Double V for victory
A campaign called for african americans to fight battles on 2 fronts
1. Victory abroad protecting american democracy from facism
2. Victory at home in eradicating racial discrimination
Executive Order #8802
Racial discrimination is illegal in industries vital to war effort
FEPC first federal program to investigate complaints against racial discrimination
First time since reconstruction that fe. GOv’t actively assists in protecting black rights
The “four freedoms”
* Freedom of speech
* Freedom of worship
* Freedom from want
* Freedom from fear
Bracero Program
* U.S., Mexico agreement where mexican immigrants work in domestic & agricultural sectors to fill labor shortage during wwii
* Temporary program ultimately extends until 1964
* Braceros lack of rights illustrated limitations of pathways to citizenship for mexican immigrants
Korematsu vs. United states (1942)
FDR passed executive order 9066 which forcibly relocated Japanese Americans from the west coast to relocation camps for the duration of the war.
McCarthyism
Red scare
Loyalty-security program (1947): Federal program to investigate for “subversive” activities
McCarthyism symbolized how foreign policy concerns shaped restriction of domestic freedoms
Marshall plan
Economic boom spurred by wwii carries over into postwar era
Cold war political climate drives expansion of U.S. economy industrial-complex
Union activism results in workers gaining greater economic benefits
Economic policy that revitalized European economics & prevent defection to communism
Truman's Doctrine
U.S. had responsibility to support efforts of independence from outside threats (i.e. communism) U.S. supported anticommunist regimes (despite their oppressive actions) to strengthen power against Soviets
Containment
* Principally focused on preventing spread of communism & soviets influence beyond eastern Europe
-shaped american foreign policy through 1980’s
GI Bill
* Central purpose: to help returning soldiers readjust to life as citizens
-aimed to ease burden of finding a job immediately of millions of veterans to the workforce
* Offered free college tuition to veterans
-increased size of educated workforce (& major universities)
“The Kitchen Debate”
Consumerism as a sign of American exceptionalism
-i.e “the kitchen debates”
The “Kitchen debates” between the U.S. Vice president Richard Nixon & soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev illustrated how american consumerism was used as a means to critique Soviet communism
Levittown
* William Levitt’s innovation to mass produce & construct cheap homes revolutions suburban home market
* Federal housing administration (FHA): federal initiative insures home mortgages, marketing home purchasing available to nearly all americans
The feminine mystique
* Friedan criticizes women’s second class status in the postwar era
* Postwar prosperity masks frustration among middle class women about lack of opportunity outside the home
* Rejected popular notion that women only found fulfillment through childbearing & homemaking “cult domesticity”
* Influenced national organization of womens (NOW) & the second wave feminism
Stokely Carmichael
* Carmichael initially champions strategy of nonviolent passive but rejects strategy and embraces military & armed self-defense
* Rejects “politics of respectability”
* Did not solely seek separatism; aimed to enhance ability to interact & integrate with whites from a position of independence.
Student nonviolent coordinating committee (SNCC)
* Advocated for nonviolent civil disobedience
-members educated on, tenants of the strategy & stimulated sit in experience to strengthen their resolve in the face of white backlash
Recruited white students from North & midwest to participate in nonviolent activism
Brown vs. Board of Education (1954)
Supreme court overturns plessy vs. ferguson views “separate but equal” unconstitutional
Court orders integration to occur “with all deliberate speed”
-shifts burden of enforcing decisions on civil rights activists level to challenge at local level
-results in rise of civil disobedience and nonviolent passive resistance
A. Philip Randolph
Influenced by a. Philip randolph, brotherhood of sleeping car porters & march on washington movement
Civil Rights Act (1964)
Primary focus: eradicating poverty & racial injustice
Voting Rights Act (1965)
Primary focus: eradicating poverty & racial injustice
The great society
Gulf of Tonkin Resolution
* North vietnam attack american destroyer in gulf tonkin
* Gulf of tonkin in resolution gave president congressional approval, without formal declaration of war, to use military force in southeast asia
* Spurs drastic escalators in american military presence in vietnam
Tet offensive
* Anti War movement increase opposition to conflict
* Some see it ast antithetical to american values
* Intervention in vietnam contradicts american exceptionalism
* Cost of war diverting funds away from great society civil rights program
* Tet offensive deteriorates support for war, compels LBJ to not run for reelection
Bay of Pigs (1964)
Jks failure to overthrow communist castro revolution in cuba escalates tension with Soviet union
Equal Rights Amendment
“Equality of rights under the law shall not be denied or abridged by the U.S. or any states on the basis of sex
Dobs vs. Jackson women’s Health (2022)
Roe vs, wade an abuse of federal power to infringe on individual rights
Religious right viewed women’s liberation movement as destroying american families
Long term efforts to undermine the decision culminate in Dobbs vs. Jackson women’s health (2022)
The “Moral Majority”
Blended concerns over american immorality with critique of expansion of federal government
The “Silent Majority”
Milliken vs. Bradley (1974)
Supreme court negates busing policy to achieve integration; absolves suburban schools of responsibility to assist in interaction of urban school s
Ryan White
Ryan white contracts AIDS via blood transfusion in Indiana, 1984
Successfully sues schools for anti-AIDS discrimination
White story exposes that AIDS wasn’t a “gay disease” as previously viewed by religious right
Inspired widespread education about the virus, how it’s contracted, how to prevent it, ect.
The war on terror
“At the present moment in world history nearly every nation of life… one way of life is based upon the will of the majority. The second way of life is based upon the will of the minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies upon terror and oppression.. And the suppression of personal freedom”- president Harry Truman march 12th, 1947