in their lives, demonstrating that the legal system in the South was not going to protect them and that they needed activism to create change. Montgomery Bus Boycott and SCLC Indeed, white resistance did not prevent African Americans from continuing to push for equal treatment and access to public services. In fact, civil rights activism increased in the late 1950s. Following a successful 1953 bus boycott in Baton Rouge and the public outcry over Emmett Till’s murder, in 1955 Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat in the “whites only” section of a Montgomery, Alabama, bus. After her arrest, the African American community in Montgomery, which had been planning for such an event for more than a year, boycotted the city’s bus system. Despite significant loss of revenue, the white owners of the bus lines refused to integrate their seating policy. They held out until 1956, when the Supreme Court declared that segregation in public transportation was unconstitutional. The Montgomery Bus Boycott, a remarkable success that mobilized the black community and demonstrated the possibilities of a widespread social movement, led directly to the formation of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), founded in January 1957 to challenge Jim Crow laws in a direct way. Several veteran civil rights activists were present at the inception, including Bayard Rustin, Ella Baker, Stanley Levison, Ralph Abernathy, and Martin Luther King, Jr. King was selected as the group’s leader. The SCLC initiated and organized massive revolts in the Deep Civil Rights Breakthroughs 447 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. nonviolence South against racial oppression, and it embraced a philosophy of peaceful integration and nonviolence. But it would take increased grassroots protests to push the movement forward, protests that would start in 1960. Strategy for social changes that rejects the use of violence American life led many Americans to critique their society as hollow and bland. Whatever else it might be, the coming decade, when these complaints would have ramifications, would not be described as bland, conformist, or dull. It is to that subject, “the sixties,” that we now must turn. What else was happening . . . Looking Ahead . . . The conflicts over race in 1950s America would turn out to be dress rehearsals for the massive social changes that would come in the 1960s. But more than just civil rights were affected by the changes in postwar America. The political spectrum was colored by the Cold War for the next half-century. Americans were to have access to greater luxuries than in any other society in the history of the world.S Jobs were mostly plentiful, and churches were generally full. But these changes came with some costs.M The fear of unpredictable nuclear holocaust loomedI over everything. Women were socially prescribed to remain in the home if the family could afford it.T Racial disparities were made worse by restrictions inH suburban housing. And the consumerist impulse of 1947 AT&T invents the cellular phone, which becomes commercially available only in 1983. 1950 Danish doctor Christian Hamburger performs the first sex change operation on New Yorker George Jorgensen, who becomes Christine Jorgensen. 1954 Ray Kroc buys the small-scale franchise McDonald’s Restaurant and begins to turn it into the most successful fast-food chain in the world. 1959 The Beatles form. Visit the CourseMate website at www.cengagebrain.com for additional study tools and review materials for this chapter. , J O S H U A 6 8 9 0 B U 448 C h apte r 2 4 Cold War America 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Chapter 25 The Sixties S M I T H , J O S H ­Learning Outcomes After reading this chapter, you should be able to do U the following: A 25-1 Describe the experiences John F. Kennedy had while president that led some to label him the “ultimate cold warrior.” 6 25-2 Discuss attempts made both by African Americans and by the 8 legal system to provide voting and other rights to black citizens. 9 25-3 Discuss Lyndon Johnson’s desire to build a “Great 0 Society” and evaluate the relative success of his programs. 25-4 B Explain the situation in Vietnam that President Johnson inherited U from his predecessors, and evaluate the decisions he made over the next few years concerning the Vietnam War. 25-5 Discuss the growth of the “counterculture” in American society during the 1960s, and describe the various movements that began to gather strength as Americans with an agenda sought to have their voices heard. 450 C h apte r 21 The Continued Move West 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. “ The transition to the excitement and disenchantments that we associate with the sixties took place slowly, beginning about 1963 or 1964. ” From today’s perspective, the years 1960, 1961, and 1962 look a lot more like the fifties than what we have come to think of as “the sixties.” The It is acceptable for the federal government to purposely economy remained strong, deceive the American public in order to promote what the those advocating for drafederal government defines as a national objective. matic social change remained Strongly Disagree Strongly Agree S largely on the margins, and 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 the child-focused world M of                                                    the postwar years retained its I grip in the ever-expanding suburbs. The transition to the excitement and disenchantT with the sixties took place slowly, beginning about 1963 or 1964. ments that we associate It culminated in 1968, as liberalism—America’s dominant political system at the time, H which stressed individual rights, democratic capitalism, and a generous system of social entitlements—seemed, under attack from all sides. Some felt it was too generous, creating a class of entitled loafers unwilling to do their fair share. Others felt postwar liberalism wasn’t generous enough, sacrificing equality for the sake of freedom, and placing J and consumerism rather than authenticity and generosity. a priority on appearances Nonviolent political stances—against racial discrimination and the Vietnam War—so O infuriated resisters that they sometimes turned to violence, which was sometimes met S in return by further violence. By the late 1960s, this violence included even the assassinations of leaders like H John F. Kennedy, Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Robert Kennedy. Furthermore, sexual and social mores seemed to be changing and loosening, U as a widespread drug culture emerged and as women pushed against society’s long-held restrictions. African Americans and other repressed minorities also began to demand A greater recognition and access to power. In the end, the agents for change provoked a conservative reaction that began mounting in 1968 and persisted for the next several decades. But they would 6 transform America before the reaction took hold.  What do you think? 8 25-1 Kennedy 9 and the Cold War The sixties started conventionally enough. After eight years in the White House, 0 Eisenhower was still beloved by much of America. But the Twenty-second Amendment, B to FDR’s four terms as president, did not permit Eisenhower, ratified in 1951 in reaction or anyone else, to run U for more than two terms in office. Eisenhower tepidly endorsed his vice president, Richard Nixon, who had risen to fame through the anticommunist witch hunts of the 1950s Red Scare. For their part, the Democrats nominated a young (forty-three-year-old) Mas­ sachusetts senator named John F. Kennedy. The scion of a prosperous Boston Irish family, Kennedy seemed to have been bred for the job. He was a World War II hero with M&N/Alamy A psychedelic image of the musician Jimi Hendrix, who symbolized the topsy-turvy nature of the latter > the new medium to showcase his youthful vigor, while Nixon’s shifting eyes and moving hands made viewers uncertain he was ready to be © Bettmann/Corbis J O S H U A president. Many radio listeners, though, thought Nixon won the debate. 452 C h apte r 2 5 The Sixties 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. OR 6 MT 4 ID 4 NV 3 CA 32 WY 3 MN 11 SD 4 CO 6 NM 4 WI 12 IA 10 NE 6 UT 4 AZ 4 ME 5 ND 4 KS 8 OK R-7/I-1 TX 24 IL 27 MI 20 AR 8 LA 10 PA 32 OH 25 IN 13 MO 13 WV 8 KY 10 AL MS I-6/D-5 8 VA 12 NC 14 TN 11 AK 3 VT 3 NH MA 4 16 NY 45 GA 12 RI NJ CT 4 16 8 DE 3 MD 9 SC 8 FL 10 HI 3 Candidate (Party) Electoral Vote Popular Vote Kennedy (Democrat) 303 56.50% 34,226,731 49.7% Nixon (Republican) 219 40.75% 34,108,157 49.5% 15 2.75% 501,643 S 0.7% M Map 25.1. The Election of 1960I Cengage Learning Single column map Election 1960 No bleeds . Cengage Learning 2014 T Ms00477 20p6 x 18p9 H Final proof 8/16/08 Correction for Boyer 7/27/09—cm: grams. As a result, Kennedy’s calls for increased , Eliminate yellow in TN Byrd (Independent) federal aid for medical care, mass transit, Correct Kennedy pop.education, vote per 1970 Abstract: 34,226,731 theStatistical unemployed, and a cabinet-level urban affairs Rev.department 11/14/09—cm: generally eliminate OR & CA state boundaries went nowhere. @ shorelines J O 25-1b Kennedy the Cold WarriorS But Kennedy did become an avid H Cold Warrior. During the election, U he vowed to take a more aggressive approach to the Cold War A than Eisenhower had, by challenging communism all over the world. Nation Building To do this, Kennedy sought the support of developing nations, which he intended to win by facilitating their economic and political maturation—a process known as nation building. Kennedy believed wholeheartedly in the doctrine of containment and announced his willingness to wage preemptive strikes to prevent the march of communism. The Kennedy administration pursued this policy all over the globe, specifically with his Alliance of Progress program, which provided $25 billion in aid to countries in Latin America. One response to the United States’ promoting wealth for its allies was the construction, in 1961, of the Berlin Wall, built by the communist government to separate impoverished, Soviet-controlled East Berlin from the more prosperous West Berlin. nation building Facilitating the economic and political maturation of developing nations; political strategy employed by President Kennedy in order to prevent developing nations from adopting communism Berlin Wall Barrier built in 1961 by the communist government to separate impoverished, Soviet-controlled East Berlin from the more prosperous West Berlin Kennedy and Cuba After the election, however, Cuba and Vietnam rapidly developed as the president’s two biggest areas of concern, and nowhere did Kennedy’s hard-line approach to the Cold War manifest itself more dramatically than in dealing with Cuba. Located 90 miles off the coast of Florida, Cuba had been a main concern of U.S. foreign policy since the SpanishAmerican War for two reasons: (1) the United States feared any political turmoil so close to its border, and (2) many Americans had invested in the country. These long-standing concerns were compounded when Fidel Castro took power in 1959 and established a communist regime. This new regime distressed Kennedy not only because it meant one more communist country in the world, but also because the Soviet Union now had an ally just 90 miles from 6 8 9 0 B U The Berlin Wall, designed to prevent East Berliners from defecting to the West, became >> a powerful symbol of the Cold War throughout the remainder of the twentieth century. Kennedy and the Cold War Paul Schutzer/Time Life Pictures/Getty Images 1960 WA 9 453 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. Cuban Missile Crisis Thirteen-day confrontation between the Kennedy administration and the Cuban communist regime in October 1962; Castro had agreed to allow the Soviet Union to base a few of its nuclear missiles in Cuba, thus potentially triggering a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union U.S. shores. Kennedy soon dedicated himself to removing Castro and the communists from power. Bay of Pigs Invasion Under Eisenhower, the CIA had designed a plan to overthrow Castro. Kennedy implemented the plan in April 1961, when the CIA sent American-trained Cuban exiles back to their homeland to spark a rebellion. This seemingly simple scheme quickly went awry. Inadequate air cover, treacherous reefs, and swampy terrain meant that the 1,400 commandos had a tough landing. In addition, the plan was hardly a secret to Castro; there had been a lot of talk about the invasion in theS Cuban immigrant community in the United States,M and the news got back to him. When the commandos arrived on Cuban shores, Castro’s forces were wait-I ing to capture them as they landed. T Kennedy, wanting to conceal U.S. aims to overthrow or even assassinate another nation’s leader,H waffled as to how to salvage the operation. His, options were to do nothing and allow the operation to fail, or send U.S. military forces into Cuba, escalating the conflict. He chose to do nothing, meaningJ that more than 1,200 exiles O Explore docuwere captured and went on ments related to trial; some were executed,S the Bay of Pigs and most were sentenced to invasion. H thirty years’ imprisonment. Those imprisoned were released in twenty months,U in exchange for $53 million in food and medicine. A It was Kennedy’s greatest humiliation as president. Cuban Missile Crisis 6 After the Bay of Pigs incident, the president launched a multifaceted assault on the Castro regime, includ-8 ing radio broadcasts, assassination plots, and sabo-9 tage raids. Castro knew that another invasion of 0 Cuba was imminent. Determined to protect his communist revolution, in April 1962 Castro agreedB to allow the Soviet Union to base a few of its nuclear U missiles in Cuba. These missiles would be easily capable of reaching U.S. targets and therefore of triggering a nuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union. The Soviet premier, Nikita Khrushchev, also knew the United States had missiles close to the Soviet Union, in American ally Turkey, and he wanted to have at least some sem- 454 C h apte r 2 5 blance of balance in the arms race. A nuclear conflict was on the horizon. In October 1962, a U.S. reconnaissance plane photographed the storage site of the missiles. This shocking discovery set off a thirteen-day confrontation known as the Cuban Missile Crisis. Kennedy hastily convened a committee of top advisors to discuss how to handle the situation. Options ranged from invading Cuba to negotiating, although most of Kennedy’s advisors favored some form of direct standoff. Kennedy ultimately decided to establish a naval “quarantine,” or blockade, of Cuba to prevent the Soviet weapons shipments from reaching port. The tension heightened on October 27 when a U.S. pilot flying over Cuba was shot down and killed. The frightening standoff subsided only when the Soviets agreed to remove their missiles from Cuba in exchange for a promise that the United States would not invade Cuba. The Kennedy administration also privately pledged to dismantle U.S. nuclear missiles that were placed in Turkey. Successful negotiations meant that both sides had averted nuclear war, and the secrecy of the agreement about removing missiles in Turkey made it appear that Kennedy had won the standoff. The two sides also took steps to avoid getting that close to a nuclear standoff again, including putting a direct telephone line between the White House and the Kremlin. Kennedy and Vietnam While Kennedy was dealing with Cuba, he was also supporting an anticommunist government in South Vietnam. U.S. forces had first entered Vietnam in the 1950s, after France removed itself as colonial overlord of the Southeast Asian country. With France gone, the country was partitioned in two halves. The south was led by the U.S.-supported leader Ngo Dinh Diem, the north by communist leaders like Ho Chi Minh. When Ho Chi Minh threatened to unify the nation under communist rule, the United States increased its involvement. First, it canceled Vietnam’s 1956 elections (which had been mandated by the Geneva Convention) because it feared the communists would win. Then it devoted resources to propping up the South Vietnamese government. By 1961, it was spending more than $40 million on improving the South Vietnamese police system and on establishing a number of programs to help the South Vietnamese battle communist-backed guerrilla forces in the south, called the Viet Cong. The Viet Cong often fought with the assistance of the North Vietnamese military but were an independent The Sixties 9781305178526, HIST: US History Since 1865, Volume 2, Third Edition, Schultz - © Cengage Learning. All rights reserved. No distribution allowed without express authorization. need for U.S. intervention. By 1963, Vietnam was a small but volatile front in the Cold War. Keystone/Getty Images 25-2 The Freedom Movement S In one of the most horrific images of the decade,M a Buddhist >> monk in Saigon makes the ultimate protest against the repression of I the Buddhist majority by setting himself on fire. T H too unit. To prevent the Viet Cong from becoming powerful in the south, Kennedy increased, the U.S. As Kennedy navigated the difficult terrain of a multifaceted worldwide Cold War, a movement at home was emerging just as dramatically. After the civil rights victories of the 1950s, African Americans stepped up their activism in the early 1960s, using Cold War rhetoric to demonstrate that America itself was not living up to its claim of being a beacon of freedom. 25-2a Expanded Nonviolence Civil rights protests had been ongoing since the Second World War, but they increased in intensity and number in the early 1960s, beginning with the actions of a collection of university students. military presence in South Vietnam from 5,000 to 16,700. The United States was slowly drawing itself The Sit-Ins and SNCC in, all in an attempt to prevent another domino J from In one of the most influential protests in American hisfalling. O tory, on February 1, 1960, four black college freshmen But when an internal battle in South Vietnam from the North Carolina Agricultural and Technical S Diem between Catholic leaders like Ngo Dinh College began a sit-in at a local Woolworth’s lunch and the Buddhist majority led to protests (several H counter in Greensboro. The young men would not Buddhists publicly burned themselves to death to U leave until they were served a cup of coffee, a pracprotest the repression of the Buddhist majority), tice regularly refused in a segregated society. The stuthe United States felt it was necessary to intervene A dents sat quietly until the store closed. The next day, in order to maintain stability. Diem was not doing twenty-seven students sat the job and was making in. Within a few days there South Vietnam susceptible 6 were more students than to a communist takeover. In 8 seats at Woolworth’s, which August 1963 the U.S. ambasprompted the students to sador to Vietnam, Henry 9 spread their protest to other Cabot Lodge, gave U.S. 0 white-only restaurants in support (and $40,000) to a the city. Within three days, group of South Vietnamese B there were more than three generals who launched a U hundred students particicoup against Diem. Within pating in the sit-in. a few days, the U.S.-backed By the end of February, officers executed the old students in other southern leaders and took charge. cities began similar proNevertheless, political tests, and by late spring, instability persisted, only —Franklin McCain, one of the original four almost seventy thousand increasing the apparent sit-in protesters at Greensboro Some way through, an old “ white lady, who must have been seventy-five or eighty-five, came over and put her hands on my shoulders and said, ‘Boys I am so proud of you. You should have done this ten years ago. ” T...
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