US History/Print version

Table of contents

• Preface

1. Introduction

Colonial America

• Introduction
• Pre-Columbian America (before 1492)
• Brief overview of European history (before 1492)
• Vikings (1000-1013)
• Exploration (1492-1620)
• Early Colonial Period (1492 - 1607)
• The English Colonies (1607 - 1754)
• Road to Revolution (1754 - 1774)

The Republic until 1877

• The American Revolution (1774 - 1783)
• A New Nation is Formed (1783 - 1787)
• The Early Years of the Constitutional Republic (1787 - 1800)
• Jeffersonian Republicanism (1800 - 1824)
• Panic of 1819
• Westward Expansion and Manifest Destiny (1824 - 1849)
• Friction Between the States (1849 - 1860)
• Intro to Secession
• Farewell to the Star-Spangled Banner (1860 - 1861)
• The Civil War (1860 - 1865)
• Reconstruction (1865 - 1877)

The Republic 1877 to 2000

• The Age of Invention and the Gilded Age (1877 - 1900)
• The Progressive Era (1900 - 1914)
• World War I and the Treaty of Versailles (1914 - 1920)
• The Roaring Twenties and Prohibition (1920 - 1929)
• The Great Depression and the New Deal (1929 - 1939)
• Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)
• World War II and the Rise of the Atomic Age (1939 - 1945)
• Truman and the Cold War (1945 - 1953)
• Eisenhower, Civil Rights, and the Fifties (1953 - 1961)
• Kennedy and Johnson (1961 - 1969)
• Nixon presidency and Indochina (1969 - 1974)
• Ford, Carter and Reagan presidencies (1974 - 1989)
• Bush and Clinton presidencies,1st Gulf War (1989 - 2001)

2000 to the Present

• George W. Bush, September 11, 2nd Gulf War, and Terrorism (2001-2006)
• Growing Crisis with Iran (2006-)
• 2008 Election
• Obama
• 2016 Election
• Trump
• Biden
• Hope

Appendices

• Appendix Alpha: Presidents and Vice Presidents of the United States
• Appendix Beta: Chief Justices of the United States Supreme Court
• Appendes Gamma: Supreme Court Decisions
• Appendex Delta: Famous Third Parties

Keywords (People, Events, etc)

Licensing and Contributors

• Authors

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Preface

This textbook is based on the College Entrance Examination Board test in Advanced Placement United States History. The test is a standard on the subject, covering what most students in the United States study in high school and college, so we treat it as the best reference.

The text was reorganized and edited in November 2008 to be closer to the content and organization the college board requires. The content was carefully chosen for significance and interest. We welcome reader feedback and suggestions for improvement.

Enjoy! The AP Course Description can be found here.

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Introduction

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This is, to the best of our knowledge, the world's first open content US History Textbook. The users are invited to tweak and refine this book until there is nothing better available. The authors are confident that this will happen because of the success of the Wikipedia site.

Brief overview of European history (before 1492)

The peoples of Europe have had a tremendous effect on the development of the United States throughout the course of U.S. history. Europeans "discovered" and colonized the North American continent and, even after they lost political control over its territory, their influence has predominated due to a common language, social ideals, and culture. Therefore, when endeavoring to understand the history of the United States, it is helpful to briefly describe their European origin.

Greece and Rome

Ancient Greece

See also: Ancient History/Greece

The first significant civilizations of Europe formed in the second millennium BCE. By 800 BCE, various Greek city-states, sharing a language and a culture based on slavery, pioneered novel political cultures. In the Greek city of Athens, by about 500 BCE, the male citizens who owned land began to elect their leaders. These elections by the minority of a minority represent the first democracy in the world. Other states in Greece experimented with other forms of rule, as in the totalitarian state of Sparta. These polities existed side by side, sometimes warring with each other, at one time combining against an invading army from Persia. Ancient Athens is known for its literary achievements in drama, history, and personal narrative. The individual city-states did not usually see themselves as a single entity. (The conqueror Alexander the Great, who called himself a Greek, actually was a native of the non-Greek state of Macedon.) The city-states of Greece became provinces of the Roman Empire in 27 BCE.

Rome

The Roman Empire

See also: Ancient History/Rome

The city of Rome was founded (traditionally in the year 753 BCE). Slowly, Rome grew from a kingdom to a republic to a vast empire, which, at various points, included most of present-day Britain (a large part of Scotland never belonged to the empire), France (then known as Gaul), Spain, Portugal, Italy, Greece, Turkey, Iraq, Palestine (including the territory claimed today by the modern state of Israel), Northern Arabia, Egypt, the Balkans, and the entire north coast of Africa. This empire was maintained through free-born or adoptive citizenship, citizen education and indoctrination, a large and well-drilled army, and taxes directed by a large bureaucracy directed by the emperor. As each province produced more Roman citizens, the state became hard to maintain. Whole kingdoms in the north and east, and the invading peoples we know as the Germanic tribes (the Ostrogoths and Visigoths and the Franks) sat apart from the system.

After the death of one emperor in 180 CE, power struggles between the army and a succession of rulers of contested origins produced anarchy. Diocletian (243 - 316) reinstated the Empire by 284. Rome regained territory until 395, when the Empire was so large that it had to be divided into two parts, each with a separate ruler. The two halves sat uneasily together. The East, which considered itself the heir of Alexander the Great, spoke Greek or a dialect, while the West spoke Latin. The Eastern Empire survived until 1453, but the system to maintain the Western Empire broke apart. Plagues and crop failures troubled the world. In 476, Germanic tribes deposed the boy who was then the Emperor. Roman roads fell into disrepair, and travel became difficult. Some memories remained in the lands which had once known Roman rule. The supreme rulers of various tribes called themselves king, a distortion of the Roman word Caesar.

The Roman Empire to the Holy Roman Empire

A mitred Adhémar de Monteil carrying the Holy Lance in one of the battles of the First Crusade

After Rome's fall, monks from Ireland (which had never known Rome) spread Catholic Christianity and the culture and language of the Western Roman Empire across Europe. Catholicism eventually spread through England (where the Germanic tribes of the Angles and the Saxons now lived)and to the lands of the post-Roman Germanic tribes. Among those tribes, the Franks rose to prominence.

Charlemagne (742 - 814), the King of the Franks, conquered great portions of Europe. He eventually took control of Rome. The senate and the political organs of Rome had disappeared, and Charlemagne did not pretend to become the head of the Church. Charlemagne's domain, a confederation of what had been Roman Gaul with Germanic states, was much smaller than Diocletian had known. But prestige came with identity with the past, and so this trunk of lands became The Holy Roman Empire. Charlemagne's descendants, as well as local rulers, took their sanction from the Church, while the Church's pope influenced both religious and political matters.

The result of political stability was technological advance. After the year 1000, Western Europe caught some of the East's discoveries, and invented others. In addition to vellum, Europeans now started making paper of rags or wood pulp. They also adopted the wind and water mill, the horse collar (for plows and for heavy weights), the moldboard plow, and other agricultural and technological advances. Towns came into being, and then walled cities. More people survived, and the knights and kings over them grew restive.

Viking Exploration of North America

In the eighth century, pushed from their homes in Scandinavia by war and population expansion, Norsemen, or Vikings, began settling parts of the Faeroe, Shetland, and Orkney Islands in the North Atlantic. They went where ever treasure was, trading as far as Byzantium and Kiev in the East. In the West they raided from Ireland and England down to the Italian peninsula, sailing into a port, seizing its gold, and murdering or enslaving its people before fleeing. They began settling Iceland in approximately 874 CE. A Viking called Erik the Red was accused of murder and banished from his native Iceland in about 982. Eric explored and later founded a settlement in a snowy western island. Knowing that this bleak land would need many people to prosper, Eric returned to Iceland after his exile had passed and coined the word "Greenland" to appeal to the overpopulated and treeless settlement of Iceland. Eric returned to Greenland in 985 and established two colonies with a population of nearly 5000.

Leif Erikson, son of Erik the Red, and other members of his family began exploration of the North American coast in 986. He landed in three places, in the third establishing a small settlement called Vinland. The location of Vinland is uncertain, but an archeological site on the northern tip of Newfoundland, Canada (L'anse aux Meadows) has been identified as the site of a modest Viking settlement and is the oldest confirmed presence of Europeans in North America. The site contains the remains of eight Norse buildings, as well as a modern reproduction of a Norse longhouse. But the settlement in Vinland was abandoned in struggles between the Vikings and the native inhabitants, whom the settlers called Skraelingar. Bickering also broke out among the Norseman themselves. The settlement lasted less than two years. The Vikings would make brief excursions to North America for the next 200 years, though another attempt at colonization was soon thwarted.

By the thirteenth century, Iceland and Greenland had also entered a period of decline during the "Little Ice Age." Knowledge of their exploration, in the days before the printing press, was ignored in most of Europe. Yet the Vikings are now considered the true European discoverers of North America. The influence of their people outlasted even the terrible raids, and their grandchildren became kings and queens. For example, a branch of Viking descendants living in France, the Normans, conquered England from the Anglo-Saxons in 1066.

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  Danish seamen, painted mid-12th century.
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  A painting depicting Leif Erikson spotting land in North America.
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  A recreation of a viking village in Newfoundland.

The Great Famine and Black Death

Burial of bodies during the black death

The Little Ice Age led to European famines in the years 1315-1317 and in 1321. In the year 1318 sheep and cattle began to die of a contagious disease. Farmers could not support the growing population. And then, in 1347, some Genoese trading ships inadvertently brought a new, invasive species of rat to Europe. These rats carried bubonic plague.

Plague was also called the Black Death, from the darkened skin left after death and from its deadly reach. It had three strands: bubonic, pneumonic, and septicemic. In bubonic plague fleas carried by the rats would leave their hosts and bite people. The masses of bacteria would flow through the human system, killing cells and leaving their refuse in lymph nodes in the armpit, groin, and neck. These nodes would swell and turn black, creating bubos. Infection could also spread into the lungs, so that a person might cough or sneeze the germ into the air. This created pneumonic plague, spreading disease into spaces where people gathered and where rats dared not go. It also spread through contamination of food. The last form of disease, and its most deadly, was septicemic. This attacked the blood, leaving stretches of pale skin looking black, and killing the person within hours.

Surviving laws of cities and guilds regulate public cleanliness and penalize adulteration of food. They cannot show how strictly these laws were applied. And they show no knowledge, of course, of germ theory and the need for sterilization. Older systems such as the few public baths which remained from the days of colonial Rome were seen as sinful and dangerous, invitations to the plague. The dwelling places of survivors of pre-Christian Rome, the Jews who were forced to live apart, were attacked by mobs who attributed the Black Death to their poisoning Christians' wells.

The responses to plague can be seen in the records left by survivors -- one third of the population of Europe died in repeated waves of disease -- and in the subsequent changes in society. Airplanes and satellites show the foundations of plague-era towns which were emptied by the disease. In just one square mile of pre-plague Europe there are reports of there being 50,000 people. In large cities, families would flee or lock themselves away, trying to keep themselves from death. Other families were locked in by city authorities. This is the beginning of the modern system of quarantine. Some branches of the family would not be among those so helped. The Black Death seemed erratic, sometimes taking people deemed good and pious, sometimes not. One priest or church prelate might die, and another survive. And a living priest might give no aid to other survivors. Some critiques of the Church which had become spread through most of Europe date from this era.

Although some lands became waste through lack of tilling, those people who survived grasped the property of those who had not. Europe then had a land-based economic system. Rich people became richer. There began a labor shortage: the farmers who survived needed hands to take in their crops. The wages of farm hands began to rise. In the surviving towns they needed people to guard the gates: in the courts they began to look for rising young men. Cities became more powerful in the depleted lands, and authority grew more centralized.

Education

Doctors meeting at the university of Paris

During the Middle Ages Western society and education were heavily shaped by Christianity as expressed through the Roman Catholic Church. Towns, courts, and feudal manors had their priests, monasteries and nunneries had their scriptora or libraries, and after the 11th century CE, a few cities had Universities, schools to educate men to be high-ranking clerics, lawyers, or doctors. Where children had schools, their parents paid a fee so that they might learn Latin, the language St. Jerome had used for his translation of the Bible. Latin was the language of the Church. It was also learned, along with military tactics and the rules of chivalry, by men who trained to be knights. A smattering of Latin was necessary, along with Math, even for the elementary schools which sprang up in some cities. There both boys and girls were taught literacy and math, prerequisite for acceptance as an apprentice in many Guilds. Latin across Europe created a European-wide culture: a doctor from Padua could talk to his fellow from Oxford in Latin.

As in the Greek and Roman eras, only a minority of people went to school. There were not enough books, little travel, and no means of spreading standardized education. Schools were attended first by persons planning to enter religious life. Occasionally a cleric would reach out to educate a very bright peasant boy. This was one of the few ways peasants could rise in the world. But the vast majority of people were serfs who served as agricultural workers on the estates of feudal lords. They were, in effect, tied to the fate of the land. From the serf up to some high princes, the vast majority of people did not attend school, and were generally illiterate.

In the rise of the Universities in the 11th century, the Church translated several manuscripts of the ancient Greek writer Aristotle into Latin. From Aristotle's emphasis upon human reason, philosophy and science, and the Church's emphasis upon revelation and the teachings of Christ, medieval scholars developed Scholasticism. This was an philosophical and educational movement which attempted to integrate into an ordered system both the natural wisdom of Greece and Rome and the religious wisdom of Christianity. It was dominant in the medieval Christian schools and universities of Europe from about the middle of the 11th century to about the middle of the 15th century, though its influence continued in successive centuries. The idea of Man in the middle of ordered nature, and yet dominant over nature, bore fruit in the observation of natural phenomena, the beginnings of what the Western World knows as science. It also led to the exultation of system over observation, and the persistence of the Ptolemaic theories such as geocentrism among formally educated people.

Noble girls were sometimes sent to live in nunneries in order to receive basic schooling. Nuns would teach them to read and write and the chores necessary to run their establishments, including spinning and weaving. (Cloth-making was a major national industry in the Middle Ages.) They taught them their manners and their prayers. Some of these girls later became nuns themselves.

Christianity, Islam, Judaism

A medieval illustration of Jerusalem, an important city in all Abrahamic religions, including Judaism, Christianity, and Islam.

During the centuries after the fall of Rome, various flavors of Christian churches spread from Northern Africa and Armenia westward. This changed after Mohammed established Islam in 610 CE. Like Christianity, it spread through conversion and conflict. At its height it was also a faith of Europe, from Spain to Albania and Bosnia and their sister states. Both Prince and Caliph held that their state must have one faith, and no other belief was encouraged. When Jerusalem was reconquered by the Seljuq Turks, Christians were no longer able to go on religious pilgrimages to the Holy City.

At the end of the eleventh century, Pope Urban II inaugurated the Crusades, urging Western European kings and great nobles to begin what would be a century and a half of warfare. Christian armies fought first to reconquer and then to hold part of the Kingdom of Jerusalem. The Crusaders ultimately failed in the face of resurgent Muslim forces. Western Europeans within Church and State argued for and against the Crusades.

Despite the failure of the Crusades, militant Western Christianity persisted in Spain in an effort known as the Reconquista (the "reconquest"), which purged the land of the Muslims who had arrived there in 711. By the fifteenth century, the Muslims were confined to the kingdom of Granada, which bordered the Mediterranean Sea in the southern side of the Iberian Peninsula. Granada finally fell in 1492 to the Spanish Christians, ending the reconquista.

Rome had destroyed Israel in 70 CE, but allowed a remnant of her people to survive. Fortified by rabbinic culture and centered on the Torah, they became a resilient group. They survived as the known world became Christian. They spread, as traders, through East and West. However, Christian relationships with Jews were punctuated by hatred. They were held to be guilty of Jesus' death, and they were supposed to be evil because they had not converted to Christianity. They were forced into the notorious ghettos, usually built on waste or undesirable land. They were forced to wear strange clothing which marked them off, and to pay heavy taxes. Christians spread rumors that Jewish officials sometimes kidnapped and killed young boys for their sacrifices. Sometimes a mob might break into the ghetto, killing some people. Individuals were sometimes forced to convert. One of the effects of European nationalism was the expulsion of a country's Jewish population. England was the first, in the 13th century; later, a reviving France; later still, Spain and Portugal. Some men crewing the ships in the Age of Exploration were Jews, often practicing their faith in hiding.

For a period in the late Twelfth century there two sets of Popes, a line in Rome and another in the French city of Avignon under the sway of that Court. In reaction against this, the Church centralized its powers in parallel to what nations were doing. There had been dissension before, in medieval England's Lollards and later with the Czech priest John Hus. However, it was only in an age after the printing press, when people began printing the Bible in their own languages, when Martin Luther founded the Protestant church. England's King Henry VIII, who had won the title "Protector of the Faith" for a work defending the Pope, later left it to become the head of the Church of England. This division of Western Christianity created religious minorities, who were persecuted throughout Europe. Among these were the Pilgrims, who helped settle America.

The Renaissance

See also: European History

The School of Athens a famous Renaissance fresco by Raphael that depicted ancient Greek philosophers.

Another, more humble result of the plague was the accumulation of rags left over from clothing. These were quickly used to make paper. Books were very rare during the Middle Ages, and the monks who made them chained them to their shelves. It took one year for a man to make one book. In that climate Bibles took priority: we have only one copy of Democritus's most famous work surviving from this period. As rag paper replaced velum, books began to become more plentiful. The supply was augmented by Europe's adoption of Johannes Gutenberg 's fixed-type printing press in the 15th century.

There had been earlier leaps in culture, including the wave of population and technological adaptation in the 12th century. This left its mark in increased population and the Roman Catholic Church's adoption of Aristotle. Yet the press made it possible for knowledge to have a foothold in society. Inventions in one place could be explained and adopted across a continent. The Greeks fleeing the fall of Byzantium brought their knowledge of ancient Greek culture to the West. The Bible, the basic book of Christendom, could be pored over by laypeople, and reading it could be learned by more people than ever before. Learning was no longer solely the province of the Church.

If the Bible was first off of the presses, pseudo-science and science followed soon after. The European witch trials were one result of the new medium. The questioning of scientific consensus was another. Andreas Vesalius published his observations about the circulatory system. Books discussing the theories of Nicolaus Copernicus and Galileo Galilei demolished the old geocentric theory of the cosmos. The arts were not neglected. Giorgio Vasari's biographical Lives introduced such new artists as Leonardo Da Vinci and Michelangelo Buonarroti to the larger world.

A later time called this growth of knowledge the Renaissance. They said it began in the Italian city-states, spreading throughout most of Europe. The Italian city of Florence was called the birthplace of this intellectual movement.

Books spread the Crusader's newly found experience and knowledge of the Mediterranean, a region whose technology was at that time superior to that of western Europe. Books written about traders, adventurers, and scholars spread knowledge of Chinese technology such as gunpowder and silk. They spread writings of the ancient world which had been lost to Europe, and nurtured a taste for new foods and flavors. They spread pictures of ancient Greek statues, Moorish carpets, and strange practices.

In the fifteenth century, the Mediterranean was a vigorous trading area. European ships brought in grains and salts for preserving fish, Chinese silks, Indian cotton, precious stones, and above all, spices. White cane sugar could be used to preserve fruit and to flavor medicine. Cinnamon was medicine against bad humors as well as preservative and flavoring, part of the mysterious poudre douce, and now available even to some European common people.

Toward Nation-States

The great age of exploration was undertaken by nation-states, cohesive entities with big treasuries who tended to use colonization as a national necessity. When such nations as Portugal, England, Spain, and France became stronger, they began building ships.

The Rise of Portugal

The Italian peninsula dominated the world because of its position in the Mediterranean Sea. Universities in Padua, Rome, and elsewhere taught men from East and West. Above all, principalities such as the Republic of Venice and Florence controlled trade. Genoa and Venice in particular ballooned into massive trading cities. Yet there was at yet no nation of Italy, so each city's riches belonged only to that city. Individual cities used their monopoly to raise the price of goods, which would have been expensive in any case, because they were often brought overland from Asia to ports on the eastern Mediterranean. The mad prices, in turn, increased the desire of purchasers to find other suppliers, and of potential suppliers to find a better and cheaper route to Asia.

Portugal was just one of many potential suppliers, with a location which extended its influence into the Atlantic and down, south and east, to Africa. Prince Henry, son of King John I, promoted the exploration of new routes to the East. He planned Portugal's 1415 capture of Ceuta in Muslim North Africa. He also sponsored voyages that pushed even farther down the West African coast. By the time of his death in 1460, these voyages had reached south to Sierra Leone.

Under King John II, who ruled from 1481 to 1495, Bartolomeu Dias finally sailed around the southernmost point of Africa to the Cape of Good Hope (1487-1488). In 1497-1499 Vasco da Gama of Portugal sailed up the east coast of Africa to India.

The Portuguese colonized and settled such islands in the Atlantic as Madeira, Cape Verde, the Azores, and Sao Tome. These islands supplied them with sugar and gave them territorial control of the Atlantic. West Africa was more promising, not only unearthing a valuable trade route to India, but also providing the Portuguese with ivory, fur, oils, black pepper, gold dust, and a supply of dark skinned slaves who were used as domestic servants, artisans, and market or transportation workers in Lisbon. They were later used as laborers on sugar plantations on the Atlantic.

France, England, And The Hundred Years' War

An idealized painting of Joan of Arc at the siege of Orléans

King Harold of England faced William the Norman usurper after defeating the last Viking forces holding the North of England. And when William the Norman became William the Conqueror, he held England by consolidating the nation. His army was ruled from newly built castles, and had the best technology of the time. His sons and their sons fought the original inhabitants of their country in Scotland and Wales, pushing their boarders. They also claimed the right to their ancestral Normandy, in what is now France. (There had long been rivalry between England and France over the wool trade.) By a English king's marriage to an former queen of France, Eleanor of Aquitaine, the king subsequently claimed Aquitaine. During the years of 1337 to 1453, the kings of England claimed the whole of France and beyond, fighting The Hundred Years' War there and in the Low Countries. For some years the English threatened Paris, and there was a question whether the small area of France proper would be entirely conquered. The early stages of the war marked by English victory against a demoralized French people and their Prince. But around 1428, a young peasant girl from Lorriene, France named Joan of Arc approached a garrison of the French army. She told them that Saint Michael, Saint Catherine, and Saint Margaret had told her to lead the army to victory. She said that God had come to her in a dream, and told her how to defeat the English. She claimed that God said Prince Charles of France needed to be crowned in order for France to claim victory over the English. After gaining the new French king, support of the populace, and several key victories, Joan was sold to the English for treason and as an appeasement. Yet France had been renewed. It pushed back against the invaders, and took back most of the land. In the next few centuries it was to remove England from Continental Europe.

The Hundred Years' War devastated both countries. But it ultimately turned both of them into stronger, colonial powers. The Hundred Years' War created opportunities for wealth and advancement for the knights of both countries. The Chivalric code showed great influence during this period. France absorbed Aquitaine, Castile, and Normandy itself, prosperous areas. The twin strokes of the plague and the Inquisition weakened opposition to the French king's rule. And English centralization continued as its own royalty sought service of serf and Baron. A group of new dialects, Middle English, came out of the tug between Norman lord and Anglo-Saxon peasant. If the nation could not get new land in Europe, it could use its ships to sail elsewhere.

Review Questions

1. Explain how one of these late medieval devices affected prosperity: the wind mill; the horse collar; the printing press.

2. How did the plague infect individuals? How did mass death affect society?

3. What was the importance of these four men to the Renaissance? Galileo Galilei, Nicolaus Copernicus, Andreas Vesalius, Leonardo Da Vinci.

Pre-Columbian America (before 1492)

Artist depiction of the Kincaid Mounds Site in the Pre-Columbian era.

Human civilization in the Americas probably began in the last ice age, when prehistoric hunters crossed a land bridge between the Asian and North American continents. Civilizations in North America, Central America, and South America had different levels of complexity, technology, and cohesiveness.

Some of the most powerful and organized societies occurred in South and Central America. These cultures developed writing, allowing them to spread and dominate. They created some of the largest cities in the Ancient world.

North American cultures were more fragmented and less unified. The tribe was often the major social unit, with exchanges between tribes creating similar societies over vast distances. Tribal dwellings as large as European towns flourished in the rugged desert of southwestern North America.

European-descended historians have difficulty referring to these cultures as a whole, as the native people did not have a unified name for themselves. At first, Europeans called natives "Indians". This term came from the belief by Christopher Columbus that he had discovered a new passage to India. Despite Amerigo Vespucci ascertaining that the Americas were not actually India, Indian continued to be used as the 'de facto' name for native inhabitants until around 1960. Starting in the 1960s, the term "Native American" was used. Yet this term may be too problematic: The name America derives from Amerigo Vespucci, an Italian who had little to do with the native people. There is also "American Indian". This is too general a term for a group having little in common other than skin tone and non-European language. In Canada, the term "First People" is used. All these terms for the native people of America show just how diverse Pre-Columbian America was and the disagreement continues among scholars today about this period.

Early Inhabitants of the Americas

Bering Land Bridge

A map depicting the crossing of the people into the Americas from Asia.

American history does not begin with Columbus's 1492 arrival. The Americas were settled long before the first European arrived. Civilization began during the last ice age, some 15 to 40 thousand years ago. Huge ice sheets covered the north, so sea levels were much lower, creating a land bridge between Asia and North America. This was the Bering land bridge, a gap in two large ice sheets creating a connection from lands near present day Alaska, through Alberta, and into the continental United States.

Nomadic Asians following herds of wild game traveled into the continental United States. A characteristic arrow point was found and first described near the present day town of Clovis, NM. Specialized tools and common burial practices are seen in many archaeological sites through North America and into South America.

Clovis People

The Clovis people are one of North America's earliest civilizations. It is not clear if the finds represent one unified tribe, or many tribes with a common technology and belief. Their trek across 2000 rugged miles is one of the great feats of pre-history. Their culture disappears dramatically from the archaeological record 12,900 years ago, with widespread speculation about what caused their disappearance. Theories range from the extinction of the mammoth, to sudden environmental changes caused by a comet, to flooding caused by the break of a massive freshwater lake, Lake Agassiz.

There is controversy about Pre-Clovis settlement of North and South America. Comparisons of culture and linguistics offer evidence of the influence of early America by several different contemporary cultures. Some genetic and time-dating studies point to the possibility that ancient Americans came from other places and arrived earlier than at the Clovis sites in North America. Perhaps some ancient settlers to the hemisphere traveled by boat along the seashore, or arrived by boats from the Polynesian islands.

As time went on, many of these first settlers settled down into agricultural societies, complete with domesticated animals. Groups of people formed stable tribes and developed distinct languages of their own, to the point that more distant relatives could no longer understand them. Comparative linguistics -- the study of languages of different tribes -- shows fascinating diversity, with similarities between tribes hundreds of miles apart, yet startling differences with neighboring groups.

At times, tribes would gain regional importance and dominate large areas of America. Empires rose across the Americas that rivaled the greatest ones in Europe. For their time, some of these empires were highly advanced.

Early Empires of Mesoamerica

Meso-American civilizations are among of the most powerful and advanced civilizations of the ancient world. Reading and writing were widespread throughout Meso-America, and these civilizations achieved impressive political, artistic, scientific, agricultural, and architectural accomplishments. Many of these civilizations gathered the political and technological resources to build some of the largest, most ornate, and highly populated cities in the ancient world.

Maya

The Mayans were a sophisticated civilization, who had great skill in the arts.

The aboriginal Americans settled in the Yucatan peninsulas of present-day Mexico around 10,000 BCE. By 2000 BCE, the Mayan culture had evolved into a complex civilization. The Mayans developed a strong political, artistic and religious identity among the highly populated Yucatan lowlands. The classic period (250-900 CE) witnessed a rapid growth of the Mayan culture and it gained dominance within the region and influence throughout present-day Mexico. Large, independent city-states were founded and became the political, religious, and cultural centers for the Mayan people.

Mayan society was unified not by politics, but by their complex and highly-developed religion. Mayan religion was astrologically based, and supported by careful observations of the sky. The Mayans had a strong grasp of astronomy that rivaled, and, in many ways, exceeded that of concurrent European societies. They developed a very sophisticated system for measuring time, and had a great awareness of the movements in the nighttime sky. Particular significance was attached to the planet Venus, which was particularly bright and appeared in both the late evening and early morning sky.

Mayan art is also considered one of the most sophisticated and beautiful of the ancient New World.

The Mayan culture saw a decline during the 8th and 9th century. Although its causes are still the subject of intense scientific speculation, archaeologists see a definite cessation of inscriptions and architectural construction. The Mayan culture continued as a regional power until its discovery by Spanish conquistadors. In fact, an independent, non-centralized government allowed the Mayans to strongly resist the Spanish conquest of present-day Mexico. Mayan culture is preserved today throughout the Yucatan, although many of the inscriptions have been lost.

Aztec

An Aztec calendar stone

The Aztec culture began with the migration of the Mexica people to present-day central Mexico. The leaders of this group of people created an alliance with the dominant tribes forming the Aztec triple alliance, and created an empire that influenced much of present-day Mexico.

The Aztec confederacy began a campaign of conquest and assimilation. Outlying lands were inducted into the empire and became part of the complex Aztec society. Local leaders could gain prestige by adopting and adding to the culture of the Aztec civilization. The Aztecs, in turn, adopted cultural, artistic, and astronomical innovations from its conquered people.

The heart of Aztec power was economic unity. Conquered lands paid tribute to the capital city Tenochtitlan, the present-day site of Mexico City. Rich in tribute, this capital grew in influence, size, and population. When the Spanish arrived in 1521, it was the fourth largest city in the world (including the once independent city Tlatelolco, which was by then a residential suburb) with an estimated population of 212,500 people. It contained the massive Temple de Mayo (a twin-towered pyramid 197 feet tall), 45 public buildings, a palace, two zoos, a botanical garden, and many houses. Surrounding the city and floating on the shallow flats of Lake Texcoco were enormous chinampas -- floating garden beds that fed the many thousands of residents of Tenochtitlan.

While many Meso-American civilizations practiced human sacrifice, none performed it to the scale of the Aztecs. To the Aztecs, human sacrifice was a necessary appeasement to the gods. According to their own records, one of the largest slaughters ever performed happened when the great pyramid of Tenochtitlan was reconsecrated in 1487. The Aztecs reported that they had sacrificed 84,400 prisoners over the course of four days.

With their arrival at Tenochtitlan, the Spanish would be the downfall of Aztec culture. Although shocked and impressed by the scale of Tenochtitlan, the display of massive human sacrifice offended European sensitivity, and the abundant displays of gold and silver inflamed their greed. The Spanish killed the reigning ruler, Montezuma in June 1520 and lay siege to the city, destroying it in 1521, aided by their alliance with a competing tribe, the Tlaxcala.

Inca

Machu Picchu, the "Lost city of the Incas".

With the ascension of Manco Capac to emperor of a tribe in the Cuzco area of what is modern-day Peru around 1200 BCE, the Incan civilization emerged as the largest Pre-Columbian empire in the Americas.

Religion was significant in Inca life. The royal family were believed to be descendants of the Inca Sun God. Thus, the emperor had absolute authority, checked only by tradition. Under the emperors, a complex political structure was apparent. The Incan emperor, regional and village leaders, and others were part of an enormous bureaucracy. For every ten people, there was, on average, one official. The organization of the Empire also included a complex transportation infrastructure. To communicate across the entire empire, runners ran from village to village, relaying royal messages.

In 1438, the ambitious Pachacuti, likely the greatest of the Incan emperors, came to the throne. Pachacuti rebuilt much of the capital city, Cuzco, and the Temple of the Sun. The success of Pachacuti was based upon his brilliant talent for military command (he is sometimes referred to as the "Napoleon of the Andes") and an amazing political campaign of integration. Leaders of regions that he wanted to conquer were bribed with luxury goods and enticed by promises of privilege and importance. As well, the Incans had developed a prestigious educational system which, not incidentally, just happened to extol the benefits of Incan civilization. Thus, much of the expansion throughout South America was peaceful.

At its height of power in the late 15th century, Incan civilization had conquered a vast patchwork of languages, people and cultures from present-day Ecuador, along the whole length of South America, to present-day Argentina.Cuzco, the capital city, was said by the Spanish to be "as fine as any city in Spain". Perhaps the most impressive city of the Incan empire, though, was not its capital, Cuzco, but the city Machu Picchu.

This mountain retreat was built high in the Andes and is sometimes called the "Lost City of the Incas." It was intended as a mountain retreat for the leaders of the Incan empire and demonstrates great artistry -- the abundant dry stone walls were entirely built without mortar, and the blocks were cut so carefully that one can't insert a knife-blade between them.

The Spanish discovered the Inca during a civil war of succession and enjoyed great military superiority over the slow siege warfare that the Incan empire had employed against its enemies. Fueled by greed at the opportunity to plunder another rich civilization, they conquered and executed the Incan emperor. The Incan empire fell quickly in 1533, but a small resistance force fled to the mountains, waging a guerrilla war of resistance for another 39 years.

Meso-American Empires

The Meso-American Empires were undoubtedly the most powerful and unified civilizations in the new world. Writings were common in Meso-America and allowed these cultures to spread in power and influence with far more ease than their counterparts in north America. Each of these civilizations built impressive urban areas and had a complex culture. They were as 'civilized' as the Spanish who conquered them in the 15th and 16th centuries.

Early Empires of the Southwest

Native Americans adapted the arid desert southwest. A period of relatively wet conditions saw many cultures in the area flourish. Extensive irrigation was developed that were among the biggest of the ancient world. Elaborate adobe and sandstone buildings were constructed. Highly ornamental and artistic pottery was created. The unusual weather conditions could not continue forever, though, and gave way, in time, to the more common drought of the area. These dry conditions necessitated a more minimal way of life and, eventually, the elaborate accomplishments of these cultures were abandoned.

Ancestral Puebloans

Cliff Palace, a structure of the Ancestral Puebloans.

One prominent group were the Ancestral Puebloans, who lived in the present day Northeastern Arizona and surrounding areas. The geography of this area is that of a flat arid, desert plain, surrounded by small areas of high plateau, called mesas. Softer rock layers within the mesas eroded to form steep canyons and overhangs along their slopes.

The Ancestral Puebloans culture used these cave-like overhangs in the side of steep mesas as shelter from the brief, fierce southwestern storms. They also found natural seeps and diverted small streams of snow melt into small plots of maize, squash and beans. Small seasonal rivers formed beds of natural clays and dried mud. The Ancestral Puebloans used hardened dry mud, called adobe, along with sandstone, to form intricate buildings that were sometimes found high in the natural overhangs of the mesas. The Ancestral Puebloans were also skilled at forming the natural clays into pottery.

Between 900 - 1130 CE a period of relatively wet conditions allowed the Ancestral Puebloans to flourish. Traditional architecture was perfected, pottery became intricate and artistic, turkeys were domesticated, and trade over long distances influenced the entire region. Following this golden period was the 300 year drought called Great Drought. The Ancestral Puebloan culture was stressed and erupted into warfare. Scientists once believed the entire people vanished, possibly moving great distances to avoid the arid desert. New research suggests that the Ancestral Puebloans dispersed; abandoning the intricate buildings and moving towards smaller settlements to utilize the limited water that existed.

Hohokam

Casa Grande Ruins, sheltered by a modern roof.

Bordering the Ancestral Puebloan culture in the north, a separate civilization emerged in southern Arizona, called the Hohokam. While many native Americans in the southwest used water irrigation on a limited scale, it was the Hohokam culture that perfected the technology (all without the benefit of modern powered excavating tools). The ability to divert water into small agricultural plots meant that the Hohokam could live in large agricultural communities of relatively high population density. This was particularly true in the Gila River valley, where the Gila River was diverted in many places to irrigate large fertile plains and numerous compact towns. The bigger towns had a 'Great House' at their centers, which was a large Adobe/stone structure. Some of these structures were four stories in size and probably were used by the managerial or religious elites. Smaller excavation or pits were enclosed by adobe walls and used as primary residences. Smaller pit rooms and pits were used for many different functions.

The successful use of irrigation is evident in the extensive Casa Grande village. Situated between two primary canals, the Casa Grande site has been the focus of nearly 9 decades of archaeological work. The original town was built around a Great House and incorporated open courtyards and circular plazas. By the 10th century neighboring settlements had been built to accommodate a large, highly developed region. The scale of this community can be seen in the results of one excavation of part of it in 1997. The project identified 247 pit houses, 27 pit rooms, 866 pits, 11 small canals, a ball court, and portions of four adobe walled compounds.

The Hohokam culture disintegrated when they had difficulty maintaining the canals in the dry conditions of the drought. Small blockages or collapses of the canal would choke the intricate irrigation networks. Large towns and extensive irrigation canals were abandoned. The people gave up their cultural way of life and dispersed into neighboring tribes.

Early Empires of the Mississippi

The Great Serpent Mount

Native Americans in the Eastern Continental United States developed mound-building cultures early in North American History. Groups of native Americans became more stratified as time went on and developed into tribes. These tribes participated in long networks of trade and cultural exchanges. The importance of trade routes developed urban cities of great influence.

The mound-building people were one of the earliest civilizations to emerge in North America. Beginning around 1000 BCE cultures developed that used mounds for religious and burial purposes. These mound-building people are categorized by a series of cultures that describe distinctive artwork and artifacts found in large areas throughout the present-day eastern United States.

The burial mound was the principle characteristic of all of these societies. These large structures were built by piling baskets of carefully selected earth into a mound. Mounds were pyramid shaped with truncated tops. Sometimes small buildings were built on top of them. Some of these mounds were quite large. The Grave Creek Mound, in the panhandle of present day West Virginia, is nearly 70 feet tall and 300 feet in diameter. Other mounds have even been shown to be oriented in a way that allows for astronomical alignments such as solstices and equinoxes.

Mound building cultures spread out in size and importance. The first culture, the Adena, lived in present-day Southern Ohio and the surrounding areas. The succeeding cultures united to create an impressive trade system that allowed each culture to influence the other. The Hopewell exchange included groups of people throughout the continental Eastern United States. There began to be considerable social stratification within these people. This organization predates the emergence of the tribe as a socio-political group of people that would dominate later eastern and western native American civilization.

The climax of this civilization was the Mississippian culture. The mound-building cultures had progressed to social complexity comparable to Post-Roman, Pre-Consolidation Tribal England. Mounds became numerous and some settlements had large complexes of them. Structures were frequently built on top of the mounds. Institutional social inequalities existed, such as slavery and human sacrifice. Cahokia, near the important trade routes of the Mississippi and Missouri rivers, became an influential and highly developed community. Extensive trade networks extended from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico.

Cahokia was one of the great centers of Mississippian culture and its largest settlement of Mississippi. The focal point of the settlement was the ceremonial mound called Monk's Mound. Monk's Mound was the largest mound ever constructed by mound-building people and was nearly 100 feet tall and 900 feet long. Excavation on the top of Monk's Mound has revealed evidence of a large building - perhaps a temple - that could be seen throughout the city. The city was spread out on a large plain south of Monks mound.

Monk's Mound located at the Cahokia site near Collinsville, Illinois.

The city proper contained 120 mounds at varying distances from the city center. The mounds were divided into several different types, each of which may have had its own meaning and function. A circle of posts immediate to Monk's Mound marked a great variety of astronomical alignments. The city was surrounded by a series of watchtowers and occupied a diamond shape pattern that was nearly 5 miles across. At its best, the city may have contained as many as 40,000 people, making it the largest in North America.

It is likely the Mississippian culture was dispersed by the onslaught of viral diseases, such as smallpox, which were brought by European explorers. Urban areas were particularly vulnerable to these diseases, and Cahokia was abandoned in the 1500's. The dispersal of tribes made it impractical to build or maintain mounds and many were found abandoned by European explorers.

Contact with European Culture

Epidemics

Graph of the population population of Mexico, with major epidemics marked.

European contact brought immediate changes in many tribes of North America. One of the most significant changes to all Indian tribes was the introduction of viral diseases and epidemics. Smallpox was probably the single biggest scourge to hit North America. Infected contagious Indians spread the plague far inland almost immediately after early encounters with European settlers. It is estimated that around 90% of all Native Americans died from diseases soon after first contact. The effects traumatized many powerful and important cultures. Urban areas were particularly vulnerable and Native American culture adapted by becoming more isolated, less unified, and with a renewed round of inter-tribal warfare as tribes seized the opportunity to gain resources once owned by rivals.

Columbian Exchange

On the other hand, Europeans brought invasive plants and animals. The horse was re-introduced to America (as original paleo-American populations of wild horses from the Bering land bridge were extinct) and quickly adapted to free range on the sprawling great plains. Tribes of nomadic Native Americans were quick to see the horse's value as an increase in their mobility; allowing them to better adapt to changing conditions and as a valuable asset in warfare. Along with Europeans bringing plants and animals, the Europeans were able to take several plants such as corn, potatoes, and tomatoes back to their native countries.

Review Questions

1. Give two names for the indigenous peoples living in America, and name the circumstances behind each name.

2. What evidence do we have for the Inca, Mayan, and Aztec cultures?

3. What in the climate contributed to the rise and fall of the indigenous peoples of South-West North America?

Vikings (1000-1013)

Who were the Vikings?

Map showing area of Scandinavian settlements during the 9th to 10th centuries. Also the trade and raid routes, often inseparable, are marked.

The Norsemen (Norwegians) who lived around the beginning of the second millennium are today more commonly known as Vikings. The Vikings were farmers who "traded" during the slow months. Now, "trading" doesn't mean "I'll give you five sheep for that cow." It means "I'll give you five sheep for that cow. If you don't want to trade, I'll kill you." These people loved to travel in boats from one place to another, and this led to the second discovery of North America (Native Americans first, Vikings second, and Columbus third). Although Irish monks, most famously Brendan, and other European explorers had voyaged in the western waters, the Vikings established a settlement, the remains of which can be seen today at L'Anse aux Meadows, Newfoundland.

Proported Ancestry and Descendants

The Norse are believed by some to have descended from the Huns, a people of uncertain ancestry. The Norse are believed by some to be the ancestors of the Goths and of modern Germans. There is no proof for these claims.

Eric "the Red" and his Children

Eric "the Red" fled Norway to Iceland to avoid facing a murder charge, and later was banished from Iceland for yet another murder. His children would have great impact on the discovery and explorations of North America.

Bjarni Ericson

Bjarni travelled around trading in his little knarr. A knarr is a small Norwegian boat that only fits about three to five people. Bjarni sighted Vinland (modern Newfoundland).

An interesting fact is that Leif Ericson bought Bjarni Herjólfsson's boat about ten years later, in about 995 C. E. This is the same boat in which Lief had discovered Vinland. Leif Ericson was about thirty years old (or thirty three, depending on whether one follows the "Eiríks saga rauða", i.e. the Saga of Eric the Red, or the "Grœnlendinga saga", or the Greenlanders Saga).

Thorvald Ericson

Explored from 1004 to 1005 AD.

Thorfinn Ericson

Traveled from 1008-1009 AD. He bravely took cattle with him on his knarr, hoping to settle in Greenland. "Greenland" is a misnomer, since it's covered in ice; his cattle died.

Freydis Erikidottir

Freydis was Eric's daughter, his fourth child. Since Freydis was a woman, there were many restrictions put upon her, but she wanted to make a name for herself. In 1013 AD, she explored with 2 Icelandic men, and killed them and their men upon arriving in Vinland (North America).

Leif Ericson

Leif Ericson did further exploration of Vinland and settled there. In 986, Norwegian-born Eirik Thorvaldsson, known as Eirik the Red, explored and colonized the southwestern part of Greenland. It was his son, Leiv Eiriksson, who became the first European to set foot on the shores of North America, and the first explorer of Norwegian extraction now accorded worldwide recognition.

The date and place of Leiv Eiriksson's birth has not been definitely established, but it is believed that he grew up on Greenland. The Saga of Eric the Red relates that he set sail for Norway in 999, served King Olav Trygvasson for a term, and was sent back to Greenland one year later to bring Christianity to its people.

Exploration (1266-1522)

Christopher Columbus

A posthumous portrait of Christopher Columbus

By the 15th Century European trade for luxuries such as spices and silk had inspired European explorers to seek new routes to Asia. The fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Empire in 1453 had closed a crucial trade corridor. Trade throughout the Ottoman Empire was difficult and unreliable. Portugal was in the lead in exploration, slowly exploring the shores of the African Continent in search of a better route to the spices and luxuries of the Orient.

Then the Italian Christopher Columbus submitted plans for a voyage to Asia by sailing around the world. By the late 15th century most educated Europeans knew the world was round. The Greek mathematician Eratosthenes had accurately deduced that the world was approximately 25,000 miles in circumference. Many of the experts studying Columbus's plans on behalf of the European monarchies he approached for funding realized that this was too far for any contemporary sailing ship to go. Columbus contested the measurements, claiming that the world was much smaller than was widely believed.

After approaching the monarchies of several Italian city-states, and repeated appeals to the English and Portuguese monarchies, the Spanish King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella finally decided to give Columbus a chance. King Ferdinand thought Columbus might find something to compete with the neighboring kingdom of Portugal. Columbus set out on August 3rd, 1492. Five weeks later, after almost being thrown overboard by his own crew, the long voyage ended when land was sighted. This was an island called Guanahani (now known as San Salvador, in the island chain called the Bahamas). During this voyage Columbus also explored what is now considered the northeast coast of Cuba and the northern coast of Hispaniola. On his return to Spain, news of the new lands spread throughout Europe. Columbus was to make three more voyages to the New World between 1492 and 1503, exploring the Caribbean and the mainland of Central and South America. He imported sugar cane to the Americas, beginning an important industry.

Columbus was granted authority by the Spanish Monarchy to claim land for the Spanish, begin a settlement, trade for valuable goods or gold, and explore. He was also made governor of all the lands which he found. Columbus become an increasingly savage and brutal governor in the course of his four voyages. He enslaved and stole from the natives, at one point threatening to cut off the hands of any native who failed to give him gold. He was retired, and to the end of his life he believed that he had reached Asia.

It took another Italian explorer for Spain, Amerigo Vespucci, to correct this error. Amerigo described the lands around his islands and tried to deduce their proximity to Asia. From his voyages, Amerigo deduced that Columbus had found a new Continent. This new continent would be named America.

French Empire in North America

A painting of Jacques Cartier meeting with the Iroquoian people of Stadacona.

Christopher Columbus's voyages inspired other European powers to seek out the new world as well. Jacques Cartier, a respected mariner in his native France, proposed a trip to the North to investigate whether Asia could be reached from another route. His trip in 1534 retraced much of the voyages of the vikings and established contacts with natives in modern-day Canada. He explored some of northern Canada, established friendly relations with the American Indians, and discovered that the St Lawrence river region neither had abundant gold nor a northwest passage to Asia.

During the 16th century, the taming of Siberian wilderness by the Russians established a thriving fur trade which created a great demand for fur throughout Europe. France was quick to realize that the North held great potential as a provider of fur. Samuel de Champlain settled the first permanent settlement in present-day Canada and created a thriving trade with the Native Americans for beaver pelts and other animal hides.

Meanwhile, in the South, Early French Protestants, called Huguenots, had the opportunity to leave hostile European lands while advancing French claims to the new world. Settlements in present-day Florida and Georgia would create tension with Spanish conquistadors, who after conquering Caribbean lands would begin to expand their search for new lands. In contrast to these French Protestant colonies, in the 17th century French members of the Catholic order of Jesuits organized a settlement in what would become Maine, and began missionary efforts in what would become lower Canada and upper New York State.

Spanish Empire in North America

Claims made by the Spanish Empire during the Rule of Phillip II, Phillip III, and Phillip IV. Claims and real control of an area could be different.

The Spanish conquistador Ponce de Leon was an early visitor to the Americas, traveling to the new world on Columbus's second voyage. He became the first governor of the present-day area of Puerto Rico in 1509. However, upon the death of Christopher Columbus, the Spanish did not allow Christopher's son to succeed. Like his father, he had committed atrocities against the Native Americans of the Caribbean. The two governors were released and replaced with successors from Spain.

Ponce De Leon, freed of his governorship, decided to explore areas to the north, where there was rumored to be a fountain of youth that restored the youth of anyone drinking from it. Ponce de Leon found a peninsula on the coast of North America, called the new land 'Florida' and chartered a colonizing expedition. His role was brief: attacked by Native American forces, he died in nearby Cuba.

By the early 16th century, Spanish conquistadors had penetrated deep into the Central and South American continents. Native American cultures had collected large troves of gold and valuables and given them to leaders of these prosperous empires. The conquistadors, believing they held considerable military and technological superiority over these cultures, attacked and destroyed the Aztecs in 1521 and the Incas in 1532.

The wealth seized by the Spanish would lead to piracy and a new wave of settlements as the other colonial powers became increasingly hostile towards Spain. Many areas that had been colonized by Spain were inundated with French and English pirates.

By 1565, Spanish forces looked to expand their influence to the New World by attacking the French settlement of Fort Caroline. The Spanish navy overwhelmed 200 French Huguenot settlers, slaughtering them even as they surrendered to Spain's superior military might. Spain formed the settlement of St. Augustine as an outpost to ensure that French Huguenots where no longer welcome in the area. St. Augustine is the oldest continuously occupied European-established city in North America.

In 1587 a Spanish Galleon landed in what is currently California with Filipinos aboard, making them among the first Asians to land in what would become the modern United States.

Catholicism was introduced to the American colonies by the Spanish settlers in what is now present day Florida (1513) and the South West United States. The first Christian worship service was a Catholic mass held in Florida in 1559, in what we now identify as Pensacola. Spain established the first permanent European Catholic settlement in St. Augustine, Florida in 1565, to help the settlers complete the "moral imperative" which was to convert all the Native peoples to Christianity, and to also to help support the treasure fleets of Spain. During the time period of 1635-1675 Franciscans operated between 40 and 70 mission stations, attempting to convert about 26,000 "Hispanicized" natives who organized themselves into 4 provinces, Timucua, in central Florida, Guale, along the coast of Georgia, Apalachee on the northeastern edge of the Gulf of Mexico, and Apalachicola to the west.

British Empire in North America

1588 painting of Sir Walter Raleigh.

England funded an initial exploratory trip shortly after Christopher Columbus's first voyage. Departing England in 1501, John Cabot explored the North American continent. He correctly supposed that the spherical shape of the earth made the North, where the longitudes are much shorter, a quicker route to the New World than a trip to the South islands Columbus was exploring. Encouraged, he asked the English monarchy for a more substantial expedition to further explore and settle the lands which he had found. The ships departed and were never seen again. England remained preoccupied with political affairs for much of the 16th century. This was despite the insistence of the author Richard Haklyt, who translated some of the accounts of exploration into English. He wrote that England ought to seek colonies in America, specifically in Virginia.

By the beginning of the 17th century, England, Scotland, and other English possessions had formed the nation of Great Britain and was becoming a formidable foe on the world's stage. The quickly expanding British navy was preparing for a massive strike upon the Spanish armada.

Sir Walter Raleigh, who had gained considerable favor from Queen Elizabeth I by suppressing rebellions in Ireland, sought to establish an empire in the new world. His Roanoke colony would be relatively isolated from existing settlements in North America. He funded the colony with his own money, unlike the previous explorers who had been funded and sponsored by monarchies. It is assumed that the colony was destroyed during a three year period in which England was at war with Spain and did serious damage to the Spanish navy.

The war left the British monarchy so drained of money and resources that the monarchy sold a charter containing lands between present-day South Carolina and the US-Canada border to two competing groups of investors, the Plymouth Company and the London Company. The two companies were given the North and South portions of this area, respectively. There was an overlapping area of development in the middle of the two Companies, a place both could exploit provided one Company's settlement wasn't within a hundred miles of the other's settlement. The Northern Plymouth settlement in Maine failed and was abandoned, but the London company established a Jamestown settlement in 1606.

Virginia and Jamestown

The ruins of Jamestown still stand to this day.

The new area was named Virginia, after both the organizing Virginia Company of London and Queen Elizabeth, "the Virgin Queen." Founded in 1607 with a charter from the Virginia Company, Jamestown was the first permanent English colony in the Americas. However, the swampy terrain was a breeding ground for mosquitoes, which carried dysentery, malaria, and smallpox, diseases that the English did not know. Many of the settlers fell sick and died shortly after.

In addition, Virginia's first government was weak, and its individuals frequently quarreled over policies. The colonists frantically searched for gold, silver, and gems, ignoring their own sicknesses. Indian raids further weakened defense and unification, and Jamestown began to die off. By the winter of 1609-1610, also known as the Starving Time, only 60 settlers remained from the original 500 passengers.

Two men helped the colony to survive: John Smith and John Rolfe. Smith, who arrived in Virginia in 1608, introduced an ultimatum: those who did not work would not receive food or pay. The colonists at last learned how to raise crops and trade with the nearby Indians, with whom Smith had made peace. In 1612, the English businessman Rolfe discovered that Virginia had ideal conditions for growing tobacco. This discovery, and the breeding of a new, "sweeter" strain, led to the plant becoming the colony's major cash crop. Tobacco was then used as medicine against the plague. With English demand for tobacco rising, Virginia had found a way to support itself economically.

In 1619, Virginia set up the House of Burgesses, the first elected legislative assembly in America. It marked the beginnings of self-government, replacing the martial law that was previously imposed on the colonists. However, at the same time Virginia was declared a "crown colony." Its charter was transferred from the Virginia Company to the Crown of England, which meant that Jamestown was now a colony run by the English monarchy. While the House of Burgesses was still allowed to run the government, the king also appointed a royal governor to settle disputes and enforce certain British policies.

Review Questions

1. Name the areas associated with these explorers: Christopher Columbus, Jacques Cartier, John Cabot, Sir Walter Raleigh.

2. Name three motives behind Columbus's voyages.

Early Colonial Period (1492 - 1607)

The Arrival of Columbus

Christopher Columbus and three ships - the Niña, the Pinta, and the Santa Maria - set sail on August 3, 1492. On October 12, a lookout cried out that he had sighted land. The crew set foot on an island that day, naming it San Salvador. It is unknown which exact island was discovered by Columbus. (Note that the island presently called San Salvador is so-called in honor of Columbus' discovery; it is not necessarily the one on which Columbus set foot.)

The Native Americans inhabiting the islands were described as "Indians" by Columbus, who had believed that he had discovered the East Indies (modern Indonesia). In reality, he had found an island in the Caribbean. He continued to explore the area, returning to Spain. Columbus' misconception that he found Asia was corrected years later by the Italian explorer Amerigo Vespucci, after whom America may be named.

The Protestant Reformation

In Europe, the power of the Pope and the influence of Catholicism was undoubted. The Catholic religion affected every aspect of politics on the continent. However, in the sixteenth century, the conditions were ripe for reform. Gutenberg's printing press made the spread of ideas much easier. The influence of nationalism grew, and rulers began to resent the power possessed by the Pope.

The Protestant movement may have commenced earlier, but the publication of Ninety-Five Theses by Martin Luther in 1517 spurred on the revolution within the Church. Luther attacked the Church's theology, which, he believed, misrepresented The Bible and placed too much authority in the hands of the clergy, and wished to reform the Church. After being excommunicated, Luther published many books on Reform. Luther's works were most influential in Germany and Scandinavia.

Persons other than Luther championed the cause of Reform. In Switzerland, Huldreich Zwingli advanced Protestant ideas, which mostly affected his home country. Similarly, Frenchman John Calvin helped the spread of Protestantism in France and the Netherlands.

English Protestantism resulted from the direct influence of the British monarch. Henry VIII (1509-1547) sought to divorce his wife, Catherine of Aragon, because she had failed to produce a viable male heir to the throne. When his divorce led to excommunication by the Pope, Henry simply declared the entire country free of Catholic domination and a bastion of Protestantism. Henry reasoned that England could survive under its own religious regulation (Anglican) and he named himself head of the church.

Elizabethan England

Elizabethan Succession

After Henry VIII died, he was succeeded by his son Edward VI (1547-1553) who reigned briefly before dying. Edward's death led to the ascension of Henry's daughter by Catherine, Mary I (1553-1558). A staunch Catholic, Mary sought to return England back to the Catholic church. Her religious zeal and persecution of Protestants earned her the nickname, "Bloody Mary." After a short reign, she was succeeded by her half-sister, Elizabeth. Elizabeth I (1558-1603) was the daughter of Henry's second wife, Anne Boleyn. Her ascendency to the throne resulted when neither of her half siblings, Edward and Mary, produced an heir to the throne.

Religious Reform

Under her siblings' reign, the nation constantly battled religious fervor as it sought to identify itself as either Protestant or Catholic. Henry VIII had severed ties with the Roman Catholic Church upon his excommunication after divorcing Catherine of Aragon. He established the Church of England (the precursor to the Anglican Church) as the official state religion and named himself, not the Pope, as its head. Under Mary, the country returned to Catholic rule. The Elizabethan Age brought stability to English government. Elizabeth sought a compromise (the Elizabethan Settlement) which returned England to a nation governed by Protestant theology with a Catholic ritual. Elizabeth called Parliament in 1559 to consider the Reformation Bill that re-established an independent Church of England and redefined the sacrament of communion. Parliament also approved the Act of Supremacy, establishing ecclesiastical authority with the monarch.

Economic Reform

Elizabeth's far more important response was to stabilize the English economy following the 1551 collapse of the wool market. To respond to this economic crisis, Elizabeth used her power as monarch to shift the supply-demand curve. She expelled all non-English wool merchants from the empire. Her government placed quotas on the amount of wool that could be produced while also encouraging manors to return to agricultural production. She also started trading directly with the Spanish colonies in direct violation of their tariff regulations. This maritime violation would later result in an attack on England by the Spanish Armada in 1588.

Queen Elizabeth was a very popular monarch. Her people followed her in war and peace. She remained unmarried until her death, probably through a reluctance to share any power and preferring a series of suitors. This gave her the name, the Virgin Queen, and in honor of her, a colony was named Virginia a few years after her death.

In the aftermath of the Armada's overwhelming defeat and building on the development of a strong fleet started by Henry VIII, England began to gain recognition as a great naval power. Nationalism in England increased tremendously. Thoughts of becoming a colonial power were inspired. These thoughts were aided by the fact that the defeated Spanish lost both money and morale, and would be easy to oppose in the New World.

Early Colonial Ventures

Richard Hakluyt

In 1584, Richard Hakluyt proposed a strong argument for expansion of English settlement into the new world. With his Discourse Concerning Western Planting, Hakluyt argued that creating new world colonies would greatly benefit England. The colonies could easily produce raw materials that were unavailable in England. By establishing colonies, England would assure itself of a steady supply of materials that it currently purchased from other world powers. Second, inhabited colonies would provide a stable market for English manufactured goods. Finally, as the economic incentives were not enough, the colonies could provide a home for disavowed Englishmen.

Roanoke

The English had already begun the exploration of the New World prior to the Armada's defeat. In 1584, Queen Elizabeth granted Sir Walter Raleigh a charter authorizing him to explore the island of Roanoke, which is part of what is now North Carolina.

Between 1584 and 1586, Raleigh financed expeditions to explore the island of Roanoke and determine if the conditions were proper for settlement. In 1586, about a hundred men were left on the island. They struggled to survive, being reduced to eating dogs. They were, however, rescued- except for fifteen men whose fate remained a mystery.

After another expedition in 1587, another group of men, women, and children- a total of more than one-hundred people- remained on the island. Governor John White of the Roanoke colony discovered from a local Native American tribe that the fifteen men who were not rescued were killed by a rival tribe. While attempting to gain revenge, White's men killed members of a friendly tribe and not the members of the tribe that allegedly killed the fifteen men.

Having thus strained relations with the Natives, the settlers could not survive easily. John White decided to return to England in 1587 and return with more supplies. When he returned, England faced war against Spain. Thus delayed, White could not return to Roanoke until 1590. When he did return, White discovered that Roanoke was abandoned. All that gave clue to the fate of the colony was the word Croatan, the name of a nearby Native American tribe, carved out on to a tree. No attempt was made to discover the actual cause of the disappearance until several years later.

There are only theories as to the cause of the loss of Roanoke. There are two major possibilities. Firstly, the settlers may have been killed by the Natives. Second, the settlers may have assimilated themselves into the Native tribes. But there is no evidence that settles the matter beyond doubt.

Review Questions

Use the content in this chapter and/or from external sources to answer the following questions. Remember to properly cite any sources used.

1. Identify or explain the significance of the following people:
   (a) Christopher Columbus
   (b) Martin Luther
   (c) King Henry VIII
   (d) Richard Hakluyt
   (e) Elizabeth I
   (f) Sir Walter Raleigh
   
2. What primary factor(s) led to the shift from Catholicism to Protestant belief in England?
3. Why did King Henry VIII establish the Church of England? How did this influence the English Reformation?
4. Differentiate between Elizabeth I's policies and Henry VIII's. What attitudes did the English have toward Elizabeth and her rule?
5. What did the defeat of the Spanish Armada symbolize to all of Europe?
6. What difficulties did the colonists of Raleigh face between 1584 and 1587? What was the fate of the colony?

The English Colonies (1607 - 1754)

Patterns of Colonization

The islands of Great Britain changed greatly in the Renaissance, resulting in the Church of England, the British Civil War, and total transformation of economic, political, and legal systems. Yet through this time, despite pressure from other nations and America's own Natives, a diverse set of English colonies were planted and thrived.

These new colonies were funded in three different ways. In one plan, corporate colonies were established by joint stock companies. A joint stock company was a project in which people would invest shares of stock into building a new colony. Depending on the success of the colony, each investor would receive profit based on the shares he had bought. This investment was less risky than starting a colony from scratch, and each investor influenced how the colony was run. These investors often elected their own public officials. (An example of a joint stock company on another continent was the British East India Company.) Virginia was settled in this way.

Proprietary colonies were owned by a person or family who made laws and appointed officials as he or they pleased. Development was often a direct result of this ownership. Charles II granted William Penn the territory now known as Pennsylvania. Penn's new colony gave refuge to Quakers, a group of millennial Protestants who opposed the Church of England. (Quakers did not have ministers and did not hold to civil or religious inequality, making them a dangerous element in hierarchical societies.) Penn was an outspoken Quaker and had written many pamphlets defending the Quaker faith. He also invited settlers from other countries and other Protestant minorities, and even some Catholics.

Finally, royal colonies were under the direct control of the King, who appointed a Royal Governor. The resulting settlement was not always identical to England. For example, England had broken with Catholicism during the reign of Henry the Eighth, and the Old Faith was seen not only as religious heresy but the prelude to domination by other countries. Yet Maryland's grant of toleration of Catholics was granted as a boon from the British Crown. In 1634, Lord Baltimore appointed George Calvert of England to settle a narrow strip of land north of Virginia and south of Pennsylvania as a Catholic colony via a royal charter. Fifteen years later, in 1649, he signed the Act of Toleration, which proclaimed religious freedom for its colonists. Despite the original charter, Protestants later became the majority faith. After Lord Baltimore's death several years later, Margaret Brent, the wife of an esteemed landowner in Maryland, executed his will as governor of the colony. She defied gender roles in the colonies by being the first woman of non-royal heritage to govern an English colony.

Massachusetts Bay Colony

The Massachusetts Bay Colony, another corporate colony, was founded as a place far from England where its religious dissenters could live. The Puritans, a group of radical Protestants who wanted what they called a return to the faith of the Bible, suffered torture and execution because they disagreed with the official Church of England. In 1620, forty-one Puritans (who called themselves Pilgrims) sailed for the new world. Their own contemporary accounts show that the Pilgrims originally intended to settle the Hudson River region near present day Long Island, New York. Once Cape Cod was sighted, they turned south to head for the Hudson River, but encountered treacherous seas and nearly shipwrecked. They then decided to return to Cape Cod rather than risk another attempt to head south. After weeks of scouting for a suitable settlement area, the Mayflower's passengers finally landed at Plymouth in present-day Massachusetts on December 26, 1620. They called it Massachusetts after the name of the Indian tribe then living there.

Passengers of the Mayflower signing the "Mayflower Compact"

William Bradford, who was selected as a governor after the death of John Carver, wrote a journal that helps us to better understand the hardships colonists endured, encounters with the Native Americans, and ultimately, the success of the colony. The Pilgrims agreed to govern themselves in the manner set forth in the Mayflower Compact, which signed on the Pilgrims' ship, The Mayflower. After two years they abandoned the communal form of partnership begun under the Compact and in 1623 assigned individual plots of land to each family to work.

Ten years later, the joint-stock Massachusetts Bay Company acquired a charter from King Charles of England. The colony of Plymouth was eventually absorbed by Massachusetts Bay, but it remained separate until 1691.

A large group of Pilgrims later migrated to the new colony of Massachusetts Bay. In keeping with its mother Church of England, the colony did not provide religious freedom. It only allowed (male) Puritans the right to vote, established Puritanism as the official religion of the colony in The Act of Toleration, and punished people who did not go to their Church.

New York

Other countries used the joint-stock company to fund exploration. In 1609, the Dutch East India company discovered a territory on the eastern coast of North America, from latitude 38 to 45 degrees north. This was an expedition in the yacht Halve Maen ("Half Moon") commanded by Henry Hudson. Adriaen Block and Hendrick Christiaensz explored the territory from 1611 until 1614. In March of 1614 the States General, the governing body of the Netherlands, proclaimed exclusive patent for trade in the New World. The States General issued patents for development of New Netherland as a private commercial venture. Ft. Nassau was swiftly built in the area of present day Albany to defend river traffic and to trade with Native Americans. New Netherland became a province of the Dutch Republic in 1624. The northern border was then reduced to 42 degrees north, as the English had encroached north of Cape Cod.

According to the Law of Nations, a claim on a territory required not only discovery and charting but settlement. In May 1624 the Dutch completed their claim by landing thirty Dutch families on Noten Eylant, modern Governors Island.

In the next few decades incompetent directors-general ran New Netherland. The settlers were attacked by Native Americans, and British and Dutch conflicts seemed destined to destroy the colony. All that changed when Peter Stuyvesant was appointed Director-General in 1647. As he arrived he said, "I shall govern you as a father his children". He expanded the colony's borders. He oversaw conquest of the one settlement of northernmost Europe, New Sweden, in 1655. He resolved the border dispute with New England in 1650. He improved defenses against Native American raids, and the population of the colony went from 500 in 1640 to 9,000 by 1664. But in August of 1664, four English warships arrived in New York Harbor demanding the surrender of the colony. At first, Stuyvesant vowed to fight, but there was little ammunition and gunpowder. He received weak support from the overwhelmed colonists, and was forced to surrender. New Netherland was subsequently renamed New York, in honor of the British Duke of York.

In an attempt to gain supremacy over trade, the English waged war against the Dutch in 1664. The English took control over the Dutch harbor of New Amsterdam on the Atlantic coast of America. James, the brother of King Charles II, received the charter for New Amsterdam and the surrounding Dutch territory.

In 1673 the Dutch, lead by Michiel de Ruyter, briefly reoccupied New Netherland again, this time naming it New Orange. After peace was made, ending the Third Anglo-Dutch War, they agreed to return it to the English.

Patterns of Colonization in the Other Early Colonies

The territory of Carolina, named after the British King Charles I, was granted as a proprietary colony to eight different nobles. The proprietors divided Carolina into two separate colonies -- North Carolina and South Carolina.

Four colonies were formed by division from already extant larger territories. When New Holland was taken to become New York, King James granted a portion of the territory, present-day New Jersey, to Lord Berkeley and Sir George Cartaret, while retaining present-day New York for himself as a proprietary colony. Sir George had come from the Isle of Jersey, and the new colony was named accordingly. Another portion of the territory became the crown colony Connecticut. This colony was also named for its native tribe of Indians. A corner of Pennsylvania which was not peopled by Quakers separated in 1704 to become the colony of Delaware. This was given the name of Thomas West, Third Baron De La Warr, a nobleman under Queen Elizabeth and a noted adventurer.

Rhode Island was a unique experiment in religious and political freedom. Massachusetts banished Roger Williams after he began asserting that Jesus Christ meant for the Church to be separate from the governing authority. This dissenter from the Church of England, and then from the Puritans, became the first American Baptist. After many adventures in other colonies, he bought land from the Narragansett Indians for a new settlement. Providence was meant to be a colony free from religious entanglements and a refuge for people of conscience. He was later followed by Anne Hutchinson. She had outraged Boston divines because she was a woman who preached, and because she believed that one's works were not always tied to grace, unlike the Puritans. She also bought land from the Indians. On this was the settlement subsequently named Portsmouth, and afterward a dissident sister town, Newport. The colony was partially based upon Aquidneck Island, later called Rhode Island for unknown reasons, and the entire establishment eventually took its name from that place.

Georgia was another proprietary colony, named after King George I, with a charter granted to James Oglethorpe and others in 1732. It was intended as a "buffer" colony to protect the others from attacks from the Florida Spanish and the Louisiana French. Because of this, Georgia was the only colony to receive funds from the Crown from its founding. The laws in Great Britain put people in prison for debt. Many of these people were shipped from overcrowded jails to freedom in the wilds of Georgia colony. America was already seen as a land of prosperity, and Oglethorpe hoped that the ex-prisoners would soon become honest and rich. However, few of the prisoners of London jails knew how to survive in the new wilderness.

Portrait of the British Colonies

The Colonies are often considered as three groups: New England (New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut), the Southern Colonies (Maryland, Virginia, the Carolinas, and Georgia), and the Middle Colonies (New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Delaware). Sometimes the Carolinas and Georgia are counted as separate from the Chesapeake Colonies.

Each group had geographic and economic characteristics. New England's rocky soil only encouraged small farms, and its agricultural opportunities were limited. Thus it focused on fishing, forestry, shipping, and small industry to make money.

Richer land in the Southern colonies was taken over by individual farmers who grasped acreage. This created large plantation farms that grew tobacco, and later cotton. Farms in the Carolinas also farmed sugar, rice, and indigo. In the 17th century, these were farmed by indentured servants, people who would work for a period of years in return for passage to America and land. Many of these servants died before their indentures ended. A group of indentured servants rose up in Bacon's Rebellion in 1676. After Bacon's Rebellion, plantations began using African slaves instead. Even after release from indenture, many of these white people remained in the economic lower classes, though not subject to the slave codes, which became more harsh as time passed, denying almost all liberty to slaves in the southern colonies. By the American Revolution, one in five colonists was an African slave. And the products produced by slavery in the South were consumed and traded by towns in the Middle Colonies and New England. Few people questioned the slave economy.

The Middle Colonies had medium-sized farms. These colonies also had people from many different cultures with many different beliefs. Individuals in these states used indentured servants, and later slaves, but there was not the concentration of masses of slave labor found in the Southern colonies.

Another distinction lies in religious practices. New England was mostly Congregationalist, with some admixture of Presbyterian congregations and the religious non-conformists who called themselves Baptists. These were all descendants of dissenters before and during the British Civil War. The South was mostly Anglican, cherishing religious and secular traditions and holidays. The Middle Colonies held small groups of people from Holland, German lands, and even Bohemia, and they brought a welter of Catholic and Protestant faiths.

Among the whites sent to the colonies by English authorities were many Scots-Irish people from Ulster. These had been Calvinist Protestants in the middle of a Irish Catholic majority, at odds both with them and with England. This minority settled in the frontier region of the Appalachian Mountains and eventually beyond in the Ohio and Mississippi country. In America their desire for land and freedom pushed the colonial boundary westward at little cost to the government, and provided an armed buffer between the eastern settlements and Native American tribes which had been driven away from the seaboard. Colonial frontiersmen endured a very harsh life, building their towns and farms by hand in a dense wilderness amid economic deprivation and native attack.

Each colony developed its own areas of edification and amusement, depending upon the local faith and the local capacities. The culture of the South recorded early interest in musical theater, with Charleston, South Carolina and Williamsburg, Virginia as hubs of musical activity. A performance of Richard III, the first professional production of Shakespeare in America, took place in New York City in 1750. And preachers, lecturers, and singers entertained the colonists.

Their commonalities were stronger than their differences. All three regions shared a population mostly derived from the British Isles. All had terrible roads, and all had connections to the Atlantic Ocean as a means of transportation. And all were tied to the Atlantic economy. Atlantic merchants used ships to trade slaves, tobacco, rum, sugar, gold, silver, spices, fish, lumber, and manufactured goods between America, the West Indies, Europe and Africa. New York, Philadelphia, Boston, and Charleston were the largest cities and main ports at that time.

Early Technology

The first wave of colonists used hand labor to cultivate their farms, and established such land-based crafts such as pottery and tanning. As later ships brought cattle and horses, draft animals became part of the economy. Indentured servants, and then slaves kidnapped from Africa, were imported. This was when larger plantations began to be founded. In the latter part of the eighteenth century small-scale machine-based manufacturing began to appear. Individuals started to dig for coal and iron ore. New England used the latter to begin making building tools and horseshoes. A new textile industry arose, dependent in part upon Southern cotton. Powered by wood or coal and fed by the need for strong metal, household forges pioneered new techniques of iron-making. The blacksmith and the tinsmith became part of large settlements. Colonies started making mechanized clocks, guns, and lead type for printing.

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  Silver beaker made around 1670 by Jeremiah Dummer, the first American born silversmith.
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  Painting of the first slave auction in New Amsterdam held in 1655. (Painting from 1895)
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  The Mount Vernon Plantation, built in 1758. As Washington rebelled against the British, he kept his own slaves who were also dissatisfied with their lack of freedom.
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  The Parkman Tavern, built in Concord, Massachusetts in 1659.

Mercantilism, Salutary Neglect and British Interference

The American colonies, entirely new societies separated by an ocean from Great Britain, believed they had the right to govern themselves. This belief was encouraged by Great Britain's Glorious Revolution and 1689 Bill of Rights, which gave Parliament the ultimate authority in government. A policy of relatively lax controls or Salutary Neglect ended in increased British regulation resulting from the policy of mercantilism, and seen through the Lords of Trade and the later Navigation Acts.

Mercantilism

Parliament placed controls on colonial trade in obedience to the economic policy of mercantilism. This was the idea that a nation's economic power depended on the value of its exports. A country could use its colonies to create finished goods, rather than raw materials. These could be traded to other countries, thus increasing the strength of the colonizing nation. This policy had been put forth by a Frenchman named Jean-Baptiste Colbert. It seemed tailor-made for Great Britain. Spain had American gold as its economic base, and France had American furs. England had neither of these. But it had American cotton, molasses, and tobacco, as well as its state-of-the-art ships. Prior to the mid-1700's, the colonies had enjoyed a long period of "salutary neglect", where the British largely let the colonies govern themselves. This now ended.

The Lords of Trade

In an attempt to enforce mercantilism policies, King Charles II created the Lords of Trade as a new committee on the Privy Council. The Lords of Trade attempted to affect the government of the colonies in a manner beneficial to the English, rather than to the colonists.

The Lords of Trade attempted to convert all American colonies to royal ones so that the Crown could gain more power. Under King James II, the successor to Charles II, New York, New Jersey, and the Puritan colonies were combined into the Dominion of New England in 1687.

However, the Dominion only lasted a brief time. King James II, a Catholic, was seen as a threat by British Protestants. James was overthrown (he was technically held abdicated by Parliament) in the bloodless Glorious Revolution of 1688. In 1689, James' daughter Mary II and her husband William III took the throne as joint rulers. However, the British Parliament actually held the power. The Dominion of New England was dissolved, the various separate colonies were reestablished, and the Lords of Trade were abandoned (replaced by a Board of Trade, a purely advisory body).

Navigation Acts

Beginning in 1660, the Parliament of England passed the Navigation Acts to increase its benefit from its colonies. The Acts required that any colonial imports or exports travel only on ships registered in England, meaning that only England could have the shipping power and the fees derived from them. They forbid the colonies to export tobacco and sugar to any nation other than England. (Tobacco was then used as medicine, and sugar was used to make alcohol, also a medicine.) And the colonies could not import anything manufactured outside England unless the goods were first taken to England, where taxes were paid, and then to the colonies.

In the 1730s, The Sugar Act established a tax of six pence per gallon of sugar or molasses imported into the colonies. By 1750, Parliament had begun to ban, restrict, or tax several more products. It tried to curtail all manufacture in the colonies. This provoked much anger among the colonists, despite the fact that their tax burdens were quite low, when compared to most subjects of European monarchies of the same period.

Colonists hated the Navigation Acts because they believed they would be more prosperous and rich if they could trade on their own behalf. They also believed that some vital resources would not be found in Britain.

Indians in the 1700s

Indians of the Great Plains:

Today, the area where the Indians of all the Great Plains lived is located from the Rocky mountains to the Mississippi River. During the 1700s, there were about 30 tribes that lived on the Great Plains. These tribes tended to rely on buffalo as their food source as well as other daily needs, such as clothing. Not only did Indians, specifically women, make their clothing out of buffalo, but also out of deer. Women would soak the deer or buffalo and scrape off the hair of the dead animal.

Also, Indian tribes traded with one another. The number of horses an individual owned was a sign of wealth; Indians would trade their horses for food, tools, weapons(such as guns), and hides. Since the tribes spoke many different languages from one another, they had to use sign language to be able to trade with each other.

Philadelphia Election Riot

A riot broke out on election day in Philadelphia in 1742 as a result of the Anglican population disagreeing with the Quaker majority. The riot stemmed over a power struggle between the Anglican and Quaker population. The Quakers had a history of political dominance over Philadelphia. The German population backed the Quaker vote because of the Quaker Pacifism which would protect from higher taxes and ultimately the draft. On election day, the Anglicans and sailors fought with the Quakers and Germans. The Quakers were able to seek shelter in the courthouse and complete the election. The Anglican party lost the election and 54 sailors were jailed following the riot.

Education

As the three sections of the colonies through the 1700s were made up of people with different interests, they provided differing sorts of education for their children. Although there were commonalities -- a rich family in any of the three regions might send a son to Europe for his education -- people in different colonies tended to educate in differing ways.

New England's motives for education were both civil and religious. The good citizen had to know his or her Bible. The Massachusetts General School Law of 1647 stated that if more than 50 families lived in a community, a schoolteacher must be hired. This law gave a justification: "It being one chief project of that old deluder, Satan, to keep men from the knowledge of the Scriptures, as in former times by keeping them in an unknown tongue, so in these latter times by persuading from the use of tongues, that so that at least the true sense and meaning of the original might be clouded and corrupted with love and false glosses of saint-seeming deceivers; and to the end that learning may not be buried in the grave of our forefathers, in church and commonwealth, the Lord assisting our endeavors." This was the Pilgrim ethos, set up in opposition to what they saw as the ignorance imposed by tyrants. Both boys and girls were often taught to read the Bible by their parents, perhaps with the aid of a horn book, an alphabet and syllabary page covered by a protective layer of horn.

In addition to being able to read the Bible, a Christian ought to be able to govern in his society. (His society: for government was the province of godly, property-holding men, rather than women.) To obtain this youths had to gain a classical education -- that is, one based thoroughly on Latin. The 1647 law was the beginning of the American grammar school, which initially taught Latin, but later included practical subjects such as navigation, engineering, bookkeeping, and foreign languages. Most of the schools opened in the colonial era were private. However, they had been preceded by the first public-supported school, the Boston Latin School, in 1635. It had a rigorous education, and as a result, few students. Harvard was the first university in America, founded in 1636 and originally intended to teach Protestant clergy. Because of the small number of people graduating from the classical curriculum, attendance was low. Some people jumped directly from the classical curriculum to the University, sometimes entering Harvard as young as 14 or 15 years old. Cotton Mather graduated Harvard at 15, an exception only because of his extreme precocity. In private schools, boys and girls learned penmanship, basic Math, and reading and writing English. These fed the various trades, where older children were apprenticed. Girls who did not become servants were often trained for domestic life, learning needlework, cooking, and the several days-long task of cleaning clothes.

Like New England, the Middle Colonies had private schools which educated children in reading and writing. However, the basics were rarer. The further west one lived, the less likely one was to be able to go to school, or to read and write at all. Ethnic and religious sub-groups would have their own private schools, which taught their own children their own folk-ways. In none of the colonies was higher education certain. Secondary schools were very rare outside of such major towns as Boston, New York, Philadelphia, and Charleston.

The Chesapeake experience was different again. Children could only could only read and write if their parents could. And the South had few schools, of any kind, until the Revolutionary era. Children in wealthy families would study with private tutors. Though wealthy girls might learn 'the womanly arts,' they would not have the same curriculum as their brothers. Martha Washington's granddaughter Eliza Custis was laughed at by her stepfather when "[I] thought it hard they would not teach me Greek and Latin because I was a girl -- they laughed and said women ought not to know those things, and mending, writing, Arithmetic, and Music was all I could be permitted to acquire." Middle class children might learn to read from their parents, and many poor children, as well as all black children, went unschooled. The literacy rates were lower in the South than the North until about the 19th century.

Founded in 1636, Harvard is the oldest institution of higher learning in the United States.

In 1693 the College of William & Mary was founded, Virginia's first University. As the 18th century wore on, it specialized not in theology for clergymen but in law. In 1701, the Collegiate College was founded. In 1718 it received funds from a Welsh governor of the British East India Company, Elihu Yale, and was renamed Yale College. These were later joined by several other universities, including Princeton in 1747. In the 18th century, astronomy, physics, modern history and politics took a bigger place in the college curriculum. Some colleges experimented with admitting Native American students in the 18th century, though not African-Americans.

In 1640, The whole Booke of Psalms Faithfully Translated into English Metre, commonly known as the Bay Psalm Book, was printed in Cambridge, Massachusetts. It was the first book written in the new world. The Bay Psalm Book was the first metrical English translation of the Biblical psalms. This famous and influential songbook was succeeded by a whole New England publishing industry. Sometime after 1687 the first New England Primer was published as an aid to childhood reading and spelling.

An alternative to the classical curriculum emerged in Benjamin Franklin's American Academy, founded in Philadelphia in 1751. This body represented something closer to the modern American high school, offering vocational education. This sort of school later outnumbered the classical secondary school. However, Franklin's Academy was private as well, making such learning open only to those who could afford it.

During this period colonists attempted to convert Native Americans to Christianity.

Review Questions

1. Choose one of the following colonies: New York, Virginia, Massachusetts, Georgia. In which of the three areas is it located? Why and how was it initially colonized? How did its immigrants and the religions they adhered to affect it?

2. Why did the British interfere with the colonies?

Road to Revolution (1754 - 1774)

The French and Indian War

(The following text is from Wikipedia)

The French and Indian War (1754–1763) was the North American chapter of the Seven Years' War. The name refers to the two main enemies of the British, the royal French forces and the various American Indian forces allied with them. This conflict, the fourth such colonial war between the kingdoms of France and Great Britain, resulted in the British conquest of all of New France east of the Mississippi River, as well as Spanish Florida. France ceded control of French Louisiana west of the Mississippi to its Spanish ally, to compensate it for its loss of Florida. By the end of this war France kept only the tiny islands of Saint Pierre and Miquelon north of the Caribbean. These colonies today still allow France access to the Grand Banks.

In Great Britain and France, the North American theatre of the Seven Years' War war usually has no special name, and so the entire worldwide conflict is known as the Seven Years' War (or the Guerre de sept ans). The "Seven Years" refers to events in Europe, from the official declaration of war in 1756 to the signing of the peace treaty in 1763. These dates do not correspond with the actual fighting in North America, where the fighting between the two colonial powers was largely concluded in six years, from the Jumonville Glen skirmish in 1754 to the capture of Montreal in 1760.

Elsewhere the conflict is known by several names. In British North America, wars were often named after the sitting British monarch, such as King William's War or Queen Anne's War. Because there had already been a King George's War in the 1740s, British colonists named the second war in King George's reign after their opponents, and thus it became known as the French and Indian War. This traditional name remains standard in the United States, although it obscures the fact that American Indians fought on both sides of the conflict. American historians generally use the traditional name or the European title (the Seven Years' War), and have also invented other, less frequently used names for the war, including the Fourth Intercolonial War and the Great War for the Empire. Canadian francophones and English speakers both refer to it as the Seven Years' War (Guerre de Sept Ans) or the War of the Conquest (Guerre de la Conquête), as the war in which New France was conquered by the British and became part of the British Empire. This war was also known as the Forgotten War.

Reasons for war

A French fur trader. Economic interests were one of the main drivers of the war.

The French and Indian War began less than a decade after France and Great Britain had fought on opposing sides in the European War of the Austrian Succession (1740–1748). One cause for the conflict was territorial expansion. Newfoundland's Grand Banks were fertile fishing grounds and coveted by both sides. Both sides also wanted to expand their territories for trapping furs to trade, and for other pursuits that aided their economic interests. Both the British and the French used trading posts and forts to claim the Ohio Country, the vast territory between the Appalachian Mountains and the Mississippi River, from the Great Lakes to the Gulf of Mexico. English claims resulted from royal grants with no definite western boundaries. La Salle had claimed the Mississippi River for France: its drainage area includes the Ohio River Valley. Both Great Britain and France took advantage of Native American factions to secure these claims, to protect their territories, and to keep the other from growing too strong.

A second cause was political & religious ideology. The English Protestant colonists feared papal influence in North America. New France was administered by French governors and Roman Catholic hierarchy. French missionaries included Armand de La Richardie. English history was told as a story of freedom from Catholic (i.e., foreign) influence. French control over North America represented a threat to Great Britain. In their turn, the French feared English anti-Catholicism, in a time when Catholics were still being persecuted under English law.

Declaration and Action Anticipating the War

Céloron's expedition

In June 1747 the Governor-General of New France, the Marquis de la Jonquière, ordered Pierre-Joseph Céloron to lead an expedition to the Ohio Country to remove British influence from the area. Céloron was also to confirm allegiance of the Native Americans in the Ohio territory to the French crown.

Céloron's expedition consisted of 213 soldiers of the Troupes de la marine (French Marines) transported by twenty-three canoes. The expedition left Lachine on June 15, 1749, and two days later reached Fort Frontenac. It then continued along the shoreline of present-day Lake Erie. At Chautauqua Portage (Barcelona, New York), it moved inland to the Allegheny River.

The troop headed south to the Ohio River at present-day Pittsburgh, where Céloron buried lead plates engraved with the French claim to the Ohio Country. Whenever British merchants or fur-traders were encountered by the French, they were informed of the illegality of being on French territory and told to leave the Ohio Country. When the expedition arrived at Logstown, the Native Americans there informed Céloron that they owned the Ohio Country, and they would trade with the British, despite anything the French said.

Céloron continued the expedition. At its farthest point south, it reached the junction between the Ohio River and the Miami River, just south of the village of Pickawillany. Here lived the old Chief of the Miami tribe, whom Céloron called "Old Britain." When Céloron arrived at Pickawillany, he informed the elderly Chief of "dire consequences" of continuing to trade with the British. "Old Britain" ignored the warning. After this meeting, Céloron and his expedition began the trip home, reaching Montreal only on November 10, 1749. In his report, Céloron wrote: "All I can say is that the Natives of these localities are very badly disposed towards the French, and are entirely devoted to the English. I don't know in what way they could be brought back."

Langlade's expedition

On March 17, 1752, Governor-General de la Jonquière died. His temporary replacement was Charles le Moyne de Longueuil. It was not until July 1, 1752 that Ange Duquense de Menneville arrived in New France to take over the post.

In the spring of 1752, Longueuil dispatched an expedition to the Ohio River area. The expedition was led by Charles Michel de Langlade, an officer in the Troupes de la marine. Langlade was given 300 men, some French-Canadians, and others members of the Ottawa tribe. His objective was to punish the Miami of Pickawillany for continuing to trade with the British. At dawn on June 21, 1752, the war party attacked the British trading center at Pickawillany, killing fourteen people of the Miami nation, including "Old Britain." The expedition then returned home.

Marin's expedition

In the spring of 1754, Paul Marin de la Malgue was given command of a 2,000 man force of Troupes de la Marine and Aboriginals. His orders were to protect the Ohio from the British. Marin followed the route that Céloron had mapped out four years before. However, where Céloron had buried lead plates, Marin was constructing and garrisoning forts. The first fort that was constructed by Paul Marin was at Presque Isle (Erie, Pennsylvania) on Lake Erie's south shore. He then had a road built to the headwaters of Rivière aux Boeuf (now known as Waterford, Pennsylvania). Marin then constructed a second fort at Le Boeuf, designed to guard the headwaters of the Rivière aux Boeuf.

Tanaghrisson's proclamation

On September 3, 1753, Tanaghrisson (d. 1754), Chief of the Mingo, arrived at Fort Le Boeuf. One tradition states that Tanaghrisson hated the French because they had killed and eaten his father. Tanaghrisson told Marin, "I shall strike . . .", threatening the French. The show of force by the French had alarmed the Iroquois in the area. They sent Mohawk runners to William Johnson's manor in Upper New York. Johnson, known to the Iroquois as "Warraghiggey", meaning "He who does big business", had become a respected member of the Iroquois Confederacy in the area. In 1746, Johnson was made a colonel of the Iroquois, and later a colonel of the Western New York Militia.

At Albany, New York, there was a meeting between Governor Clinton of New York and Chief Hendrick, as well as other officials from a handful of American colonies. Chief Hendrick insisted that the British abide by their obligations and block French expansion. When an unsatisfactory response was offered by Clinton, Chief Hendrick proclaimed that the "Covenant Chain", a long-standing friendly relationship between the Iroquois Confederacy and the British Crown, was broken.

Dinwiddie's reaction

The earliest authenticated portrait of George Washington shows him wearing his colonel's uniform of the Virginia Regiment from the French and Indian War. However, this portrait was painted years after the war in 1772.

Governor Robert Dinwiddie of Virginia found himself in a predicament. Many merchants had invested heavily in fur trading in Ohio. If the French made good on their claim to the Ohio Country and drove out the British, then the Virginian merchants would lose a lot of money. Dinwiddie could not possibly allow the loss of the Ohio Country to France. In October 1753 he wrote a letter to the commander of the French forces in the Ohio Country, Jacques Legardeur de Saint-Pierre, demanding an immediate French withdrawal. To deliver it he delegated Major George Washington of the Virginia militia. Major Washington left for Fort Le Boeuf on the 31st of October, along with his interpreter Jacob Van Braam and several other men.

A few days later, Washington and his party arrived at Wills Creek (Cumberland, Maryland). Here Washington enlisted the help of Christopher Gist, a surveyor who was familiar with the area. They arrived at Logstown on November 24, 1753. At Logstown, Washington met with Tanaghrisson, who was angry over the French military encroachment upon his land. Washington convinced Tanaghrisson to accompany his small group to Fort Le Boeuf.

On December 12, 1753, Washington and his men reached Fort Le Boeuf. Commander Saint-Pierre invited Washington to dine with him that evening. Over dinner, Washington presented Saint-Pierre with the letter from Dinwiddie. Saint-Pierre was civil in his response, saying, "As to the Summons you send me to retire, I do not think myself obliged to obey it." The French explained to Washington that France's claim to the region was superior to that of the British, as René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de a Salle (1643–1687) had explored the Ohio Country nearly a century earlier.

Washington's party left Fort Le Boeuf early on December 16, 1753. By January 16, 1754, they had arrived in Williamsburg, Virginia. In his report, Washington stated, "The French had swept south." They had constructed and garrisoned forts at Presque Isle, Le Boeuf and Venango.

War

The French and Indian War was the last of four major colonial wars between the British, the French, and their Native American allies. Unlike the previous three wars, the French and Indian War began on North American soil and then spread to Europe, where Britain officially declared war on France on May 15, 1756, marking the beginnings of the Seven Years' War in Europe. Native Americans fought for both sides, but primarily alongside the French (with one exception being the Iroquois Confederacy, which sided with the American colonies and Britain). The first major event of the war was in 1754. Lieutenant Colonel George Washington, then twenty-one years of age, was sent to negotiate boundaries with the French, who did not give up their forts. Washington led a group of Virginian (colonial) troops to confront the French at Fort Duquesne (present day Pittsburgh). Washington discovered the French troops at the Battle of Jumonville Glen (about six miles or ten kilometers North-West of soon-to-be-established Fort Necessity). In the ensuing skirmish, a French Officer, Joseph Coulon de Jumonville, was killed. Washington pulled back a few miles and established Fort Necessity. The French forced Washington and his men to retreat. Meanwhile, the Albany Congress was taking place as means to discuss further action.

Edward Braddock led a campaign against the French at Fort Duquesne in 1755. Washington was again among the British and colonial troops. Braddock employed European tactics -- bold, linear marches and firing formations -- and employed heavy cannon. This led to disaster at the Monongahela. The French and natives were heavily outmanned and outgunned. But they used superior tactics, taking cover behind trees and bushes to gun down and rout the British. Braddock was killed. Despite four close calls, Washington escaped unharmed and led the survivors in retreat. This stunning British defeat heralded a string of major French victories over the next few years, at Fort Oswego, Fort William Henry, Fort Duquesne, and Carillon, where veteran Montcalm famously defeated five times his number. The sole British successes in the early years of the war came in 1755, at the Battle of Lake George, which secured the Hudson Valley; and in the taking of Fort Beauséjour (which protected the Nova Scotia frontier) by Lieutenant Colonel Robert Monckton. A consequence of this last battle was the subsequent forced deportation of the Acadian population of Nova Scotia and the Beaubassin region of Acadia.

In 1756 William Pitt became Secretary of State of Great Britain. His leadership, and France's continued neglect of the North-American theater, eventually turned the tide in favor of the British. The French were driven from many frontier posts such as Fort Niagara, and the key Fortress Louisbourg fell to the British in 1758. In 1759, the Battle of the Plains of Abraham gave Quebec City to the British, who had to withstand a siege there after the Battle of Sainte-Foy a year later. In September of 1760, Pierre François de Rigaud, Marquis de Vaudreuil-Cavagnal, the King's Governor of New France, negotiated a surrender with British General Jeffrey Amherst. General Amherst granted Vaudreuil's request that any French residents who chose to remain in the colony would be given freedom to continue worshiping in their Roman Catholic tradition, continued ownership of their property, and the right to remain undisturbed in their homes. The British provided medical treatment for the sick and wounded French soldiers, and French regular troops were returned to France aboard British ships with an agreement that they were not to serve again in the present war.

Summary of the war in America In 1752 the French and their Native allies raided a trading outpost sited at modern day Cleveland rid the area of Pennsylvanians. In 1754 General George Washington attacked French soldiers and then became trapped in his poorly built, Fort Necessity in Great Meadows Pennsylvania and more than one-third of Washingtons's men shortly became casualties. Twenty-two year old Washington and his men surrendered and were allowed to leave back to Virginia. In July 1755, a few miles south of Fort Duquensne in Pennsylvania, the combined forces of French and Natives attacked British colonial troops that were preparing a to assault the fort. The aftermath that ensued would result in a British defeat and General Edward Braddock would be killed. Once London heard of this Britain declared war upon France and formally began the seven years war. After this the British feared that France would attempt to retake Nova Scotia and that the 12,000 French Nova Scotians would break their neutrality, so the British military forced around seven thousand French Nova Scotians from their homeland. This was history's first large-scale modern deportation, the French would be sent from Louisiana to the Caribbean and families would become torn apart. In July of 1758 The British had recaptured the fort at Loiusberg winning control of the St. Lawerence River. This would cut the major French supply route and open up more supply lines for the British. In the fall of 1758 the Shawnee and Delaware Natives accepted peace offerings from the British and the French abandoned Fort Duquesne. A decisive attack would happen in the fall of 1759 when General James Wolfe's forces defeated the French on the Plains of Abraham and thus taking Quebec. A year after this event the British would capture Montreal and the North American stage of the war would be over.

Outcome

The descent of the French on St. John's, Newfoundland, 1762.

Though most of the North American fighting ended on September 8, 1760, when the Marquis de Vaudreuil surrendered Montreal — and effectively all of Canada — to Britain (one notable late battle allowed the capture of Spanish Havana by British and colonial forces in 1762), the war officially ended with the signing of the Treaty of Paris on February 10, 1763. The treaty sealed France's loss of all its North American possessions east of the Mississippi except for Saint Pierre and Miquelon islands off Newfoundland. All of Canada was ceded to Britain. France regained the Caribbean islands of Guadeloupe and Martinique, which had been occupied by the British. The economic value of these islands to France was greater than that of Canada at the time, because of their rich sugar crops; and the islands were easier to defend. However, the British were happy to take New France: defense was not an issue, and they had many sources of sugar. Spain gained Louisiana, including New Orleans, in compensation for its loss of Florida to the British.

French Canada contained approximately 65,000 French-speaking Roman Catholic residents. Early in the war, in 1755, the British had expelled French settlers from Acadia. (Some of these eventually fled to Louisiana, creating the Cajun population.) Now at peace, and eager to secure control of its hard-won colony, Great Britain made concessions to its newly conquered subjects with the Quebec Act of 1774. The history of the Seven Years' War, particularly the siege of Québec and the death of British Brigadier General James Wolfe, generated a vast number of ballads, broadsides, images, maps and other printed materials, which testify to how this event continued to capture the imagination of the British public long after Wolfe's death in 1759.

The European theatre of the war was settled by the Treaty of Hubertusburg on February 15, 1763. The war changed economic, political, and social relations between Britain and its colonies. It plunged Britain into debt, which the Crown chose to pay off with tax money from its colonies. These taxes contributed to the beginning the American Revolutionary War.

Battles and expeditions

United States

• • Battle of Jumonville Glen (May 28, 1754)
  • Battle of Fort Necessity, aka the Battle of Great Meadows (July 3, 1754)
  • Braddock Expedition (Battle of the Monongahela aka Battle of the Wilderness) (July 9, 1755)
  • Kittanning Expedition (climax September 8, 1756)
  • Battle of Fort Duquesne (September 14, 1758)
  • Battle of Fort Ligonier (October 12, 1758)
  • Forbes Expedition (climax November 25, 1758)

• Province of New York
  • Battle of Lake George (1755)
  • Battle of Fort Oswego (August, 1756)
  • Battle on Snowshoes (January 21, 1757)
  • Battle of Fort Bull (March 27, 1756)
  • Battle of Sabbath Day Point (July 26, 1757)
  • Battle of Fort William Henry (August 9, 1757)
  • Attack on German Flatts (1757) (November 12, 1757)
  • Battle of Carillon (July 8, 1758)
  • Battle of Ticonderoga (1759)
  • Battle of La Belle-Famille (July 24, 1759)
  • Battle of Fort Niagara (1759)
  • Battle of the Thousand Islands, 16-25 August, 1760

• West Virginia
  • Battle of Great Cacapon (April 18, 1756)

Canada

• New Brunswick
  • Battle of Fort Beauséjour (June 16, 1755)

• Nova Scotia
  • Battle of Louisburg (July 27, 1758)

• Ontario
  • Battle of Fort Frontenac (August 25, 1758)
  • Battle of the Thousand Islands, 16-25 August, 1760

• Quebec
  • Battle of Beauport (July 31, 1759)
  • Battle of the Plains of Abraham (September 13, 1759)
  • Battle of Sainte-Foy (April 28, 1760)
  • Battle of Restigouche, July 3-8, (1760)

• Newfoundland
  • Battle of Signal Hill September 15, 1762

Proclamation of 1763

(The following text is taken from the Wikipedia article)

A portion of eastern North America; the 1763 "Proclamation line" is the border between the red and the pink areas.

The Royal Proclamation of 1763 was issued October 7, 1763 by George III following Great Britain's acquisition of French territory in North America after the end of the Seven Years' War. The purpose of the proclamation was to make sure Britain could control its new territory for its The Proclamation in essence forbade Americans from settling or buying land west of the Appalachians. Colonists were angry because many already had land in that area. Additionally, the Proclamation gave the Crown a monopoly in land bought from Native Americans.

Native land

In the fall of 1763, a royal decree was issued that prohibited the North American colonists from establishing or maintaining settlements west of an imaginary line running down the crest of the Appalachian Mountains. The proclamation acknowledged that Native Americans owned the lands on which they were then residing and white settlers in the area were to be removed.

However, provision was made to allow specially licensed individuals and entities to operate fur trading ventures in the proscribed area. There were two motivations for this policy:

To avoid warfare with the Indians. Neither side evidenced any affection for the tribes, but Indian conflicts were very expensive, and the British hadn't yet deployed enough soldiers in the West to keep the peace. Some Indians welcomed this policy, believing that separation from the colonies would allow them to resume their traditions. Others realized that the proclamation would, at best, only provide breathing room before the next onslaught of settlers.

To concentrate colonial settlements on the seaboard where they could be active parts of the British mercantile system. British trade officials took it as a first priority to populate the recently secured areas of Canada and Florida (referring to the Treaty of Paris), where colonists could reasonably be expected to trade with the mother country. Settlers living west of the Appalachians would be highly self-sufficient and have little opportunity to trade with English merchants.

The reaction of colonial land speculators and frontiersmen was immediate and negative. They believed their fight in the recent war had been "rewarded" by the creation of a vast restricted native reserve in the lands they coveted. Most concluded that the proclamation was only a temporary measure: a number ignored it entirely and moved into the prohibited area. Almost from its inception, the proclamation was modified to suit the needs of influential people with interests in the American West, both high British officials and colonial leaders.

Beginning in 1764, portions of the Proclamation Line were adjusted westward to accommodate speculative interests. Later, in 1768, the first Treaty of Fort Stanwix formally recognized the surrender of transmontane lands claimed by the Iroquois.

The Proclamation of 1763 was a well-intentioned measure. Pontiac’s Rebellion had inflicted a terrible toll on the frontier settlements in North America and the British government acted prudently by attempting to avoid such conflict in the foreseeable future.

The colonists, however, were not appreciative and regarded the new policy as an infringement of their basic rights. The fact that western expansion was halted at roughly the same time that other restrictive measures were being implemented, made the colonists increasingly suspicious

Almost immediately, many British colonists and land speculators objected to the proclamation boundary, since there were already many settlements beyond the line (some of which had been temporarily evacuated during Pontiac's War), as well as many existing land claims yet to be settled. Indeed, the proclamation itself called for lands to be granted to British soldiers who had served in the Seven Years' War. Prominent American colonists joined with land speculators in Britain to lobby the government to move the line further west. As a result, the boundary line was adjusted in a series of treaties with Native Americans. The Treaty of Fort Stanwix and the Treaty of Hard Labor (both 1768) and the Treaty of Lochaber (1770) opened much of what is now West Virginia and Kentucky to British settlement.

Organization of new colonies

Besides regulating colonial expansion, the proclamation dealt with the management of newly ceded French colonies. It established government for four areas: Quebec, West Florida, East Florida, and Grenada. All of these were granted the ability to elect general assemblies under a royally appointed governor or a high council, which could then create laws and ordinances specific to the area in agreement with British and colonial laws. In the meantime, the new colonies enjoyed the same rights as native-born Englishmen, something that British colonists had been fighting over for years. An even bigger affront to the British colonies was the establishment of both civil and criminal courts complete with the right to appeal--but those charged with violating the Stamp or Sugar Act were to be tried in admiralty court, where the defendant was considered guilty until he or she could prove his or her innocence.

Legacy

The influence of the Royal Proclamation of 1763 on the coming of the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) has been variously interpreted. Many historians argue that the proclamation ceased to be a major source of tension after 1768, since the aforementioned treaties opened up extensive lands for settlement. Others have argued that colonial resentment of the proclamation contributed to the growing divide between the colonies and the Mother Country.

In the United States, the Royal Proclamation of 1763 ended with the American Revolutionary War, because Great Britain ceded the land in question to the United States in the Treaty of Paris (1783). Afterwards, the U.S. government also faced difficulties in preventing frontier violence, and eventually adopted policies similar to those of the Royal Proclamation. The first in a series of Indian Intercourse Acts was passed in 1790, prohibiting unregulated trade and travel in Native American lands. Additionally, the U.S. Supreme Court case Johnson v. M'Intosh (1823) established that only the U.S. government, and not private individuals, could purchase land from Native Americans.

The Royal Proclamation continued to govern the cession of aboriginal land in British North America, especially Upper Canada and Rupert's Land. The proclamation forms the basis of land claims of aboriginal peoples in Canada – First Nations, Inuit, and Metis. The Royal Proclamation of 1763 is thus mentioned in Section Twenty-five of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

The Stamp Act and other Laws

The Boston Massacre in 1770 worsened American opinions of British rule.

In 1764, George Grenville became the British Chancellor of the Exchequer (minister of finance). He allowed customs officers to obtain general writs of assistance, which allowed officers to search random houses for smuggled goods. Grenville thought that if profits from smuggled goods could be directed towards Britain, the money could help pay off debts. Colonists were horrified that they could be searched without warrant at any given moment. Also in 1764, with persuasion from Grenville, Parliament began to impose several taxes on the colonists. The Sugar Act of 1764 reduced the taxes imposed by the Molasses Act, but at the same time strengthened the collection of the taxes. It also provided that British judges, and not juries, would try cases involving that Act.

The next year, Parliament passed the Quartering Act, which required the colonies to provide room and board for British soldiers stationed in North America; the soldiers would serve various purposes, chiefly to enforce the previously passed acts of Parliament.

Following the Quartering Act, Parliament passed one of the most infamous pieces of legislation: the Stamp Act. Previously, Parliament imposed only external taxes on imports. But the Stamp Act provided the first internal tax on the colonists, requiring that a tax stamp be applied to books, newspapers, pamphlets, legal documents, playing cards, and dice. The legislature of Massachusetts requested a conference on the Stamp Act; the Stamp Act Congress met in October that year, petitioning the King and Parliament to repeal the act before it went into effect at the end of the month, crying "taxation without representation."

The act faced vehement opposition throughout the colonies. Merchants threatened to boycott British products. Thousands of New Yorkers rioted near the location where the stamps were stored. In Boston, the Sons of Liberty, a violent group led by radical statesman Samuel Adams, destroyed the home of Lieutenant Governor Thomas Hutchinson. Parliament did indeed repeal the Stamp Act, but additionally passed the Declaratory Act, which stated that Great Britain retained the power to tax the colonists, even without substantive representation.

Believing that the colonists only objected to internal taxes, Chancellor of the Exchequer Charles Townshend proposed bills that would later become the Townshend Acts. The Acts, passed in 1767, taxed imports of tea, glass, paint, lead, and even paper. The colonial merchants again threatened to boycott the taxed products, reducing the profits of British merchants, who in turn petitioned Parliament to repeal the Townshend Acts. Parliament eventually agreed to repeal much of the Townshend legislation. But Parliament refused to remove the tax on tea, implying that the British retained the authority to tax the colonies despite a lack of representation.

In 1773, Parliament passed the Tea Act, which exempted the British East India Company from the Townshend taxes. Thus, the East India Company gained a great advantage over other companies when selling tea in the colonies. The colonists who resented the advantages given to British companies dumped British tea overboard in the Boston Tea Party in December of 1773.

The Boston Tea Party

In retaliation for the Boston Tea Party, Parliament passed the Coercive Acts, which were in the colonies known as the Intolerable Acts. Parliament reduced the power of the Massachusetts legislature and closed the port of Boston. Also, the Quartering Act was extended to require private individuals to lodge soldiers. Furthermore, Parliament allowed royal officials accused of crimes to be tried by a British, rather than a colonial, jury.

First Continental Congress

Carpenters Hall in Philadelphia, where the First Continental Congress met.

In order to debate a response to the Intolerable Acts, all American colonies except for Georgia sent delegates to the First Continental Congress at Philadelphia. The Congress met in September 1774 and issued a Declaration of Rights and Grievances. When the Congress adjourned, it stipulated another Congress would meet if King George III did not meet the demands of the Declaration. When the Second Congress did meet, the military hostilities of the Revolutionary War had already begun, and the issue of Independence, rather than a redress of grievances, dominated the debates.

Education

Literacy grew for both men and women during the 18th century. In New England and the Middle States, more middle-class girls were sent to school. However, as Science and the requirements for citizenship became more a part of education, girls were excluded from learning these topics.

Higher education continued to develop, with the 1746 opening of The College of New Jersey (later known as Princeton), and King's College (now Columbia) in 1754. All of these universities were meant exclusively for White men, though some of the colleges experimented by admitting Native Americans. In the public schools, vocational education expanded.

Though what was lost by failing to educate the underclasses was incalculable, we can gauge the lost possibilities through such individuals as Benjamin Banneker and Phillis Wheatley. Mr. Banneker, a self-educated free African-American, observed the stars, wrote his own almanac, and was one of the surveyors of what would later become the District of Columbia. Miss Wheatley, an African-born slave educated and freed by her mistress, wrote a remarkable volume of poems published in the year 1773. Most of these had been published in The Newport Mercury, edited by Benjamin Franklin's brother James.

Questions For Review

1. What were the reasons for the French and Indian War?

2. What was the strategy of General Braddock against the French at Fort Duquesne? What was the strategy of the defending French and Indian forces?

3. Examine the succession of acts imposed upon the American Colonists in the wake of the war, beginning with the Sugar Act. What was the intended purpose of each act? What was its actual effect?

Footnotes

Further reading

• Eckert, Allan W. Wilderness Empire. Bantam Books, 1994, originally published 1969. ISBN 0-553-26488-5. Second volume in a series of historical narratives, with emphasis on Sir William Johnson. Academic historians often regard Eckert's books, which are written in the style of novels, to be fiction.
• Parkman, Francis. Montcalm and Wolfe: The French and Indian War. Originally published 1884. New York: Da Capo, 1984. ISBN 0-306-81077-8.
• Taylor, Alan. American Colonies: The Settling of North America. Penguin Books, 2001. Edited by Eric Foner. ISBN 0-670-87282-2.

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The American Revolution (1774 - 1783)

Background

The British forces might at first glance seem to have every advantage. At the outset of the War they had stocks of cannon and ammunition. The Colonists had single-shot rifles from local forges, guns which took time to load and could easily misfire or explode. When Washington took command of the army in 1775, he learned that there was only enough gunpowder to provide nine rounds of ammunition per man. The British had a large professional army drilled to a pitch like that of Ancient Rome, well-supplied with food, uniforms, and arms. But the American lack of training meant that they did not mass in the European style. Instead they relied on snipers, individuals hidden behind the trees who shot their bullet and then loaded again while their neighbors fired. They had learned this during the French and Indian War. Snipers helped strengthen the American odds.

The Beginning of the War (1775 - 1778)

Lexington and Concord

The skirmish at Lexington.

The British government commanded General Thomas Gage to enforce the Intolerable Acts and limit rights in Massachusetts. Gage decided to confiscate a stockpile of colonial arms located in Concord. On April 19, 1775, Gage's troops marched to Concord. On the way, at the town of Lexington, Americans who had been warned in advance by Paul Revere and others of the British movements made an attempt to stop the troops. No one knows which side fired the first shot, but it sparked battle on Lexington Green between the British and the Minutemen. Faced against an overwhelmingly superior number of British regular troops in an open field, the Minutemen were quickly routed. Nevertheless, alarms sounded through the countryside. The colonial militias poured in and were able to launch guerrilla attacks on the British while they marched on to Concord. The colonials amassed of troops at Concord. They engaged the British in force there, and they were able to repulse them. They then claimed the contents of the armory. The British retreated to Boston under a constant and withering fire from all sides. Only a reinforcing column with artillery support on the outskirts of Boston prevented the British withdrawal from becoming a total rout. The following day the British woke up to find Boston surrounded by 20,000 armed colonists, occupying the neck of land extending to the peninsula the city stood on.

The Battle of Bunker Hill

The Battle of Bunker Hill.

Don't shoot until you see the whites of their eyes.

—Colonel William Prescott, Order prior to the battle

The action changed from a battle to a siege, where one army bottles up another in a town or a city. (Though in traditional terms, the British were not besieged, since the Royal Navy controlled the harbor and supplies came in by ship.) General Artemas Ward, the head of the Massachusetts militia, had the initial oversight of the siege. He set up headquarters at Cambridge, Massachusetts and positioned his forces at Charlestown Neck, Roxbury, and Dorchester Heights. The 6,000 to 8,000 rebels faced some 4,000 British regulars under General Thomas Gage. Boston and little else was controlled by British troops. General Gage countered the siege on June 17 by attacking the colonists on Breed's Hill and Bunker Hill. Although the British suffered tremendous casualties compared to the colonial losses, the British were eventually able to dislodge the American forces from their entrenched positions. The colonists were forced to retreat when many colonial soldiers ran out of ammunition. Soon after, the area surrounding Boston fell to the British. However, because of the losses they suffered, they were unable to break the siege of the city. Despite the early defeat for the colonists, the battle proved that they had the potential to counter British forces, which were at that time considered the best in the world.

The Last Chance For Peace

The Second Continental Congress adopted the Olive Branch Petition, a petition for peace, on July 5, 1775. The Congress affirmed its allegiance to the Crown. It was received in London at the same time as it heard of the Battle For Bunker Hill. The King refused to read the petition or to meet with its ambassadors. Parliament reacted by passing the Prohibitory Act, which banned trade with the colonies.

Battle For Boston

Despite the British access to the ships, the town and the army were on short rations. Salt pork was the order of the day, and prices escalated rapidly. While the American forces had some information about what was happening in the city, General Gage had no effective intelligence of rebel activities.

On May 25, 1775, 4,500 reinforcements and three new generals arrived in Boston Harbor. The fresh leaders were Major General William Howe and Brigadiers John Burgoyne and Henry Clinton. Gage began planing to break out of the city.

On July 3, 1775, George Washington arrived to take charge of the new Continental Army. Forces and supplies came in from as far away as Maryland. Trenches were built at Dorchester Neck, extending toward Boston. Washington reoccupied Bunker Hill and Breeds Hill without opposition. However, these activities had little effect on the British occupation.

Henry Knox helped bring the Continental Army the artillery used to defeat the British.

In the winter of 1775– 1776, Henry Knox and his engineers under order from George Washington used sledges to retrieve sixty tons of heavy artillery that had been captured at Fort Ticonderoga. Knox, who had come up with the idea to use sledges, believed that he would have the artillery there in eighteen days. It took six weeks to bring them across the frozen Connecticut River, and they arrived back at Cambridge on January 24, 1776. Weeks later, in an amazing feat of deception and mobility, Washington moved artillery and several thousand men overnight to take Dorchester Heights overlooking Boston. General John Thomas fortified the area. The British fleet had become a liability, anchored in a shallow harbor with limited maneuverability, and under the American guns on Dorchester Heights.

When General Howe saw the cannons, he knew he could not hold the city. He asked that George Washington let them evacuate the city in peace. In return, they would not burn the city to the ground. Washington agreed: he had no choice. He had artillery guns, but did not have the gunpowder. The whole plan had been a masterful bluff. The siege ended when the British set sail for Halifax, Nova Scotia on March 17, 1776. The militia went home, and in April Washington took most of the Continental Army forces to fortify New York City.

Ethan Allen and Fort Ticonderoga

Ethan Allen capturing Fort Tinconderoga.

The British had considered Fort Ticonderoga a relatively unimportant outpost in a conflict which had up to then been mostly based in Massachusetts. However, a veteran of the French and Indian War, Ethan Allen, had his eye on the fort. Allen had built up a Vermont territorial militia, the Green Mountain Boys, until it was an effective fighting force. Vermont was claimed by the New York colony, but Allen wanted more independence. In April of 1775, Allen was surprised by a visit by Commander Benedict Arnold of the Connecticut Militia. Arnold announced that he had been commissioned to seize the cannons of Fort Ticonderoga. A heated discussion between the two concluded with the agreement that the two militias would combine to attack the fort. This was for the best, for both forces together were small, well short of brigade strength. On May tenth, the combined American forces captured the fort. They seized the arms, including the cannons, which were then hauled by oxen all the way to Boston.

Strengthening The Cause

Through the media available in that day, the Revolution promoted the idea of honorable men in revolt against tyranny. Newspapers in North and South published incendiary stories and inspiring engravings. The theater contributed dramatic outcries, including those of Mary Otis Warren. Songs were played and sung to rally flagging spirits.

Thomas Paine's 1776

In January of 1776, the Englishman Thomas Paine published the pamphlet Common Sense. This anti-monarchical publication encouraged American independence, using examples from the Bible and republican virtues to argue that kings were never good for any free state. In late 1776 he began printing his series of pamphlets, The American Crisis, calling soldiers to mass to the cause of the Revolution. The first of these pamphlets begins with the stirring words, "These are the times that try men's souls."

The Declaration of Independence

Raising the first flag at Independence Hall. Copy of a painting by Clyde O. Deland.

As military hostilities built up, the Second Continental Congress appointed George Washington as General of the Continental Army. Washington gave up his salary for the position all through the war. (As he was among the richest men in the colonies, he could afford this choice.) In June of 1776, the Second Continental Congress felt it needed a spur for separation from Great Britain. It appointed a Committee of Five to draft a declaration of independence: John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, Robert Livingston, Roger Sherman and Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson became the principal author of this document.

Although the British king was no longer principally responsible for his dominion's policy, the Declaration of Independence called him a tyrant. It justified the rights of the rebellion with words the European Enlightenment would have hailed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal[.]" The Continental Congress signed the document on July 4, 1776. However, the signatures at this point showed that they wished independence: they could not alone achieve it.

Army Bands

One of the attributes of a well-drilled company of soldiers was its military band. The British and Hessian troops drilled to the beat of drums, which carried the rhythm of the march above the noise of musket fire, and provided a way to communicate on the battlefield. "By 1778 soldiers marched at seventy-five 24″ steps per minute in common time and nearly double that (120 steps per minute) when marching in quick time." The music of the fife (a shrill flute) and drum helped build soldier morale.

If the Rebellion could not have good supplies, it would at least have high morale. With the Middle-brook Order, George Washington directed that every officer must provide military music for his troops. This was despite the limited number of instruments. The bands were used to announce the beginning and end of the day, direct troops in battle, and uplift spirits.

Popular Music in the Revolution

One of the two major songs of the Revolution was the hymn Chester, first published in 1770 in "The New England Psalm Singer" and revised in 1778. Its author and composer, William Billings, created a combination of the biblical (Let tyrants shake their iron rod) and the topical (Howe and Burgoyne and Clinton too,/ With Prescot and Cornwallis join'd).

Another was the song Yankee Doodle, adapted from a tune of the Seven Years War. This was originally used by the British to laugh at the provincial manners of the Colonists, but was turned into a theme of the American upstarts.

Canada

In September of 1775, the Colonists, led by General Richard Montgomery, invaded Canada. At first the invasion proved successful, with Montgomery capturing Fort St. Jean and the city of Montreal. On December 30 he made the decision to launch an attack onto the British held city of Quebec. It proved disastrous, and Montgomery was killed in battle. This was the last major action in Canada, although Benidict Arnold and a number of other generals did attack the coasts or Canada, or launch raids across the border.

The Turning Point of the War

Despite the numerous defeats they faced in the early years of the war, the colonists were able to turn the tide around with several major victories.

New York and New Jersey

In July, 1776, General William Howe and thirty-thousand British troops arrived at Staten Island in New York. The large army attacked and defeated General George Washington's American forces in the Battle of Long Island. After nearly having his entire army captured, Washington led a skilled withdrawal out of New York. Eventually the Continental Army was forced to set up camp in Pennsylvania.

Howe could have ended the war by pursuing Washington's forces. But Howe was very cautious and took almost no risks. He feared losing too many men so far from home. Britain hired German mercenaries (Hessians) to guard the British fort at Trenton. Howe took advantage of these replacements and decided to wait until spring to attack the Continental Army again.

Washington also took advantage of the situation, though from a different perspective. He figured that the Hessians would be weakest on Christmas night, after heavy feasting and drinking. On the night of December 25, 1776, Washington led his troops 9 miles, and across the Delaware River to ambush the Hessians. Crossing the river was difficult. A hail and sleet storm had broken out early in the crossing, winds were strong and the river was full of ice floes. The crossing took 3 hours longer than expected, but Washington decided to continue the attack anyway. As Washington predicted, the mercenaries were completely caught off guard and had little time to respond. Within just a over an hour, on the morning of December 26, the Continental Army had won the Battle of Trenton. The Americans had just 4 wounded and 0 killed against 25 Hessians Killed, 90 wounded and 920 captured. The victory increased the troops' morale and eventually led to re-enlistments. Some historians even speculate Trenton saved the revolution.

On January 2, the British came to re-take Trenton, and did so with heavy casualties. Washington once again led a clever withdrawal, and advanced on Princeton. At the Battle of Princeton, the Continental Army attacked the rear-guard of the British Army, and forced them to retreat from New Jersey.

During the war, the New World was being devastated by the 1775–1782 North American smallpox epidemic. Having survived the diseased in his youth, and having been warned about the effect the disease may have on the Army by Benjamin Franklin, George Washington wrote he had more dread of the disease crippling the continental army then the British Troops. On February 5, George Washington ordered the first mass inoculation of troops, following large disruptions caused by smallpox outbreaks. The policy was unpopular among soldiers, but stopped the mass infections from continuing.

The Battle of Saratoga

Burgoyne surrendering to the Continental Army.

In the summer of 1777, British General John Burgoyne and General Howe agreed to attack the colonial Army from two sides and defeat it. Howe marched north, winning the Battles of Brandywine and Germantown and eventually capturing Philadelphia. But Burgoyne was not so fortunate. Delayed by natural traps set up by the Continental Army, his troops slowly marched from Canada to Albany. By September of the year, his forces reached Saratoga, where an enormous American Army attacked the troops. In October, General Burgoyne surrendered all his forces to the Americans. General Howe resigned his post, thwarted despite his victories in Pennsylvania.

The Battle of Saratoga proved to be the major turning point in the war. It persuaded France that America had to overthrow Great Britain, and French aid now was introduced to the colonists. The battle was also the last time the British would advance North. By the summer of 1778, following the Battle of Monmouth in New Jersey, all fighting would take place in the South.

Defeat of the Iroquois

The Iroquois Confederacy in its zenith had been the equal of the European Powers. But since the French and Indian war it had been in decline. The Tribes of the Confederacy disagreed on who to support in the Revolution. The Onedia and Tuscaroras supported the Americans, while the Mohawk, Onondaga, Cayuga, and the Seneca supported the British. The Confederacy managed to stay together until 1777, when following the Battle of Saratoga, the 4 Tribes supporting the British began to attack American settlements across New York and Pennslyvenia.

A back and forth battle followed. The Iroquois would attack American Forts and Towns, then the Americans would burn Iroquois villages. In 1779 George Washington sent General Sullivan to destroy the Iroquois Nation. After defeating the Iroquois at the Battle of Newtown, Sullivan's army then carried out a scorched earth campaign, methodically destroying at least forty Iroquois villages. The devastation created great hardships for the thousands of Iroquois refugees outside Fort Niagara that winter, and many starved or froze to death. The survivors fled to British regions in Canada and the Niagara Falls and Buffalo areas. Thus ended the 700-year history of the Iroquois Confederacy.

Conclusion of the War (1778 - 1781)

After the loss at Saratoga, the French, traditional rivals of the British, offered their aid in the Revolution. The United States allied itself with France in 1778. Spain and the Dutch Republic also joined the American side, both lending money to the United States and going to war with Britain.

Valley Forge

A painting of Washington and Lafayette at Valley Forge.

Following the capture of Philadelphia by the British, Washington took his followers to Valley Forge on December 17th, 1777, a defensible nearby area, and built camp for 12,000 soldiers and 400 civilians, then the fourth largest settlement in the colonies. Following the introduction of the Prussian protege of Frederick the Great, Baron Von Steuben to Congress by way of Benjamin Franklin, he was directed to Valley Forge, where he arrived on February 23, 1778.

On the Seas

War broke out on the seas as well. Americans granted commissions to "privateers" to attack and destroy all British ships, whether they were military or not. One of the most famous privateers, John Paul Jones, scored several victories at sea for the Americans, even attacking the shores of Britain itself.

Benjamin Lincoln accepting the British surrender at Yorktown, with Washington in the background.

The War Heads South

An attempted treachery was defeated when its architect, British Major John Andre, was captured in September of 1780. Benedict Arnold, one of the heroes of Fort Ticonderoga, had been placed in charge of Fort Clinton, New York (now called West Point). In response to a bribe, Arnold neglected maintenance of the fortification, and was then preparing to turn the fort over to the British. After he had learned of Andre's arrest he fled to join the British army.

Britain turned its attention from the North to the South, where more loyalists lived. They were at first very successful, defeating the Americans at Waxhaws, Charleston, and Camden. Lord Cornwallis, commander of the British forces in the south, was faced with the challenge of chasing down the Americans. Nathanael Greene had split his army into two, leaving one under the control of Daniel Morgan. Morgan drew Banastre Tarleton, who was commanding one half of the British Army, to Cowpens where they were they decisively defeated the British. The other half of the British Army, still under control of Cornwallis, defeated the Americans at the Battle of Guilford Court House. However, it was a bloody victory for Cornwallis and he was forced to withdraw to Yorktown Virginia to regroup.

After hearing that the British were in Yorktown, and there was a French Fleet arriving, Washington took the Continental Army, along with French Troops, to Yorktown and surrounded the British. By mid September the town was under siege. Cornwallis was assured by British Commander-in-Chief, Henry Clinton, who was in New York, that he would be relieved shortly. However, the British relief force was defeated by the French fleet. The British continued to hold off for a few more days, but the allied army moved in closer and closer to Yorktown, and their cannons destroyed many of the British defenses. On October 19, 1781, Cornwallis surrendered his entire army, over 7,000 men.

Scattered fighting continued, but back in Britain, the British were crushed by this defeat. Parliament voted to cease all offensive operations in "the colonies." Washington took his army to Newburgh, New York, where he stopped a mutiny in the Army.

At the conclusion of the war in 1783 large numbers of loyalists and their families relocated to the home country of England and in large part to Canada as well as to other British Colonies. They submitted claims for lost property and lands in America. Many of the claims were not accepted by the English government for lack of evidence of the losses or significantly reduced. The property and lands were acquired by the American communities and then resold to the highest bidders.

Due to the climatic effects of a 1782 eruption of an Icelandic volcano, the loyalists also experienced one of the coldest Canadian winters on record which contributed to poor crops in 1783-1784. Starvation, disease and hardship were rampant and many resolved to return to the United States despite the threats of retribution rather than subsist on their meager produce.

Treaty of Paris (1783)

The British lost hope of crushing the rebellion after Yorktown. They decided to negotiate peace with The United States, France, and Spain. The Treaty of Paris was signed on September 3rd, 1783. In it, the United States was recognized as an independent nation, with boundaries stretching from the Canadian border in the North, to the Mississippi River to the West, and the northern border of Florida in the South. Britain was forced to return Florida to Spain, but could still hold Canada. Congress was told to advise the states to restore property lost or stolen from the Loyalists. (However, many Loyalists had fled during the Revolution, and many of them did not return to claim their property.)

Religion & the Revolution

Catholics in the Revolution

The complex situation of Catholicism in Great Britain had results in its Colonies. At the time of the American revolution, Catholics formed approximately 1.6% of the total American population of the original 13 colonies. If Catholics were seen as potential enemies of the British state, Irish Catholics, subject to British rule, were doubly-damned. In Ireland they had been subject to British domination. In America Catholics were still forbidden from settling in some of the colonies. Although the head of their faith dwelt in Rome, they were under the official representation of the Catholic Bishop of the London diocese, one James Talbot. When War began, Bishop Talbot declared his faithfulness to the British Crown. (If he had done otherwise, Catholics in England would have been in trouble. Anti-Catholic sentiment still ran high.) He forbade any Colonial priest to serve Communion. This made practice of the faith impossible. This created sympathy for the Colonial rebels. The Continental Army's alliance with the French increased sympathy for the faith. When the French fleet arrived in Newport, Rhode Island, the colony repealed the Act of 1664 and allowed citizenship to Catholics. (This anticipated the provision of the Constitutional Bill of Rights which would strike anti-Catholic laws from the books.) After the war, the Pope created an American Bishop, John Carroll -- a descendant of the same Carrolls who had helped found Maryland -- and an American Diocese communicating directly with Rome.

From Anglicanism to Episcopalianism

On the one hand the colonial Church of England was an organ of the British government and a collaborator with it. Its clergy swore allegiance to the King. Several colonial governments paid monies to the local Anglican Church. Although other faiths were allowed in those states, the Anglican was considered the Official (Established) Church, putting pressure on other denominations. Still, several Revolutionaries, including Thomas Jefferson, rented their pews in a Church of England building. (Jefferson's own faith was Low Church, and he disagreed with the miracles in Christianity.) Significant meetings of the rebellion were held in Church of England buildings.

But after the war, the Church needed to find a new role. Some of the Loyalist clergy went north to Canada. Others were allowed to remain after swearing an oath to the new government. The formerly Established Church was no more: even before the creation of the Constitution, with its separation of Church and State, Americans did not want to pay any extra fees. The Book of Common Prayer, the form of worship in that Church, was pragmatically revised for the new Episcopal Church so that people prayed for "Civil Rulers," instead of the King. But many Church buildings were closed, and there was now room for other denominations to flourish in Virginia and other states.

The Early Government of the New United States

[Copied from Wikipedia]

The Articles of Confederation, formally the Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, was an agreement among the 13 founding states that established the United States of America as a confederation of sovereign states and served as its first constitution. Its drafting by the Continental Congress began in mid-1776, and an approved version was sent to the states for ratification in late 1777. The formal ratification by all 13 states was completed in early 1781. Even when not yet ratified, the Articles provided domestic and international legitimacy for the Continental Congress to direct the American Revolutionary War, conduct diplomacy with Europe and deal with territorial issues and Native American relations. Nevertheless, the weakness of the government created by the Articles became a matter of concern for key nationalists. [Whom?]

Questions for Review

1. Who were these authors/composers, and what were they known for? (Mary Otis Warren, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, William Billings.)

2. How do the battles of Lexington and Concord show the early strengths and weaknesses of the American fighters?

3. Examine a copy of the Declaration of Independence in relation to this and the previous chapters. How does its rhetoric (choice of words) address the concerns of the American rebellion? How does it deviate from actual events to make a point?

A New Nation is Formed (1783 - 1787)

The Articles of Confederation

(The following text is taken from Wikipedia)

The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union, also the Articles of Confederation, was the governing constitution of the alliance of thirteen independent and sovereign states styled "United States of America." The Article's ratification (proposed in 1777) was completed in 1782, legally uniting the states by compact into the "United States of America" as a union with a confederation government. Under the Articles (and the succeeding Constitution) the states retained sovereignty over all governmental functions not specifically deputed to the confederation.

The final draft of the Articles was written in the summer of 1777 and adopted by the Second Continental Congress on November 15, 1777 in York, Pennsylvania after a year of debate. In practice the final draft of the Articles served as the de facto system of government used by the Congress ("the United States in Congress assembled") until it became de jure by final ratification on March 1, 1781; at which point Congress became the Congress of the Confederation. The Articles set the rules for operations of the "United States" confederation. The confederation was capable of making war, negotiating diplomatic agreements, and resolving issues regarding the western territories; it could mint coins and borrow inside and outside the United States. An important element of the Articles was that Article XIII stipulated that "their provisions shall be inviolably observed by every state" and "the Union shall be perpetual." This article was put to the test in the American Civil War.

The Articles were created by the chosen representatives of the states in the Second Continental Congress out of a perceived need to have "a plan of confederacy for securing the freedom, sovereignty, and independence of the United States." Although serving a crucial role in the attainment of nationhood for the thirteen states, a group of reformers, known as "federalists", felt that the Articles lacked the necessary provisions for a sufficiently effective government. Fundamentally, a federation was sought to replace the confederation. The key criticism by those who favored a more powerful central state (i.e. the federalists) was that the government (i.e. the Congress of the Confederation) lacked taxing authority; it had to request funds from the states. Another criticism of the Articles was that they did not strike the right balance between large and small states in the legislative decision making process. Due to its one-state, one-vote plank, the larger states were expected to contribute more but had only one vote. The Articles were replaced by the United States Constitution on June 21, 1788.

Background

The political push for the colonies to increase cooperation began in the French and Indian Wars in the mid 1750s. The opening of the American Revolutionary War in 1775 induced the various states to cooperate in seceding from the British Empire. The Second Continental Congress starting 1775 acted as the confederation organ that ran the war. Congress presented the Articles for enactment by the states in 1777, while prosecuting the American Revolutionary war against the Kingdom of Great Britain.

Ratification

Congress began to move for ratification of the Articles in 1777:

The articles can always be candidly reviewed under a sense of the difficulty of combining in one general system the various sentiments and interests of a continent divided into so many sovereign and independent communities, under a conviction of the absolute necessity of uniting all our councils and all our strength, to maintain and defend our common liberties...

The document could not become officially effective until it was ratified by all of the thirteen colonies. The first state to ratify was Virginia on December 16, 1777. The process dragged on for several years, stalled by the refusal of some states to rescind their claims to land in the West. Maryland was the last holdout; it refused to go along until Virginia and New York agreed to cede their claims in the Ohio River valley. A little over three years passed before Maryland's ratification on March 1, 1781.

Article summaries

Even though the Articles of Confederation and the Constitution were established by many of the same people, the two documents were very different. The original five-paged Articles contained thirteen articles, a conclusion, and a signatory section. The following list contains short summaries of each of the thirteen articles.

1. Establishes the name of the confederation as "The United States of America."
2. Asserts the precedence of the separate states over the confederation government, i.e. "Each state retains its sovereignty, freedom, and independence, and every power, jurisdiction, and right, which is not by this Confederation expressly delegated."
3. Establishes the United States as a league of states united ". . . for their common defense, the security of their liberties, and their mutual and general welfare, binding themselves to assist each other, against all force offered to, or attacks made upon them . . . ."
4. Establishes freedom of movement–anyone can pass freely between states, excluding "paupers, vagabonds, and fugitives from justice." All people are entitled to the rights established by the state into which he travels. If a crime is committed in one state and the perpetrator flees to another state, he will be extradited to and tried in the state in which the crime was committed.
5. Allocates one vote in the Congress of the Confederation (United States in Congress Assembled) to each state, which was entitled to a delegation of between two and seven members. Members of Congress were appointed by state legislatures; individuals could not serve more than three out of any six years.
6. Only the central government is allowed to conduct foreign relations and to declare war. No states may have navies or standing armies, or engage in war, without permission of Congress (although the state militias are encouraged).
7. When an army is raised for common defense, colonels and military ranks below colonel will be named by the state legislatures.
8. Expenditures by the United States will be paid by funds raised by state legislatures, and apportioned to the states based on the real property values of each.
9. Defines the powers of the central government: to declare war, to set weights and measures (including coins), and for Congress to serve as a final court for disputes between states.
10. Defines a Committee of the States to be a government when Congress is not in session.
11. Requires nine states to approve the admission of a new state into the confederacy; pre-approves Canada, if it applies for membership.
12. Reaffirms that the Confederation accepts war debt incurred by Congress before the Articles.
13. Declares that the Articles are perpetual, and can only be altered by approval of Congress with ratification by all the state legislatures.

Still at war with the Kingdom of Great Britain, the colonists were reluctant to establish another powerful national government. Jealously guarding their new independence, members of the Continental Congress created a loosely-structured unicameral legislature that protected the liberty of the individual states. While calling on Congress to regulate military and monetary affairs, for example, the Articles of Confederation provided no mechanism to force the states to comply with requests for troops or revenue. At times, this left the military in a precarious position, as George Washington wrote in a 1781 letter to the governor of Massachusetts, John Hancock.

The end of the war

The Treaty of Paris (1783), which ended hostilities with Great Britain, languished in Congress for months because state representatives failed to attend sessions of the national legislature. Yet Congress had no power to enforce attendance. Writing to George Clinton in September 1783, George Washington complained:

Congress have come to no determination yet respecting the Peace Establishment nor am I able to say when they will. I have lately had a conference with a Committee on this subject, and have reiterated my former opinions, but it appears to me that there is not a sufficient representation to discuss Great National points.

Function

The Articles supported the Congressional direction of the Continental Army, and allowed the 13 states to present a unified front when dealing with the European powers. As a tool to build a centralized war-making government, they were largely a failure, but since guerrilla warfare was correct strategy in a war against the British Empire's army, this "failure" succeeded in winning independence. Under the articles, Congress could make decisions, but had no power to enforce them. There was a requirement for unanimous approval before any modifications could be made to the Articles. Because the majority of lawmaking rested with the states, the central government was also kept limited.

Congress was denied the power of taxation: it could only request money from the states. The states did not generally comply with the requests in full, leaving the confederation chronically short of funds. Congress was also denied the power to regulate commerce, and as a result, the states fought over trade as well. The states and the national congress had both incurred debts during the war, and how to pay the debts became a major issue. Some states paid off their debts; however, the centralizers favored federal assumption of states' debts.

Nevertheless, the Congress of the Confederation did take two actions with lasting impact. The Land Ordinance of 1785 established the general land survey and ownership provisions used throughout later American expansion. The Northwest Ordinance of 1787 noted the agreement of the original states to give up western land claims and cleared the way for the entry of new states.

Once the war was won, the Continental Army was largely disbanded. A very small national force was maintained to man frontier forts and protect against Indian attacks. Meanwhile, each of the states had an army (or militia), and 11 of them had navies. The wartime promises of bounties and land grants to be paid for service were not being met. In 1783, Washington defused the Newburgh conspiracy, but riots by unpaid Pennsylvania veterans forced the Congress to leave Philadelphia temporarily.

Signatures

The Second Continental Congress approved the Articles for distribution to the states on November 15 1777. A copy was made for each state and one was kept by the Congress. The copies sent to the states for ratification were unsigned, and a cover letter had only the signatures of Henry Laurens and Charles Thomson, who were the president and secretary to the Congress.

But, the Articles at that time were unsigned, and the date was blank. Congress began the signing process by examining their copy of the Articles on June 27 1778. They ordered a final copy prepared (the one in the National Archives), and that delegates should inform the secretary of their authority for ratification.

On July 9, 1778, the prepared copy was ready. They dated it, and began to sign. They also requested each of the remaining states to notify its delegation when ratification was completed. On that date, delegates present from New Hampshire, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania, Virginia and South Carolina signed the Articles to indicate that their states had ratified. New Jersey, Delaware and Maryland could not, since their states had not ratified. North Carolina and Georgia also didn't sign that day, since their delegations were absent.

After the first signing, some delegates signed at the next meeting they attended. For example, John Wentworth of New Hampshire added his name on August 8. John Penn was the first of North Carolina's delegates to arrive (on July 10), and the delegation signed the Articles on July 21 1778.

The other states had to wait until they ratified the Articles and notified their Congressional delegation. Georgia signed on July 24, New Jersey on November 26, and Delaware on February 12 1779. Maryland refused to ratify the Articles until every state had ceded its western land claims.

The Act of the Maryland legislature to ratify the Articles of Confederation on February 2, 1781

On February 2, 1781, the much-awaited decision was taken by the Maryland General Assembly in Annapolis. As the last piece of business during the afternoon Session, "among engrossed Bills" was "signed and sealed by Governor Thomas Sim Lee in the Senate Chamber, in the presence of the members of both Houses… an Act to empower the delegates of this state in Congress to subscribe and ratify the articles of confederation" and perpetual union among the states. The Senate then adjourned "to the first Monday in August next." The decision of Maryland to ratify the Articles was reported to the Continental Congress on February 12. The formal signing of the Articles by the Maryland delegates took place in Philadelphia at noon time on March 1, 1781 and was celebrated in the afternoon. With these events, the Articles entered into force and the United States came into being as a united, sovereign and national state.

Congress had debated the Articles for over a year and a half, and the ratification process had taken nearly three and a half years. Many participants in the original debates were no longer delegates, and some of the signers had only recently arrived. The Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union were signed by a group of men who were never present in the Congress at the same time.

The signers and the states they represented were:

• New Hampshire: Josiah Bartlett and John Wentworth Jr.
• Massachusetts Bay: John Hancock, Samuel Adams, Elbridge Gerry, Francis Dana, James Lovell, and Samuel Holten
• Rhode Island and Providence Plantations: William Ellery, Henry Marchant, and John Collins
• Connecticut: Roger Sherman¹, Samuel Huntington, Oliver Wolcott, Titus Hosmer, and Andrew Adams
• New York: James Duane, Francis Lewis, William Duer, and Gouverneur Morris
• New Jersey: John Witherspoon and Nathaniel Scudder
• Pennsylvania:Robert Morris², Daniel Roberdeau, Jonathan Bayard Smith, William Clingan, and Joseph Reed
• Delaware: Thomas McKean, John Dickinson³, and Nicholas Van Dyke
• Maryland: John Hanson and Daniel Carroll³
• Virginia: Richard Henry Lee, John Banister, Thomas Adams, John Harvie, and Francis Lightfoot Lee
• North Carolina: John Penn, Cornelius Harnett, and John Williams
• South Carolina: Henry Laurens, William Henry Drayton, John Mathews, Richard Hutson, and Thomas Heyward Jr.
• Georgia: John Walton, Edward Telfair, and Edward Langworthy

¹ The only person to sign all four great state papers of the United States: the Articles of Association, the United States Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

² One of only 2 people to sign three of the great state papers of the United States: the United States Declaration of Independence, the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

³ One of only 4 people to sign both the Articles of Confederation and the United States Constitution.

Presidents of the Congress

The following list is of those who led the Congress of the Confederation under the Articles of Confederation as the presidents of the United States in Congress Assembled. Under the Articles, the president was the presiding officer of Congress, chaired the Cabinet (the Committee of the States) when Congress was in recess, and performed other administrative functions. He was not, however, a chief executive in the way the successor President of the United States is a chief executive, but all of the functions he executed were under the auspices and in service of the Congress.

• Samuel Huntington (March 1, 1781 – July 9, 1781)
• Thomas McKean (July 10, 1781 – November 4, 1781)
• John Hanson (November 5, 1781 – November 3, 1782)
• Elias Boudinot (November 4, 1782 – November 2, 1783)
• Thomas Mifflin (November 3, 1783 – October 31, 1784)
• Richard Henry Lee (November 30, 1784 – November 6, 1785)
• John Hancock (November 23, 1785 – May 29, 1786)
• Nathaniel Gorham (June 6, 1786 – November 5, 1786)
• Arthur St. Clair (February 2, 1787 – November 4, 1787)
• Cyrus Griffin (January 22, 1788 – November 2, 1788)

For a full list of presidents of the Congress Assembled and presidents under the two Continental Congresses before the Articles, see President of the Continental Congress.

Revision and replacement

In May 1786, Charles Pinckney of South Carolina proposed that Congress revise the Articles of Confederation. Recommended changes included granting Congress power over foreign and domestic commerce, and providing means for Congress to collect money from state treasuries. Unanimous approval was necessary to make the alterations, however, and Congress failed to reach a consensus.

In September, five states assembled in the Annapolis Convention to discuss adjustments that would improve commerce. Under their chairman, Alexander Hamilton, they invited state representatives to convene in Philadelphia to discuss improvements to the federal government. Although the states' representatives to the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia were only authorized to amend the Articles, the representatives held secret, closed-door sessions and wrote a new constitution. The new Constitution gave much more power to the central government, but characterization of the result is disputed. Historian Forrest McDonald, using the ideas of James Madison from Federalist 39, describes the change this way:

The constitutional reallocation of powers created a new form of government, unprecedented under the sun. Every previous national authority either had been centralized or else had been a confederation of sovereign states. The new American system was neither one nor the other; it was a mixture of both.

Historian Ralph Ketcham comments on the opinions of Patrick Henry, George Mason, and other antifederalists who were not so eager to give up the local autonomy won by the revolution:

Antifederalists feared what Patrick Henry termed the "consolidated government" proposed by the new Constitution. They saw in Federalist hopes for commercial growth and international prestige only the lust of ambitious men for a "splendid empire" that, in the time-honored way of empires, would oppress the people with taxes, conscription, and military campaigns. Uncertain that any government over so vast a domain as the United States could be controlled by the people, Antifederalists saw in the enlarged powers of the general government only the familiar threats to the rights and liberties of the people.

According to their own terms for modification (Article XIII), the Articles would still have been in effect until 1790, the year in which the last of the 13 states ratified the new Constitution. The Congress under the Articles continued to sit until November 1788, overseeing the adoption of the new Constitution by the states, and setting elections.

Historians have given many reasons for the perceived need to replace the articles in 1787. Jillson and Wilson (1994) point to the financial weakness as well as the norms, rules and institutional structures of the Congress, and the propensity to divide along sectional lines.

Rakove (1988) identifies several factors that explain the collapse of the Confederation. The lack of compulsory direct taxation power was objectionable to those wanting a strong centralized state or expecting to benefit from such power. It could not collect customs after the war because tariffs were vetoed by Rhode Island. Rakove concludes that their failure to implement national measures "stemmed not from a heady sense of independence but rather from the enormous difficulties that all the states encountered in collecting taxes, mustering men, and gathering supplies from a war-weary populace." The second group of factors Rakove identified derived from the substantive nature of the problems the Continental Congress confronted after 1783, especially the inability to create a strong foreign policy. Finally, the Confederation's lack of coercive power reduced the likelihood for profit to be made by political means, thus potential rulers were uninspired to seek power.

When the war ended in 1783, certain special interests had incentives to create a new "merchant state," much like the British state people had rebelled against. In particular, holders of war scrip and land speculators wanted a central government to pay off scrip at face value and to legalize western land holdings with disputed claims. Also, manufacturers wanted a high tariff as a barrier to foreign goods, but competition among states made this impossible without a central government.

Historical importance

The Articles are historically important for two major reasons: i) they were the first constitution or governing document for the United States of America and ii) they legally established a union of the thirteen founding states; a Perpetual Union. Early on, tensions developed surrounding the Union, not least because of the fact that with the US Constitution the basis of government was changed from that of confederation to federation. Thomas Jefferson and John C. Calhoun were in their time leading proponents of guaranteeing the constitutional rights of states in federal legislation. Over time, a legal view developed that if the union violated the constitutional rights of states they might rightfully seceed. A significant tension in the 19th century surrounded the expansion of slavery (which was generally supported in agricultural Southern states and opposed in industrial Northern states). As the secessionist view gained support in the South, the opposing view in the North was that since the U.S. Constitution declared itself to be "a more perfect union" than the Articles, it too must be perpetual, and also could not be broken without the consent of the other states. This view was promoted by Daniel Webster and Abraham Lincoln. In 1861, these constitutional contracts were cited by President Lincoln against any claims by the seceding states that unilaterally withdrawing from the Union and taking federal property within those states was legal.

The Northwest Ordinance

The Congress established the Northwest Territory around the Great Lakes between 1784 and 1787. In 1787, Congress passed the Northwest Ordinance banning slavery in the new Territory. Congressional legislation divided the Territory into townships of six square miles each and provided for the sale of land to settlers. The Northwest Territory would eventually become the states of Ohio, Wisconsin, Indiana, Illinois and Michigan.

Problems with the Confederation

The Confederation faced several difficulties in its early years. Firstly, Congress became extremely dependent on the states for income. Also, states refused to require its citizens to pay debts to British merchants, straining relations with Great Britain. France prohibited Americans from using the important port of New Orleans, crippling American trade down the Mississippi river.

Shays' Rebellion

Due to the post-revolution economic woes, agitated by inflation, many worried of social instability. This was especially true for those in Massachusetts. The legislature's response to the shaky economy was to put emphasis on maintaining a sound currency by paying off the state debt through levying massive taxes. The tax burden hit those with moderate incomes dramatically. The average farmer paid a third of their annual income to these taxes from 1780 to 1786. Those who couldn't pay had their property foreclosed and were thrown into crowded prisons filled with other debtors.

But in the summer of 1786, a revolutionary war veteran named Daniel Shays began to organize western communities in Massachusetts to stop foreclosures, with force, by prohibiting the courts from holding their proceedings. Later that fall, Shays marched the newly formed "rebellion" into Springfield to stop the state supreme court from gathering. The state responded with troops sent to suppress the rebellion. After a failed attempt by the rebels to attack the Springfield arsenal, and other small skirmishes, the rebels retreated and then uprising collapsed. Shays retreated to Vermont by 1787.

While Daniel Shays was in hiding, the government condemned him to death on the charge of treason. Shays pleaded for his life in a petition which was finally granted by John Hancock on June 17, 1788. With the threat of treason behind him, Shays moved to New York and died September 25, 1825

U.S. presidents before George Washington

Who was the first president of the United States? Ask any school child and they will readily tell you "George Washington." And of course, they would be correct—at least technically. Washington was inaugurated on April 30, 1789, and yet, the United States continually had functioning governments from as early as September 5, 1774, and operated as a confederated nation from as early as July 4, 1776. During that nearly fifteen-year interval, Congress—first the Continental Congress and then later the Confederation Congress—was always moderated by a duly elected president. This officer was known as the "President of the Continental Congress", and later as the "President of the United States, in Congress Assembled".

However, the office of President of the Continental Congress had very little relationship to the office of President of the United States beyond the name. The president of the United States is the head of the executive branch of government, while the president of the Continental Congress was merely the chair of a body that most resembled a legislature, although it possessed legislative, executive, and judicial powers. The following brief biographies profile these "forgotten presidents."

Peyton Randolph of Virginia (1723–1775)

A portrait of Peyton Randolph

When delegates gathered in Philadelphia for the first Continental Congress, they promptly elected the former King's Attorney of Virginia as the moderator and president of their convocation. He was a propitious choice. He was a legal prodigy—having studied at the Inner Temple in London, served as his native colony's Attorney General, and tutored many of the most able men of the South at William and Mary College—including the young Patrick Henry. His home in Williamsburg was the gathering place for Virginia's legal and political gentry—and it remains a popular attraction in the restored colonial capital. He had served as a delegate in the Virginia House of Burgesses, and had been a commander under William Byrd in the colonial militia. He was a scholar of some renown—having begun a self-guided reading of the classics when he was thirteen. Despite suffering poor health served the Continental Congress as president twice, in 1774 from September 5 to October 21, and then again for a few days in 1775 from May 10 to May 23. He never lived to see independence, yet was numbered among the nation's most revered founders.

Henry Middleton (1717–1784) America's second elected president was one of the wealthiest planters in the South, the patriarch of the most powerful families anywhere in the nation. His public spirit was evident from an early age. He was a member of his state's Common House from 1744 to 1747. During the last two years he served as the Speaker. During 1755 he was the King's Commissioner of Indian Affairs. He was a member of the South Carolina Council from 1755 to 1770. His valor in the War with the Cherokees during 1760–1761 earned him wide recognition throughout the colonies—and demonstrated his leadership abilities while under pressure. He was elected as a delegate to the first session of the Continental Congress and when Peyton Randolph was forced to resign the presidency, his peers immediately turned to Middleton to complete the term. He served as the fledgling coalition's president from October 22, 1774, until Randolph was able to resume his duties briefly beginning on May 10, 1775. Afterward, he was a member of the Congressional Council of Safety and helped to establish the young nation's policy toward the encouragement and support of education. In February 1776 he resigned his political involvements in order to prepare his family and lands for what he believed was inevitable war—but he was replaced by his son Arthur who eventually became a signer of both the Declaration of Independence and the Articles of Confederation, served time as an English prisoner of war, and was twice elected Governor of his state.

John Hancock (1737–1793)

John Hancock, a signer of the Declaration of Independence

The third president was a patriot, rebel leader, merchant who signed his name into immortality in giant strokes on the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776. The boldness of his signature has made it live in American minds as a perfect expression of the strength and freedom—and defiance—of the individual in the face of British tyranny. As President of the Continental Congress during two widely spaced terms—the first from May 24 1775 to October 30 1777 and the second from November 23, 1785, to June 5, 1786—Hancock was the presiding officer when the members approved the Declaration of Independence. Because of his position, it was his official duty to sign the document first—but not necessarily as dramatically as he did. Hancock figured prominently in another historic event—the battle at Lexington: British troops who fought there April 10, 1775, had known Hancock and Samuel Adams were in Lexington and had come there to capture these rebel leaders. And the two would have been captured, if they had not been warned by Paul Revere. As early as 1768, Hancock defied the British by refusing to pay customs charges on the cargo of one of his ships. One of Boston's wealthiest merchants, he was recognized by the citizens, as well as by the British, as a rebel leader—and was elected President of the first Massachusetts Provincial Congress. After he was chosen President of the Continental Congress in 1775, Hancock became known beyond the borders of Massachusetts, and, having served as colonel of the Massachusetts Governor's Guards he hoped to be named commander of the American forces—until John Adams nominated George Washington. In 1778 Hancock was commissioned Major General and took part in an unsuccessful campaign in Rhode Island. But it was as a political leader that his real distinction was earned—as the first Governor of Massachusetts, as President of Congress, and as President of the Massachusetts constitutional ratification convention. He helped win ratification in Massachusetts, gaining enough popular recognition to make him a contender for the newly created Presidency of the United States, but again he saw Washington gain the prize. Like his rival, George Washington, Hancock was a wealthy man who risked much for the cause of independence. He was the wealthiest New Englander supporting the patriotic cause, and, although he lacked the brilliance of John Adams or the capacity to inspire of Samuel Adams, he became one of the foremost leaders of the new nation—perhaps, in part, because he was willing to commit so much at such risk to the cause of freedom.

Henry Laurens (1724–1792)

Henry Laurens, "father of our country"

The only American president ever to be held as a prisoner of war by a foreign power, Laurens was heralded after he was released as "the father of our country," by no less a personage than George Washington. He was of Huguenot extraction, his ancestors having come to America from France after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes made the Reformed faith illegal. Raised and educated for a life of mercantilism at his home in Charleston, he also had the opportunity to spend more than a year in continental travel. It was while in Europe that he began to write revolutionary pamphlets—gaining him renown as a patriot. He served as vice-president of South Carolina in 1776. He was then elected to the Continental Congress. He succeeded John Hancock as President of the newly independent but war beleaguered United States on November 1, 1777. He served until December 9, 1778, at which time he was appointed Ambassador to the Netherlands. Unfortunately for the cause of the young nation, he was captured by an English warship during his cross-Atlantic voyage and was confined to the Tower of London until the end of the war. After the Battle of Yorktown, the American government regained his freedom in a dramatic prisoner exchange—President Laurens for Lord Cornwallis. Ever the patriot, Laurens continued to serve his nation as one of the three representatives selected to negotiate terms at the Paris Peace Conference in 1782.

John Jay (1745–1829)

John Jay, Chief Justice

America's first Secretary of State, first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, one of its first ambassadors, and author of some of the celebrated Federalist Papers, Jay was a Founding Father who, by a quirk of fate, missed signing the Declaration of Independence—at the time of the vote for independence and the signing, he had temporarily left the Continental Congress to serve in New York's revolutionary legislature. Nevertheless, he was chosen by his peers to succeed Henry Laurens as President of the United States—serving a term from December 10, 1778, to September 27, 1779. A conservative New York lawyer who was at first against the idea of independence for the colonies, the aristocratic Jay in 1776 turned into a patriot who was willing to give the next twenty-five years of his life to help establish the new nation. During those years, he won the regard of his peers as a dedicated and accomplished statesman and a man of unwavering principle. In the Continental Congress Jay prepared addresses to the people of Canada and Great Britain. In New York he drafted the State constitution and served as Chief Justice during the war. He was President of the Continental Congress before he undertook the difficult assignment, as ambassador, of trying to gain support and funds from Spain. After helping Franklin, Jefferson, Adams, and Laurens complete peace negotiations in Paris in 1783, Jay returned to become the first Secretary of State, called "Secretary of Foreign Affairs" under the Articles of Confederation. He negotiated valuable commercial treaties with Russia and Morocco, and dealt with the continuing controversy with Britain and Spain over the southern and western boundaries of the United States. He proposed that America and Britain establish a joint commission to arbitrate disputes that remained after the war—a proposal which, though not adopted, influenced the government's use of arbitration and diplomacy in settling later international problems. In this post Jay felt keenly the weakness of the Articles of Confederation and was one of the first to advocate a new governmental compact. He wrote five Federalist Papers supporting the Constitution, and he was a leader in the New York ratification convention. As first Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, Jay made the historic decision that a State could be sued by a citizen from another State, which led to the Eleventh Amendment to the Constitution. On a special mission to London he concluded the "Jay Treaty," which helped avert a renewal of hostilities with Britain but won little popular favor at home—and it is probably for this treaty that this Founding Father is best remembered.

Samuel Huntington (1732–1796) An industrious youth who mastered his studies of the law without the advantage of a school, a tutor, or a master—borrowing books and snatching opportunities to read and research between odd jobs—he was one of the greatest self-made men among the Founders. He was also one of the greatest legal minds of the age—all the more remarkable for his lack of advantage as a youth. In 1764, in recognition of his obvious abilities and initiative, he was elected to the General Assembly of Connecticut. The next year he was chosen to serve on the Executive Council. In 1774 he was appointed Associate Judge of the Superior Court and, as a delegate to the Continental Congress, was acknowledged to be a legal scholar of some respect. He served in Congress for five consecutive terms, during the last of which he was elected President. He served in that office from September 28, 1779 until ill health forced him to resign on July 9, 1781. He returned to his home in Connecticut—and as he recuperated, he accepted more Councilor and Bench duties. He again took his seat in Congress in 1783, but left it to become Chief Justice of his state's Superior Court. He was elected Lieutenant Governor in 1785 and Governor in 1786. According to John Jay, he was "the most precisely trained Christian jurists ever to serve his country."

Thomas McKean (1734–1817) During his astonishingly varied fifty-year career in public life he held almost every possible position—from deputy county attorney to President of the United States under the Confederation. Besides signing the Declaration of Independence, he contributed significantly to the development and establishment of constitutional government in both his home state of Delaware and the nation. At the Stamp Act Congress he proposed the voting procedure that Congress adopted: that each colony, regardless of size or population, has one vote—the practice adopted by the Continental Congress and the Congress of the Confederation, and the principle of state equality manifest in the composition of the Senate. And as county judge in 1765, he defied the British by ordering his court to work only with documents that did not bear the hated stamps. In June 1776, at the Continental Congress, McKean joined with Caesar Rodney to register Delaware's approval of the Declaration of Independence, over the negative vote of the third Delaware delegate, George Read—permitting it to be "The unanimous declaration of the thirteen United States." And at a special Delaware convention, he drafted the constitution for that State. McKean also helped draft—and signed—the Articles of Confederation. It was during his tenure of service as President—from July 10, 1781 to November 4, 1782—when news arrived from General Washington in October 1781 that the British had surrendered following the Battle of Yorktown. As Chief Justice of the supreme court of Pennsylvania, he contributed to the establishment of the legal system in that State, and, in 1787, he strongly supported the Constitution at the Pennsylvania Ratification Convention, declaring it "the best the world has yet seen." At sixty-five, after over forty years of public service, McKean resigned from his post as Chief Justice. A candidate on the Democratic-Republican ticket in 1799, McKean was elected Governor of Pennsylvania. As Governor, he followed such a strict policy of appointing only fellow Republicans to office that he became the father of the spoils system in America. He served three tempestuous terms as Governor, completing one of the longest continuous careers of public service of any of the Founding Fathers.

John Hanson (1715–1783) He was the heir of one of the greatest family traditions in the colonies and became the patriarch of a long line of American patriots—his great grandfather died at Lutzen beside the great King Gustavus Aldophus of Sweden; his grandfather was one of the founders of New Sweden along the Delaware River in Maryland; one of his nephews was the military secretary to George Washington; another was a signer of the Declaration; still another was a signer of the Constitution; yet another was Governor of Maryland during the Revolution; and still another was a member of the first Congress; two sons were killed in action with the Continental Army; a grandson served as a member of Congress under the new Constitution; and another grandson was a Maryland Senator. Thus, even if Hanson had not served as President himself, he would have greatly contributed to the life of the nation through his ancestry and progeny. As a youngster he began a self-guided reading of classics and rather quickly became an acknowledged expert in the juridicalism of Anselm and the practical philosophy of Seneca—both of which were influential in the development of the political philosophy of the great leaders of the Reformation. It was based upon these legal and theological studies that the young planter—his farm, Mulberry Grove was just across the Potomac from Mount Vernon—began to espouse the cause of the patriots. In 1775 he was elected to the Provincial Legislature of Maryland. Then in 1777, he became a member of Congress where he distinguished himself as a brilliant administrator. Thus, he was elected President in 1781. He served in that office from November 5, 1781 until November 3, 1782. He was the first president to serve a full term after the full ratification of the Articles of Confederation—and like so many of the Southern and New England Founders, he was strongly opposed to the Constitution when it was first discussed. He remained a confirmed anti-federalist until his untimely death.

Elias Boudinot (1741–1802) He did not sign the Declaration, the Articles, or the Constitution. He did not serve in the Continental Army with distinction. He was not renowned for his legal mind or his political skills. He was instead a man who spent his entire career in foreign diplomacy. He earned the respect of his fellow patriots during the dangerous days following the traitorous action of Benedict Arnold. His deft handling of relations with Canada also earned him great praise. After being elected to the Congress from his home state of New Jersey, he served as the new nation's Secretary for Foreign Affairs—managing the influx of aid from France, Spain, and Holland. The in 1783 he was elected to the Presidency. He served in that office from November 4, 1782 until November 2, 1783. Like so many of the other early presidents, he was a classically trained scholar, of the Reformed faith, and an anti-federalist in political matters. He was the father and grandfather of frontiersmen—and one of his grandchildren and namesakes eventually became a leader of the Cherokee nation in its bid for independence from the sprawling expansion of the United States.

Thomas Mifflin (1744–1800) By an ironic sort of providence, Thomas Mifflin served as George Washington's first aide-de-camp at the beginning of the Revolutionary War, and, when the war was over, he was the man, as President of the United States, who accepted Washington's resignation of his commission. In the years between, Mifflin greatly served the cause of freedom—and, apparently, his own cause—while serving as the first Quartermaster General of the Continental Army. He obtained desperately needed supplies for the new army—and was suspected of making excessive profit himself. Although experienced in business and successful in obtaining supplies for the war, Mifflin preferred the front lines, and he distinguished himself in military actions on Long Island and near Philadelphia. Born and reared a Quaker, he was excluded from their meetings for his military activities. A controversial figure, Mifflin lost favor with Washington and was part of the Conway Cabal—a rather notorious plan to replace Washington with General Horatio Gates. And Mifflin narrowly missed court-martial action over his handling of funds by resigning his commission in 1778. In spite of these problems—and of repeated charges that he was a drunkard—Mifflin continued to be elected to positions of responsibility—as President and Governor of Pennsylvania, delegate to the Constitutional Convention, as well as the highest office in the land—where he served from November 3, 1783, to November 29, 1784. Most of Mifflin's significant contributions occurred in his earlier years—in the First and Second Continental Congresses he was firm in his stand for independence and for fighting for it, and he helped obtain both men and supplies for Washington's army in the early critical period. In 1784, as president, he signed the treaty with Great Britain which ended the war. Although a delegate to the Constitutional Convention, he did not make a significant contribution—beyond signing the document. As Governor of Pennsylvania, although he was accused of negligence, he supported improvements of roads, and reformed the State penal and judicial systems. He had gradually become sympathetic to Jefferson's principles regarding states' rights; even so, he directed the Pennsylvania militia to support the Federal tax collectors in the Whiskey Rebellion. In spite of charges of corruption, the affable Mifflin remained a popular figure. A magnetic personality and an effective speaker, he managed to hold a variety of elective offices for almost thirty years of the critical Revolutionary period.

Richard Henry Lee (1732–1794) His resolution "that these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent States", approved by the Continental Congress July 2, 1776, was the first official act of the United Colonies that set them irrevocably on the road to independence. It was not surprising that it came from Lee's pen—as early as 1768 he proposed the idea of committees of correspondence among the colonies, and in 1774 he proposed that the colonies meet in what became the Continental Congress. From the first, his eye was on independence. A wealthy Virginia planter whose ancestors had been granted extensive lands by King Charles II, Lee disdained the traditional aristocratic role and the aristocratic view. In the House of Burgesses he flatly denounced the practice of slavery. He saw independent America as "an asylum where the unhappy may find solace, and the persecuted repose." In 1764, when news of the proposed Stamp Act reached Virginia, Lee was a member of the committee of the House of Burgesses that drew up an address to the King, an official protest against such a tax. After the tax was established, Lee organized the citizens of his county into the Westmoreland Association, a group pledged to buy no British goods until the Stamp Act was repealed. At the First Continental Congress, Lee persuaded representatives from all the colonies to adopt this non-importation idea, leading to the formation of the Continental Association, which was one of the first steps toward union of the colonies. Lee also proposed to the First Continental Congress that a militia be organized and armed—the year before the first shots were fired at Lexington; but this and other proposals of his were considered too radical—at the time. Three days after Lee introduced his resolution, in June of 1776, he was appointed by Congress to the committee responsible for drafting a declaration of independence, but he was called home when his wife fell ill, and his place was taken by his young protégé, Thomas Jefferson. Thus Lee missed the chance to draft the document—though his influence greatly shaped it and he was able to return in time to sign it. He was elected President—serving from November 30, 1784 to November 22, 1785 when he was succeeded by the second administration of John Hancock. Elected to the Constitutional Convention, Lee refused to attend, but as a member of the Congress of the Confederation, he contributed to another great document, the Northwest Ordinance, which provided for the formation of new States from the Northwest Territory. When the completed Constitution was sent to the States for ratification, Lee opposed it as anti-democratic and anti-Christian. However, as one of Virginia's first Senators, he helped assure passage of the amendments that, he felt, corrected many of the document's gravest faults—the Bill of Rights. He was the great uncle of Robert E. Lee and the scion of a great family tradition.

Nathaniel Gorham (1738–1796) Another self-made man, Gorham was one of the many successful Boston merchants who risked all he had for the cause of freedom. He was first elected to the Massachusetts General Court in 1771. His honesty and integrity won his acclaim and was thus among the first delegates chose to serve in the Continental Congress. He remained in public service throughout the war and into the Constitutional period, though his greatest contribution was his call for a stronger central government. But even though he was an avid federalist, he did not believe that the union could—or even should—be maintained peaceably for more than a hundred years. He was convinced that eventually, in order to avoid civil or cultural war, smaller regional interests should pursue an independent course. His support of a new constitution was rooted more in pragmatism than ideology. When John Hancock was unable to complete his second term as President, Gorham was elected to succeed him—serving from June 6, 1786 to February 1, 1787. It was during this time that the Congress actually entertained the idea of asking Prince Henry—the brother of Frederick II of Prussia—and Bonnie Prince Charlie—the leader of the ill-fated Scottish Jacobite Rising and heir of the Stuart royal line—to consider the possibility of establishing a constitutional monarch in America. It was a plan that had much to recommend it but eventually the advocates of republicanism held the day. During the final years of his life, Gorham was concerned with several speculative land deals which nearly cost him his entire fortune.

Arthur St. Clair (1734–1818) Born and educated in Edinburgh, Scotland, during the tumultuous days of the final Jacobite Rising and the Tartan Suppression, St. Clair was the only president of the United States born and bred on foreign soil. Though most of his family and friends abandoned their devastated homeland in the years following the Battle of Culloden—after which nearly a third of the land was depopulated through emigration to America—he stayed behind to learn the ways of the hated Hanoverian English in the Royal Navy. His plan was to learn of the enemy's military might in order to fight another day. During the global conflict of the Seven Years' War—generally known as the French and Indian War—he was stationed in the American theater. Afterward, he decided to settle in Pennsylvania where many of his kin had established themselves. His civic-mindedness quickly became apparent: he helped to organize both the New Jersey and the Pennsylvania militias, led the Continental Army's Canadian expedition, and was elected Congress. His long years of training in the enemy camp was finally paying off. He was elected President in 1787—and he served from February 2 of that year until January 21 of the next. Following his term of duty in the highest office in the land, he became the first Governor of the Northwest Territory. Though he briefly supported the idea of creating a constitutional monarchy under the Stuart's Bonnie Prince Charlie, he was a strident Anti-Federalist—believing that the proposed federal constitution would eventually allow for the intrusion of government into virtually every sphere and aspect of life. He even predicted that under the vastly expanded centralized power of the state the taxing powers of bureaucrats and other unelected officials would eventually confiscate as much as a quarter of the income of the citizens—a notion that seemed laughable at the time but that has proven to be ominously modest in light of our current governmental leviathan. St. Clair lived to see the hated English tyrants who destroyed his homeland defeated. But he despaired that his adopted home might actually create similar tyrannies and impose them upon themselves.

Cyrus Griffin (1736–1796) Like Peyton Randolph, he was trained in London's Inner Temple to be a lawyer—and thus was counted among his nation's legal elite. Like so many other Virginians, he was an anti-federalist, though he eventually accepted the new Constitution with the promise of the Bill of Rights as a hedge against the establishment of an American monarchy—which still had a good deal of currency. The Articles of Confederation afforded such freedoms that he had become convinced that even with the incumbent loss of liberty, some new form of government would be required. A protégé of George Washington—having worked with him on several speculative land deals in the West—he was a reluctant supporter of the constitutional ratifying process. It was during his term in the office of the presidency—the last before the new national compact went into effect–that ratification was formalized and finalized. He served as the nation's chief executive from January 22, 1788 until George Washington's inauguration on April 30, 1789.

References

• R. B. Bernstein, "Parliamentary Principles, American Realities: The Continental and Confederation Congresses, 1774-1789," in Inventing Congress: Origins & Establishment Of First Federal Congress ed by Kenneth R. Bowling and Donald R. Kennon (1999) pp 76-108
• Burnett, Edmund Cody. The Continental Congress: A Definitive History of the Continental Congress From Its Inception in 1774 to March, 1789 (1941)
• Barbara Feinberg, The Articles Of Confederation (2002). [for middle school children.]
• Robert W. Hoffert, A Politics of Tensions: The Articles of Confederation and American Political Ideas (1992).
• Lucille E. Horgan. Forged in War: The Continental Congress and the Origin of Military Supply and Acquisition Policy (2002)
• Merrill Jensen, The Articles of Confederation: An Interpretation of the Social-Constitutional History of the American Revolution, 1774-1781 (1959).
• Merrill Jensen: "The Idea of a National Government During the American Revolution", Political Science Quarterly, 58 (1943), 356-79. online at JSTOR
• Calvin Jillson and Rick K. Wilson. Congressional Dynamics: Structure, Coordination, and Choice in the First American Congress, 1774-1789. (1994)
• Forest McDonald.Novus Ordo Seclorum: The Intellectual Origins of the Constitution. (1985)
• Andrew C. Mclaughlin, A Constitutional History of the United States (1935) online version
• Pauline Maier, American Scripture: Making the Declaration of Independence (1998).
• Jackson T. Main, Political Parties before the Constitution. University of North Carolina Press, 1974
• Jack N. Rakove, The Beginnings of National Politics: An Interpretive History of the Continental Congress (1982).
• Jack N. Rakove, “The Collapse of the Articles of Confederation,” in The American Founding: Essays on the Formation of the Constitution. Ed by J. Jackson Barlow, Leonard W. Levy and Ken Masugi. Greenwood Press. 1988. Pp 225-45 ISBN 0313256101

Further reading

• Klos, Stanley L. (2004). President Who? Forgotten Founders. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania: Evisum, Inc. p. 261. ISBN 0-9752627-5-0.

External links

• Text Version of the Articles of Confederation
• Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union
• Articles of Confederation and related resources, Library of Congress
• Today in History: November 15, Library of Congress
• United States Constitution Online - The Articles of Confederation
• Free Download of Articles of Confederation Audio
• Audio narration (mp3) of the Articles of Confederation at Americana Phonic
• The Articles of Confederation, Chapter 45 (see page 253) of Volume 4 of Conceived in Liberty by Murray Rothbard, in PDF format.

The Early Years of the Constitutional Republic (1787 - 1800)

Early Immigration to the Americas as of 1790

The following table is an approximation of the countries of origin for new arrivals to United States up to 1790. The regions marked * were a part of Great Britain. The Irish in the 1790 census were probably mostly Irish Protestants and the French Huguenots. The total U.S. Catholic population in 1790 was probably less than 5%.

Group	Immigrants before 1790	Population 1790
Africa	360,000 (most as slaves)	800,000
England*	230,000	1,900,000
Ulster Scot-Irish*	135,000	300,000
Germany	103,000	270,000
Scotland*	48,500	150,000
Ireland*	8,000	(Incl. in Scot-Irish)
Netherlands	6,000	100,000
Wales*	4,000	10,000
France	3,000	50,000
Jews	1,000	2,000
Sweden	500	2,000
Other	---	200,000

James Webb, among others, has argued that not enough credit is given to early Scots-Irish for the role they played in early American history. These people formed a full 40% of the American Revolutionary army: their culture is now dominant in the American South, Midwest and Appalachian Region.

Failures Under Confederation

The original constitution as defined in the Articles of Confederation was meant to provide a league of sovereign states, rather than a united government. However, the uniting of these states in the Revolution showed flaws in this legislation. From place to place the same goods and services had a wide variation in price, and a wide variation in the way they were paid for. Should they be paid with trade in kind, as with many rural communities; in tobacco, as in Virginia; in gold and silver ores; or in Spanish Dollars or British Pound Sterling? If the last, how to establish that the states were neither Spanish nor British? Hard currency was in short supply following the American Revolution. The Revolution had been paid for in Continental specie: inflation left these bills "not worth a Continental." Several states had also printed paper currency, but it, like the Continental dollar, was heavily depreciated. Article Twelve said that War debts would be paid for by the central government, but Article Eight said that these monies would be raised by State legislatures. Without a strong central authority, how could equality of funding be assured? In fact, none of the debts, individual or national, had yet been paid, since the confederation had not the power of taxation. With all their rich resources, the States were running a trade deficit, buying many of their goods from the British. The confederation was also powerless to defend American navigational rights, evict the British from forts they were holding in violation of the Treaty of Paris, or settle disputes between two states.

The bankrupt confederation had trouble paying the soldiers who fought in the Revolutionary War. This led to the Newburgh Conspiracy, an planned overthrow of the confederation which would have installed General Washington as head of a military junta. Washington, not interested in being a military dictator, quelled the cabal, negotiated pay and pensions for his soldiers, and resigned his commission, returning to civilian life at Mount Vernon.

One event that made it clear that some reform of the Articles was necessary was Shays' Rebellion. Thousands of disgruntled and impoverished farmer-soldiers, led by Daniel Shays, shut down courthouses and led an (ultimately unsuccessful) military uprising against the government of Massachusetts.

The Constitutional Convention

Signing of the Constitution

In 1787, a Convention was called in Philadelphia with the declared purpose of revising the Articles of Confederation. However many delegates intended to use this convention for the purpose of drafting a new constitution. All states except for Rhode Island sent delegates, though all delegates did not attend. It was presided over by George Washington. Other leading figures at the convention included James Madison and Edmund Randolph of Virginia, Ben Franklin, Gouverneur Morris and Robert Morris of Pennsylvania and Alexander Hamilton of New York.

There were several divides between delegates at the convention, such as between free and slave states, and between supporters of expanded and limited government. However, one of the most important divides was between large and small states over the issue of Congressional representation. Under the Articles, each state had one vote in Congress. The more populous states wanted representation to be based on population (proportional representation). James Madison of Virginia crafted the Virginia Plan, which guaranteed proportional representation and granted wide powers to the Congress. The small states, on the other hand, supported equal representation through William Paterson's New Jersey Plan. The New Jersey Plan also increased the Congress' power, but it did not go nearly as far as the Virginia Plan. The conflict threatened to end the Convention, but Roger Sherman of Connecticut proposed the "Great Compromise" (or Connecticut Compromise) under which one house of Congress would be based on proportional representation, while the other would be based on equal representation. Eventually, the Compromise was accepted and the Convention saved.

After settling on representation, compromises seemed easy for other issues. The question about the counting of slaves when determining the official population of a state was resolved by the Three-Fifths Compromise, which provided that slaves would count as three-fifths of persons. In another compromise, the Congress was empowered to ban the slave trade, but only after 1808.

While most delegates agreed to the need for a central executive, there was significant debate over the empowerment and election of the President. Ultimately, it was decided that the President would be elected by the Electoral College.

The Federalist Papers and Ratification

Alexander Hamilton wrote many of the Federalist Papers

The Convention required that the Constitution come into effect only after nine states ratify, or approve, it. The fight for ratification was difficult, but the Constitution eventually came into effect in 1788.

During 1788 and 1789, there were 85 essays published in several New York State newspapers, designed to convince New York and Virginia voters to ratify the Constitution. The three people who are generally acknowledged for writing these essays are Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and John Jay. Since Hamilton, Madison, and Jay were considered Federalists, this series of essays became known as "The Federalist Papers. One of the most famous Federalist Papers is Federalist No. 10, which was written by Madison and argues that the checks and balances in the Constitution prevent the government from falling victim to factions.

Anti-Federalists did not support ratification. Many individuals, such as Patrick Henry, George Mason, and Richard Henry Lee, were Anti-Federalists. The Anti-Federalists had several complaints with the constitution. One of their biggest was that the Constitution did not provide for a Bill of Rights protecting the people. They also thought the Constitution gave too much power to the federal government and too little to individual states. A third complaint of the Anti-Federalists was that Senators and the President were not directly elected by the people, and that the House of Representatives was elected every two years instead of annually.

On December 7, 1787, Delaware was the first state to ratify the Constitution. The vote was unanimous, 30-0. Pennsylvania followed on December 12 and New Jersey on ratified on December 18, also in a unanimous vote. By summer 1788, Georgia, Connecticut, Massachusetts, Maryland, South Carolina, New Hampshire, Virginia and New York had ratified the Constitution, and it went into effect. On August 2, 1788, North Carolina refused to ratify the Constitution without amendments, but it relented and ratified it a year later.

A number of states that ratified the Constitution also issued statements requesting changes to the constitution, such as a Bill of Rights. This led to the Bill of Rights being drawn up in the first few years of the federal government.

The Bill of Rights

George Washington was inaugurated as the first United States president on April 30, 1789. However, North Carolina, Rhode Island and Vermont had not ratified the Constitution. Although governance was assured, there were no protections of people's religion, speech, or civil liberties. On September 26, 1789, Congress sent a list of twelve amendments to the states for ratification. Ten of the amendments would become the Bill of Rights. North Carolina ratified the Constitution in November of 1789, followed by Rhode Island in May 1790. Vermont became the last state to ratify the Constitution on January 10, 1791, becoming the 14th state in the Union.

The Bill of Rights was enacted on December 15, 1791. Here is a summary of the ten amendments ratified on that day:

1. Establishes freedom of religion, speech, the press, assembly, petition.
2. Establishes the right to keep and bear arms as part of a well-regulated militia.
3. Bans the forced quartering of soldiers.
4. Interdiction of unreasonable searches and seizures; a search warrant is required to search persons or property.
5. Details the concepts of indictments, due process, self-incrimination, double jeopardy, rules for eminent domain.
6. Establishes rights to a fair and speedy public trial, to a notice of accusations, to confront the accuser, to subpoenas, and to counsel.
7. Provides for the right to trial by jury in civil cases
8. Bans cruel and unusual punishment, and excessive fines or bail
9. Lists unremunerated rights
10. Limits the powers of the federal government to only those specifically granted by the constitution.

Washington Administration

George Washington, the first President of the United States

After George Washington had become the successful Commander in Chief of the Continental Army in the American Revolutionary War, he became the first President of the United States, holding office from 1789 to 1797.

In 1788, the Electors unanimously chose Washington as president. A short time after he had helped bring the government together, rivalries arose between his closest advisors, particularly between Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton. Out of these developments evolved two new political parties: The Federalists, who shared the same name as the earlier pro-ratification party, and the Democratic-Republican Party, also known as the Jeffersonian party, or as the Anti-Federalists.

Washington's two-term administration set many policies and traditions that survive today. He was again unanimously elected in 1792. But after his second term expired, Washington again voluntarily relinquished power, thereby establishing an important precedent that was to serve as an example for the United States and also for other future republics. Washington also abjured titles. He didn't want to be called "Your Excellency" or "Your Majesty." He insisted on being called "Mr. President," and referred to as "The President of the United States". Because of his central role in the founding of the United States, Washington is often called the "Father of his Country". Scholars rank him with Abraham Lincoln among the greatest of United States presidents.

Hamilton's Financial Plan

The First Bank of the United States in Philadelphia, an institution spearheaded by Alexander Hamilton.

One of the main conflicts between the Federalists and the Anti-Federalists was over how to pay off Revolutionary War Debts. In 1790, Alexander Hamilton wrote his First Report on Public Credit to achieve this end. The report advocated that the federal government assume, or take over, state debts and turn them into one national debt. However, Jefferson and the anti-Federalists criticized this plan. In the Compromise of 1790, the federal government was allowed to assume state debts in exchange for the national capital being relocated to the District of Columbia.

In the Second Report on Public Credit, Hamilton argued that a National Bank was necessary to expand the flow of legal tender and encourage investment in the United States. Jefferson claimed that the creation of the National Bank violated the 10th Amendment of the Constitution, and therefore was unconstitutional. Hamilton responded that the bank was constitutional because the constitution gave "implied powers" to the Federal Government to do what was "necessary and proper" to fulfill its duties. Legislation creating the bank was passed in February 1791, and gave the bank a charter of twenty years.

Jefferson did not agree with Hamilton's idea of a national bank. Jefferson's faction envisioned an America more similar to ancient Athens or pre-Imperial Rome, with independent farming households following their own interests and nurturing liberty. Jefferson believed America should teach people to be self-sufficient farmers, and he wanted the federal government to stop interfering in state matters. (However, some evidence suggests Jefferson did support Hamilton's plan for paying off state debts. He wanted leverage to pressure Hamilton's agreement to locate the government's permanent capital in the South, on the Potomac River in what would become Washington, D.C.)

Both President Washington and Congress agreed to Hamilton's Bank. Jefferson's plan was overruled, and he eventually resigned as Secretary of State.

Whiskey Rebellion (1794)

Washington rallies troops to quell the Whiskey Rebellion.

Washington was involved in one controversy during his presidency, the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794. The new Republic needed funds. This motivated Alexander Hamilton to press Congress to pass an excise tax on the sale of whiskey. Rural Pennsylvania farmers, who had never known a centralized American authority, were horrified by a call on what they considered their own profit and refused to pay the tax. A mob of 500 men attacked a tax collector's house. In response, Washington and Hamilton led an army of 15,000 men to quell the rebellion, an army larger than the force Washington had commanded in the American Revolution. When the army showed up, the rebels dispersed. The whiskey tax was eventually repealed by the Democratic Republicans in 1801.

Foreign Affairs

The French Revolution

The French Revolution broke out in 1789, a few months after the American Constitution had gone into effect. At first, as France overthrew the monarchy and declared itself a republic, many Americans supported the revolution. They believed their own revolt against England had spurred France to republicanism. But as the Reign of Terror began, and thousands of French aristocrats went to the guillotine, many Americans were shocked at the revolution's excesses. By the mid-1790s, as France went to war against neighboring monarchies, the revolution polarized American public opinion. Federalists viewed England, France's traditional enemy, as the bastion of stable government against a growing tide of French anarchy. Members of the emerging Democratic Republican Party, on the other hand, who took their party's name in part from the French Republic, believed the Terror to be a temporary excess and continued to view England as the true enemy of liberty.

President Washington's policy was neutrality. He knew that England, France, or even Spain, would be happy to eat up American resources and territory. The United States in the 1790s was still new and frail. He hoped that America could stay out of European conflicts until it was strong enough to withstand any serious foreign threat. Yet both England and France found opportunities to each use American resources against the other.

Hamilton and Jefferson clashed here as well. The former argued that the mutual defense treaty that the United States had signed with France in 1778 was no longer binding, as the French regime that had made that treaty no longer existed. The latter disagreed. But Washington sided with Hamilton, issuing a formal Proclamation of Neutrality in 1793. Washington repeated his belief in neutrality and argued against factionalism in his Farewell Address of 1796.

That same year, Citizen Edmund Charles Genêt arrived as the French minister to the United States. He soon began issuing commissions to captains of American ships who were willing to serve as privateers for France. This blatant disregard of American neutrality angered Washington, who demanded and got Genêt's recall.

English and Spanish Negotiations

The Royal Navy, meanwhile, began pressing sailors into service, including sailors on American merchant ships. Many English sailors had been lured into the American merchant service by high wages and comparatively good standards of living, and England needed these sailors to man its own fleet, on which England's national security depended. This violation of the American flag, however, infuriated Americans, as did the fact that England had not yet withdrawn its soldiers from posts in the Northwest Territory, as required by the Treaty of Paris of 1783.

In response, President Washington sent Supreme Court Chief Justice John Jay to negotiate a treaty with England. But Jay had little leverage with which to negotiate: the final treaty did require immediate English evacuation of the frontier forts, but it said nothing about the matter of impressments. The Jay Treaty provoked an outcry among American citizens, and although the Senate ratified it narrowly, the debate it sparked was the final blow which solidified the Federalist and Republican factions into full-scale political parties, Federalists acquiescing in the treaty, and Republicans viewing it as a sell-out to England (and against France).

Spain, meanwhile, viewed the Jay Treaty negotiations with alarm, fearing that America and England might be moving towards an alliance. Without being certain of the treaty provisions, Spain decided to mollify the United States and give ground in the southwest before a future Anglo-American alliance could take New Orleans and Louisiana. Spain thus agreed to abandon all territorial claims north of Florida and east of the Mississippi, with the exception of New Orleans, and to grant the United States both the right to navigate the Mississippi and the right of commercial deposit in New Orleans. This would give westerners greater security and allow them to trade with the outside world. This Treaty of San Lorenzo, also called Pinckney's Treaty after American diplomat Charles Pinckney, was signed in 1795 and ratified the following year. Unlike Jay's treaty, it was quite popular.

If Jay's Treaty alarmed Spain, it angered France, which saw it as a violation of the Franco-American mutual defense treaty of 1778. By 1797, French privateers began attacking American merchant shipping in the Caribbean.

Election of 1796

The 1796 Electoral College results.

The first election where the presidency was not a foregone conclusion produced four candidates: Washington's Federalist Vice President John Adams, Democratic-Republican Thomas Jefferson, the Federalist Thomas Pinckney, and the Democratic-Republican Aaron Burr. (Burr was in fact hoping to become Vice President if the other Democratic-Republican were to win.) There were no Vice Presidential candidates, for under the original draft of the Constitution, the Vice President would be the candidate with the second-largest number of votes.

This was also the election testing the Constitution's Electoral College. Voters in each state did not directly elect candidates. Instead, their choices directed the two votes cast by the state's Electors.

In the election of 1796, John Adams won the required majority, but Thomas Jefferson came in second place. The President and the Vice President were in two different parties. The Constitutional role of the Vice President was defined in relation to the President: there was little else for him to do. Jefferson was isolated from an administration which supported strong government and a central Bank, and his contrary views were not consulted in the Adams administration.

The XYZ Affair

Painting showing American and French ships trading blows during the Quasi-war.

Newly-elected President John Adams sent a delegation to Paris, resolving to negotiate a settlement with France. However, the delegates found it impossible even to secure an appointment with Talleyrand, the French foreign minister. The delegates were approached by three minor functionaries who insisted that the Americans pay a bribe to inaugurate negotiations, warning them of "the power and violence of France" if they refused. The delegates refused. ("The answer is no; no; not a sixpence," one of them retorted. This was popularly rendered as "Millions for defense, not a penny for tribute.") When Adams made the correspondence public, after replacing the names of the French functionaries with X, Y, and Z, American sentiment swung strongly against France. Under the control of the Federalists, Congress initiated a military buildup, fielding several excellent warships and calling Washington out of retirement to head the army. (Washington agreed only on condition that he not command until the army actually took the field. The army was never marshaled.)

The result was a Quasi-war, or an undeclared naval war with France. It consisted of combat between individual ships, mostly in the Caribbean, from 1798 to 1800. Eventually the United States and France agreed to end hostilities and to end the mutual defense treaty of 1778. Adams considered this one of his finest achievements.

Alien and Sedition Acts

Under Adams, the Federalist-dominated congress pushed passage of a series of laws under the cover of overcoming dangerous "aliens." In fact, the four acts were used to silence domestic political opponents.

1. The Alien Act authorized the president to deport an alien deemed "dangerous."
2. The Alien Enemies Act authorized the president to deport or imprison any alien from a country that the United States was fighting a declared war with.
3. The Sedition Act made it a crime to criticize government officials and publish "false, scandalous, and malicious writing" against the government or its agents.
4. The Naturalization Act changed the residency requirements for aliens to become citizens from 5 to 14 years.

Although it was openly deemed to be a security act, it provided powerful tools to the ruling Federalist party to quiet opposition from the growing Democratic-Republican Party. By extending the time required to become a citizen, they decreased the number of new voters that might choose to support the minority party. However, these acts were rarely enacted against political opponents due to the possibility of conflict such actions could create.

Education

In well-off families both boys and girls went to a form of infant school called a petty school. However only boys went to what you call grammar school. Upper class girls and sometimes boys were taught by tutors. Middle class girls might be taught by their mothers. Moreover during the 17th century boarding schools for girls were founded in many towns. In the boarding schools girls were taught subjects like writing, music and needlework. In the grammar schools conditions were hard. Boys started work at 6 or 7 in the morning and worked to 5 or 5.30 pm, with breaks for meals. Corporal punishment was usual. Normally the teacher hit naughty boys on the bare butt with birch twigs. Other boys in the class would hold the naughty boy down.

In the 17th and early 18th centuries women were not encouraged to get an education. Some people believed that if women were well educated it would ruin their marriage prospects and be harmful to their mind. Protestants believed that women as well as men should be able to read the bible. Only the daughters of the wealthy or nobility could get an education. By the mid 17th century young women were allowed to go to school with their brothers. Sometimes if you had the money you would be placed within a household of a friend and within the household and you would be taught various things. Some of the things you would learn would be to read and write, run a household, and practice surgery.

After the signing of the Declaration of Independence, several states had their own constitutions and there were sections in them that had information pertaining to education. But Thomas Jefferson had the thought that education should be left up to the government. He believed that education should not have a religious bias in it and believed that it should be free to all people not matter what their social status was. It was still very hard to make the concept of public schools easy for people to accept because of the vast number of people who were immigrating, the many different political views, and the different levels of economic difficulties.

Technology

In the 1790s certain New England weavers began building large, automated looms, driven by water power. To house them they created the first American factories. Working the looms required less skill and more speed than household laborers could provide. The looms needed people brought to them; and they also required laborers who did not know the origin of the word sabotage. These factories sought out young women.

The factory owners said they wanted to hire these women just for a few years, with the ideal being that they could raise a dowry for their wedding. They were carefully supervised, with their time laid out for them. Some mill owners created evening classes to teach these women how to write and how to organize a household.

The factories provided a cheaper source of cotton cloth, sent out on ships and on roads improved by a stronger government. For the first time some people could afford more than two outfits, work and Sunday best. They also provided an outlet for cotton from the slave states in the South. Cotton was at that time one among many crops. Many slaves had to work to separate cotton from the seeds of the cotton plant, and to ship it to cloth-hungry New England. This was made simpler by Eli Whitney's invention of the cotton gin in 1793. Cotton became a profitable crop, and many Southern farms now made it their only crop. Growing and picking cotton was long, difficult labor, and the Southern plantation made it the work for slaves. Northern factories became part of the economy of slavery.

This renewed reliance on slavery was going against the trend in other parts of the country. Vermont had prohibited it in its state constitution in 1777. Pennsylvania passed laws for the gradual abolition of the condition in 1780, and New York State in 1799. Education, resources, and economic development created the beginnings of industrialization in many Northern states and plantations and slavery and less development in states in the Deep South.

• 
  Slater Mill, a historic textile mill built in 1793.
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  Reproduction of a Cotton Gin.
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  1798 portrait of an American Family. Advances in textiles made a difference in the world of clothing.

Review Questions

1. Identify, and explain the significance of the following people:

(a) James Madison

(b) William Paterson

(c) Alexander Hamilton

(d) Patrick Henry

(e) Thomas Jefferson

(f) George Washington

(g) John Adams

(h) Edmund Genet

(i) Charles Pinckney

2. What was accomplished during the Constitutional Convention in terms of states' representations in the national government?

3. How did Hamilton take measures to ensure the ratification of the Constitution?

4. Name two problems or complaints the Anti-Federalists had with the Constitution.

5. What precedents did George Washington set in his two terms in office?

6. On what issues did Jefferson and Hamilton differ? How did this affect policies during the Washington administration?

7. What was the Whiskey Rebellion? Why was it significant?

8. What did Jay's Treaty and Pinckney's Treaty accomplish?

9. How did the United States respond to the French Revolution?

10. What was the XYZ Affair? What was its result?

11. What was the original purpose of the Alien, Sedition, and Naturalization Acts? How did their purpose change?

Jeffersonian Republicanism (1800 - 1824)

1805 painting of President Thomas Jefferson

The Election of 1800

1800 Election electoral college results.

John Adams' Presidency was not popular. Adams and Congress enacted the Alien and Sedition Acts, which restricted the free speech of the opposing Democratic-Republicans. Anti-Federalists in Virginia and Kentucky responded by passing the Virginia and Kentucky Resolves, written by Jefferson and Madison, which tried to invalidate the Alien and Sedition Acts. Adams even angered his own party by disregarding his cabinet's advice. By 1800, Adams was clearly vulnerable.

The Constitution originally called for the individual with the most votes in an election to become President, and for the runner-up to become Vice President. George Washington, who had approved of this system, had justified it by the belief that it worked against factionalism in political parties. However, it had already resulted in the alienation of Vice President Thomas Jefferson under the Adams administration.

In 1800, Thomas Jefferson and Aaron Burr ran against Adams and his running mate Charles Cotesworth Pinckney. The two Anti-Federalist candidates would have preferred for Jefferson to become President and Burr to become Vice President. But the Electoral College vote was tied between the two of them. The Federalist-controlled House of Representatives was called upon to chose between them. It had to vote thirty-six times before Jefferson was chosen to be President, and then only with the reluctant agreement of Alexander Hamilton. Congress later approved a Constitutional amendment allowing for separate balloting for President and Vice President in the Electoral College. (Vice President Aaron Burr bore a grudge against Hamilton for this. In 1804, when the two ran for Governor of New York, they dueled, and Burr killed Hamilton.)

Jeffersonian Democracy

Jefferson's first term was called the Revolution of 1800, because of the many changes to America resulting from the first transition of power from one party to another. The peaceful transition of power effectively capped the demise of the Federalists, but not before the Federalists had established a strong, working central government structured and principled as described in the Constitution, instituted a sound financial system, and began diversifying the economy. An indirect legacy of the Federalists, via the Judiciary Act of 1801 and the ensuing Marbury v. Madison, was the doctrine of judicial review, or the power of the federal judiciary to invalidate federal laws on constitutional grounds.

Jefferson differed from the Federalists in that he saw government as a threat to individual freedom; the only protection against that threat was democracy and strong protections of personal liberties. He did not, however, reject wholesale the accomplishments of the Federalist administrations that preceded him, and his combination of them with his own beliefs came to be known as Jeffersonian democracy.

Important Supreme Court cases

In 1803, the U.S. Supreme Court established some principles that would have a profound effect in the life of America. The first was the issue of judicial review and the second was the controversial trial of Aaron Burr. The first trial Marbury v. Madison dealt with the court packing policies of the previous president John Adams. This trial introduced the concept of judicial review to the political scene.

Louisiana Purchase

The Purchase was one of several territorial additions to the U.S.

The French province of Louisiana included present-day North Dakota, South Dakota, Nebraska, Iowa, Arkansas, Oklahoma, Missouri as well as most of Kansas, the western part of Minnesota, the eastern parts of Montana, Colorado, and Wyoming, and, of course, Louisiana. This big territory, lightly developed by the French, was recognized as a raw asset, and was the object of speculation by many nations.

After the French and Indian War, France ceded all of Louisiana east of the Mississippi to Britain, keeping back only the city of New Orleans. France gave New Orleans and the western part of Louisiana to Spain. It was a Spanish colony after 1762. The Treaty of Paris gave the British part of Louisiana to the United States. Napoleon Bonaparte obtained the return of Louisiana from Spain in 1800, under the Treaty of San Ildefonso. The treaty was kept secret, and Louisiana remained under Spanish control for an interval. The transfer of power finally took place on November 30, 1803, just three weeks before the colony was due to be ceded to the United States.

The port of New Orleans was crucial to trade on the Mississippi. President Jefferson sent James Monroe to Paris in 1802, seeking to negotiate a treaty with France that would allow the United States to benefit from New Orleans. Jefferson put forth four options: the purchase of only New Orleans, the purchase of New Orleans and Florida, the purchase of some Louisianan land allowing the US to build a port there, or the purchase of navigation rights on the Mississippi. But the French rejected all four options. It was all of Louisiana or nothing. Napoleon was preparing to invade Great Britain. The French faction who wanted funds for war had overruled those like de Talleyrand, who had hoped for French empire in North America. (It is also possible that the French knew that Jefferson was prepared to go to war rather than tolerate a strong French presence in America. Napoleon did not want to fight on two fronts at once.) The U.S. agreed to purchase Louisiana for $15 million. The Senate ratified the treaty in 1803, thus dramatically increasing the size of the United States.

Although Jefferson did make the Louisiana Purchase, he had to stretch the Democratic-Republican view of literal constitutionality. The Constitution did not give a president the right to buy land. Jefferson's excuse was that the land would greatly benefit Americans. The Federalists were opposed to the purchase, arguing that the interests of Louisiana territory settlers would conflict with the interests of the established States, threatening the Union.

The Lewis & Clark Expedition

A painting of The Lewis & Clark expedition on the Columbia river.

After purchasing the Louisiana Territory, Jefferson sent Meriwether Lewis and William Clark to survey the new land. The two men, and forty or so others, set out from St. Louis in 1804 and traveled northwest over the next two years. They had the help of Sacajawea, a Shoshone Indian who served as their interpreter, and her husband Toussaint Charbonneau, a Canadian fur trapper. Along the way they traded a few goods with the Native Americans. By December 1805, the party had reached the mouth of the Columbia River as it spilled into the Pacific Ocean. The party split into two groups in 1806 -- one led by Lewis, the other by Clark -- eventually reconvening in Fort Mandan, in present-day North Dakota.

The expedition returned to St. Louis by September 1806, Lewis and Clark with journals in hand to report their findings to Jefferson. They had set up diplomatic relations with some of the people they had traded with. In their journals they recorded their native contacts, writing and drawing the shape of the landscape and the new creatures of this Western word. William Clark had also drawn a series of detailed maps, noting and naming rivers and creeks, significant points in the landscape, the shape of river shore, and spots where the expedition had spent each night or camped or portaged for longer periods of time.

The Pike Expedition

In 1805, the soldier Zebulon Pike set out to explore the new territory. Like Lewis and Clark, Captain Pike started in St. Louis, but unlike them he traveled directly west into the Rocky Mountains. He reached Santa Fe, where he was captured briefly by Spanish soldiers. Pike returned to Washington in 1807 to report the number of Spanish forces in the region. More important, however, was his description of the sparsely-vegetated territory, which he called "The Great American Desert." This name deterred settlers from "moving west" for the next thirty to forty years.

Embargo and Non-Intercourse Acts

In 1807, Britain and France, frustrated with America's refusal to help either of them in the Napoleonic Wars, were constantly seizing American merchant ships and taking their cargo and sailors.

The Chesapeake-Leopard Affair

A depiction of the British HMS Leopard on the right firing at the USS Chesapeake on the left.

Britain disregarded American neutrality. It seized American ships and forced their sailors to join the Royal Navy, often without regard for the sailors' nationality. This forced service was known as impressment. The British claim that these impressed sailors were "deserters" was not subject to review, and these sailors were often not really deserters from the Royal Navy. In June of 1807, the commander of the American ship Chesapeake had refused to let an encroaching British ship search it for British deserters. The British ship, Leopard, attacked in American waters. The Chesapeake lost, and four "deserters" were taken from its crew. President Jefferson demanded an apology for the Chesapeake-Leopard Affair from the British, and an end to impressment. Yet while the British government did apologize for the Affair, they did not stop searching American ships or end impressment. British impressment of American citizens, with subsequent personal loss to the families of these sailors and economic problems for their ships, was a major cause of the War of 1812.

The Embargo Act and its aftermath

A political cartoon mocking the Embargo act.

On June 22, 1807, Jefferson called an emergency Cabinet meeting to discuss continuing British and French disregard for American sea neutrality. The pro-British faction of Americans urged Jefferson to go to war with France. But the Congress kept to its principles in extremis, and on December 22 it passed the Embargo Act. This law stopped American merchants from trading by sea with any other nation. The originators of the law hoped that it would protect all merchant ships, and perhaps weaken the economies of both Great Britain and France. The embargo did indeed stop nearly all trade between America and Europe. But it severely damaged the economy of the United States. Merchants, who mainly belonged to the Federalist Party, howled in complaint. Smuggling flourished. And the embargo made neither Great Britain or France respect US neutrality.

In 1808 the Democratic-Republican candidate James Madison was elected. He was also a Virginian and had been Jefferson's Secretary of State. Yet the Democrat-Republicans suffered reverses in the House of Representatives. The Embargo Act was unpopular and had damaged the party. In 1809 Congress modified it with the Non-Intercourse Act, an addendum to the embargo which let merchants trade with any nation other than Britain and France. Although trade improved, British and French ships begin seizing American ships again.

A final change to the Embargo and Non-Intercourse acts was passed in 1810 with Macon's Bill No. 2. The bill said that if either Britain or France dropped trade restrictions against the U.S. and stopped seizing American ships, the United States would trade with them and not with the other. The French Emperor Napoleon consented to the conditions of the Bill. America agreed to trade with France and its colonies, rather than Great Britain and its colonies. The end of an American impartiality maintained for years was a prelude to The War of 1812.

Education

Another product of the Second Great Awakening in America was the appearance of Sunday Schools and adult education in New England and the Middle States. The Sunday School movement began in England, partly as a result of reaction to the Church of England's grip on the British educational system. In America it reached out to children in the cities, often too poor for private schools, and children on the frontier to whom the name of Washington was practically unknown. They taught literacy, primarily of the Bible, basic math, and some principles of cleanliness and decorum. In Northern mill towns such as Lowell, Massachusetts, as well as in the Middle States, the churches reached out to workers in the new factories, some of whom were illiterate. They began teaching adults on Sundays (their only day free), as part of denominational education, as well as in the late evenings. Workers believed that knowing how to read and write meant a chance at a better job, and a few more pennies in the weekly wage. Some factory owners began sponsoring these classes, thinking that an educated man would be a more Christian worker -- and, perhaps, a more docile worker. Yet these efforts would be overtaken by a national system of public elementary schools.

Thomas Jefferson's love of knowledge and hatred of religious denomination persisted through his life. As early as 1778 he had mooted a system of public education. On December 2nd, 1806, he pushed an amendment into congress that would legalize federal support for public education. Congress did not pass it, so Jefferson had it written into the constitution of his home state of Virginia. Jefferson made an understandable plan for education which included the elementary, high school, and college levels. Despite this, Virginia did not adopt his plan.

President Jefferson thought that elementary education was the most important form. He had six goals for education: to allow free-born men to deal with their own business, make them able to express their own opinions and ideas in writing, to better their thoughts and faculties through reading, to comprehend civic duties and the duties of their neighbors, to know their rights and how to use them, and to use what they knew in their social lives. He hoped that this would make all men “productive and informed voters.”

Questions For Review

Burning of the USS Philadelphia during the First Barbary War.

1. Define Jeffersonian democracy.

2. Why did France sell America its portion in the Louisiana Purchase?

3. Macon's Bill Number 2, The Embargo Act, and The Non-Intercourse Act. Place these laws in their correct order. What were the reasons for and the effects of each of them?

Westward Expansion and Manifest Destiny (1824 - 1849)

The Election of 1840

President William Henry Harrison

President Martin Van Buren was blamed for the Panic of 1837, but felt that he deserved to be reelected in 1840. Van Buren was a Democrat from New York who had continued the policies of Andrew Jackson. To oppose him the Whig Party joined to bring in a hero of the Indian wars, William Henry Harrison, "Old Tippecanoe." The ticket was balanced by the Vice Presidential candidate, a Southerner named John Tyler.

The Harrison campaign was thoroughly managed. The campaign song, "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too," was headed with an image of the log cabin where Harrison had supposedly grown up. Paid staffers went to frontier towns rolling a huge canvas ball, inscribed, "Keep it rolling for Tippecanoe and Tyler Too." (The American idiom "Keep the ball rolling" comes from this usage.) The ball would stop in front of a local tavern, then a common meeting place of the community. There they would stage a rally, typically with some free cider. Another sign of Harrison's plain man status was his title as "the hard cider candidate." There was little discussion of the issues. For its part, Van Buren's campaign called Harrison a provincial, out-of-touch old man. (The latter was then sixty-eight years old, a rare age in those days.)

Harrison won, and gave an hours-long, polished inaugural speech to prove his sophistication. Three weeks afterward, he came down with a cold which turned into pneumonia. He died in April of 1841, and John Tyler was sworn in as President. Thus the Whig Party, predominately Northern and ambivalent about slavery, elected a Virginian advocate of slavery and opponent of the American System. This was a startling omen for those like Clay who believed in American unity.

John Tyler Presidency

President John Tyler

Tyler's dislike of Jackson had moved him to change his party from Democrat to Whig. His government marked the only Whig presidency. His supporters included formerly anti-Jackson Democrats and National Republicans. He supported states' rights; so when many of the Whig bills came to him, they were never voted in. In fact, Tyler vetoed the entire Whig congressional agenda. The Whigs saw this as a party leader turning on his own party. He was officially expelled from the Whig party in 1841.

The Tyler presidency threw the Whig party into disarray. Because of divisions between the two factions in the party, the Whigs could not agree on one goal. Much of the public did not take Tyler's presidency seriously. They saw his lack of appeal in Congress and the embarrassing resignations of all of but one of Harrison's cabinet appointees in a single month. Yet Tyler's administration helped polarize the two parties. When he appointed John C. Calhoun, a staunch pro-slavery Democrat, as his Secretary of State, he confirmed a growing feeling that Democrats were the party of the South and Whigs the party of the North. In the election of 1844, Whigs voted by sectional ties. Because of these weakening divisions within the party, the Democratic candidate, James Polk, won. After one term, the Whigs were out of power.

Manifest Destiny

A frontier fort.

Many Western European-descended "White" Americans supported anti-Native American policies. The theme of conquest over the Indian was seen as early as John Filson's story of Daniel Boone in 1784. In the Nineteenth Century this was joined to the conviction that the United States was destined to take over the whole continent of North America, the process of Manifest Destiny articulated by John O' Sullivan in 1845.[source needed] America carried the Bible, civilization, and democracy: the Indian had none of these. Many European descendants believed other ethnic groups, including those people imported as slaves from Africa and their descendants, were childlike, stupid, and feckless. It was the duty of so-called superior groups to meet these inferior groups and to dominate them. So-called inferior ethnic groups could not advance technologically or spiritually. The idea of Manifest Destiny resulted in the murders and dislocation of millions of people. The Cherokee had been converted to Christianity, they were by-and-large peaceful, and they were using a self-invented alphabet to print newspapers. But their deportation, the "Trail of Tears," was justified by Manifest Destiny. The conviction was behind the Louisiana Purchase, the final shaking of French colonialism in what would become the Continental United States. It was behind the defeat of Spanish and Mexicans in a succession of skirmishes and wars. It helped send out pro- and anti-slavery factions across new areas, and still later brought about legislation such as the Homestead Act.

Amistad Case

In February of 1839, Portuguese slave hunters abducted a large group of Africans from Sierra Leone and shipped them to Havana, Cuba, a center for the slave trade. This abduction violated all of the treaties then in existence. Fifty-three Africans were purchased by two Spanish planters and put aboard the Cuban schooner Amistad for shipment to a Caribbean plantation. On July 1, 1839, the Africans seized the ship, killed the captain and the cook, and ordered the planters to sail to Africa. On August 24, 1839, the Amistad was seized off Long Island, NY, by the U.S. brig Washington. The planters were freed and the Africans were imprisoned in New Haven, CT, on charges of murder. Although the murder charges were dismissed, the Africans continued to be held in confinement as the focus of the case turned to salvage claims and property rights. President Van Buren was in favor of extraditing the Africans to Cuba. However, abolitionists in the North opposed extradition and raised money to defend the Africans. Claims to the Africans by the planters, the government of Spain, and the captain of the brig led the case to trial in the Federal District Court in Connecticut. The court ruled that the case fell within Federal jurisdiction and that the claims to the Africans as property were not legitimate because they were illegally held as slaves. The case went to the Supreme Court in January 1841, and former President John Quincy Adams argued the defendants' case. Adams defended the right of the accused to fight to regain their freedom. The Supreme Court decided in favor of the Africans, and 35 of them were returned to their homeland. The others died at sea or in prison while awaiting trial. The result, widely publicized court cases in the United States helped the abolitionist movement.

Technology

The canals had been a radical innovation. But they had their limitations. They could only overcome mountains with complicated, overland bypasses, and in winter they froze, stopping traffic completely. But an answer was found in the steam-driven, coal-powered engine. The steamboat was already bringing cotton and people up the rivers, erasing an age-old transportation problem. The development of railroad engines made travel and manufacture possible even in winter. It made the expensive canal obsolete: wherever you could run a rail, you could have a town. And the coal-fired, steam-powered engine could bring manufacturing to places without great rivers. The prosperity of the New England mill towns could be replicated elsewhere.

By 1857 Pittsburgh, like many other cities, was industrializing.

Coal and its byproducts became a major industry in America. (In the 1850s some German cities became known for creating coal-based dyes to make bold-colored fabrics.) Iron works and glass plants built large furnaces, fueled by coke, a coal derivative. They were contained by huge buildings. Steam-boats burned coke. So did steam-driven works. Smoke and smut from industry and household coal fires poured into city air. In his 1842 tour of Pittsburgh, Charles Dickens looked at the haze and fire and called it "Hell with the lid off."

Canals, railroads, and the teletype system tied the country together in a way thought impossible in 1790. They increased the market for goods, and thus the demand. The Second Industrial Revolution produced faster ways of satisfying that demand. In 1855 Henry Bessemer patented a furnace which could turn iron into steel, in high quantity. Iron workers, "puddlers," had worked slowly and regularly, had been paid a high wage, and had been considered craftsmen. The new steelworkers did not need that skill. They could be paid more cheaply. In other industries, faster processes of work either made a mockery of the apprenticeship system or eliminated it altogether. Manufacturers faced the same situation of the New England cloth makers a generation before, and solved it another way. To find fresh, fast, cheap labor, you could often hire children. You didn't have to pay them as much, and they didn't complain. Where children used to work on the farm, they now worked in groups in factories for higher wages. These children were, at the best, expected to work long and hard. (It was cheaper to run big machines in shifts than to have them idle all night.) Boys and girls worked naked in the coal mines; boys got burned in the glassworks; boys got maimed or killed running heavy machinery. None of them went to school, so even the ones who survived to adulthood were unfit for jobs when they came of age.

The ideals of Thomas Jefferson were dead. Instead of craftsmen and farmers living by their own hands, the cities were being filled by people who owned little or nothing, getting on by the wages paid by often indifferent employers. This was true in New England and the Middle States, though not in the South (except for the Tregar Ironworks in Richmond, Virginia, itself partially manned by slaves). Politicians such as John C. Calhoun jeered at Northern "wage slaves," and dreamed of a South with the technology and government of Sparta.

Compromise of 1850

Missouri Compromise Line.

The Compromise of 1850 was an intricate package of five bills passed in September 1850. It defused a four-year confrontation between the slave states of the South and the free states of the North that arose following the Mexican-American War. The compromise, drafted by Whig Henry Clay and brokered by Democrat Stephen Douglas, quieted sectional conflict for four years. The calm was greeted with relief, although each side disliked specific provisions. Texas surrendered its claim to New Mexico, but received debt relief and the Texas Panhandle, and retained the control over El Paso that it had established earlier in 1850. The South avoided the humiliating Wilmot Proviso, but did not receive desired Pacific territory in Southern California or a guarantee of slavery south of a territorial compromise line like the Missouri Compromise Line or the 35th parallel north. As compensation, the South received the possibility of slave states by popular sovereignty in the new New Mexico Territory and Utah Territory, which, however, were unsuited to plantation agriculture and populated by non-Southerners; a stronger Fugitive Slave Act, which in practice outraged Northern public opinion; and preservation of slavery in the national capital, although the slave trade was banned there except in the portion of the District of Columbia that adjoined Virginia. The Compromise became possible after the sudden death of President Zachary Taylor, who, although a slave owner himself, tried to implement the Northern policy of excluding slavery from the Southwest. Whig leader Henry Clay designed a compromise, which failed to pass in early 1850. In the next session of Congress, Democratic Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois narrowly passed a slightly modified package over opposition by extremists on both sides, including Senator John C. Calhoun of South Carolina.

Texas and Mexico

Map of the Republic of Texas

Mexico won independence from Spain in 1821. Weakened by more than a decade of struggle, the new Republic of Mexico attempted to attract settlers from the United States to the then-sparsely populated Mexican state of Coahuila y Texas. The first white settlers were 200 families led by Stephen F. Austin as a part of a business venture started by Austin's father. Despite nominal attempts to ensure that immigrants would be double penetrated with Mexican cultural values -- by requiring, for example, acceptance of Catholicism and a ban on slave holding -- Mexico's immigration policy led to the whites, rather than Mexicans, becoming the demographic majority in Texas by the 1830's, their beliefs and American values intact.

Due to past US actions in Texas, Mexico feared that white Americans would convince the United States to annex Texas and Mexico. In April 1830, Mexico issued a proclamation that people from the United States could no longer enter Texas. Mexico also would start to place custom duties on goods from the United States. In October 1835, white colonists in Texas revolted against Mexico by attacking a Mexican fort at Goliad, defeating the Mexican garrison. At about the same time, the Mexican president, Antonio López de Santa Anna, provoked a constitutional crisis that was among the causes of the revolt in Texas, as well as a rebellion in the southern Mexican province of Yucután. An official declaration of Texas independence was signed at Goliad that December. The next March, the declaration was officially enacted at the Texan capital of Washington-on-the-Brazos, creating the Republic of Texas.

Depiction of the Fall of the Alamo.

A few days before the enactment of the declaration, a Mexican force led by General Antonio López de Santa Anna laid siege to the Alamo, a mission in present day San Antonio. Vastly outnumbered, fewer than 200 Texans at San Antonio de Béxa, renamed the Alamo, held out for 12 days, until the final attack at dawn on March 6, 1836. Santa Anna, as he had promised during the siege, killed the few prisoners taken in the capture. Though the Alamo had been garrisoned in contravention of orders from Sam Houston, who had been placed in charge of Texan armed forces, the delay their defense forced on the Mexican army allowed the Texan government some crucial time to organize.

The next month saw the battle of San Jacinto, the final battle of the Texas Revolution. A force of 800 led by Sam Houston, empowered by their rallying war cry of "Remember the Alamo!", defeated Santa Anna's force of 1600 as they camped beside the sluggish creek for which the 20-minute-long battle is named. Santa Anna himself was captured and the next day signed the Treaties of Velasco, which ended Mexico-Texas hostilities. After the fighting had ended, Texas asked to be admitted to the Union, but Texas's request forced Congress to an impasse.

Evolution of the Mexican territory.

One of the most significant problems with the annexation of Texas was slavery. Despite Mexican attempts to exclude the practice, a number of white-Texans held slaves, and the new Republic of Texas recognized the practice as legitimate. In the United States, The Missouri Compromise of 1818 provided for an equality in the numbers of slave and non-slave states in the US, and to allow Texas to join would upset that power balance. For about ten years, the issue was unresolved, until President James Polk agreed to support the annexation of Texas. In 1845, Texas formally voted to join the US. The Mexicans, however, who had never formally recognized Texas's independence, resented this decision.

The southern boundary with Texas had never officially been settled and when the United States moved federal troops into this disputed territory, war broke out (assisted by raids carried out across the border by both sides). In the Mexican-American War, as this was called, the US quickly defeated the Mexican Army by 1848. The peace settlement, called the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, ceded one-third of Mexico's territory to the United States. In addition to Texas, with the border fixed at the Rio Grande River, the United States acquired land that would become the present-day states of New Mexico, California, Arizona, Colorado, Nevada, Utah, and parts of Colorado and Wyoming; the US paid Mexico $15 million. However, the new territories posed even more problems relating to slavery: the balance between slave and non-slave states seemed threatened again.

Oregon

Map of contested US and British claims on Oregon Country.

In 1824 and 1825 Russia gave up its claim to Oregon. The U.S. and British Canada jointly made an agreement for occupation. However, disputes surfaced over the northwestern boundary of the US and the southwestern boundary of Canada. The US claimed that it owned land south of Alaska, while the British claimed that the boundary was drawn at present-day Oregon. President Polk, who had initiated the dispute, gave Great Britain an ultimatum - negotiate or go to war. On June 15, 1846, Britain agreed to give up the land south of the 49th parallel, while keeping Vancouver Island and navigation rights to the Columbia River. Polk agreed. Comparing this incident to the president's aggressiveness toward Mexico, several individuals [whom?] concluded that Polk favored the causes of the South over those of the North.

Oregon Trail

Trail ruts from the Oregon Trail can still be seen - Shown here in this photo from 2008.

Sometimes Native Americans and white settlers met in peace. During the twenty years after 1840, around 250,000 to 500,000 people walked the Oregon Trail across most of the continent on foot, with the trek taking an average of seven months. Many of these settlers were armed in preparation for Native attack, but the majority of the encounters were peaceful. Most of the starting points were along the Missouri River, including Independence, St. Joseph, and Westport, Missouri. Many settlers set out on organized wagon trains, while others went on their own. Settlers timed their departures so they would arrive after spring, allowing their livestock days of pasture at the end, and yet early enough to not travel during the harsh winter. Walking beside their wagons, settlers would usually cover fifteen miles a day. Men, women and children sometimes endured weather ranging from extreme heat to frozen winter in their 2,000 mile journey West. If a traveler became ill, he or she would have no doctor and no aid apart from fellow travelers. Only the strong finished the trail. Although most interactions between Native Americans and settlers were undertaken in good faith, sometimes things went bad. Eventually hostile relations would escalate into full blown war and many years of bloodshed.

California

California Territory

Dramatic depiction of the Bear Flag Revolt

When war broke out between the United States and Mexico in 1845, a few white settlers in the Sacramento Valley in the Mexican state of California seized the opportunity to advance white business interests by declaring independence from Mexico despite the wishes of many Mexicans and natives present in California. Before the arrival of Europeans, scholars place the population of California at 10 million natives. The sparsely populated Bear Flag Republic, as the new nation was called, quickly asked the US for protection from Mexico, allowing US military operations in the new Republic's territory. As skirmishes occurred in California, Mexicans suffered many abuses at the hands of the new white government.

When the war ended, the California territory and a large surrounding territory were ceded by Mexico to the US in exchange for $15 million. The territory included what would become present day California, Nevada, Utah, most of New Mexico, Arizona, and Colorado and a small part of Wyoming. The continental US was nearly complete. The final piece would come in 1853, when southern Arizona and New Mexico were bought from Mexico for $10 million. The land from the purchase, known as the Gadsden Purchase, was well suited for building a southern transcontinental railroad.

California Gold Rush

Prospectors during the gold rush.

In 1848 gold was found at the mill of John Sutter, who lived in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada mountain range, 40 miles east of Sacramento. Word of the gold on the American River (the river on which Sutter's mill was located on) spread, and hordes of people rushed into California to mine gold. The rush peaked in 1849, and those who came during that year were known as "forty-niners." The population of the northern California city of San Francisco exploded as a result of the immigration to the region.

Many immigrants that joined the Gold Rush did not find opportunity but rather discrimination at the hands of white prospectors and newly changed government. One of these, Joaquin Murrieta, known as the Mexican Robin Hood, had become a bandit and hero of those still loyal to Mexico. As a reaction the Governor of California, John Bigler, formed the California Rangers. This group went after and allegedly found Murrieta and his companions. They cut off his head, which was later put on display. Many still doubt whether the person the California Rangers decapitated was actually Murrieta or some other poor soul. Be that as it may, the memory of Murrieta is still much loved and respected by Mexican Americans today.

Apart from being gained by a handful of very lucky prospectors, a great deal of the wealth generated by the Gold Rush belonged to those who owned businesses that were relevant to gold mining. For example, Levi Strauss, a German Jew, invented denim pants for prospectors when he observed that normal pants could not withstand the strenuous activities of mining. Strauss eventually became a millionaire, and the Levi's brand still is recognized today.

Mormonism

The Birth of the Latter Day Saints

Portrait of Joseph Smith Jr.

One continuation of the Second Great Revival is seen in the birth of an American faith, Mormonism, or The Church of God of the Latter Day Saints. Joseph Smith, a resident of New York State, said that he had found golden plates. The documents which he supposedly translated from these plates revealed what he said was a restoration of the faith which Jesus and the apostles had known, a new American-based order. In 1830 he organized what he designated The Church of Christ, or the Church of the Latter Day Saints. This body spread through conversion, its truth seen in its organization and its prosperity. It had several divergences from existing United States law, including the doctrine that men might have more than one wife. After Smith had been arrested in 1844 in Illinois, charged by civil officials with starting a riot and with treason, a crowd broke into the jail where he was being held and murdered him.

The Great Mormon Exodus

A painting of Mormons entering the Salt Lake Valley

Yet the Latter Day Saints persevered. Smith's successor was another prophet, Brigham Young. Continued conflict between the U.S. Government, most signally the state of Illinois, and the Mormons led to the decision to leave the States and go to a less-settled place. The territory of Utah, obtained through the wars with Mexico, certainly counted as less-settled: a vast alkali desert, punctuated by grotesque mountains, and sparsely peopled by Spanish-speaking settlements and Indian tribes.

The Mormons began sending out a few pioneers for the new territory as early as 1846. In the two decades afterward, while conversion and population growth further increased the Mormons, about 70,000 people made the trek through difficult conditions. In some cases the migrants walked on foot through hostile landscapes, carrying all their goods with them in handcarts they pulled themselves.

When they reached Utah, they formed tightly-organized, top-down structures driven by doctrine and individual discipline. The settlers diverted mountain streams to their fields. In places which had been waste, they created fertile farms and productive vegetable gardens.

Continuing Skirmishes

Yet even in this new land, conflicts continued between Mormons and the U.S. government. In the spring of 1857, President James Buchanan appointed a non-Mormon, Alfred Cumming, as governor of the Utah Territory, replacing Brigham Young, and dispatched troops to enforce the order. The Mormons prepared to defend themselves and their property; Young declared martial law and issued an order on Sept. 15, 1857, forbidding the entry of U.S. troops into Utah. The order was disregarded, and throughout the winter sporadic raids were conducted by the Mormon militia against the encamped U.S. army. Buchanan dispatched (Apr., 1858) representatives to work out a settlement, and on June 26, the army entered Salt Lake City, Cumming was installed as governor, and peace was restored.

In 1890, the president of the Mormon Church, Wilford Woodruff, ruled that there would be no more plural marriages. Other distinctive practices which had become Church practice under Joseph Smith continued, including theocratic rule and declaration of people as gods. By 1896, when Utah became one of the United States, it was both Mormon and as American as Massachusetts or New York State.

Public Schools and Education

Horace Mann

The Board of Education in Massachusetts was established in 1837, making it the oldest state board in the United States. Its responsibilities were and are to interpret and implement laws for public education in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Public education in the Commonwealth was organized by the regulations adopted by the Board of Education, which were good faith interpretations of Massachusetts and federal law. The Board of Education was also responsible for granting and renewing school applications, developing and implementing the Massachusetts Comprehensive Assessment System, submitting yearly budget proposals for public education to the Massachusetts General Court, setting standards for teachers, certifying teachers, principals, and superintendents, and monitoring achievements of districts in the Commonwealth.

There was a movement for reform in public education. The leader of this movement was Horace Mann, a Massachusetts lawyer and reformer. He supported free, tax-supported education to replace church schools and the private schools set up by untrained, young men. Mann proposed universal education, which would help Americanize immigrants. During Mann’s tenure as secretary of the Massachusetts Board of Education from 1837 to 1848, Massachusetts led the common school movement brought training for teachers, lengthened school years and raised the teachers pay to attract people to that profession.

In this period education began being extended more and more to women. Early elementary schools had separate rooms for boy students and girl students. Now some elementary classes became co-educational, and women began to be hired as teachers. The first woman's college, Mt. Holyoke, was founded in South Hadley, Massachusetts. It was created by Mary Lyon, and intended as a liberal arts college.

"Bleeding Kansas"

There was never much doubt that the settlers of Nebraska would, in the face of popular sovereignty, choose to bar slavery. Kansas, however, was another matter. Abolitionist and pro-slavery groups tried to rush settlers to Kansas in hopes of swinging the vote in the group's own direction. Eventually, both a free-state and a slave-state government were functioning in Kansas - both illegal.

Violence was abundant. In May 1856, a pro-slavery mob ransacked the chiefly abolitionist town of Lawrence, demolishing private property of the anti-slavery governor, burning printing presses, and destroying a hotel. Two days later, in retaliation, Abolitionist John Brown and his sons went to the pro-slavery town of Pottawatomie Creek and hacked five men to death in front of their families. This set off a guerilla war in Kansas that lasted through most of 1856.

Depiction of Representative Preston Brooks hitting Senator Sumner with a cane on the Senate floor.

Violence over the issue of Kansas was even seen in the Senate. Massachusetts Senator Charles Sumner accused South Carolinian Andrew Butler of having "chosen a mistress to whom he has made his vows - Slavery." Upon hearing these words, Butler's nephew, Representative Preston Brooks, walked onto the Senate floor and proceeded to cane Sumner in the head. Sumner suffered so much damage from the attack that he could not return to the Senate for over three years. Brooks was expelled by the House. Cheered on by southern supporters (many of whom sent Brooks new canes, to show approval of his actions), came back after a resounding reelection.

After much controversy and extra legislation, Kansas found itself firmly abolitionist by 1858.

Dred Scott v. Stanford - 1857

A painting of Dred Scott

Dred Scott was an African-American slave who first sued for his freedom in 1846. His case stated that he and his wife Harriet had been transported to both the state of Illinois and Minnesota territory. Laws in both places made slavery illegal. Dred and Harriet began with two separate cases, one for each of them. Slaves were not allowed legal marriage, but the two considered themselves married, and wanted to protect their two teenage daughters. As Dred became ill, the two merged their suit. At first it was the rule that state courts could decide if African-Americans in their jurisdictions were slave or free. After many years and much hesitation, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case. The United States Supreme Court ruled 7-2 in favor of the slave master, citing precedent that found that neither Dred nor his wife could claim citizenship. As they were not citizens, they did not have a claim in Federal Court. The majority argument cited the Missouri Compromise of 1854 to state that a temporary residence outside of Missouri did not immediately emancipate them, since the owner would be unfairly deprived of property.

Ostend Manifesto

James Buchanan

Southern slave owners had a special interest in Spanish-held Cuba. Slavery existed on the island, but a recent rebellion in Haiti had spurred some Spanish officials to consider emancipation. The Southerners did not want freed slaves so close to their shores, and other observers thought Manifest Destiny should be extended to Cuba. In 1854 three American diplomats, Pierre Soulé (the minister to Spain), James Buchanan (the minister to Great Britain), and John Y. Mason (the minister to France), met in Ostend, Belgium. They held in common the same views as many Southern Democrats. The diplomats together issued a warning to Spain that it must sell Cuba to the United States or risk having it taken by force. This statement had not been authorized by the Franklin Pierce administration and was immediately repudiated. Reaction, both at home and abroad, was extremely negative.

Women's History of the Period

Declaration of Sentiments

1848 marked the year of the Declaration of Sentiments; it was a document written as a plea for the end of discrimination against women in all spheres of Society. Main credit is given to Elizabeth Cady Stanton for writing the document. The document was presented at the first women's rights convention held at Seneca Falls, New York. Though the convention was attended by 300 women and men, only 100 of them actually signed the document which included; 68 women and 32 men.

Elizabeth Blackwell

Elizabeth Blackwell

In 1849 Elizabeth Blackwell became the first woman to receive a medical degree. She attended Geneva College in New York and graduated on January 23, 1849. Even though she had her medical degree she was still banned from practicing in most hospitals. She then relocated to Paris, France and continued her training as a midwife instead of a physician. While in Paris she contracted an eye infection from a small baby that forced her to lose her right eye. It was replaced by a glass eye which ended her medical career.

Missouri v. Celia

This murder trial took place in Calloway County, Missouri beginning October 9, 1855. It involved a slave woman named Celia and her master Robert Newsome. After being purchased at the age of 14 in 1850 Celia bore two of her masters children. Soon after becoming intimate with another slave while still being sought after by her master Celia became pregnant. On June 23, 1855, feeling unwell from the pregnancy, Celia pleaded with her master to let her rest; when Newsome ignored her pleas she struck him twice in the head with a heavy stick. She then spent the night burning his corpse in her fireplace and grinding the smaller bones into pieces with a rock. Although Missouri statutes forbade anyone "to take any woman unlawfully against her will and by force, menace or duress, compel her to be defiled," the judge residing over the case instructed the jury that Celia, being enslaved, did not fall within the meaning of "any woman" thus since the "sexual abuser" was her master the murder was not justified on the claim of self-defense. Celia was found guilty of the crime on October 10, 1855 and was sentenced to be hanged. The case still remains significant in history because it graphically illustrates the dreadful truth that enslaved women had absolutely no recourse when it came to being raped by their masters.

Panic of 1857

A bank run during the Panic of 1857.

The Panic of 1857 introduced the United States, at least in a small way, to the intricate dealings of the worldwide economy. On the same day that the Central America wrecked, Cincinnati's Ohio Life Insurance and Trust Company ceased operation thanks to embezzlement. News of the twin disasters spread quickly, in part because of the telegraph now becoming common. Investors, including British investors, began to withdraw money from Wall Street in massive numbers. Bank failures increased, mostly in the industrial Northeast and New England states, while the West and South, still more dependent on agriculture, seemed to weather the storm better. There were many underlying causes for the Panic of 1857, and by the time the twin disasters occurred the United States was well on its way into the economic downturn. For 3 years the Crimean War had involved European and Asian countries which increase foreign dependence on American agriculture. The return of the men and land to agricultural production meant an abundance of crops in 1857 which led to falling prices for farm goods. Land speculation, too, had become rampant throughout the United States. This led to an unsustainable expansion of the railroads. As investment money dried up, the land speculation collapsed, as did many of the railroads shortly thereafter. Attempts were made by the federal government to remedy the situation. A bank holiday was declared in October, 1857 and Secretary of the Treasury Howell Cobb recommended the government selling revenue bonds and reducing the tariff (Tariff of 1857). By 1859 the country was slowly pulling out of the downturn, but the effect lasted until the opening shots of the Civil War.

Rebellion at Harper's Ferry, Virginia

John Brown

Portrait of John Brown.

John Brown had been born in Connecticut on May 19, 1800. He grew up in Ohio, where his father worked as a tanner and a minister near Oberlin, Ohio. His father preached abolitionism, and John Brown learned from him. He married twice, his first wife dying while giving birth to their seventh child. He would ultimately father twenty children, eleven of them surviving to adulthood. He started several failed business ventures and land deals in Ohio and Massachusetts. For a while he settled in a community of both black and white settlers. He lived there peacefully until the mid-1850s. Then two of his sons who had moved to Kansas asked him for guns to defend themselves against Missouri Border Ruffians. After two failed defense efforts, Brown left the Kansas area to avoid prosecution for the Pottawatomie massacre. He was already gaining some mention in the press for his efforts. He moved back East and decided to plan a way to destroy slavery in America forever.

Brown's Raid On Harper's Ferry

Marines attack John Brown during the raid on Harper's Ferry.

After the troubles in Kansas Brown decided on a plan. A lightly-defended armory in Harper's Ferry, Northern Virginia, contained 100,000 muskets and rifles. An attacker would need some monetary investment to obtain a battalion of men, a similar number of rifles, and a thousand pikes. With the weapons seized at the armory, Brown planned on arming sympathizers and slaves freed by his personal army as it swept through the South. Harper's Ferry had no plantations, and Brown expected no resistance from the local townspeople. On October 16, 1859, Brown carried out his raid, which he planned as the beginning of his revolution. However, instead of his battalion of 450 men, he went in with a group of twenty, including two of his sons. They easily overtook the single nightwatchman and killed several townspeople on the way in, including a free African American man who discovered their plot. Brown had also underestimated the resolve of the local townspeople, who formed a militia and surrounded Brown and his raiders in the armory. After a siege of two days, the U.S. Army sent in a detachment of Marines from Washington, D.C., the closest available contingent. The marines, led by Robert E. Lee, stormed the armory, and in a three minute battle ten of Brown's men were killed. Brown and six others were taken alive and imprisoned for a swift trial. Brown and five of his raiders were hung before the end of the year. Three others were killed in early 1860.

Public Reaction

News of the rebellion spread rapidly around the country by telegraph and newspaper, though opinions differed about what it meant. The Charleston Mercury of November seven, 1859, represents one Southern view: "With five millions of negroes turned loose in the South, what would be the state of society? It would be worse than the 'Reign of Terror'. The day of compromise is passed." The reaction was most mixed and vigorous among those who called themselves Christians. Abraham Lincoln typified the response of many others when he said that, though Brown "agreed with us in thinking slavery wrong," "[t]hat cannot excuse violence, bloodshed, and treason." The Unitarian William Lloyd Garrison, already having swerved from his previously-held pacifism, on the day of Brown's death preached a sermon commemorating him. "Whenever there is a contest between the oppressed and the oppressor, -– the weapons being equal between the parties, –- God knows that my heart must be with the oppressed, and always against the oppressor. Therefore, whenever commenced, I cannot but wish success to all slave insurrections." The Congregationalist Minister Henry Ward Beecher likewise supported Brown from the pulpit. In short, a faction of White people of faith both conservative and liberal began saying that only by violence could slavery be struck from America.

Election of 1860

A poster advocating Abraham Lincoln as president.

The new-born Republican party supported Northern industry, as the Whigs had done. It also promised a tariff for the protection of industry and pledged the enactment of a law granting free homesteads to settlers who would help in the opening of the West. But by 1860, it had become the party of abolition. Many Republicans believed that Lincoln's election would prevent any further spread of slavery. It selected Abraham Lincoln of Illinois as its presidential candidate, and Hannibal Hamlin of Maine as its vice-presidential candidate.

The Democratic party split in two. The main party or the Northern Democrats could not immediately decide on a candidate, and after several votes, their nominating convention was postponed when the Southern delegates walked out. When it eventually resumed, the party decided on Stephen Douglas of Illinois as its candidate. The first vice-presidential candidate, Benjamin Fitzpatrick, dropped his name from consideration once his home state of Alabama seceded from the Union. His replacement was Herschel Johnson of Georgia. The Southern delegates from the Democratic party selected their own candidate to run for president. John C. Breckenridge of Kentucky with Joseph Lane of Oregon as their vice-presidential candidate.

Former Whigs and Southern Republicans who supported the Union in the slavery issue formed the Constitutional Union party. Tennessee senator John Bell was chosen as the Constitutional Union party presidential candidate, over former Texas governor Sam Houston. Harvard President Edward Everett was chosen as the vice-presidential candidate.

Abraham Lincoln won the election with only forty percent of the vote. But with the electorate split four ways, it led to a landslide victory in the Electoral College. Lincoln garnered 180 electoral votes without being listed on any of the ballots of any of the future secessionist states in the deep South (except for Virginia, where he received 1.1% of the vote). Stephen Douglas won just under 30% of the popular vote, but only carried 2 states for a total of 12 electoral votes. John Breckenridge carried every state in the deep South, Maryland, and Delaware, for a total of 72 electoral votes. Bell carried the border slave states of Kentucky, Virginia, and Tennessee, for a total of 39 electoral votes. Except for the split decision in the presidential election of 1824, no President in US History has won with a smaller percentage of the popular vote.

Lincoln's election ensured South Carolina's secession, along with Southern belief that they now no longer had a political voice in Washington. Other Southern states followed suit. They claimed that they were no longer bound by the Union, because the Northern states had in effect broken a constitutional contract by not honoring the South's right to own slaves as property.

Questions For Review

1. What affect did proslavery sentiments have on the Mexican War?
2. Reconstruct Brown's raid in terms of what happened first, second, and so on.

Friction Between the States (1849 - 1860)

Ideas and Questions of the Time

The overriding question throughout the decade preceding the Civil War was, “Should slavery be allowed in the new territories of the United States?” Before 1848, the question had been hypothetical; however, with the new lands acquired during the Mexican War, it was time for America to make a firm decision regarding the expansion of slavery.

The central ideas dominating the debate were:

The Wilmot Proviso

David Wilmot tried to stop slavery from expanding into lands gained from Mexico

On August 8, 1846, Representative David Wilmot, a Pennsylvania Democrat, presented a proposal expressing that “slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist in any part of any territory obtained from Mexico.” The Wilmot Proviso was never accepted as law, but it at long last put the issue forth on the political table.

The Calhoun Resolutions

John C. Calhoun defended the institution of Slavery with the Calhoun Resolutions.

John C. Calhoun, the South Carolina statesman, responded with the Calhoun Resolutions, which said that Congress had no right to stop any citizen with slaves in their possession from taking those slaves into one of the territories. If they did so, the Fifth Amendment, which states that no person can be “deprived of life, liberty, or property, without due process of law,” would be violated. While this was not made formal legislation either, this belief became the standard in most of the south.

Popular Sovereignty

A third option, which appealed to many moderates, most prominently Stephen A. Douglas of Illinois, was the idea of popular sovereignty. This was the idea of letting the settlers of a territory themselves decide whether slavery was to be allowed in it, by voting on state constitutions and other such measures. The primary merit of this initiative was that it took the debate out of Congress, which quickly grew tired of the issue, and put it into the hands of people it truly affected. There was also an unspoken understanding that most of the territories would end up being free, as most settlers that were already in those areas did not bring their slaves with them.

Compromise of 1850

America looked to the Senate for an answer to the question of slavery within the territories. Henry Clay, nicknamed the "Great Compromiser," constructed a compromise: California was admitted as a free state, but all other territories in the Mexican Cession were allowed to choose between becoming a free territory or a slave territory. Also, as part of the Compromise, the slave trade was banned in the District of Columbia, and a Fugitive Slave Act was passed to allow the capture of fugitive slaves.

The Fugitive Slave Act was a very controversial measure. Previously, many in the North felt that slavery merely occurred in the South and that they had nothing to do with it. But under the Fugitive Slave Act, Northerners were required to help return runaway slaves. Thus, the Northerners felt that they were being dragged into aiding the institution of slavery. Several Northern states passed laws prohibiting their officials from aiding the enforcement of the Act.

While the admission of California as a free state gave the free states the majority in Congress, the pro-slavery measures in the Fugitive Slave Act made the Compromise seem more favorable to the South.

Uncle Tom’s Cabin

Uncle Tom's Cabin showed readers the suffering that slaves faced in their lives.

Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Uncle Tom’s Cabin, published in 1852, is often called “the book that started the Civil War.” The melodramatic story of the evil overseer Simon Legree and his slaves Eliza and Uncle Tom painted an accurate picture of the horrors of slavery, and gave rise to much abolitionist feeling in the North. However, the effects were not easily visible from the start: because the country was growing tired of the sectional bickering over slavery, it took a while for the story to becoming embedded in the American imagination.

Nat Turner

Nat, commonly called Nat Turner, (October 2, 1800 – November 11, 1831) was an American slave whose slave rebellion in Southampton County, Virginia, was the most remarkable instance of black resistance to enslavement in the antebellum southern United States. His methodical slaughter of white civilians during the uprising makes his legacy controversial, but he is still considered by many to be a heroic figure of black resistance to oppression. At birth he was not given a surname, but was recorded solely by his given name, Nat. In accordance with a common practice, he was often called by the surname of his owner, Samuel Turner.

Election of 1852

In one of the less spectacular elections in American history, Senator Franklin Pierce of the Democratic party defeated General Winfield Scott of the Whig party. The Whigs tried to rely on Scott’s heroics as a general during the Mexican war to get him elected, a strategy that proved unsuccessful. Pierce, of New Hampshire, ended up being largely an ineffective president, trying and failing to please both the North and the South.

The Kansas-Nebraska Act and its Effects

Throughout this time, plans were underway for a transcontinental railroad. A question arose as to what Eastern city should be the main terminus. Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois hoped to advance his own state’s interests by making Chicago the railroad hub. To do this, he suggested a piece of legislation known as the “Kansas-Nebraska Act,” requiring recognition of two new territories, Kansas and Nebraska, west of Missouri and Iowa, respectively. These territories would both help his railroad and solve the overdue issue of the territories in the remainder of the Louisiana Purchase.

But to get the Kansas-Nebraska Act passed, he would have to get the support of Southerners, who wanted a railroad along a more southern route. For this reason, Douglas included in the Act the provision of popular sovereignty in the territories.

This blatantly violated the Missouri Compromise of 1821, which stated that slavery would be prohibited above the 36º30’ line. Douglas therefore opened himself up to the verbal barrage of protests from the North, who denounced the cancellation of the Missouri Compromise as unfair. Yet the Act passed, to the indignation of many Northerners, with the support of President Pierce.

The North

Many in the North figured that if the Missouri Compromise was not an unbreakable law, neither was the Fugitive Slave Act, leading to many demonstrations against it. Boston witnessed the most remarkable of these, leading to many New Englanders turning against Pierce for his support of the Kansas-Nebraska Act.

Political Parties

The Whig party essentially buckled under the pressure of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, with the North condemning it and the South supporting it. Whigs from the North joined some Democrats and Free Soilers that united under the general principle of the Wilmot Proviso, eventually calling themselves the Republican Party and offering its first presidential candidate, John C. Fremont in 1856.

Rachel v. Walker

Rachel v. Walker was a lawsuit involving a slave who, in 1834, sued for her freedom from John Walker in the Supreme Court of Missouri, and won. This result was cited in 1856 in the famous Dred Scott v. Sandford case before the Supreme Court of the United States.[1]

Dred Scott

The question of the constitutionality of Congressional Compromises was decided by the Supreme Court in 1856. In "Scott v. Sanford", the Court ruled against a slave, Dred Scott, who had sued to become free. The Court ruled 7-2 that Scott remained a slave, and there were nine written opinions. The Chief Justice of the United States, Roger Taney, decided that blacks were so inferior that they could not be citizens of the United States, and that, consequently, they could not sue for his freedom (a state issue)in diversity in federal court, and therefore the court lacked jurisdiction. Nevetheless (the biggest "nevertheless" in American history) in a supererogatory effort to settle the question of slavery once and for all, the Marylander Taney ruled that the Missouri Compromise (which had banned the expansion of slavery into the territories north of Missouri) among other laws, was unconstitutional because it restricted the Constitutional right to own property. Many felt that Taney had committed a legal error in his decision. First, Taney had ruled that Scott had no right to sue. The case should have ended there. Taney had ruled on the constitutionality of the Missouri Compromise, which had, under Taney's own ruling that Scott had no right to sue, no bearing upon the case. Thus, the outrage against the Dred Scott decision was increased even more.

Free and Slave States in 1869

John Brown’s Raid

John Brown

John Brown, an extreme abolitionist known for fighting in Bloody Kanasas, came to the federal arsenal at Harper’s Ferry, Virginia for his last fight. He planned to take over the arsenal, give weapons to the slaves that would support him, and make a center of black power in the Appalachian Mountains that would support slave uprisings in the south.

The raid did not go as planned. Brown did take over the arsenal and took a couple of hostages, but ended up being assaulted by Virginia militia and U.S. Marines under the command of Col. Robert E. Lee of the US 2nd Cavalry. He was tried, convicted, and hanged for treason to the State of Virginia.

However, his raid left a profound impact. John Brown became a martyr for the abolitionist cause during the Civil War. In the South, his actions gave cause to rumors of Northern conspiracy supporting slave insurrections, engendering further suspicion of outsiders in the South. A later Northern marching song sang “John Brown’s body lies a-mouldering in the grave, but his soul is marching on.”

Lincoln

Lincoln campaign poster

In 1860, four major candidates ran for President. The Whigs, adopting the name "Constitutional Union", nominated Tennessean Senator John Bell. The Northern Democrats nominated Senator Stephen Douglas of Illinois and the Southern Democrats nominated the Vice President John Breckenridge of Kentucky. The more united Republican party nominated Abraham Lincoln, who spoke out against expansion of slavery. Though he assumed that, under the constitution, Congress could not outlaw slavery in the South, he assured all that he would work to admit only free states to the US. Due to divisions between the parties, Lincoln won the election by carrying every Northern State. Douglas won Missouri, Bell the Upper South, and Breckenridge the Deep South. The South was outraged. The North had a far larger population than the South, and thus had more electoral votes. The South had been out voted.

Intro to Secession

Secession and the Southern Confederacy

With the demise of the Whig Party and the split of the Northern and Southern branches of the Democratic Party, the opportunity afforded itself for the recently organized Republican Party to increase its political power in both chambers of Congress and to successfully elect Abraham Lincoln to the Presidency. Wendell Phillips acknowledged that the Republican Party was "a sectional party, organized against the South." Several other leading Republicans even went so far as to advocate civil war in order to keep the Southern States in a condition of subordination to a Northern majority.

Tariffs

Southern leaders, such as John C. Calhoun, had warned that if the North ever gained control of the federal Government the rights of the Southern people would be lost. In the Republicans' pledge to confine slavery within the existing States and to prevent its spread into the common Territories was perceived an intent to destroy the rights of the Southern people wholesale. Many Republicans, such as the former Whig and Henry Clay admirer, Abraham Lincoln, also openly advocated a high tariff and internal improvement system (which Clay had named, "The American System"). Historically, high tariffs benefited Northern industry and had adverse effects on the price of exported Southern cotton.

Why They Fought

Consequently, the conflict between the North and the South had much more to do with differing views on the relation of the States to the federal Government, the extent of State power, and economics rather than the issues of slavery or African-American rights. In fact, some of the Northern people deplored Abolitionism and were opposed to African-American equality. Even Lincoln openly declared himself in opposition to African-American citizenship. Most of the Northern States had various anti-African American laws on the books and Lincoln's own State of Illinois altered its constitution in 1862 to prohibit the immigration of free African Americans entirely.

Secession

Upon receiving news of Lincoln's election, the South Carolina Convention voted for secession on December 20, 1860. In the next few months, Mississippi, Florida, Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana, and Texas had all seceded and joined South Carolina in forming the Confederate States of America. The other four Southern States - Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Arkansas - originally voted against secession, but later joined the Southern Confederacy when Lincoln's call for 75,000 militia was issued on April 15, 1861.

Definition

Secession was generally accepted as a revolutionary, if not a constitutional right, by both North and South prior to the actual secession of the seven Gulf States. In fact, secession was first threatened in the early years of the Union by the State of Massachusetts, and the threat was repeated several times over the decades preceding the War Between the States. A Northern Confederacy of the New England States was proposed and nearly formed in protest of the War of 1812. Of course, Southern leaders such as Jefferson Davis believed that since the original thirteen States had voluntarily acceded to the Union, they could also rescind that accession and lawfully secede. This act of secession was to be voted upon and declared to the world by the same sovereign power which had brought the State into the Union - that of the people assembled in convention. According to this logic, those States which were admitted to the Union after 1789 also retained this right of secession, since the main ground of their admission was that they would stand "on equal footing" with the other States. The Tenth Amendment to the Constitution was also appealed to with the claim that the several States never surrendered their sovereignty to the federal Government, and could therefore recall their delegated powers from their common agent by withdrawing from the Union.

Lincoln's View

Abraham Lincoln, on the other hand, insisted that the relation of the States to the Federal Government was akin to that of counties to States. He believed that the Union preceded the States, rather than vice versa, and that State sovereignty was a myth. Consequently, secession was treason and could only result in anarchy. For these views, he relied upon Daniel Webster's speeches in the Senate in the early 1830s.

Jefferson Davis

Jefferson Davis (June 3, 1808 – December 6, 1889) was an American soldier and politician, most famous for serving as the first and only President of the Confederate States, leading the Confederate States of America during the American Civil War. Before the Civil War, Davis served in the Mississippi Legislature, the U.S. House and U.S. Senate. He fought in the Mexican-American War as a colonel of a volunteer regiment. Later he became Secretary of War in the cabinet of U.S. President Franklin Pierce.

The Civil War (1860 - 1865)

Causes of the Civil War

There are several fundamental causes of the civil war, most of which were related to the south's use of slavery. These include the election of Abraham Lincoln without a single southern electoral college vote. The rise of the Republican party which was opposed to the westward expansion of slavery. The south wanted to protect the rights of their states to determine how they could treat slaves free of federal interference. The northern and southern economies were vastly different, mainly as a result of the south's use of slavery compared to the north's use of free labor which encouraged industrialization.

“	A geographical line has been drawn across the Union, and all the States north of that line have united in the election of a man to the high office of President of the United States, whose opinions and purposes are hostile to slavery. He is to be entrusted with the administration of the common Government, because he has declared that that "Government cannot endure permanently half slave, half free" and that the public mind must rest in the belief that slavery is in the course of ultimate extinction.	”
—Declaration of the Immediate Causes Which Induce and Justify the Secession of South Carolina from the Federal Union - December 24, 1860

Dixie's Constitution

By the end of March, 1861, the Confederacy had created a constitution and elected its first and only president, Jefferson Davis. The Constitution of the Confederate States of America was the supreme law of the Confederate States of America, as adopted on March 11, 1861 and in effect through the conclusion of the American Civil War. The Confederacy also operated under a Provisional Constitution from February 8, 1861 to March 11, 1861.

In regard to most articles of the Constitution, the document is a word-for-word duplicate of the United States Constitution. The original, hand-written document is currently located in the University of Georgia archives at Athens, Georgia. The major differences between the two constitutions was the Confederacy's greater emphasis on the rights of individual member states, and an explicit support of slavery.

Fort Sumter and the Beginning of the War

A painting depicting the bombardment of Fort Sumter.

Several federal forts were seized and converted to Confederate strongholds. By the time of Lincoln's inauguration only two major forts had not been taken. On April 11, Confederate General P. G. T. Beauregard demanded that Union Major Robert Anderson surrender Fort Sumter in Charleston, South Carolina. Sumter had a strategic position on an island defending Charleston's harbor. The supplies of the besieged forts would only last a few weeks. The Union sent ships to resupply the fort, but they were held off by Confederate ships. Beauregard's troops surrounded the fort and opened fire. A tremendous cannon firefight remarkably claimed no casualties. By April 14, Anderson was forced to surrender the fort. The first casualties of the War occurred after the surrender: while the fort flag was being lowered, a Union cannon misfired.

The next day, President Lincoln declared that the US faced a rebellion. Lincoln called up state militias and requested volunteers to enlist in the Army. In response to this call and to the surrender of Fort Sumter, four more states seceded; Virginia, Arkansas, Tennessee, and North Carolina. The Civil War had begun.

A cartoon depicting the Anaconda Plan, General Scott's plan to strangle the south.

Each side determined its strategies. The Confederate leadership felt that its army only needed to defend itself to gain independence. By its tactical strengths and its material shortages, it created what Jefferson Davis named an "offensive defensive" strategy. It would strengthen its defense posture, when conditions were right, by occasional offensive strikes into the North. However, three people who had important roles in Confederate plans had different strategies. While President Davis argued for a solely defensive war, General Robert E. Lee asserted they had to fight the Union head on, and General Thomas Jackson claimed they needed to invade the Union's important cities first and defeat the enemy to reclaim the cities.

The strategy of aging Union General Winfield Scott became popularly known as the Anaconda Plan. Named for the South American snake that strangles its victims to death, the plan aimed to defeat the Confederacy by surrounding it on all sides with a blockade of Southern ports and the swift capture of the Mississippi River.

First Battle of Bull Run and the Early Stages of the War

Citizens organize a picnic to observe the Battle of Bull Run. Many incorrectly assumed the battle would be an easy union victory.

A lithograph depicting the First Battle of Bull Run.

Four slave states remained in the Union; Delaware, Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri. The four border states were all important, and Lincoln did not want them to join the Confederacy. Missouri controlled parts of the Mississippi River, Kentucky controlled the Ohio river, and Delaware was close to the important Pennsylvania city of Philadelphia. Perhaps the most important border state was Maryland. It was close to the Confederate capital, Richmond, Virginia, and the Union capital of Washington was located between pro-Confederate sections of Maryland and seceded Virginia. Lincoln knew he had to be cautious if he did not want these states to join the Confederacy. But after the Battle of Fort Sumter, all of these states except for Maryland joined the South.

Both sides had strengths and weaknesses. The North had a greater population, more factories, more supplies, and more money than the South. The South had more experienced military leadership, better-trained armies, and the advantage of fighting on familiar territory. Robert E. Lee is an example of the leadership the South relied upon. Before the Civil War, President Lincoln asked him to lead the Union army. Even though Lee was himself against slavery, he followed the people of his home state of Virginia into succession.

Support for secession and the war was not unanimous in the Confederacy, and all of the southern states provided substantial numbers of troops for the Union armies. Moreover, the presence of slavery acted as a drain of southern manpower, as adult males who might otherwise join the army were required to police the slaves.

On July 21, 1861, the armies of General Beauregard and Union General Irvin McDowell met at Manassas, Virginia in the Battle of Bull Run. Here the North originally had the upper hand, but Confederate General Thomas Jackson and his troops blocked Northern progress. Jackson's men began to retreat but Jackson stayed, standing "as a stone wall" (he was hereafter nicknamed "Stonewall Jackson"). As Confederate reinforcements arrived, McDowell's army retreated in confusion and was totally defeated. Before this, the North had nurtured a hope of quick victory over the Confederacy. The loss killed that hope. Though the Confederates achieved victory, General Beauregard did not chase stragglers of the defeated Union Army. Angered by this, Davis replaced him with General Robert E. Lee. Northern general McDowell's defeat by Confederates caused his replacement by George McClellan.

Early Southern victories raised the complete defeat of the Union. The Confederacy appointed two representatives to the United Kingdom and France. Both traveled to Europe on a British ship, the RMS Trent. A Union Captain, Charles Wilkes, seized the Trent and forced the Confederate representatives to board the Union ship. This seizure violated the neutrality of the United Kingdom. The British demanded apologies, and Lincoln eventually complied, even releasing the Confederate representatives. If he had failed to do so, the United Kingdom would have had an excuse to join with the Confederacy against the Union. Factories in the North of England depended upon Confederate cotton, and their neutrality was not assured.

Technology

The Civil War was affected by technological innovations that changed the nature of battle. The most lethal change was the introduction of rifling to muskets. In previous wars, the maximum effective range of a musket was between 70 to 110 meters. Muskets, which were smooth bore firearms, weren't accurate beyond that. Tactics involved moving masses of troops to musket range, firing a volley, and then charging the opposing force with the bayonet, which is a sword blade attached to a firearm. However, a bullet from an aimed rifled musket could hit a soldier more than 1300 meters away. This drastically improved any defense. Massed attacks were easier to stop from a longer distance. The standardization of the rifle during the revolutionary war was extended to these new armaments, and to other military supplies.

Some other key changes on land dealt with logistics -- the art of military supply -- and communications. By 1860, there were approximately 30,000 miles of railroad track, mostly in the Northern states. The railroads meant that supplies need not be obtained from local farms and cities, and that armies could operate for extended periods of time without fear of starvation. The advances in food preservation created during the Napoleonic Wars brought a wider variety of food to the soldier. In addition, armies could be moved across the country within days, without marching. Doctors could move to the wounded.

The telegraph is the third of the key technologies that changed the nature of the war. Washington City and Richmond, the capitals of the two opposing sides, could stay in touch with commanders in the field, passing on updated intelligence and orders. President Lincoln used the telegraph frequently, as did his chief general, Halleck, and field commanders such as Grant.

At sea, the greatest innovation was the introduction of ironclad warships. In 1862, the Confederate Navy built the CSS Virginia on the half-burned hull of the USS Merrimack. This ship, with iron armor, was impervious to cannon fire that would drive off or sink a wooden ship. The Virginia sank the U.S. frigate Cumberland. It might have broken the blockade of the Federal fleet if it had not been for the arrival of the ironclad USS Monitor, built by Swedish-American John Ericsson. The two met in May 1862 off Hampton Roads, Virginia. The battle was a draw, but this sufficed for the Union to continue its blockade of the Confederacy. The Virginia'had retreated into a bay where it could not be of much use, and the Confederacy later burned it to prevent Union capture.

The U.S. Civil War introduced the first American railroad artillery; a successful submarine; a "snorkel" breathing device; the periscope for trench warfare; field trenches, land-mine fields, and wire entanglements, as battles began to take place for days at a time; American use of flame throwers and naval torpedoes; aerial reconnaissance, using hot-air balloons and cameras, and antiaircraft fire; resultant camouflage and blackouts; repeating rifles; telescopic sights for rifles for the aid of snipers, fixed ammunition, and long-range rifles for general use; electronic exploding bombs and torpedoes; revolving gun turrets on boats; and a workable machine gun. As part of the organization of men and materiel, the Civil War introduced foreign social innovations such as incorporation of female and civilian support in the Northern Sanitation Fairs, an organized medical and nursing corps with bandages, opium, and other anesthetics, hospital ships, and an army ambulance corps. To supply newspapers and magazines, with their sophisticated new engraving devices, there arose a wide-range corps of press correspondents in war zones. New aids in communication included the bugle call, "Taps," and other new calls, and the wigwag signal code in battle. To enable the federal prosecution of the war, the North inaugurated American conscription, legal voting for servicemen, The U.S. Secret Service, the income, withholding, and tobacco (cigarette) taxes, and the Medal of Honor. The Southern forces created a Confederate Department of Justice. The North created the first U.S. Navy admiral. Both sides commissioned Army Chaplains. The North commissioned African-American fighters, and its first African-American U.S. Army Officer, Major M.R. Delany.

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  Battle between the USS Monitor and CSS Virginia.
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  Artillery transported by rail during the war.
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  1862 Gatling Gun, a predecessor to the modern machine gun.
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  An observation balloon is prepared, 1862.
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  A man cuts telegraph wire to slow communication.
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  Painting of the Confederate Submarine Torpedo Boat H.L. Hunley
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  US Army Pontoon Boat
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  US Army Pontoon Bridge
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  Various repeating guns, revolvers, and rifles of the Civil War in a display case.

Shiloh and Ulysses Grant

A chromolithograph depicting the Battle of Shiloh.

While Union military efforts in the East were frustrated and even disastrous, the war west of the Appalachians developed differently, resulting in the first significant battlefield successes for the North.

On the border between the Union and Confederacy, Kentucky was divided in its sentiments toward the two sides and attempted political neutrality. By the autumn of 1861, the Kentucky state government decided to support the Union, despite its being a slave state. Its indecision and the divided loyalties of its population directed the course of military operations in the West; neither North or South wished to alienate Kentucky.

Below the confluence of the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers where the Kentucky, Tennessee and Missouri borders come together, Union Brigadier General Ulysses S. Grant, under command of Major General Henry W. Halleck, conducted a series of operations that would bring him national recognition. It was just across the Mississippi from Kentucky in Columbus, Missouri that Grant fought his first major battle.

The western campaigns continued into 1862 under Halleck's overall direction with Grant continuing into Western Tennessee along the Mississippi. In February, Grant attacked and captured the Tennessean Fort Donelson, providing a significant victory for the North.

About two months after the victory at Fort Donelson, Grant fought an even more important battle at Shiloh. Confederate generals A. S. Johnston and P. G. T. Beauregard made a surprise attack on the Union army. Though the initial attack was successful, the Union made a counter-attack and the Confederates were defeated.

After the Union took Fort Donelson, Grant wanted to push onto into Charleston and Memphis, perhaps gaining control of the Eastern railroad and supply line. But General Helleck vetoed their proposal.

Grant's troops killed Confederate General Albert Johnston and defeated the Confederate troops, but at a steep price. Approximately thirteen thousand Union soldiers and eleven thousand Confederate soldiers died, and Grant lost a chance of capturing the West quickly.

Peninsular Campaign

General Stonewall Jackson was nearing Washington. To prevent Jackson from invading, Union General George McClellan left over fifty thousand men in Washington. Yet Jackson's threat was deceptive, as he did not even have five thousand men in his army. McClellan's unnecessary fear forced him to wait over half a year before continuing the war in Virginia, allowing enough time for the Confederates to strengthen their position and earning him the nickname "Tardy George. Jackson's deception had a further effect in the Peninsular Campaign, the Union attempt to take the Confederate capital Richmond without the aid of the force remaining in Washington. (The Union strategy for a quick end to the war was capturing Richmond, which was close to Washington.)

Union artillery outside Yorktown, Virginia.

In early April 1862, McClellan's troops began the Campaign, traveling over sea to the peninsula formed by the mouths of the York and James Rivers. This spit of land included Yorktown and Williamsburg and led straight to Richmond. By late May, McClellan was a few miles from Richmond, when Robert E. Lee took control of one of the Confederate Armies. After several victorious battles, it seemed as if McClellan could march to Richmond. But he refused to attack without reinforcements, which he saw as necessary to defeat Jackson's illusory troops. The forces he wanted were instead defending Washington. During the last week of June, Confederate General Robert E. Lee started the Seven Days' Battles that forced McClellan to retreat. By July, McClellan had lost over fifteen thousand men: there was little consolation in the fact that Lee had lost even more.

Other important skirmishes occurred in the course of the Peninsular Campaign. Flag Officer David Farragut of the Union Navy easily took control of the Mississippi River when he captured the key port of New Orleans in April, providing a key advantage to the Union and depriving the Confederacy of the river. The North raised a blockade around the ports of the South, cutting off dry goods such as shoes and vastly increasing inflation. (Although the Confederates produced raw materials, they did not have the industrial wherewithal to finish them -- for example, the cotton mills in the North and abroad -- or the railroads to fully distribute them.)

Second Bull Run and Antietam

Depiction of the Battle of Antietam

A new Union Army was organized at the same time under General John Pope. Pope attempted to join his army with McClellan's to combine their strengths. Stonewall Jackson headed this off by surrounding Pope's Army in Manassas, which the North called the Second Battle of Bull Run. Both sides fought on August 29, and the Confederates won against a much larger Union force.

President Lincoln meets with General McClellan following the battle.

Pope's battered Army did eventually combine with McClellan's. But the Second Battle of Bull Run had encouraged General Lee to invade Maryland. In Sharpsburg, Maryland, McClellan and Lee led their armies against each other. On September 17, 1862, the Battle of Antietam (named for a nearby creek) led to the deaths of over ten thousand soldiers from each side; no other one-day battle led to more deaths in one day. This day is called "Bloodiest day of American History". McClellan's scouts had found Lee's battle plans with a discarded packet of cigars, but he did not act on the intelligence immediately. The Union technically won the Pyrrhic victory; McClellan lost about one-sixth of his Army, but Lee lost around one-third of his. Even though they could march and end the war, McClellan didn't go forward because he thought he's already lost too many soldiers. This was the victory needed for Lincoln's Emancipation Proclamation, so that it did not appear as an act of desperation.

The Emancipation Proclamation

General McClellan seemed too defensive to Lincoln, who replaced McClellan with General Ambrose Burnside. Burnside decided to go on the offensive against Lee. In December 1862, at Fredricksburg, Virginia, Burnside's Army of the Potomac assaulted built-up Confederate positions and suffered terrible casualties to Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. The Federal superiority in numbers was matched by Lee's use of terrain and modern firepower. "Burnside's Slaughter Pen" resulted in over ten thousand Union casualties, as the North used Napoleonic tactics against the South's carbines. Burnside then again attempted to capture Richmond, but was foiled by winter weather. The "Mud March" forced the Army of the Potomac to return to winter quarters.

President Lincoln liked men who did not campaign on the abolition of slavery. He only intended to prevent slavery in all new states and territories. On the 22nd of August, 1862, Lincoln was coming to the decision that abolishing slavery might help the Union, in a letter from that time he wrote "My paramount object in this struggle is to save the Union, and is not either to save or destroy slavery. If I could save the Union without freeing any slave, I would do it; and if I could save it by freeing all the slaves, I would do it; and if I could do it by freeing some and leaving others alone, I would also do that.". Doing so would especially disrupt the Confederate economy. In September, 1862, after the Battle of Antietam, Lincoln and his Cabinet agreed to emancipate, or free, southern slaves. On January 1, 1863, Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation, which declared all slaves in rebel states "forever free."

A map showing where the Emancipation Proclamation abolished slavery. Red areas are where the Proclamation abolished slavery. Blue areas were exempt, though most had banned slavery on their own.

The constitutional authority for the Emancipation Proclamation cannot be challenged. The Proclamation did not abolish slavery everywhere; it was restricted to states "still in rebellion" against the Union on the day it took effect. The Proclamation, technically, was part of a military strategy against states that had rebelled; this was to prevent internal conflict with the border states. Still, all the border states except Kentucky and Delaware had abolished slavery on their own. Naturally, the proclamation had no way of being enforced: the Executive in the form of military action was still trying to force the Confederacy to rejoin. Nonetheless, many slaves who had heard of the Proclamation escaped when Union forces approached.

The Proclamation had another profound effect on the war: it changed the objective from forcing the Confederacy to rejoin the Union to eliminating slavery throughout the United States. The South had been trying too woo Great Britain (which relied on the South's agricultural exports, especially cotton, for manufacturing) into an alliance; now all hopes for one were eliminated. Great Britain was firmly against the institution of slavery, and it had been illegal throughout the British Empire since 1833. In fact, some slaves freed via the Underground Railroad were taken to Britain, since it was safe from bounty hunters. (Canada was too close to the U.S. for some).

Although the Union did not at first accept black freedmen for combat, it hired them for other jobs. When troops became scarce, the Union began enlisting blacks. At the end of the war, the 180,000 enlisted blacks made up about 10% of the Union Army, and 29500 enlisted blacks to Navy. Until 1864, the South refused to recognize captured black soldiers as prisoners of war, and executed several of them at Fort Pillow as escaped slaves. Lincoln believed in the necessity of black soldiers: in August 1864, he said if the black soldiers of the Union army all joined the Confederacy, "we would be compelled to abandon the war in three weeks."

Fredericksburg and Chancellorsville

Depiction of the battle of Fredericksburg

In 1863, Lincoln again changed leadership, replacing Burnside with General Joseph Hooker. Hooker had a reputation for aggressiveness; his nickname was "Fighting Joe". From May 1 to May 4, 1863, near Chancellorsville, Virginia, General Lee, again outnumbered, used audacious tactics — he divided his smaller force in two in the face of superior numbers, sending Stonewall Jackson to the Union's flank, and defeated Hooker. Again, the Confederacy won, but at a great cost. Shortly after the battle of Chancellorsville, Stonewall Jackson was accidentally shot by Confederate soldiers who didn't recognize him in the poor evening light, dying soon after.

Vicksburg

Depiction of the Battle of Vicksburg.

The North already held New Orleans. If it could control the entire Mississippi River, it could divide the Confederacy in two, making Confederate transportation of weapons and troops more difficult. Vicksburg and Fort Hudson were major Confederate ports. General Scott's "Anaconda Plan" was based on gaining control of the Mississippi.

The city of Vicksburg, Mississippi, was located on high bluffs on the eastern bank of the river. At the time, the Mississippi River went through a 180-degree U shaped bend by the city. (It has since shifted course westward and the bend no longer exists.) Guns batteries there prevented Federal steamboats from crossing. Vicksburg was also on one of the major railroads running east-west through the Confederacy. Vicksburg was therefore a key point under Confederate control.

Major General Ulysses Grant marched on land from Memphis, Tennessee, while General William Tecumseh Sherman and his troops traveled by water. Both intended to converge on Vicksburg. Both failed, at least for the time being. In December, 1862, Grant's supply line was disrupted, and Sherman had to attack alone.

Since Vicksburg had not fallen to a frontal assault, the Union forces made several attempts to bypass Vicksburg by building canals to divert the Mississippi River, but these failed.

Grant decided to attack Vicksburg again in April. Instead of approaching from the north, as had been done before, his army approached Vicksburg from the south. Grant's Army of Tennessee crossed from the West bank to the East at Big Bluff on April 18, 1863. Then, in a series of battles, including Raymond and Champion's Hill, defeated Southern forces coming to the relief of Confederate general Pemberton. Sherman and Grant together besieged Vicksburg. Two major assaults were repelled by the defenders of Vicksburg, including one in which a giant Union land mine was set off under the Confederate fortifications.

From May to July, Vicksburg remained in Confederate hands, but on July 3, 1863, one day before Independence Day, General Pemberton finally capitulated. Thirty thousand Confederates were taken prisoner, but released after taking an oath to not participate in fighting the United States unless properly exchanged (a practice called parole).

This victory cut the Confederate States in two, accomplishing one of the Union total war goals. Confederate forces would not be able to draw on the food and horses previously supplied by Texas.

This victory was very important, giving the Union control of the whole Mississippi River and effectively splitting the Confederacy. Confederate forces were now deprived of food and supplies from Texas.

Gettysburg

A Harvest of Death: dead soldiers await burial following the Battle of Gettysburg. NARA, public domain.

Background

At the same time as the opening of the Vicksburg Campaign, General Lee decided to march his troops into Pennsylvania. He had three reasons for doing this. He intended to win a major victory on Northern soil, increasing Southern morale, encouraging Northern peace activists sympathetic to the South (the "Copperheads"), and increasing the likelihood of political recognition by England and France. His hungry, poorly shod army could raid supplies from the North, reducing the burden on the Confederate economy. And he intended to encroach upon the Northern capital, forcing the recall of Federal troops from the Western Theater and easing some of the pressure on Vicksburg.

Keeping the Blue Ridge Mountains between him and the Federal army, Lee advanced up the Shenandoah Valley into West Virginia and Maryland before finally marching into South-Central Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, the Union forces moved north on roads to Lee's east, without the latter's knowledge. His cavalry commander and chief scout, Jeb Stuart, had launched a raid eastward to "ride around" the Union army. On July first, 1863, Confederate Division Leader Henry Heth's soldiers ran into John Buford's Federal cavalry unit west of the city of Gettysburg. Buford's two brigades held their ground for several hours, until the arrival of the Union 1st Corps, and then withdrew through the town. The Confederates occupied Gettysburg, but by then the Union forces had formed a strong defensive line on the hills south of the town.

The Battle

Depiction of the Battle of Gettysburg.

For the next three days, the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia faced the Union Army of the Potomac, now under the command of General George G. Meade, a Pennsylvanian who replaced Hooker, who had resigned as commander. (Hooker was given a corps command in the Army of the Cumberland, then in eastern Tennessee, where he performed satisfactorily for the remainder of the war.)

South of Gettysburg are high hills shaped like an inverted letter "J". At the end of the first day, the Union held this important high ground, partially because the Confederate left wing had dawdled moving into position. One July 2, Lee planned to attack up Emmitsburg Road from the south and west, hoping to force the Union troops to abandon the important hills and ridges. The attack went awry, and some Confederate forces, including Law's Alabama Brigade, attempted to force a gap in the Federal line between the two Round Tops, dominant heights at the extreme southern end of the Union's fish hook-shaped defensive line. Colonel Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain, commander of the 20th Maine Regiment, anchored this gap. He and the rest of his brigade, commanded by Colonel Strong Vincent, held the hill despite several hard-pressed attacks, including launching a bayonet charge when the regiment was low on ammunition.

Meanwhile, north of the Round Tops, a small ridge immediately to the west of the Federal line drew the attention of Union General Daniel Sickles, a former New York congressman, who commanded the Third Corps. He ordered his corps to advance to the peach-orchard crested ridge, which led to hard fighting around the "Devil's Den," Wheatfield, and Peach Orchard. Sickles lost a leg in the fight.

Pickett's Charge

Depiction of Pickett's Charge

On the third day of the Battle of Gettysburg, Lee decided to try a direct attack on the Union and "virtually destroy their army." Putting Lieutenant General James Longstreet in charge of the three-division main assault, he wanted his men, including the division of Major General George Pickett, to march across a mile and a half up a gradual slope to the center of the Union line. Lee promised artillery support, but any trained soldier who looked across those fields knew that they would be an open target for the Union soldiers--much the reverse of the situation six months before in Fredericksburg. However, the choice was either to attack or withdraw, and Lee was a naturally aggressive soldier.

By the end of the attack, half of Longstreet's force was dead, wounded or captured and the position was not taken. George Pickett never forgave Lee for "slaughtering" his men. Pickett's Charge, called the "High Water Mark of the Confederacy," was practically the last hope of the Southern cause at Gettysburg.

Aftermath & The Gettysburg Address

Lee withdrew across the Potomac River. Meade did not pursue quickly, and Lee was able to reestablish himself in Virginia. He offered to Confederate President Jefferson Davis to resign as commander of the Army of Northern Virginia, saying, "Everything, therefore, points to the advantages to be derived from a new commander, and I the more anxiously urge the matter upon Your Excellency from my belief that a younger and abler man than myself can readily be attained." Davis did not relieve Lee; neither did Lincoln relieve Meade, though he wrote a letter of censure, saying "Again, my dear general, I do not believe you appreciate the magnitude of the misfortune involved in Lee's escape. He was within your easy grasp, and to have closed upon him would, in connection with our other late successes, have ended the war. As it is, the war will be prolonged indefinitely."

The battle of Gettysburg lasted three days. Both sides lost nearly twenty-five thousand men each. After Gettysburg, the South remained on the defensive.

On November 19, 1863 Lincoln delivered his most famous speech in the wake of this battle. The Gettysburg Address is often cited for its brevity (it followed a two-hour speech by Edward Everett) and its masterful rhetoric. As with other early Republican documents, it placed its justification in the Founding Fathers. Unlike them, it did not place the justification of emancipation in the Constitution, but in the Declaration of Independence: "All men are created equal."

Black Americans and the Civil War

A lithograph depicting Black regiments fighting hard while storming Fort Wagner.

The view of the Union towards blacks had changed during the previous two years. At the beginning of hostilities, the war was seen as an effort to save the Union, not free slaves. Several black slaves who reached Federal lines were returned to their owners. This stopped when Major General Benjamin F. Butler, a New Jersey lawyer and prominent member of the Democratic party, announced that slaves, being the property of persons in rebellion against the United States, would be seized as "contraband of war" and the Fugitive Slave Act could not apply. "Contrabands" were, if not always welcome by white soldiers, not turned away.

However, as the struggle grew more intense, abolition became a more popular option. Frederick Douglas, a former slave, urged that the war aim of the Union include the emancipation of slaves and the enlistment of black soldiers in the Union Army. This was done on a nationwide basis in 1863, though the state of Massachusetts had raised two regiments (the 54th and 55th Massachusetts) before this.

The 54th Massachusetts Regiment was the first black regiment recruited in the North. Col. Robert Gould Shaw, the 25 year old son of very wealthy abolitionist parents, was chosen to command. On May 28, the well equipped and drilled 54th paraded through the streets of Boston and then boarded ships bound for the coast of South Carolina. Their first conflict with Confederate soldiers came on July 16, when the regiment repelled an attack on James Island. But on July 18 came the supreme test of the courage and valor of the black soldiers; they were chosen to lead the assault on Battery Wagner, a Confederate fort on Morris Island at Charleston. In addressing his soldiers before leading them in charge across the beach, Colonel Shaw said, "I want you to prove yourselves. The eyes of thousands will look on what you do tonight."

African American troops fighting for the union.

While some blacks choose to join the military fight others fought by other means. An American teacher named Mary S. Peake worked to educate the freedmen and "contraband". She spent her days under a large oak tree teaching others near Fort Monroe in Virginia. (This giant tree is now over 140 years old and called Emancipation Oak). Since Fort Monroe remained under Union control this area was some what of a safe location for refugees and runaways to come to. Soon Mary began teaching in the Brown Cottage. This endeavor, sponsored by the American Missionary Association, became the basis from which Hampton University would spawn. Mary's school would house around 50 children during the day and 20 adults at night. This remarkable American died from tuberculosis on Washington's birthday in 1862.

Confederate President Jefferson Davis reacted to the raising of black regiments by passing General Order No. 111, which stated that captured black Federal soldiers would be returned into slavery (whether born free or not) and that white officers who led black soldiers would be tried for abetting servile rebellion. The Confederate Congress codified this into law on May 1, 1863. President Lincoln's order of July 30, 1863 responded:

“

It is therefore ordered that for every soldier of the United States killed in violation of the laws of war, a rebel soldier shall be executed; and for every one enslaved by the enemy or sold into slavery, a rebel soldier shall be placed at hard labor on the public works and continued at such labor until the other shall be released and receive the treatment due to a prisoner of war.

”

Eventually the Federal forces had several divisions' worth of black soldiers. Their treatment was not equal to white soldiers: at first, for example, black privates were paid $10 a month, the same as laborers, while white privates earned $13 a month. In addition, blacks could not be commissioned officers. The pay difference was settled retroactively in 1864.

The issue of black prisoners of war was a continual contention between the two sides. In the early stages of the war, prisoners of war would be exchanged rank for rank. However, the Confederates refused to exchange any black prisoner. The Union response was to stop exchanging any prisoner of war. The Confederate position changed to allowing blacks who were born free to be exchanged, and finally to exchange all soldiers, regardless of race. By then, the Federal leadership understood that the scarcity of white Confederates capable of serving as soldiers was an advantage, and there were no mass exchanges of prisoners, black or white, until the Confederate collapse.

Chickamauga and Chattanooga

A lithograph depicting the Battle of Chickamauga.

In September 1863, Union Major General William Rosecrans decided to attempt the takeover of Chattanooga, a Confederate rail center in the eastern part of Tennessee. Controlling Chattanooga would provide a base to attack Georgia. The Confederates originally gave up Chattanooga, thinking that they could launch a devastating attack as the Union Army attempted to take control of it. Rosecrans did not, in the end, fall into such a trap. However, on November 23, 1863, the Union and Confederate Armies met at Chickamauga Creek, south of Chattanooga, upon which a rail line passed into Georgia.

The battle of Chickamauga was a Confederate victory. The Army of the Cumberland was forced to withdraw to Chattanooga, but Union General George Thomas, "the Rock of Chickamauga," and his troops prevented total defeat by standing their ground.

After Rosecrans withdrew to Chattanooga, the Confederates under General Braxton Bragg decided to besiege the city. Rosecrans was relieved of command; Lincoln's comment was that he appeared "stunned and confused, like a duck hit on the head." Meanwhile, by great effort, the Federal forces kept a "cracker line" open to supply Chattanooga with food and forage. Ulysses Grant replaced Rosecrans.

Grant's forces began to attack on November 23, 1863. On November 24 came the Battle of Lookout Mountain, an improbable victory in which Union soldiers, without the initiative of higher command, advanced up this mountain, which overlooks Chattanooga, and captured it. One of the authors of this text had an ancestor in the Confederate forces there; his comment was when the battle started, he was on top of the hill throwing rocks at the Yankees, and when it was over, the Yankees were throwing rocks at him.

By the end of November, Grant and his troops had pushed the Confederates out of East Tennessee and begun operations in Georgia.

Ulysses Grant As General-in-Chief

A 1864 photograph of General Grant at Cold Harbor.

Lincoln recognized the great victories won by Ulysses Grant. In March, 1864, the President made Grant the general-in-chief of Union Forces, with the rank of Lieutenant General (a rank only previously held by George Washington). Grant decided on a campaign of continual pressure on all fronts, which would prevent Confederate forces from reinforcing each other.

He went east and made his headquarters with General Meade's Army of the Potomac (although Grant never took direct command of this Army). The Army of the Potomac's chief mission would be to whittle down the manpower of the Army of Northern Virginia, Lee's army. In May 1864, the two sides met in Virginia near site of the previous year's Battle of Chancellorsville. The terrain was heavily wooded and movement to attack or reinforce was particularly difficult.

During the Battle of the Wilderness, the Union lost eighteen thousand soldiers, while the Confederates lost eleven thousand. Nevertheless, the Union pushed on. The two Armies fought each other again at Spotsylvania Court House and at Cold Harbor. In each case, the Union again lost large numbers of soldiers. Grant then hatched a plan to go around rather than through the Confederate Army in order to capture Richmond. At the last second, due to a hesitation by Major General "Baldy" Smith, the Army of Northern Virginia blocked the Union troops at Petersburg. Grant then decided to siege the city (and Lee's forces) and force it to surrender; if Lee could not move, he could not help other Confederate armies.

The siege took almost one year.

The Georgia Campaign and Total War

Battles for Atlanta

This victory had a significant effect on the election of 1864. Without it, there might have been more support for his Copperhead opponent General McClellan.

The March to the Sea

An engraving depicting Sherman's March to the Sea. Note the burning of buildings, destruction of roalroads, and toppling of telegraph poles. Far away from Union support, and engaging in a policy of Total War, General Sherman inflicted great damage to Confederate Logistics and Infrastructure.

The ultimate Union strategy emerged with six parts: blockade the Confederate coastlines, preventing trade; free the slaves, destroying the domestic economy; disconnect the Upper South from the Deep South by controlling the Mississippi River; further split the Confederacy by attacking the Southeast coast (Georgia, South Carolina, and North Carolina), denying access to foreign supply; capture the capital of Richmond, which would severely incapacitate the Confederacy; and engage the enemy everywhere, weakening the army through attrition.

If Richmond had indeed been captured quickly and the war had ended within a few months, the Plantation system and slavery would probably not have changed significantly. Because the South was fighting predominately in its own territory, primarily rural farmland, its soldiers could take or force food and support from the people around them. After the unsuccessful Union attacks in Virginia, Lincoln began to think about the Emancipation Proclamation, and the Union changed its strategy from a quick capture of Richmond to the destruction of the South through total war. In total war, an invading army destroys both military and non-combatant resources important to war. It can involve attacks on civilians or the destruction of civilian property. General William Sherman used total war in his March to the Sea in November and December in 1864.

Once Atlanta was taken, General Sherman and four army corps disconnected themselves from any railroad or telegraphic communications with the Union and headed through the state of Georgia. Their objective was Savannah, Georgia, a major seaport. Sherman's strategy was to inflict as much damage on the civilian population of Georgia as possible, short of killing people. To accomplish this, he issued orders to "forage liberally on the country." Many of his soldiers saw this as a license to loot any food or valuable property they could. Sherman officially disapproved of this.

Some of Sherman's neckties can be found in the South to this day.

Sherman's army carved a path of destruction 300 miles long and over 60 miles wide from Atlanta to the coastal city of Savannah. It destroyed public buildings and railroad tracks wherever it went. Troops heated railroad rails to white heat and twisted them around the trees, creating "Sherman's neckties." Sherman's strategy separated his forces from the main body of the Union army, yet maintained the men with food and weapons. It not only aided his regiments without supply lines -- Southern destruction of supply lines had previously halted Northern advances -- but destroyed supply caches for Confederate forces in the area as well. But this destruction combined with Southern army raids to throw non-combatants into starvation.

On his way to Savannah, Sherman did not burn down every town he passed through, choosing to spare some such as [Madison, Georgia for political reasons.

The Confederate forces were unable to take on Sherman's forces, and evacuated, leaving behind large amounts of supplies in the city of Savannah. Undefended, the historic city of Savannah surrendered to Sherman, and it was spared. He reached the city of Savannah on December 24, 1864, and telegraphed President Lincoln "I present to you the city of Savannah as a Christmas present."

Moving through the Carolinas

Sherman's forces then moved north into South Carolina, while faking an approach on Augusta, Georgia; the general's eventual goal was to coordinate his forces with those of General Grant in Virginia and entrap and destroy Lee's Army of Northern Virginia. The pattern of destruction by the Union soldiers continued, often with a more personal feeling of vengeance. A Federal soldier said to his comrades, "Here is where treason began and, by God, here is where it will end!"

On February 17, 1865, Sherman's forces reached Columbia, the capital of South Carolina. After a brief bombardment, the city surrendered. However, a large stock of whiskey was left behind as the Confederates retreated. Drunken soldiers broke discipline; convicts were let loose from the city jail, and somehow fires broke out, destroying much of the city.

Hood's Invasion of Tennessee and the Battle of Nashville

Spring Hill

The battle of Spring Hill was fought on November 29, 1864, at Spring Hill, Tennessee. The Confederates attacked the Union as it retreated from Columbia. The Confederates were not able to inflict significant damage to the retreating Union force. So the Union Army was still able to make it safely north to Franklin during the night. The following day the Confederates decided to follow the Union and attack a much more fortified group at the Battle of Franklin. This did not prove to be a wise decision, as the Confederates suffered many casualties.

Franklin

The Battle of Franklin was fought on November 30, 1864 at Franklin, Tennessee. This battle was a devastating loss for the Confederate Army. It detrimentally shut down their leadership. Fourteen Confederate Generals were extinguished with 6 killed, 7 wounded and 1 captured. 55 Regimental Commanders were casualties as well. After this battle the Confederate Army in this area was effectively handicapped.

Nashville

Chromolithograph of the Battle of Nashville. Note the Black soldiers advancing over the ridge.

In one of the decisive battles of the war, two brigades of black troops helped crush one of the Confederacy's finest armies at the Battle of Nashville on December 15-16, 1864. Black troops opened the battle on the first day and successfully engaged the right of the rebel line. On the second day Col. Charles R. Thompson's black brigade made a brilliant charge up Overton Hill. The 13th US Colored Troops sustained more casualties than any other regiment involved in the battle.

Fort Pillow

The Battle of Fort Pillow was fought on was fought on April 12, 1864, at Fort Pillow on the Mississippi River at Henning, Tennessee. The battle ended with a massacre of surrendered Union African-American troops under the direction of Confederate Brigadier General Nathan Bedford Forrest.

The End of the Confederacy

The Siege of Petersburg

Ruins of Richmond following the Siege of Petersburg.

The Siege of Petersburg, also known as The Richmond Petersburg Campaign, began on June 15, 1864 with the intent by the Union Army to take control of Petersburg which was Virginia's second largest city and the supply center for the Confederate capital at Richmond. The campaign lasted 292 days and concluded with the occupation of Union forces on April 3, 1865. Thirty-two black infantry and cavalry regiments took part in the siege.

First Battle of Deep Bottom

The First Battle of Deep Bottom is also known as Darbytown, Strawberry Plains, New Market Road, and Gravel Hill. It was part of The Siege of Petersburg, and was fought July 27-29, 1864, at Deep Bottom in Henrico County, Virginia.

The Crater

A photograph of the Crater about 47 years later in 1911.

The Battle of the Crater was part of the Siege of Petersburg and took place on July 30, 1864. The battle took place between the Confederate Army of Northern Virginia and the Union Army of Potomac. The battle was an unusual attempt by the Union to penetrate the Confederate defenses south of Petersburg, VA. The battle showed to be a Union disaster. The Union Army went into battle with 16,500 troops, under the direct command of Ulysses S. Grant; the Confederate Army was commanded by Robert E. Lee and entered battle with 9,500 troops. Pennsylvania miners in the Union general Ambrose E. Burnside's Ninth Corps, worked for several weeks digging a long tunnel, and packing it with explosives. The explosives were then detonated at 3:15 on the morning of July 30, 1864. Burnside originally wanted to send a fresh division of black troops against the breach, but his superiors, Ulysses S. Grant, ruled against it. The job, chosen by short straw, went to James H. Ledlie. Ledlie watched from behind the lines as his white soldiers, rather than go around, pile into the deep crater, which was 170 feet long, 60 feet across, and 30 feet deep. They were not able to escape making the Union soldiers easy targets for the Confederates. The battle was marked by the cruel treatment of black soldiers who took part in the fight, most of them were captured and murdered. The battle ended with a confederate victory. The Confederacy took out 3,798 Union soldiers, while the Union were only able to defeat 1,491 Confederate soldiers. The United States Colored Troops suffered the most with their casualties being 1,327 which would include 450 men being captured.

Second Deep Bottom

The Second Battle of Deep Bottom was fought August 14-20, 1864, at Deep Bottom in Henrico County, Virginia; it was part of the Siege of Petersburg. The battle is also known as Fussell's Mill, Kingsland Creek, White's Tavern, Bailey's Creeks, and Charles City Road. General Winfield Scott Hancock came across the James River at Deep Bottom where he would threaten Richmond, Virginia. This would also cause the Confederates to leave Peterburgs, Virginia and the trenches and Shenandoah Valley.

Appomattox

A painting of General Lee surrendering at Appomattox Court House.

Sherman did not stop in Georgia. As he marched North, he burnt several towns in South Carolina, including Columbia, the capital. (Sherman's troops felt more anger towards South Carolina, the first state to secede and in their eyes responsible for the war.) In March 1865, Lincoln, Sherman, and Grant all met outside Petersburg. Lincoln called for a quick end to the Civil War. Union General Sheridan said to Lincoln, "If the thing be pressed I think Lee will surrender." Lincoln responded, "Let the thing be pressed."

On April 2, 1865, the Confederate lines of Petersburg, Richmond's defense, which had been extended steadily to the west for 9 months, broke. General Lee informed President Davis he could no longer hold the lines; the Confederate government then evacuated Richmond. Lee pulled his forces out of the lines and moved west; Federal forces chased Lee's forces, annihilated a Confederate rear guard defense, and finally trapped the Army of Northern Virginia. General Lee requested terms. The two senior Army officers met each other near Appomattox Courthouse in Virginia on April 9th,1865. The men met at the home of Wilmer McLean. The gathering lasted about two and half hours. Grant offered extremely generous terms, requiring only that Lee's troops surrender and swear not to bear arms till the end of the War. This meeting helped to nearly end the bloodiest war in American history.

General Sherman met with Confederate General Robert E. Lee to discuss the surrender of Confederate troops in the South. Sherman initially allowed even more generous terms than Grant. However, the Secretary of War refused to accept the terms because of the assassination of Abraham Lincoln by the Confederate John Wilkes Booth. By killing Lincoln at Ford's Theater, Booth made things worse for the Confederacy. Sherman was forced to offer harsher terms of surrender than he originally proposed, and General Johnston surrendered on April 26 under the Appomattox terms. All Confederate armies had surrendered by the end of May, ending the Civil War.

Notable Raids

The Great Locomotive Chase resulted in the first Medal of Honor being issued.

Morgan's Raid was a Confederate raid that went deep into Union territory.

Besides the Fighting

Not all the important events of the Civil War took place on the battlefield.

Petroleum Nasby

Operating under the pseudonym "Petroleum V. Nasby", journalist David Ross Locke gained a large amount of popularity by Union residents during the war, including by President Abraham Lincoln. "Petroleum V Nasby" was a mockery of Pro South Democrats, with his published letters being filled with misspellings, drunkenness, vitriol, bigotry, and a general desire to slack and grift his way to a comfy position as a postmaster.

Domestic Affairs

On April 22, 1864, the U.S. Congress passed the Coinage Act of 1864 which mandates that the inscription "In God We Trust" be placed on all coins minted as United States currency.

Dr. Rebecca Lee Crumpler becomes the first black woman to receive a medical degree in 1864.

As far back as the 1850s Whig interests had introduced three bills to Congress: a homestead act, a Pacific railroad act, and grants to establish agricultural and technical colleges. These measures were seen as remedies for the depression of 1857. Southern interests had vetoed all of them. Now Republicans took advantage of a legislature free of slave interests.

On May 20, 1862, the United States Congress passed the Homestead Act. Now any adult American citizen, or a person intending to become an American citizen, who was the head of a household, could qualify for a grant of 160 acres (67 hectares) of land by paying a small fee and living on the land continuously for five years. If a person was willing to pay $1.25 an acre, the time of occupation dwindled to six months.

The Pacific Railway Acts of 1862 and 1864 enabled the United States Government to make a direct grant of land to railway companies for a transcontinental railroad, as well as a payment of $48,000 for every mile of track completed and lower-than-prime rate loans for any railway company who would build such a railway. The Central Pacific and the Union Pacific began to construct lines. The two railways finally met four years after the war, in Promontory Point, Utah, in 1869.

The third major bill of these three, which established a land-grant university, is discussed below.

The Draft

The federal government started a draft lottery in July 1863. Men could avoid the draft by paying $300, or hiring another man to take their place. This caused resentment among the lower classes as they could not afford to dodge the draft. On Monday, July 13, 1863, between 6 and 7 A.M., the Civil War Draft Riots began in New York City. Rioters attacked the draft offices, the Bull's Head Hotel on 44th Street, and more upscale residences near 5th Avenue. They lynched black men, burned down the Colored Orphan Asylum on 5th Avenue between 43rd and 44th Streets, and forced hundreds of blacks out of the city. Members of the 7th New York Infantry and 71st New York Infantry subdued the riot.

Military Intelligence

A reproduction of a Confederate cipher disk based on a Vigenère cipher. As the war raged in 1863, a Prussian officer published a general method for breaking such ciphers.

Both the Union and the Confederacy operated intelligence gathering efforts during the Civil War.

A number of Women conducted Espionage during the war. Harriot Tubman was one such spy for the Union.

The Confederate Secret Service and the Confederate Signal Corps both conducted espionage for the Confederacy.

The Union intercepted a number of Confederate cipher messages during the war.

Indigenous People

While Lincoln proved to be instrumental in the emancipation of blacks, the Native Americans were not so lucky. Lincoln was responsible for the largest mass hanging in United States history. Thirty-eight Native Americans from the Santee Sioux tribe were hung on December 26, 1862. The US government failed to honor its treaties with the Indian Nations. They were supposed to supply the Indians with money and food for signing a treaty to turn over more than one million acres of land. Instead the agents kept the money and sold the food that was supposed to go the Indians to the white settlers. The food that was given to the Indians was spoiled and unfit for human consumption. Subsequently, the Indians went off the reservation in hunting parties to try to find suitable food. One of the Indian hunting groups took some eggs from a white settler's land and that caused this extreme government action. Authorities in Minnesota asked President Lincoln to order the execution of all 303 Indian males. However, Lincoln was afraid of how Europe would react so he tried to compromise. They would only execute those who were in the group. Lincoln also agreed to kill or remove every Indian from the state and provide Minnesota with 2 million dollars in federal funds. Ironically, he owed the Sioux only 1.4 million dollars for the land.

Education

Land Grant Universities

An early building at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. A number of notable institutions, such as the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, are Land Grant Universities. These Institutions would have major impacts on American life through their scientific and technological developments.

In the Morrill Act of 1862, the government granted land to Union states to sell for funding educational institutions. This excluded the states which had seceded from the Union. The schools would teach military tactics, agriculture, and engineering. This answered the Republican campaign promise of 1860. These "Land Grant Universities" were proposed to spread small farm prosperity, as opposed to the large, inherited plantations, and to increase industrial innovations across a wider area.

1860's schoolhouses

In the 1860s, most schools were small, multiple grades were taught in one classroom at one time. Paper was expensive, and the more prosperous schools had students write their problems on individual student slates. Memorization was a common means of learning, and student knowledge was measured by oral recitation. Teachers often punished "bad children" with the dunce cap, a rap on a palm with a ruler, hitting or spanking, or even striking a child with a rod or a whip. Corporal punishment was seen as simply one way of enforcing obedience. Teacher and parent both generally agreed that obedience was the trait of good children.

Literacy

Farming was still a major form of employment in America. It had been so since the first semester, the time when students were allowed to be in school because the crops had been sown. Students worked in the fields during harvest time, and most left school for good to work on a farm. Abraham Lincoln himself, as a youth on the frontier, had had little schooling. Yet despite these brief periods of education, the reading levels were actually quite high. By the fifth grade students were sometimes reading books that we would consider college level, and Latin was still a part of many curricula.

Academies

Academies during this time provided education for children between the ages of thirteen and twenty. These academies offered an array of classes. Most of the academies kept the boys and girls separate. There were also seminaries, or private schools, which might cater to boys or girls. Girl's schools varied widely. Emily Dickinson's school, Amherst Academy, taught Mental Philosophy, Geology, Latin, and Botany. Some schools left girls idle, with not even what we would call physical education. Others taught non-intellectual, "feminine" skills such as deportment, needle craft, and perhaps arts and crafts. The Home Economics movement, inaugurated by Catherine Beecher, advocated teaching homemaking skills in school. It also promoted female physical education. In contrast, feminists such as Susan B. Anthony and Emma Willard, and reformers such as Jane Addams and Mary McLeod Bethune, wanted to expand women's education into the plane of men. These women helped establish the higher education institutions where women were able to take classes not otherwise offered to them. The first co-educational college was Oberlin College, established in 1833. The first all-women's college was Vassar College in 1861.

Questions For Review

1. What are the four principal causes of the Civil War?

2. Why did Sherman feel compelled to adopt the total war strategy in his March to the Sea? What are the advantages and disadvantages of this strategy?

3. The Morrill Act of 1862, the Homestead Act of 1862, and the Pacific Railroad Acts of 1862 and 1864: why did slave-holding Southern interests oppose their predecessors? What effect did they have?

Reconstruction (1865 - 1877)

Start of Reconstruction

A railyard in Atlanta, Georgia in 1866. Following the Civil War, the south was devastated.

Congress passed the first Reconstruction Act on 2nd March, 1867. The South was now divided into five military districts, each under a major general. New elections were to be held in each state with freed male slaves being allowed to vote. The act also included an amendment that offered readmission to the Southern states after they had ratified the Fourteenth Amendment and guaranteed adult male suffrage. President Andrew Johnson immediately vetoed the bill but Congress re-passed the bill the same day.

Andrew Johnson consulted General Ulysses S. Grant before selecting the generals to administer the military districts. Eventually he appointed John Schofield (Virginia), Daniel Sickles (the Carolinas), John Pope (Georgia, Alabama and Florida), Edward Ord (Arkansas and Mississippi) and Philip Sheridan (Louisiana and Texas).

During the American Civil War, in which the nation decided how to handle the return of the seceded states and the status of the Freedmen (the newly freed slaves). Most scholars have accepted 1865-1877 as the boundaries for Reconstruction.

The era itself was controversial and pitted various segments of American society against one another. Differing conceptions on how to restore the former Confederate States into the Union collided with diverse opinions concerning the status of African-Americans.

The meaning of freedom itself was at stake in this crucial time period. The nascent Republican Party was divided between the mainstream which wanted a modicum of protection for blacks, and the Radicals, who wanted a thorough reorganization of Southern society. Conservative elements of this time period (in particular the Democrats) believed that the old order that governed relations between the states and between blacks and whites should remain intact.

The bulk of African-Americans desired equal civil and political rights, protection of their person, and in many cases a redistribution of land and the break-up of the plantation system. These diverse perspectives enabled the period from 1865 to 1877 to be, in many ways, a grand experiment in interracial democracy, but the period was also dominated by tense political relations and a preponderant violence across the South.

Definition

Reconstruction, in United States history, refers both to the period after the Civil War when the states of the breakaway Confederate States of America were reintegrated into the United States of America, and to the process by which this was accomplished.

For victory in the American Civil War to be achieved, Northern moderate Republicans and Radical Republicans concurred that the Confederacy and its system of slavery had to be destroyed, and the possibility of either being revived had to be eliminated. Controversy focused on how to achieve those goals, and who would decide when they were achieved. The Radical Republicans held that reaching those goals was essential to the destruction of the Slave Power, and necessary to guaranteeing perpetual unity of the states, as well as a solution to the many problems of Freedmen.

United States Senator Charles Sumner of Massachusetts, a Radical Republican, held that Congress should abolish slavery along with the Confederacy, extend civil and political rights to blacks, and educate black and white students together.

The "moderates" claimed early success in achieving the goals by assurances that the former Confederates had renounced secession and abolished slavery. Most moderates, like Abraham Lincoln and Andrew Johnson, wanted suffrage for black army veterans but not other African Americans. Southern political leaders renounced secession and gave up slavery, but were angered in 1867 when their state governments were ousted by federal military forces, and replaced by Radical Republican governments made up of Freedmen, Carpetbaggers and Scalawags.

Their primary instrument was the Black Codes (1865). These restricted the rights of Blacks and limited economic and educational opportunities. For example, there was very little, if any, employment available in the south. The Yankees may have won the war to end slavery, however the reconstruction did not benefit the African Americans who searched for employment.

The Problem of Reconstruction

Wealth per capita in the United States in 1872. The South was devastated.

Reconstruction was the effort of rebuilding the South based on free labor instead of slave labor. The issue to Northern politicians was how it would be done. At the end of the Civil War, Congress proposed the Thirteenth Amendment, which sought to prohibit slavery. A state was not to gain re-admittance into the Union until it ratified the Amendment, but some states such as Mississippi were admitted despite failing to ratify. The Amendment became a part of the Constitution in December 6,1865.

During this time many Northerners moved to the South to start new lives. Sometimes carrying their belongings in briefcases made of carpet, they were known by Confederate Southerners as "carpetbaggers." Confederate Southerners also had a derogatory name for southern whites who sided with the Republicans. They called them scalawags. The period just after the war also saw the rise of black codes, which restricted the basic human rights of freed slaves. Some of the more common codes seen were: race was dependent on blood, which meant if you had any amount of black blood in your body, you were considered black, freedmen could not get together unless accompanied by a white person, public restrooms and other facilities were segregated.

This time in history was really volatile. Many racially motivated riots broke out all over the country. The hostilities the south held toward the north and the African Americans grew stronger and stronger.

Ku Klux Klan

KKK in Mississippi

Ku Klux Klan (KKK) is the name of several past and present organizations in the United States that have advocated white supremacy, anti-Semitism, anti-Catholicism, racism, homophobia, anti-Communism and nativism. These organizations have often used terrorism, violence, and acts of intimidation, such as cross burning and lynching, to oppress African Americans and other social or ethnic groups.

The first branch of the Ku Klux Klan was established in Pulaski, Tennessee, in May, 1866. A year later, a general organization of local Klans was established in Nashville in April, 1867. Most of the leaders were former members of the Confederate Army and the first Grand Wizard was Nathan Forrest, an outstanding general during the American Civil War. During the next two years Klansmen wearing masks, white cardboard hats and draped in white sheets, tortured and killed black Americans and sympathetic whites. Immigrants, who they blamed for the election of Radical Republicans, were also targets of their hatred. Between 1868 and 1870, the Ku Klux Klan played an important role in restoring white rule in North Carolina, Tennessee, and Georgia.

The Klan's first incarnation was in 1866. Founded by veterans of the Confederate Army, its main purpose was to resist Reconstruction. It focused as much on intimidating "carpetbaggers" and "scalawags" as on putting down the freed slaves. The KKK quickly adopted violent methods. A rapid reaction set in. The Klan's leadership disowned violence as Southern elites saw the Klan as an excuse for federal troops to continue their activities in the South. The organization declined from 1868 to 1870 and was destroyed in the early 1870s by President Ulysses S. Grant's vigorous action under the Civil Rights Act of 1871 (also known as the Ku Klux Klan Act).

At the end of the American Civil War, members of Congress attempted to destroy the white power structure of the Rebel states. The Freeman’s Bureau was established by Congress on March 3rd, 1865. The bureau was designed to protect the interests of former slaves. This included helping them to find new employment and to improve educational and health facilities. In the year that followed, the bureau spent $17,000,000 establishing 4,000 schools, 100 hospitals and providing homes and food for former slaves.

Violence against African Americans started on the first days of Reconstruction and became more organized significant after 1867. Members of The Klan looked to frustrate Reconstruction. They also, tried to keep freedom in subjection. Terrorism dominated some counties and regions so, nighttime harassment, whippings, beatings, rapes, and murders became more common. The Klan's main purpose was political, even though, they tormented blacks who stood up for their rights. Active Republicans were the target of lawless night riders. When freedmen that worked for a South Carolina scalawag started to vote, terrorists went to the plantation and, in the words of a victim, "whipped every ... [black] man they could lay their hands on."

Lincoln and Reconstruction

A drawing of African Americans voting for the first time. Jim Crow laws would later be developed to deprive African Americans of their civil liberties once again.

Lincoln firmly believed that the southern states had never actually seceded, because, constitutionally, they cannot. He hoped that the 11 states that seceded could be "readmitted" by meeting some tests of political loyalty. Lincoln began thinking about re-admittance early on. In his Proclamation of Amnesty and Reconstruction, which was issued in 1863, Lincoln established a simple process, hoping that Unionists would rise to political power rather than secessionalists. This plan would have granted presidential pardons to all southerners (save the political leaders at the time) who took an oath of future allegiance to the Union. Under Lincoln's plan, a state could be established as legitimate as soon as 10 percent of the voting population in the 1860 general election took this oath and a government was set up accepting the emancipation of the slaves.

Rejecting Lincoln's Presidential reconstruction plan, radical Republicans in congress arguing that it was too lenient, passed the Wade-Davis bill in 1864, which proposed far more demanding terms. It required 50 percent of the voters to take the loyalty oath and allowed only those who could swear that they had never supported the confederacy to run for office or hold federal employment. Lincoln rejected this plan and pocket-vetoed the bill. In March 1865, Congress created a new agency, the Freedman's Bureau. This agency provided food, shelter, medical aid, help to find employment, education, and other needs for blacks and poor whites. The Freedman's Bureau was the largest scale federal aid relief plan at this time. It was the first large scale governmental welfare program.

Artwork depicting the assassination of President Abraham Lincoln. This horrific event led to Andrew Johnson assuming the Presidency, which would radically change the course of southern reconstruction.

In 1864, his Vice Presidential running mate was the only Southern Senator to remain loyal to the Union - Andrew Johnson from Tennessee. After Lincoln was assassinated on April 14, 1865, and Johnson became President, the latter proved to be an obstacle to the Radical Republicans in Congress, who attempted to completely overhaul the Southern government and economy, which would have caused further tensions.

In May, 1865, Johnson made his own proclamation, one that was very similar to Lincoln's. Offering amnesty to almost all Confederates who took an oath of allegiance to the Union, Johnson also reversed General Sherman's decision to set aside land for the express use of freed slaves. Not long after Johnson took office, all of the ex-Confederate states were able to be readmitted under President Johnson's plan. In 1866, Johnson vetoed two important bills, one that bolstered the protection that the Freedmen's Bureau gave to blacks and a civil rights bill that gave full citizenship to blacks.

After realizing that if all of the Republicans, moderate and radical alike, united, they could overcome Johnson's vetoes, they soon passed the Civil Rights Act of 1866 and the Fourteenth Amendment. This amendment declared citizenship for all persons born in the United States and required the states to respect the rights of all US citizens. The Civil Rights Act outlawed the black codes that had been prevalent throughout the South.

Over Johnson's vetoes, Congress passed three Reconstruction acts in 1867. They divided the southern states into five military districts under the control of the Union army. The military commander in charge of each district was to ensure that the state fulfilled the requirements of Reconstruction by ratifying the Fourteenth Amendment and by providing voting rights without a race qualification. Tennessee was not included in the districts because it had ratified the Fourteenth Amendment in 1866 and was quickly readmitted to the Union.

In 1868, the House of Representatives impeached Andrew Johnson. Earlier, Congress had passed the Tenure of Office Act (over Johnson's veto), which required the President to dismiss officers only with the advice and consent of the Senate if he appointed them with the same advice and consent. Johnson believed that the Act was unconstitutional (and the Supreme Court, years after his Presidency, agreed in 1926), and intentionally violated it, to "test the waters." Radical Republicans used this violation as an excuse to impeach Johnson, who was acquitted by one vote in the Senate.

In the election of 1868, Ulysses Grant was nominated for the Republican ticket and won on an incredibly small margin. Republicans noticed that if they did not act swiftly to protect the voting rights of blacks, they might soon lose a majority. Thus, Congress passed the Fifteenth Amendment in 1869, which enforced that the suffrage of male citizens shall not be denied on account of race. This was a major blow to the women's movement, as it was the first time gender was deliberately placed into the Constitution. Republicans claimed that if the amendment had included both race and gender discrimination clauses, it would have never had a chance to pass in Congress.

African-Americans in Congress

Hiram Rhodes Revels, the first African American to serve in Congress

A number of African-Americans were elected for the first time in American history during this period. With the Reconstruction Acts sending federal troops in the southern states where African-Americans held majorities in South Carolina and Mississippi, and nearly equal numbers with whites in Louisiana, Florida, Georgia, and Alabama, Blacks were elected to Congress from these states.

John Willis Menard was elected in the 2nd District of Louisiana in 1868. His challenger, Caleb Hunt, filed an objection with the election result and the House of Representatives, upon hearing arguments from both candidates, decided to seat neither of them.

Hiram Revels was elected by the Mississippi Senate by an 81-15 margin to finish the term of Mississippi Senator Albert G. Brown, who vacated the seat during the Civil War. Revels served from February 23, 1870 to March 3, 1871.

Joseph Rainey was elected to the US House of Representatives from South Carolina's 1st District in the elections of 1870. He was the longest serving African-American member of congress prior to William L. Dawson in the 1950's.

Blanche Bruce was elected to serve a full term in the US Senate by the Mississippi state senate in 1871. Bruce was the only former slave to ever serve in the US Senate.

Alaskan Purchase

A painting depicting the signing of the Alaska Treaty of Cessation on March 30, 1867.

Beginning in the 1770's the Russian Empire began colonizing Alaska. On March 30, 1867 the American Government purchased Alaska from the Russian empire for 7.2 million dollars. The decision was widely ridiculed at the time, but the purchase was later proven to be a bargain when gold and oil were discovered there. The few Russian settlers in the territory were given three years to return to Russia, with the option of staying and becoming American citizens.

The Panic of 1873

A bank run in New York City during the Panic of 1873.

The Panic of 1873 was the first depression experienced by America and Europe following the Civil War. The depression was a result of the fall for an international demand for silver. Germany stopped using the silver standard after the Franco-Prussia war. The United States enacted the Coinage Act of 1873 which shifted the backing of our monetary system with gold and silver to just gold. The act immediately depreciated the value of silver and hurt western mining operations. Another factor that influenced the Panic of 1873 was the risky over investment into railroad companies that would not bring quick returns. The Jay Cook and Company was a United States bank that declared bankruptcy on September 18, 1873. The bank went under as a result of over investment in the railroad business. As a result, the New York Stock Exchange closed for ten days starting September 20, 1873. 89 of 364 railroad companies failed during the depression. Real estate values, wages, and profits by corporations decreased over the course of the panic. Thousands of businesses fell during the depression as well. The depression was a major highlight in President Grant's second term.

The Great Railroad Strike of 1877

Blockade of engines during the strike.

The strike started on July 14, 1877 in Martinsburg, West Virginia. The strike was caused by wage cuts from the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad Company. The workers refused to let the railroad operate. State militia was sent in to quell the strike but would not fire upon the strikers. Governor Henry Mathews called upon federal troops to put down the strike and resume operations of the railroad. The strike spread to Cumberland, Maryland. Troops in Maryland fired upon the mob of strikers and killed ten rioters. The strike occurred in Philadelphia, Baltimore, Pittsburgh, and even spread to St. Louis. The strikes resulted in millions of dollars of property damage the casualties of many. The great strike lasted 45 days, after finally being put down by federal troops from city to city.

Republicans fall from power

Grant's presidency would bring about the decline of the Republican Party. He appointed a great number of corrupt officials to federal positions and to his cabinet. Many split with the party over that issue. Others grew tired of Reconstruction and proposed reconciliation with the South in a peaceful manner. These people called themselves Liberal Republicans, and nominated Horace Greeley to run against Grant in 1872. The Democrats also endorsed Greeley. Despite wide support, Grant won the election of 1872 decisively.

During the election season, Liberal Republicans were busy pushing the Amnesty Act through Congress, and in May 1872, it passed. The Amnesty Act pardoned most former Confederate citizens, and allowed them to run for office. The act restored the rights to the Democratic majorities in the South. Soon, Democrats had control of the Virginia and North Carolina governments. In states with black Republican majorities, the Ku Klux Klan (formed after the civil war as a white supremacist group) terrorized Republicans and forced them to vote Democratic or not at all. By 1876, Republicans controlled only three states in the South: Florida, Louisiana, and South Carolina-- all of which were still occupied by Union troops.

Republicans continued to decline during Grant's second term, after many high level political scandals came to light. Most shocking to the public was that a scandal involved the Vice President, and another involved the Secretary of War. The Northern population's confidence in the party was shaken even more when the nation slipped into a Depression that same year.

In the congressional elections of 1874, Republicans would suffer huge losses in both houses, and for the first time since before the start of the Civil War, Democrats were able to gain control of a part of Congress (the House). Congress no longer was able to be committed strongly to Reconstruction.

The certificate for the electoral vote for Rutherford B. Hayes and William A. Wheeler for the State of Louisiana

In the election of 1876, Democrats nominated New York governor S.J. Tilden to run, and the Republicans nominated Ohio governor Rutherford B. Hayes. On election day, it seemed that Tilden would win by more than 250,000 votes. But the seven, four, and eight electoral votes from South Carolina, Florida, and Louisiana, respectively, were disputed (Northern troops still occupied these states). Also, one of Oregon's three electoral votes was disputed. If Hayes won all 20 votes, he would win the election. Congress created a special commission of seven Democrats, seven Republicans, and one independent to review the election and decide a winner. But the independent resigned, and a Republican was appointed to take his place. The commission voted along party lines to award Hayes the election, but Democrats warned that they would fight the decision.

Republican and Democratic leaders secretly met up to draw up a compromise, and the result of the meeting was the Compromise of 1877. Proclaiming that Hayes would win the election, troops left the South and more aid was given to the South; it marked the end of Reconstruction. Ultimately, Reconstruction and the Compromise itself would be failures, as Democrats refused to hold up their end of the compromise, which was to protect the rights of African Americans in the South.

The period after Reconstruction saw the rise of the Democratic "Redeemers" in the South. The Redeemers vowed to take back the South from Republican rule, which had been ousted after the 1876 election. They passed Jim Crow laws, which segregated blacks and whites, and put voting restrictions on blacks that wouldn't be outlawed until the next century. Jim Crow laws were challenged in Plessy v. Ferguson, when the Supreme Court voted to uphold the laws if and only if segregated facilities remained "separate but equal."

Sinmiyangyo

A captured Sujagi, flag of a commanding general, on the USS Colorado in 1871.

The United States expedition to Korea in 1871, also known as Sinmiyangyo (Western Disturbance of the Year Sinmi year) was the first American military action in Korea. It took place predominantly on and around the Korean island of Ganghwa. America sent a military expeditionary force to Korea to support an American diplomatic delegation sent to establish trade and diplomatic relations with Korea, to ascertain the fate of the General Sherman merchant ship, and to establish a treaty assuring aid for shipwrecked sailors. The isolationist Joseon Dynasty government and the assertive Americans led to a misunderstanding between the two parties that changed a diplomatic expedition into an armed conflict. The United States won a minor military victory, but the Koreans refused to open up the country to them. As the U.S. forces in Korea did not have the authority or strength to press the issue, the United States failed to secure their diplomatic objectives.

Religion During the 19th Century

The New Wave of Jewish Immigration

1887 picture depicting European immigrants arriving in New York City.

Between the years of 1820 and 1880, about 250,000 Jews came to the U.S. The immigration was not only based in a troubled European economy but also in the 1848 failure of liberal revolutions in the German states.

Railways and the great steamer ships opened up immigration to America in the later 1800s and early 1900s. Yet the trip was dirty, uncomfortable, and dangerous. While prosperous families in upper-class compartments had private cabins, most of the immigrants went across in steerage class: three hundred tightly-packed men, women and children, sleeping on double- or even triple-bunk beds. The beds were about six feet long and two feet wide, with only two-and-a-half feet separating each bunk. Their goods, such as they were, rested on the bunk. The people had little or no running water, the stench was incredible, and there was little recourse against vermin. One witness, a Sophia Kreitzberg, said, "When you scratched your head [. . .] you got lice on your hands." This close environment joined with the background of privation and the strain of long travel to cause break-outs of diseases. The Jews were served unkosher meat and soup, which many refused to eat. Instead they nibbled on what they had brought with them, mostly dried fruit, hard bread, or stale cheese.

At the other end of the passage was often a few ports of entry to the United States. From 1855 to 1890 this was predominantly Castle Garden (also called Castle Clinton), a point at the tip of Manhattan Island in what would later be called New York City. From 1890 onward a vast number of immigrants came through the new reception area at Ellis Island. In these places human beings were duly categorized by ship, country of origin, past employment, and other relevant information. (This next footnote shows one such document from Castle Garden.)

Catholic America

James Gibbons, a prominent Catholic leader in the United States from the 1860's to the early 1900's.

A political cartoon from 1875, protraying the Catholic church as an enemy of American public education. Thomas Nast feared that public money would be shifted from public education to support Catholic education.

Catholic Immigration

A massive influx of immigrants from Ireland, Italy, Germany, Austria-Hungary, and the Russian Empire (most notably Poland) caused a dramatic increase in the U.S. Catholic population during the latter half of the 19th century. From 1840 to 1851 Ireland suffered famine and oppression. The other immigration was caused by nationalization and national upheavals. By 1850 Catholicism had become the United States' largest religious denomination: between 1860 and 1890 the Catholic population tripled, mostly because of immigration. This massive influx of Catholics to the United States eventually led to a significant increase of power for the Catholic church.

Persecution

American Protestants often feared the increasing power and prominence of American Catholics. In pre-Civil War America anti-Catholic prejudice was shown through the "Know Nothings" and the American branch of the Orange Institution. After the war the American Protective Association, and the Ku Klux Klan regularly persecuted and discriminated against Catholics with such acts as The Philadelphia Nativist Riot, "Bloody Monday", and the Orange Riots of New York City in 1871 and 1872.

Nativism

The severe anti-Catholic activities revealed the sentiments of Nativism, which encouraged all "native-born American men" to rise up against foreigners. (This appeal went out to European-descended Protestants, of course, rather than the actual Native Americans who lived there before the had settled here.)

The first Nativist publication was called The Protestant; its first edition sold on January 2nd, 1830. Its editor was George Bourne, and as he wrote, "the goal of the paper is centered around the denunciation of the Catholic faith" Anti-Catholic rhetoric was occasionally met with violence; yet the Nativists produced one of the greatest violent acts of the 1830's. On August 10, 1834, forty to fifty people gathered outside the Ursuline Convent school and burned it to the ground. In 1834 F. B. Morse, a nativist leader who was a professor of sculpture and painting at New York University, wrote "The Foreign Conspiracies Against the Liberties of the United States", in which his basic message is centered around protecting the American birth right of liberty.

The concern, and fear of the foreign and Catholic communities grew out of the Protestant fear of the monarchial tendencies of Catholicism, during this time urban areas were also starting to grow rapidly with the massive influx of immigrants who all congregated and lived in the same areas. Nativists saw this as an act of "clannishness", and an attempt to avoid or resist "Americanization." With the success of Morse, and his contemporary Lyman Beecher, the nativist movement reached a point where the public did not care whether the stories they heard were true or false, but began to accept works of fiction as truth as well.

In 1836 Maria Monk authored a worked called "Awful Disclosures of the Hotel Dieu Nunnery of Montreal." In her book she tells of her experiences with Catholicism, which involved forced sexual intercourse with priests and the murdering of nuns and children, the book concludes with her [Maria] escaping to save her unborn child. Monk's mother denies her work, and said that Maria was never in a nunnery, and that a brain injury Maria received as a child may have been the cause of her stories. In the Midwest and northern sections of the country Catholics were seen as incapable of free thought and were said to be "anti-American Papists" because it was thought that they took every direction from the Pope in Rome.

During the Mexican-American war Mexican Catholics were displayed in the media as silly or stupid due to their "Papist superstition". It was because of the general attitude in America about Catholics that about 100 American Catholics, mostly recently immigrated Irish, fought against the United States in the Mexican-American war. These men fought for the Mexicans and were known as "Saint Patrick's Battalion (). In 1850, Franklin Pierce presented several resolutions that would remove the restrictions on Catholics from holding public office in New Hampshire, these resolutions that were, at the time, considered "pro-Catholic' were defeated (Battle of Religious Tolerance," The World Almanac, 1950, 53). However as the 19th century passed, hostilities between Catholics and Protestants eased due to the fact that many Irish Catholics fought alongside Protestants during the Civil War, for both the North and the South.

Education

The General Oliver Otis Howard House, built in 1867 and the oldest building at Howard University still standing.

Ex-slaves everywhere across the nation reached out for education. Blacks of all ages really wanted to know what was in the books that had been only permitted to whites. With freedom they started their own schools and the classes were packed days and nights. They sat on log seats or the dirt floors. They would study their letters in old almanacs and in discarded dictionaries. Because the desire to escape slavery's ignorance was so great, ignoring their poverty, many blacks would pay tuition, sometimes $1 or $1.50 a month. Blacks and their white allies also saw a need for colleges and universities, in this case to train teachers, ministers, and professionals for leadership. There were seven colleges founded by the American Missionary Association, Fisk and Atlanta Universities, between 1866 and 1869. The Freedoms Bureau helped to establish Howard University in Washington D.C. As well as Northern religious groups, such as the Methodists, Baptists, and Congregationalists, supported dozens of seminaries and teachers’ colleges. The earliest forms of education that blacks received was from the missionaries to convert them to Christianity. The education of blacks was very low during the civil war, until Lincoln issued the Emancipation Proclamation in 1863. The Department of Education was developed in 1867 to help start more effective schools systems. Howard University was developed in Washington D.C. for black youth “in the liberal arts and sciences.” The first public school day was in Boston in 1869.

Technology

An oil field in Pennsylvania.

Just before the Civil War a vast source of petroleum was discovered in and around Titusville, Pennsylvania, and after the War this began to be exploited. At first oil was used for medicinal purposes alone. However, as the supply increased, it also began to be used for industrial purposes, and instead of whale oil. The dangerous and expensive whaling industry collapsed. While some cities used coal gas for night illumination, others began to use oil lamps, and major cities were lit at night. Petroleum, lamp oil (for the great engine lamp), and machine oil increased the usefulness of railways.

First Transcontinental Railroad, Utah, 1869

Information could be transmitted across great distances via the telegraph. In the 1870s and 1880s inventors vied to transmit a human voice. The two major competitors were the Scots-born Alexander Graham Bell and Elisha Gray. In the year 1875, Alexander Graham Bell used an electromagnetic machine to transmit the sound of a steel reed. On February 14, 1876, a partner of Bell presented his patent to the patent office in Washington, D.C., on the same day as his rival Elisha Gray. Three weeks later, on March Seventh, Bell’s patent won out and was granted.

Native Americans After The War

The injustices that Native Americans dealt with during the Civil War did not go away at War's end. The U. S. National government made it clear that though these people were indigenous to the continent, they were not going to be citizens of the country. The Native Americans were forced to live out in the west on reservations. Their travel was restricted and scrutinized by government agents who monitored them. Traveling off the reservations to hunt, fish or even visit the neighboring reservations was frowned upon by the Bureau of Indian Affairs. Subsequently, the Bureau instituted a pass system in order keep them under control. This system required the Natives to get a pass from the agents before they were allowed off the reservation.

White settlers also took issue with Indians traveling on trains. However, the Central Pacific Railroad in Nevada granted the Native Americans permission to ride on top of the trains in exchange for their railroads being allowed to cross through the reservations. Many Indian agents were unhappy with this free travel arrangement. They began writing letters to the Bureau to stop it. One of the agents commented that "The injurious effects of this freedom from restraint, and continual change of place, on the Indian, can not be overestimated."

With the 14th amendment the civil rights acts were contrived. For the Indians however, their positioning was made clear. The Civil Rights Act of 1866 states “That all persons born in the United States, and not subject to any foreign power, excluding Indians not taxed, are hereby declared to be citizens of the United States."

Battle at Little Bighorn

A depiction of the battle by a Cheyenne artist.

In 1876, after a few uneventful confrontations, Col. George A. Custer and his small cavalry came across the Sioux and some of their allies at the Little Bighorn River. To force the large Indian army back to the reservations, the Army dispatched three columns to attack. One of these groups contained Lt. Custer and the Seventh Cavalry. They spotted the Sioux village about fifteen miles away just along the Rosebud River, Custer also found a nearby group of about forty men. He ignored orders to wait, and decided to attack before they could alert the main party. He was unaware of how much he was outnumbered. The Sioux and their allies had three times as much force. Custer divided his forces in three, He sent troops under control of Captain Frederick Benteen to try to stop them from escaping through the upper valley of the Little Bighorn River. Major Marcus Reno job was to pursue the group, then cross the river, and attack the Indian village in a conjunction with the remaining troops under his command. He Intended to strike the Indian camp from the north and south, but he had no idea that he would have to cross a rough terrain in order to achieve this. As the Indians descended Custer ordered his men to shoot their horses and stack the carcasses in front of them in order to form a wall. But this did not protect them against bullets. In less than an hour, Custer and all his men were killed in one of the worst American military disasters of all time. After one more day of fighting, Reno and Benteen's now unified forces fled when the Indians stopped fighting. They [who?] knew two more columns of soldiers were coming towards them, so they escaped toward them.

The massacre of Custer's final battle eclipsed any success he had had in the Civil War. Custer was defeated and killed at the Battle of the Little Bighorn on June 25, 1876, while fighting Native American tribes in a battle that has come to be known as "Custer's Last Stand".

Women's History of the Period

Victoria Woodhull

Presidential Candidate Victoria Woodhull

In 1872 Victoria Woodhull became the first woman to run for President of the United States. She was nominated by the Equal Rights Party on May 10. Though it is undisputed that she was the first female to run for president, the legality of her petition is questioned; her name didn't actually appear on the ballot and she was under the age of 35 which is the required age for a presidential candidate according to the constitution. Woodhull did not receive any electoral votes, but evidence supports that she received popular votes that were never counted.

Woman's Christian Temperance Union

The Woman's Christian Temperance Union was formed on December 22, 1873. Fredonia, New York is credited as being the birthplace of the group. The temperance movement was a social movement that pushed for the reduction of alcohol consumption. The movement spread all over the country, and women would go to bars and drug stores to sing and pray. The National Woman's Christian Temperance Union was established in 1874 in Cleveland, Ohio. The women demonstrated use of non violent protestation of the consumption of alcohol by praying in saloons. Often, they were denied entrance and yelled at by patrons. The movement ultimately contributed to prohibition in America's future.

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The Age of Invention and the Gilded Age (1877 - 1900)

President Grover Cleveland

President Grover Cleveland

In 1884, as the presidential campaign season approached, the Republican party chose former Speaker of the House James G. Blane as its candidate, with John Logan as the vice presidential candidate. Against them the Democrats ran New York governor Stephen Grover Cleveland for a presidential candidate and vice presidential candidate Thomas A. Hendricks. Cleveland and Hendricks won with the combined support of Democrats and reform Republicans, the "Mugwumps."

Grover Cleveland was the only Democrat elected to the presidency during the era of Republican political domination that lasted from 1860 to 1912. In fact, he won the popular vote for president three times, in 1884, 1888, and 1892. His last election in 1892 defeated Republican president Benjamin Harrison. He was thus the only president to serve two non-consecutive terms, and is the only individual to be counted twice in the numbering of the presidents. (In that last election, Cleveland's vice president was Adlai E. Stevenson; Harrison's Vice President was Whitelaw Reid.) Cleveland's conservative economic stand in favor of the gold standard brought him the support of various business interests. The democrats then won control of both houses of Congress.

Racism

Public Lynchings were rampant during this time, such as this 1893 lynching of Henry Smith in Texas.

Racism was a major blight of the 1890s', largely unacknowledged by the government in Washington. The freedoms which had been given to the former slaves by Emancipation were taken away in Southern states. Every one of them passed laws which disenfranchised African Americans, including poll taxes and literacy tests. The notorious Jim Crow laws, named for an old minstrel show song, started to take effect even in some states which had not seceded. Blacks were barred from public drinking fountains, bathrooms, and train cars, and directed by sign to "Negro only" facilities which were often dirty and defective. A new set of photographic post cards started going through the mail. These showed the results of public lynchings, largely of African American men. Many of these postcards show large crowds, some including White children, and the hung, mutilated, or burnt body of the victim. These proud shows seldom resulted in any prosecution of the attackers, who sometimes included local public officials.

In 1898 white citizens of Wilmington, North Carolina, resenting African Americans’ involvement in local government and incensed by an editorial in an African American newspaper accusing white women of loose sexual behavior, rioted and killed dozens of blacks. In the fury’s wake, white supremacists overthrew the city government, expelling black and white office holders, and instituted restrictions to prevent blacks from voting.

Industrialization

Rise of Industrial Power

The completion of the Transcontinental Railroad in 1869. With the railroad finished by a golden spike, the east and west coast were connected by rail.

In the 1870's, as the Civil War receded into memory, the United States became a leading Industrial power. Advances in technology and new access to the immense resources of the North American continent drove American Industrialization. This industrialization brought the growth of new American cities such as Chicago, and the arrival of a flood of immigrants from all over Europe to man the factories. During the Gilded Age, businessmen reaped enormous profits from this new economy. Powerful tycoons formed giant trusts to monopolize the production of goods that were in high demand. Andrew Carnegie built a giant steel empire using vertical integration, a business tactic that increased profits by eliminating middlemen from the production line. Jay Gould grabbed the railroads, and then the resources brought by those railroads. Though industrialization caused many long-term positives, it did cause problems in the short-term. Rich farmers who could afford new machinery grew even richer, while poorer farmers were forced to move to urban areas, unable to compete in the agricultural sector.

In 1878 the U.S. had entered an era of success after a long downfall of the mid 1870's. The number of manufacturing plants and number of people doubled. By the 1900s the South had more than 400 mills. Women and children worked in bad conditions for up to 12 to 16 hours per day. They only made about a half a dollar per day, equivalent to fifteen 2015 dollars.

The War of the Currents

During the 1880's and 1890's the War of the currents was fought between American Thomas Alva Edison and George Westinghouse, then Titans in the American electrical industry.

Type Revolution

An 1876 Sholes Typewriter

In 1868 the typewriter was perfected by an editor named Christopher Sholes. This invention brought about a wave of new employment opportunities for women. The machine was made popular by several authors, most notably Mark Twain: the first to make a typewritten manuscript, and the first to send it to a printer. Not even the best and most accurate copperplate printer could fit as many words on a page as the standard typewriter. (For many years, a "typewriter" was the name for the person operating the machine.) It was cheaper to employ women than men as typists and telephone and telegraph operators. Along with this new machine also came other inventions such as the telephone and the telegraph. In the 1890s the number of telephone and telegraph operators went up 167 percent, and the number of women stenographers and typists went up 305 percent.

Internal Combustion Engine

Among the early innovations in technology was development of the internal-combustion engine. In 1885 a German engineer, Gottlieb Daimler, built a lightweight engine driven by vaporized gasoline. This development inspired American Henry Ford. In the 1880's, while he was still an electrical engineer in Detroit's Edison Company, Ford experimented in his spare time using Daimler's engine to power a vehicle. George Selden, a Rochester, New York, lawyer, had already been tinkering with such technology, but it was Ford who created a massive industry.

Factory Jobs

An 1888 engraving, depicting a seat shop boss threatening an employee.

As industrialization increased, more job opportunities opened. Factory jobs were perfect for women and children, with their smaller hands and their lower pay rates. Despite terrible work conditions, increasing numbers of women moved from the home to factories. But while women became part of the factory floor, virtually none were trusted with management, or even with handling money. The factories also took in immigrants and used them as cheap labor. Catholic immigrants from Ireland and Germany and Jews from Eastern Europe were second-class citizens in the workplace, with very low wages and no benefits. Without safety precautions, workers often suffered serious injury and lost their jobs.

Workers adjusted to mechanization as best they could. Some people submitted to the demands of the factory, machine, and time clock. Some tried to blend old ways of working into the new system. Others turned to resistance. Individuals challenged the system by ignoring management's orders, skipping work, or quitting. But also, anxiety over the loss of independence and a desire for better wages, hours, and working conditions drew disgruntled workers into unions.

In the cities, laborers and employers often clashed over wages, sanitary conditions, working hours, benefits, and several other issues. Laborers organized themselves into unions to negotiate with companies. The companies, however, attempted to shut down labor unions. Some imposed yellow dog contracts, under which an employer could dismiss a worker who participated in union activity.

In 1886, the American Federation of Labor was formed to fight for laborers in general. The AFL and other union groups employed as many tactics as possible to force employers to accede to their demands. One tactic was the strike. Some strikes escalated into riots, as with the Knights of Labor's strike in 1886 becoming the Haymarket Riots. The Haymarket Riots of 1886 occurred when an unknown person threw a dynamite bomb into a group of police officers. Eight officers were killed in the explosion and gunfight that ensued. As a result, eight anarchists were tried for murder -- four were sentenced to death and one committed suicide.

Significant Strikes

The Pullman Strike.

The Pullman Strike occurred in 1894, in response to Pullman Company workers' wages being cut following the Panic of 1893, an economic depression which was caused in part by excessive railroad speculation. Approximately 3,000 workers began the strike on May 11. Many of the workers were members of the American Railway Union, and although the strike began without authorization from union officials (known as a "wildcat strike"), the ARU eventually supported the strike by launching a nationwide boycott of Pullman cars on June 26. Within four days, approximately 125,000 ARU members had quit their jobs rather than switch Pullman cars. On July 6, President Cleveland sent Army troops to break up the strike, ostensibly because it prevented delivery of mail and was considered a threat to public safety.

The companies sometimes retaliated against strikes by suing the unions. Congress had passed the Sherman Antitrust Act to prevent trusts, or corporations that held stock in several different companies, from obstructing the activities of competitors. Though the Sherman Act was intended to target trusts, the companies sued the union under it, claiming that unions obstructed interstate commerce.

During the machine age, there were a number of strikes that took place due to the demands from factories and time clocks. It was hard for individuals to adjust to that system, and as a result, they challenged the system by ignoring management's orders, skipping work, or quitting. The desire and longing for better wages let to anxiety and frustration. Like farming and mining, industry was massive in size and changed not only the nature of the work but the person doing it. Soon, all of these disgruntled individuals formed specialized groups into unions. The different jobs varied in not only skill, but other things as well that were non-related to worker conflict; race, sex, etc. These jobs were such as working on/in railroads, steel factories, and automobiles. The outcome for many working in labor during the Gilded Age led to horrific labor violence. Industrialists and workers literally fought over control of the workplace. Many suffered due to the strikes and riots and it inevitably led to deaths, loss of jobs, and often continuous violence. For most American workers, the Machine age had varying results. At times there was no job stability and when costs of living would increase drastically there were even more problems.

Prices and Wages Fall

Prices, and consequently wages, fell sharply in about the 1870s and stayed that way all the way through the 1970s. The prices of necessities in the late 1800s were: 4 pounds butter for $1.60, 1 bag of flour $1.80, a quart of milk for $0.56, vegetables $0.50, 2 bushels of coal $1.36, soap, starch, pepper, salt, vinegar, etc. $1.00, rent for $4.00 a week, and more. The average total of a person's wages was $16.00. By the time that person bought the necessities such as food and soap and rent, most, if not all, of the money would be gone.

Woman's Movement

The Woman's Movement, the group of women advocating women's suffrage and equality, continued after the Civil War. Even many women who were not interested in the Vote were creating clubs and crusades, advocating for public issues both before and after marriage. The argument of "separate spheres" for men and women, the rough public world for the former and the gentle domestic world for the latter, was being contested. Jane Addams argued that “If women have in any sense been responsible for the gentler side of life which softens and blurs some of its harsher conditions, may not they have a duty to perform in our American cities?”

Urbanization

This era saw the construction of some of the first skyscrapers

With industrialization came urbanization. The increasing factory businesses created many more job opportunities in the cities. Soon people began to flock from rural, farm areas, to large cities. Minorities and immigrants added to these numbers. Factory jobs were the only jobs some immigrants could get, and as more came to the cities to work, the larger the urbanization process became. In 1870 there were only two American cities with a population of more than 500,000, but by 1900 there were six, and three of these, New York, Chicago, and Philadelphia had over one million inhabitants. Roughly 40 percent of Americans lived in cities and the number was climbing. These large populations in the cities caused the crime rates to go up, and disease was rapidly spreading. Not only did urbanization cause cities to grow in population, it also caused cities to grow in building size. Skyscrapers were being built in the cities and the idea of mass transit had started. With these mass transits being built it allowed people to commute to work from further distances. Suburbs were beginning to form and higher class families began to move to them to get out of the over crowded city but still gave them the ability to go into the city to work each day. City living was for the lower class the upper class had enough money to get away from all of the pollution and the city stench. This still holds true today in larger cities a lot of the nicer homes are located further out from the center of the city. For example, in the city of Chicago, you will find a lot of the nicer homes away from the city, and more towards the suburbs. In this case, this is because there are a lot of violence in the inner city. Therefore, people try to live more further out from the city in order to stay away from the violence.

Agriculture

A tractor from around the turn of the century. Mechanization of agriculture allowed less people to farm more land.

In the late 1880s and early 1900s, a typical farm would be about 100 acres. Farmers could only plow with the aid of a horse or a mule. Later on the internal combustion engine was used to create tractors. Unlike Southern cotton plantations, most farms raised a variety of foodstuffs, breeding cows, pigs and chickens, and growing turnips, potatoes, carrots, wheat, and corn. They were often self-sufficient. Farmers made their bread from their own wheat, and killed the runt pig for their own table.

While industry generally increased in importance, farmers struggled due to debt and falling prices. In the 1880s there were crop failures. Steamships and railways brought in wheat from abroad, lowering American farm prices still more. Economic transformation created industrial prosperity and new lifestyles, but in states still dominated by farming these changes also had a widespread negative effect. Crop diversification and a greater focus on cotton as a cash crop did not give many farmers any potential to get ahead.

American farmers helped to create regulation of the railroads. When domestic farmers needed to transport their crops, they also had to rely on the railroad system. But railroads often charged outrageous prices. Farmers, small merchants, and reform politicians started to demand rate regulation. In 1877, in Munn v. Illinois, the Supreme Court upheld the principle of state regulation, declaring that grain warehouses owned by railroads acted in the public interest and therefore must submit to regulation for the common good. By 1880 fourteen states had established commissions to limit freight and storage charges of state-chartered lines.

Between 1860 and 1905 the number of farms tripled from two million to six million. In 1905 the number of people living on farms grew to thirty-one million. The value of farms went from eight billion in 1860 to thirty billion in 1906. Then as now, wheat was a major crop, creating such common food as bread, a major source of both starch and protein for poorer people.

Farmers had to rise early, often at four or five in the morning. Cows and goats had to be milked twice a day, at morning and at evening. Chickens' eggs were gathered every morning, cleaned, and packed in cases. Because they laid eggs, female chickens or pullets were more important than the male chickens or roosters. Because of this, and to keep roosters from attacking each other, poultry farmers would have only one rooster with several hens.

After the Civil War, more prosperous farmers gained more machinery to plant and harvest their crops. In 1879 the centrifugal cream separator was patented. In 1885, chicken raising became a lot more profitable due to the invention of the mechanized incubator. Complicated horse-drawn mechanical combines and threshers were used about this time. With the aid of machines a farmer could harvest about 135 acres of wheat; without them, he or she could only harvest about 7.5 acres of wheat in the same amount of time. The Montgomery Ward & Company mail order catalogue of 1895 listed various grist mills, seeders and planters, a hay pitcher, a hay tedder, and nearly a full page of mechanical churns.

Imperialism

A 1899 map showing land claimed by the United States.

As time progressed, Industrialization caused American businessmen to seek new international markets in which to sell their goods. In addition, the increasing influence of Social Darwinism led to the belief that the United States had the inherent responsibility to bring concepts like industry, democracy and Christianity to less scientifically developed, "savage" societies. The combination of these attitudes, along with other factors, led the United States toward Imperialism, the practice of a nation increasing its sphere of influence.

The Orient

American troops scaling the walls of Beijing during the Boxer Rebellion.

In the Orient, Russia, Japan, the United Kingdom, France, and Germany all exercised influence. US Secretary of State John Hay endorsed the Open Door Policy, under which all foreign powers would exercise equal economic power in the Orient. The US thus protected its interests in China and maintained a balance of power there.

Chinese nationalists known as the "Righteous Fists of Harmony", or "Boxers" in English, who resented foreign influence, promoted hatred of non-Chinese as well as Chinese Christians. In June 1900 in Beijing, Boxer fighters threatened foreigners and forced them to seek refuge in the Legation Quarter. In response, the initially hesitant Empress Dowager Cixi, urged by the conservatives of the Imperial Court, supported the Boxers and declared war on foreign powers. Diplomats, foreign civilians, soldiers, and Chinese Christians in the Legation Quarter were under siege by the Imperial Army of China and the Boxers for 55 days. The siege was raised when the Eight-Nation Alliance brought 20,000 armed troops to China, defeated the Imperial Army, and captured Beijing. The Boxer Protocol of 7 September 1901 specified an indemnity of 67 million pounds (450 million taels of silver), more than the government's annual tax revenue, to be paid over a course of thirty-nine years to the eight nations involved.

Spanish Territories

The Battle of Manilla Bay helped secure the Philippines.

By 1825 Spain had acknowledged the independence of its possessions in the present-day United States. The only remnants of the Spanish Empire in the Western Hemisphere were Cuba, Puerto Rico, across the Pacific in the Philippines Islands, as well as the Carolina, Marshall, and Mariana Islands (including Guam) in Micronesia.

In 1898, the American battleship USS Maine was destroyed by an explosion in the Cuban Harbor of Havana. Although later investigations proved that an internal problem was to blame, at the time it was thought that Spanish forces had sunk it. On the advice of Assistant Secretary of the Navy Theodore Roosevelt, President William McKinley asked Congress to declare war on April 11, 1898. Senator Henry M. Teller of Colorado added an amendment to the proposed U.S. declaration of war against Spain on April 19, which proclaimed that the United States would not establish permanent control over Cuba. The amendment stated that the United States "hereby disclaims any disposition of intention to exercise sovereignty, jurisdiction, or control over said island except for pacification thereof, and asserts its determination, when that is accomplished, to leave the government and control of the island to its people."

At that time Spanish troops stationed on the island included 150,000 regulars and 40,000 irregulars and volunteers while rebels inside Cuba numbered as many as 50,000. Total U.S. army strength at the time totalled 26,000, requiring the passage of the Mobilization Act of April 22 that allowed for an army of at first 125,000 volunteers (later increased to 200,000) and a regular army of 65,000.

Depiction of the American Flag being raised over Fort Santiago in Manila on August 13, 1898.

On April 25, 1898 Congress declared war on Spain. The United States Navy won two decisive naval battles, destroying the Spanish Pacific Fleet at Manila in the Philippines and the Atlantic fleet at Santiago, Cuba. The U.S. then landed forces in Cuba, which fought the tropical climate and associated diseases as well as the Spanish forces. In the Battle of San Juan Hill (actually Kettle Hill), Lt. Colonel Theodore Roosevelt earned a reputation as a military hero by leading the attack on entrenched Spanish positions. The regiment to which Roosevelt belonged, the First U.S. Volunteers, was recruited throughout the United States and known as the Rough Riders because of the large number of cowboys to volunteer. The 10th Cavalry, a regiment of black soldiers, supported the Rough Riders in the attack. Joseph Wheeler, a Confederate general of the Civil War, commanded U.S. forces in Cuba. Two of Robert E. Lee's nephews were also U.S. generals. The war ended eight months later with the signing of the Treaty of Paris on December 10, 1898. As a result Spain lost its control over the remains of its overseas empire. The treaty allowed the United States to purchase the Philippines Islands from Spain for $20 million. The war had cost the United States $250 million and 3,000 lives, of whom 90% had perished from infectious diseases. True to the letter of the Teller Amendment, American forces left Cuba in 1902.

The Spanish-American War was seen domestically as a sign of increasing national unity.

Hawaii

Kingdom of Hawaii

Iolani Palace was the residence of the monarchy of Hawai'i, and still stands to this day as the only royal palace in the United States.

The Kingdom of Hawaii was established in 1795 with the subjugation of the smaller independent chiefdoms of Oʻahu, Maui, Molokaʻi, Lānaʻi, Kauaʻi and Niʻihau by the chiefdom of Hawaiʻi (or the "Big Island"), ruled by the dynasty of King Kamehameha the Great. In 1887 the Honolulu Rifle Company, a paramilitary force also known as the Honolulu Rifles, deposed the Hawaiian monarchy and forced King David Kalākaua to sign a new constitution at gunpoint. The bayonets fixed to their guns led to the term Bayonet Constitution. No voting rights were extended to Asiatics and the requirements for voting rights included land ownership. The Bayonet Constitution has become one of the most controversial documents in history.

Native-born, European-descended Hawaiian Sanford B. Dole, serving as a friend of both Hawaiian royalty and the elite immigrant community, advocated the westernization of Hawaiian government and culture. Dole was a lawyer and jurist in the Hawaiian Islands as a kingdom, protectorate, republic and territory. King Kalākaua appointed Dole a justice of the Supreme Court of the Kingdom of Hawaii on December 28, 1887, and to a commission to revise judiciary laws on January 24, 1888. After Kalākaua's death, his sister Queen Liliʻuokalani appointed him to her Privy Council on August 31, 1891.

A native Hawaiian with surfboard in 1890.

Annexation

On January 17, 1893, the Queen, the last monarch of the Kingdom of Hawaiʻi, was deposed in a coup d'état led largely by American citizens opposed to her attempt to establish a new Constitution. Dole was named president of the Provisional Government of Hawaii formed after the coup, and was recognized within forty-eight hours by all nations with diplomatic ties to the Kingdom of Hawaii, with the exception of the United Kingdom.

The Americans in Hawaii asked the US to annex the islands, but President Benjamin Harrison's annexation treaty was stalled in the Senate by Democrats until a Democratic President, Stephen Grover Cleveland, took office. With Grover Cleveland's election as President of the United States, the Provisional Government's hopes of annexation were derailed. In fact, Cleveland tried to directly help reinstate the monarchy, after an investigation led by James Henderson Blount. The Blount Report of July 17, 1893, commissioned by President Cleveland, concluded that the Committee of Safety conspired with U.S. ambassador John L. Stevens to land the United States Marine Corps, to forcibly remove Queen Liliʻuokalani from power, and declare a Provisional Government of Hawaii consisting of members from the Committee of Safety. Although unable to restore Lili'uokalani to her former position, Cleveland withdrew the treaty.

The Territory of Hawaii or Hawaii Territory existed as a United States organized incorporated territory from July 7, 1898, until August 21, 1959, when its territory, with the exception of Johnston Atoll, was admitted to the Union as the fiftieth U.S. state.

Resource Booms

Klondike prospectors cross the Chilkoot Pass

There were a number of resource booms, resulting in the development of certain rural areas. Notable booms during this time include the Colorado Silver Boom, the Ohio Oil Rush, the Indiana gas boom, and the Cripple Creek Gold Rush. The Klondike Gold Rush was famous for showing there was value in Alaska with the discovery of Gold.

The Progressive Era (1900 - 1914)

Progressivism

A Progressive Era cartoon in favor of Women's Rights. Suffragists saw success on the west coast, and wanted to extend equality to the east coast.

Industrialization led to the rise of big businesses at the expense of the worker. Factory laborers faced long hours, low wages, and unsanitary conditions. The large corporations protected themselves by allying with political parties. The parties, in turn, were controlled by party leaders, rather than by the voters. The Progressive movement was an effort to cure America: not so much an organized movement, but a general spirit of reform embraced by Americans with diverse goals and backgrounds during the early twentieth century . These problems included the aftermath of slavery, Reconstruction from the American Civil War, and female subjugation. The goal was to remove corrupt political machines and get more common people into the political process. Progressivism believed individuals could make the world better through regulation and reform. It worked on the Federal, state, local and public and private spheres, moving toward local public safety and efficiency, elimination of corruption, social justice, and the social control of knowledge.

Local Reform

At the urban level, Progressivism mainly affected municipal government. The system whereby the city is governed by a powerful mayor and a council was replaced by the council-manager or the commission system. Under the council-manager system, the council would pass laws, while the manager would do no more than ensure their execution. The manager was essentially a weak mayor. Under the commission system, the executive would be composed of people who each controlled one area of government. The commission was essentially a multi-member, rather than single-member, executive.

At the state level, several electoral reforms were made. Firstly, the secret ballot was introduced. Prior to the secret ballot, the ballots were colored papers printed by the political parties. Due to the lack of secrecy, bribing or blackmailing voters became common. It was to prevent businessmen or politicians from thus coercing voters that the secret ballot was introduced. Also, reforms were made to give voters more say in government. The initiative allowed voters to propose new laws. The referendum allowed certain laws (for example tax increases) to be approved by the voters first. Finally, the recall, allowed the voters to remove public officials for wrongdoing while in office.

In addition, Progressives sought to combat the power of party leaders over which candidates would be nominated. The direct primary was instituted, under which the voters cast ballots to nominate candidates. Before the primary was introduced, the party leaders or party faithful were the only ones allowed to nominate candidates. The South pioneered some political reforms; "the direct primarily originated in North Carolina; the city commission plan arose in Galveston, Texas; and the city manager plan began in Stanton, Virgina. Progressive governors introduced business regulation, educational expansion,and other reforms that duplicated actions taken by northern counterparts.

Labor Reforms

Progressive movement also attempted to give more power over legislation to the general populace. Three practices - the referendum, the initiative, and the recall - were created. The referendum allowed the voters to vote on a bill at an election before it took force as law. The initiative permitted the voters to petition and force the legislature to vote on a certain bill. Finally, the recall permitted voters to remove elected officials from office in the middle of the term. State laws were formed to improve labor conditions. Many states enacted factory inspection laws, and by 1916 nearly two-thirds of the states required compensation for the victims in industrial accidents.

In 1901, Jane Addams founded the Juvenile Protective Association, a non-profit agency dedicated to protecting children from abuse. In 1903, Mary Harris Jones organized the Children's Crusade, a march of child workers from Kensington, Pennsylvania to the home of President Theodore Roosevelt in Oyster Bay, New York, bringing national attention to the issue of child labor. In 1909, President Roosevelt hosted the first White House Conference on Children, which continued to be held every decade through the 1970s. In 1912, the United States Children's Bureau was created in order to investigate "all matters pertaining to the welfare of children and child life among all classes of our people." At the instigation of middle class coalitions, many states enacted factory inspection laws, and by 1916 two-thirds of the states required compensation for victims of industrial accidents. An alliance of labor and humanitarian groups induced some legislatures to grant aid to mothers with dependent children. Under pressure from the National Child Labor to Committee, nearly every state set a minimum age for employment and limited hours that employers could make children work.Families that needed extra income evaded child labor restrictions by falsifying their children's ages to employers.

The Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire on March 25, 1911.

States also regulated female labor by setting maximum work hours, especially when an accident at the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory resulted in the deaths of more than 100 women. The Supreme Court ruled in favor of regulated work hours for women in "Muller v. Oregon". Finally, some minimum wage provisions were introduced (for men and women).

The Industrial Workers of the World (IWW) was founded in Chicago in 1905 at a convention of anarchist and socialist union members who were opposed to the policies of the American Federation of Labor (AFL). Unlike the AFL, which was a group composed of separate unions for each different trade (craft unionism), the IWW supported the concept of industrial unionism, in which all workers in a given industry are organized in one union, regardless of each worker's particular trade. They promoted the idea of "One Big Union" in the hopes that one large, centralized body would be better equipped to deal with similarly-large capitalist enterprises.

1881 The Great influx of Russian and Polish Jews. They formed an objectionable part of the population, because they couldn't speak English, lived closely crowded, and dirty. Penniless and unfamiliar with industrial conditions. They were apart of industrial, intellectual, and civil life. Their willingness to work 18 hours obnoxiously was crazy compared to Americans who worked (part-time). "It's not the condition that the immigrant comes from that determines he's usefulness;But the power one shows to rise above the condition."

President Theodore Roosevelt

President Theodore Roosevelt circa 1904.

At the national level, Progressivism centered on defeating the power of large businesses. President Theodore Roosevelt, who succeeded to the Presidency when President McKinley was assassinated in 1901, helped the Progressive movement greatly.

Coal Strike

In early 1902, anthracite coal miners struck. Their salaries had not been raised in over two decades. Furthermore, they were paid with scrips. Scrips were essentially coupons for goods from pricey company stores.

The president of the Reading Railroad, George F. Baer, said that the miners had erred by distrusting the owners. He declared that the mine owners were "Christian men of property to whom God has given control of the property rights of the country," who could be trusted more than union leaders.

The owners and the miners refused to negotiate with each other. As autumn approached, many feared that the coal strike would cripple the economy. President Roosevelt intervened by asking the owners and miners to submit to arbitration. The miners accepted, but the owners refused Roosevelt's suggestion. Roosevelt then threatened to use the Army to take over the mines. The owners finally acquiesced; the strike was settled in 1903. Roosevelt's policy triumphed in 1904 when the Supreme Court, convinced by the government's arguments, created by J.P Morgan and his business allies. Roosevelt choose however , not to attack others trust, such as u.s steel another of Morgan's creations. Prosecution of northern securities began reportedly collared Roosevelt and offered "if we have done anything wrong, send your man to my man and we can fix it up".

Sherman Antitrust Act

Roosevelt continued his Progressive actions when he revived the Sherman Antitrust Act. The Act sought to prevent companies from combining into trusts and gaining monopolies. A trust is formed when many companies loosely join together under a common board of directors to gain total control of an entire market so that prices can be raised without the threat of competitors. This total control of a market and subsequent price raising is a monopoly. However, until Roosevelt's administration, the Act was rarely enforced.

Hepburn Act

Roosevelt also enforced the Hepburn Act, which allowed the Interstate Commerce Commission to regulate railroads. The railroads had allied themselves with large businesses, charging higher rates to those business' competitors. Thus, the large businesses would gain even more power. The Hepburn Act prevented railroads from granting reduced rates to businesses.

Panama Canal

President Roosevelt visits workers on the Panama Canal in 1906

President Roosevelt oversaw the successful completion of the Panama Canal. The finished canal vastly improved shipping logistics, allowing boats going from the Atlantic to the Pacific and vice versa to bypass the voyage around South America, saving much time on each trip.

Conservation

Roosevelt also championed the cause of conservation. He set aside large amounts of land as part of the national park system.

Conflicts with other Imperialist Nations

A political cartoon showing Roosevelt's use of naval power as a way to protect American nations from European interference.

Imperialism was yet a common theme in the relations between nations in this era. It should be noted that although the US annexed Hawaii, Japan also had interests in the island and an aggressive foreign policy; Japan had already seized Taiwan from China in 1885 and would annex Korea in 1905. Imperial Germany was another aggressive power. The U.S. and Germany had conflicts over who would control Samoa, in the Pacific, as well as nearly faced a naval war with Germany in 1902 over German plans to seize the customs revenues of Venezuela.

However, under the administration of President Theodore Roosevelt, the United States became more open in asserting international power. In 1905, Russia and Japan went to war over control of Korea and China. The Japanese won naval victories over two Russian fleets, in the Battles of the Yellow Sea and Tsushima. President Roosevelt offered to negotiate peace between the two nations, and in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, a peace treaty was signed.

To demonstrate the ability of the United States to project power around the world (unlike Russia), Roosevelt ordered a fleet of U.S. men-o'war to sail around the world. The fleet left the east coast of the U.S. in 1908 and returned in 1909, visiting ports in Europe, Australia, and Japan.

President William Howard Taft

President Taft

When Theodore Roosevelt decided not to run for the presidency again in the election of 1908, that opened the doors for another Republican candidate. Into the gap stepped William H. Taft, former Ohio Supreme Court Justice, former Solicitor General of the United States, and former judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Sixth Circuit. James S. Sherman was chosen as his vice president. They ran against the Democratic slate of William Jennings Bryan and John Kern, and Socialist nominee Eugene V. Debs. Taft won the election by over a million votes and the Republicans retained control of both houses of Congress. During Taft's presidency, his primary goals were to continue Roosevelt's trust-busting and to reconcile old guard conservatives and young progressive reformers in the Republican Party. Taft was somewhat more cautious and quiet than Roosevelt, despite his own credentials, and therefore had less public attention.

Taft tried to win over the Filipino people by reforming education, transportation, and health care. New railroads, bridges, and telegraph lines strengthened the economy. A public school system was founded, and new health care policies virtually eliminated such diseases as cholera and smallpox. These reforms slowly reduced Filipino hostility.

Although Taft was less of an attention-grabber than Roosevelt, he went far beyond what Roosevelt ever did. Taft used the Sherman Antitrust Act, a law passed in 1890 that made trusts and monopolies illegal, and they had to sue many large and economically damaging corporations. Taft won more antitrust lawsuits in four years than Roosevelt had won in seven.

Taft also pushed for the Sixteenth Amendment, which gave the federal government the right to tax citizens' income. The amendment was meant to supply the government with cash to replace the revenue generated from tariffs, which Progressives had hoped that Taft would lower. Taft failed to lower the tariff. In addition, he failed to fight for conservation and environmentalism, actually weakening some conservation policies to favor business. When Roosevelt came back from an expedition to Africa in 1910, he was disappointed in Taft, and vigorously campaigned for progressive republicans in the congressional elections of 1910.

Roosevelt tried to capitalize on his still enormous popularity by again running for reelection in 1912, but he failed to win the nomination because of Taft's connections to influential people in the Republican Party. Roosevelt and his supporters then broke off from the Republicans, forming the Progressive Party. (This later was known as the Bull Moose party after Roosevelt declared that he felt "as strong as a bull moose!") The Republican split hurt the two candidates, and Democratic candidate Woodrow Wilson gathered a 42 percent plurality of the popular votes and 435 out of 531 electoral votes.

On the Supreme Court

Taft as Chief Justice of the Supreme Court in 1921.

Taft would later become a member of the Supreme Court, making him the only former President to do so. In 1921, when Chief Justice Edward Douglass White died, President Warren G. Harding nominated Taft to take his place, thereby fulfilling Taft's lifelong ambition to become Chief Justice of the United States. Very little opposition existed to the nomination, and the Senate approved him 60-4 in a secret session, but the roll call of the vote has never been made public. He readily took up the position, serving until 1930. As such, he became the only President to serve as Chief Justice, and thus is also the only former President to swear in subsequent Presidents, giving the oath of office to both Calvin Coolidge (in 1925) and Herbert Hoover (in 1929). He remains the only person to have led both the Executive and Judicial branches of the United States government. He considered his time as Chief Justice to be the highest point of his career: he allegedly once remarked, "I don't remember that I ever was President."

President Woodrow Wilson

Official portrait of President Woodrow Wilson, painted in 1913.

Although Woodrow Wilson was a Democrat, he still pushed for progressive reforms. One of the first successes of his administration was the lowering of tariffs, which he accomplished in 1913. Wilson believed that increased foreign competition would spur U.S. based manufacturers to lower prices and improve their goods. That same year, Wilson passed the Federal Reserve Act, which created twelve regional banks that would be run by a central board in the capitol. This system gave the government more control over banking activities.

Wilson also pushed for governmental control over business. In 1914, a Democratic-controlled Congress established the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to investigate companies that participated in suspected unfair and illegal trade practices. Wilson also supported the Clayton Antitrust Act, which joined the Sherman Antitrust Act as one the government's tools to fight trusts the same year.

By the end of Wilson's First term, progressives had won many victories. The entire movement lost steam, though, as Americans became much more interested in international affairs, especially the war that had broken out in Europe in 1914.

The Supreme Court and Labor

Upset workers had succeeded in lobbying Congress to pass legislation that improved work conditions. However, the Supreme Court of the United States somewhat limited the range of these acts. In Holden v. Hardy (1896), the Supreme Court ruled that miners' hours must be short because long hours made the job too dangerous. However, in Lochner v. New York, laws ruled that bakery workers did not have a job dangerous enough to put restrictions on the free sale of labor. Putting aside this decision, in 1908, the decision in Muller v. Oregon said that women's health must be protected "to preserve the strength and vigor of the race." This did, clearly, protect women's health, but it also locked them into menial jobs.

Controlling Prostitution

An anti-prostitution cartoon, portraying a women being conned in an Ice Cream parlor.

Moral outrage erupted when muckraking journalists charged that international gangs were kidnapping young women and forcing them into prostitution, a practice called white slavery. Accusations were exaggerated, but they alarmed some moralists who falsely perceived a link between immigration and prostitution. Although some women voluntarily entered "the profession" because it offered income and independence from their male counterparts, some women had very little option to a life where they had little if any amenities and many were forced into this profession and lifestyle. Reformers nonetheless believed they could attack prostitution by punishing both those who promoted it and those who practiced it. In 1910 Congress passed the White Slave Traffic Act (Mann Act), prohibiting interstate and international transportation of a woman for immoral purposes. By 1915 nearly all states outlawed brothels and solicitation of sex. Such laws ostensibly protected young women from exploitation, but in reality they failed to address the more serious problem of sexual violence that women suffered at the hands of family members, presumed friends, and employers.

Football and the Formation of the NCAA

A college football game in 1921.

By the turn of the century American football was already in the process of becoming a large national sport. Originally formed and played at universities as an intercollegiate sport, it was seen as only for the upper class. The size of the field depended on what the players agreed with, but it was almost always over 100 yards. Once a player started a game, the player could not leave unless he/she became injured. Very soon the sport began to gain spectators, and with spectators came controversy. With over 15 deaths in 1905 alone, many saw a need for change in the sport. However, others liked the violence and would watch because of this. President Roosevelt formed a group to reconstruct the rules of football and make it less violent. Standard rules would not be made and used until 1894. The group was originally named the Intercollegiate Athletic Association, and in 1910 it was renamed to the National College Athletic Association.

World War I and the Treaty of Versailles (1914 - 1920)

Europe

European Military Alliances in 1914

In 1815, Europe had united to defeat French Emperor Napoleon. For a century since that time, there had been no major war in Europe. Countries had organized themselves in a complex system of alliances.

After Napoleon's defeat, the United Kingdom, France, Prussia, Russia, and Austria met in Vienna. These nations decided that if power in Europe was balanced, then no nation would become so powerful as to pose a threat to the others. The most important of these were the German Confederation. In 1871, after defeating France and Prussia, several small German nations combined into the German Empire. This upset the traditional balance of power.

German Chancellor Otto Von Bismarck began to construct a web of alliances to protect German dominance. Germany and the United Kingdom were on good terms, as Germany had not built a navy to go up against British sea power. In 1873, Russia, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and Germany formed the Three Emperors' League. Nine years later, Austria-Hungary, Italy, and Germany formed the Triple Alliance. In 1887, the Reinsurance Treaty ensured that Russia would not interfere in a war between France and Germany.

During this time the British Queen Victoria built alliances in her own way. During years of relative peace, she had her children marry into many of the royal families of Europe, believing that this would solidify relations among the nations. In the first decade of the Twentieth century the Kaiser and the King of England were cousins through Victoria, as were the Tsar and Tsarina of Russia.

In 1890, Bismarck was fired by Kaiser Wilhelm II, who then began to undo many of Bismarck's policies. He decided to build up a German navy, antagonizing the United Kingdom. He did not renew German agreements with Russia. In 1894, this led Russia to form a new alliance with Germany's rival France.

In 1904, France and the United Kingdom decided to end centuries of bitter enmity by signing the Entente Cordiale. Three years later, those two nations and Russia entered the Triple Entente. Imperial Russia began to build its army, as did Germany and Austria-Hungary.

War Breaks Out

Austria-Hungary was a patchwork of several nations ruled by the Habsburg family. Several ethnic groups resented rule by the Habsburgs. In June, 1914, the heir to the throne, Archduke Franz Ferdinand, traveled to Sarajevo in Bosnia and Herzegovina. A Serbian nationalist named Gavrilo Princip, who hated Habsburg rule, assassinated the Archduke and his wife. This assassination triggered the First World War.

The Central Powers.

The Austro-Hungarian government decided to retaliate by crushing Serbian nationalism. They threatened the Serbian government with war. Russia came to the aid of the Serbs. To oppose this alliance, Austria-Hungary called on Germany. Kaiser Wilhelm II said his country would give Austria-Hungary whatever it needed to win the war; in effect, a "blank check." In addition to these open agreements, any of these countries might have had secret agreements with other states. The result was almost all of Europe at war, with the largest battlefield ever seen before.

In July, 1914, Austria-Hungary declared war on Serbia. Austria-Hungary, Russia, and Germany began to mobilize their troops. The conflict in Austria-Hungary quickly spread over Europe. In August, Germany declared war on France. The Germans demanded that Belgium allow German troops to pass through the neutral nation. When King Albert of Belgium refused, Germany violated Belgian neutrality and invaded. Belgium appealed to the United Kingdom for aid. The British House of Commons threatened that Great Britain would wage war against Germany unless it withdrew from Belgium. The Germans refused, and the United Kingdom joined the battle. The Central Powers, Germany and Austria-Hungary, were pitted against the Allies, the United Kingdom, Russia, and France.

The Early Stages

German troops entered Belgium on August 4. By August 16, they had begun to enter France. The French Army met the Germans near the French border with Belgium. France lost tens of thousands of men in less than a week, causing the French Army to retreat to Paris. The Germans penetrated deep into France, attempting to win a quick victory.

On August 5, the United States formally declared their neutrality in the war. They also offered to mediate the growing conflict. In the United States, the opinions were divided. Some felt we should aid England, France, and Belgium because they were depicted as victims of barbarous German aggression and atrocities. Others felt we should avoid taking sides.

The Allies won a key battle at Marne, repelling the German offensive. The Germans lost especially due to a disorganized supply line and a weak communications network. The French Army, however, had not completely defeated the Germans. Both sides continually fought each other, to no avail. On the Western Front, Germany and France would continue to fight for more than three years without any decisive victories for either side.

Meanwhile, on the Eastern Front, Germany faced Russia. In the third week of August, Russian troops entered the eastern part of Germany. Germany was at a severe disadvantage because it had to fight on two different fronts, splitting its troops. However, despite Germany's disadvantage, no decisive action occurred for three years.

The United Kingdom used its powerful Royal Navy in the war against Germany. British ships set up naval blockades. The Germans, however, countered with submarines called U-boats. U-boats sank several ships, but could not, during the early stages of the war, seriously challenge the mighty Royal Navy.

The war spread to Asia when Japan declared war on Germany in August, 1914. The Japanese sought control of German colonies in the Pacific. Germany already faced a two-front war, and could not afford to defend its Pacific possessions.

In October, 1914, the Ottoman Empire entered, allying itself with the Central Powers. The entry of the Ottoman Empire was disastrous to the Allies. The Ottoman Empire controlled the Dardanelles strait, which provided a route between Russia and the Mediterranean. The Ottoman sultan declared holy war- jihad- against the Allies. Muslims in the British Empire and French Empire were thus encouraged to rebel against their Christian rulers. However, the Allies' concerns were premature. Few Muslims accepted the sultan's proclamation. In fact, some Muslims in the Ottoman Empire supported the Allies so that the Ottoman Empire could be broken up, and the nations they ruled could gain independence.

The Middle Stages

A British propaganda poster showing a German Zeppelin falling down in flames. The Germans used strategic bombing during the war, and also made use of talented fighter pilot aces such as the Red Baron (Manfred von Richthofen).

Between 1914 and 1917, the war was characterized by millions of deaths leading nowhere. Neither side could gain a decisive advantage on either front.

In 1915, the Germans began to realize the full potential of Submarines. German Submarines engaged in official unrestricted warfare, engaging and sinking any ship found within the war zone regardless of the flag flown. Germany's justification for this use of force was that there was no certain method to ascertain the ultimate destination of the passengers and cargo carried by the ships in the war zone, and thus they were all taken as attempts at maintaining the anti-German blockade.

In May, 1915, Italy broke the Triple Alliance by becoming an Allied Power. In October, Bulgaria joined the Central Powers. Each side had induced their new partners to join by offering territorial concessions. Italy prevented Austria-Hungary from concentrating its efforts on Russia, while Bulgaria prevented Russia from having connections with other Allied Powers.

In May, 1916, one of the most significant naval battles in World War I occurred. The Royal Navy faced a German fleet during the Battle of Jutland. The Battle proved that the Allied naval force was still superior to that possessed by the Central Powers. The Germans grew even more dependent on U-boats in naval battle.

In August, 1916, Romania joined the Allies. Romania invaded Transylvania, a province of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. But when the Central Powers struck back, they took control of important Romanian wheat fields.

In 1917, the liberal-democratic government of Russia that was lead by Aleksander Kerensky was over thrown by Vladimir Lenin. When Lenin took over in Russia one of the things he promised was to change world politics. The terms by which Lenin wanted to changed world politics challenged Woodrow Wilson's vision and Lenin's Bolshevik-style revolutions spreading world wide was something that western leaders did not want.

The United States Declares War

Through all of this, America was neutral. It adopted the policy of isolationism because it felt that the increasing colonialism in Europe did not affect North America. There was a strong pacifist strain in American society, as evidenced by such popular songs as "I Didn't Raise My Boy to be a Soldier" and "Don't Take My Darling Boy Away," though at the same time many ethnic groups agitated for involvement. Economic links with the Allies also made neutrality difficult. The British were flooding America with new orders, many of them for arms. The sales were helping America get out of its recession. Although this was good for the economic health of the United States, Germany saw America becoming the Allied arsenal and bank.

Drawing of the Lusitania being hit.

On May 7, 1915, the German navy sunk the Cunard Line passenger ship R.M.S. Lusitania, operating under the flag of Great Britain. Of the 1,959 passengers 1200 died, including one hundred twenty Americans. The ship's quick explosion was due to a hidden cargo of American weaponry, a fact the US government denied. Woodrow Wilson's Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan, a pacifist, resigned over Wilson's responsibility for the placement of arms and the consequent inevitability of war. Various American citizens from different ethnic groups put pressure on their government to join the war. However, the US government was calmed by the Germans, who agreed to limit submarine warfare. In 1917, the Germans reinstated unrestricted submarine warfare in order to cripple the British economy by destroying merchant ships, and break the sea blockade of Britain.

On February 24, 1917, the American ambassador received a telegram in London from the British. It enclosed a British-decoded message, originally sent as a ciphered telegram from the German foreign Secretary, Arthur Zimmerman, to the ambassador in Mexico. Zimmerman proposed that the event of the war with the United States, Germany and Mexico would join in alliance. Germany would fund Mexico's conflict with the US: victory achieved. Mexico would then be able to gain their lost territories with Arizona. The message was published in American newspapers on March 1st.

On the evening of April 4, 1917 at 8:30 P.M., President Wilson appeared before a joint session of Congress, asking for the declaration of war to make the world "safe for democracy." He was hoping for a quick resolution of the conflict. Congress complied on April 6, 1917. The United States was at last at war with Germany.

The last American war had been the minor Spanish-American War a generation before. A draft of men above the age of eighteen followed the call to war, but many more volunteered. Men wanted to escape their lives and join the military for a job and an adventure.

A 1917 poster depicting Uncle Sam saying "I want you for U.S. Army". Propaganda like this was key for mobilizing troops.

The US had to mobilize its military before it could aid the Allies by sending troops. The cadre of the U.S. Army had experience in mobilizing and moving troops from its Mexican expedition, but the Army needed to expand to over one million men, most of which were untrained. This new draft was for a "scientific" army. Military officers were selected by the new "IQ" tests. The new conscripts met en massein embarkation camps in places such as Yahank, New York. Companies exercised together and drilled together. At this time, soldiers were taught techniques such as assembling and disassembling weapons blindfolded. They drilled constantly in formation. There was much amusement at these shaven-headed, first-time solders.

The chorus of a contemporary song went, "Good morning, Mister Zip-Zip-Zip,/ With your hair cut just as short as mine,/ Good morning, Mister Zip-Zip-Zip,/ You're surely looking fine!/ Ashes to ashes, and dust to dust,/ If the Camels don't get you,/ The Fatimas must . . . [Camels and Fatimas were brands of cigarettes.]

Then they went into ships to be transported to Europe. On the battlefield, they were placed in companies with other Americans, rather than being embedded with other nations.

American business and industry became involved as men created more military supplies, and jobs opened for building and designing new materials to be used in battle. However, for purposes of the battle, most of the weapons American soldiers carried had been designed by Europeans. An American-style tank was produced but only came out after the war.

In the same way, the Navy could send a battleship division to assist the British Grand Fleet, but needed to expand. To supply the American forces, new supply lines in France would be needed south of the British and French lines, which meant the U.S. would take over the southern part of the Western Front battle line. The US could and did help the Allies with monetary assistance. Increased taxes and the sale of war bonds allowed the US to raise enormous sums of money. Politicians and celebrities, as well as such movie stars as Charlie Chaplin and Mary Pickford, headed huge patriotic "Bond Rallies," where people were encouraged to buy bonds.

A government committee to influence the public on the war was formed, the Committee on Public Information or CPI. Among its organs of publicity were the "Four Minute Men," speakers who talked on pertinent subjects on Vaudeville stages, in movie theaters, and in public assemblies. There was also an organization of private citizens formed to root out German sympathizers, the American Protective League. A hit movie, "The Kaiser, the Beast of Berlin," was one hit of 1918. To strengthen the United States in this time of stress, families were encouraged to grow Victory Gardens, and American women and African Americans were encouraged to go into jobs the servicemen had left. This is the beginning of the Great Migration, when Southern African Americans began moving to Northern cities for jobs.

Trench Warfare

An American Doughboy

The U.S. commander, General John J. "Black Jack" Pershing, faced immense pressure from the British and French governments to use American forces in small units to reinforce depleted British and French units. This was impossible politically. Pershing insisted to General Foch, the Generalissimo of the Allied armies, that the U.S. Army would fight as a single Army. Pershing did not want to give his men to other Allied commanders, many of whose strategies he disagreed with.

A first aid station in an American trench

The European method of fighting, as it had been since the Boer War, was trench warfare. An army on the French battleground protected itself from the enemy with zigzag trenches, mines, barbed wire, and a line of rifles and machine guns. Between the enemy lines was a contested area, "no man's land." An attempt to advance toward the enemy was met with gunfire. These trenches stalemated military advances, as any man who raised his head from the trenches would be shot. At the Battle of the Somme in 1916, for example, Allied troops suffered 600,000 dead and wounded to earn only 125 square miles; the Germans lost 400,000 men. Rain fell in the trenches. As one song put it, a soldier was "Up to your waist in water, up to your eyes in slush." The damp produced a foot disease known as "trench foot": if untreated, it could rot flesh from the bone. The close, unsanitary conditions of the front lines encouraged fleas and lice, and typhoid, typhus, and dysentery caused deaths unrelated to gunfire. Worst of all, perhaps, was that sometimes the enemy would gas your trench. There was no way to escape, and sometimes no masks to protect you.

First used by the Germans in April 1915, chlorine gas stimulated overproduction of fluid in the lungs, leading to death by drowning. One British officer tended to troops who had been gassed reported that,

“

quite 200 men passed through my hands . . . Some died with me, others on the way down . . . I had to argue with many of them as to whether they were dead or not.

”

Chlorine, mustard, and phosgene gas would continue in use throughout the war, sometimes blistering, sometimes incapacitating, and often killing.

The End of the War

Despite the fact that the Germans could concentrate their efforts in one area, the Central Powers faced grim prospects in 1918. Encouraged by the United States joining the war, several nations joined the Allied Powers. The four Central Powers of Germany, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and Bulgaria faced the combined might of the Allied Powers of the United Kingdom and the British Empire, Australia, New Zealand, Canada, South Africa, France, Belgium, Japan, Serbia, Montenegro, San Marino, Italy, Portugal, Romania, the United States, Cuba, Panama, Guatemala, Nicaragua, Honduras, Haiti, Costa Rica, Brazil, Liberia, Siam (Thailand) and China (some of the above nations did not support the war with troops, but did contribute monetarily.) The Germans launched a final, desperate attack on France, but it failed miserably. Due to Allied counterattacks, the Central Powers slowly began to capitulate.

Bulgaria was the first to collapse. A combined force of Italians, Serbs, Greeks, Britons, and Frenchmen attacked Bulgaria through Albania in September, 1918. By the end of September, Bulgaria surrendered, withdrawing its troops from Serbia and Greece, and even allowing the Allies to use Bulgaria in military operations.

British forces, led by T. E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia), together with nationalist Arabs, were successful in the Ottoman Empire. About a month after Bulgaria's surrender, the Ottoman Empire surrendered, permitting Allies to use the Ottoman territory, including the Dardanelles Strait, in military operations.

The Austro-Hungarian Empire also decided to surrender in October. The royal family, the Habsburgs, and the Austro-Hungarian government desperately sought to keep the Empire of diverse nationalities united. Though Austria-Hungary surrendered, it failed to unite its peoples. The once-powerful Austro-Hungarian Empire was destroyed by the end of October, splitting into Austria, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Yugoslavia.

Germany, remaining all alone, also decided to surrender. President Wilson required that Germany accede to the terms of the Fourteen Points, which, among other things, required Germany to return territory acquired by the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk to Russia and the provinces of Alsace and Lorraine to France. Germany found the terms too harsh, while the Allies found them too lenient. But when German Emperor Wilhelm II abdicated the throne, the new German government quickly agreed to Wilson's demands. On November 11, 1918, World War I had come to an end.

The war had been marked by millions and millions of casualties. The deaths were so wide-spread and so vast that people in England talked of "The Lost Generation." Many died in battle, others died from disease and some even died after when hit with an influenza that spread throughout the whole world in 1918. Destruction of factories and farms, not to mention houses, created economic damage, and was one of the factors creating widespread European starvation during the winter of 1918-1919.

Police in Seattle wear masks during the Spanish Flu pandemic.

In contrast, damage was low in America. Although America had also suffered from the flu, the war had not touched U.S. shores. For years afterward, in Germany, France, and even British Commonwealth countries such as Canada, you could see men wearing artificial tin faces to hide battle wounds, men who wheezed because of damage from poison gas, and "war cripples" begging with bowls on the street corner. But American men were by-and-large intact. U.S. factories had been fully supplied, and the nation was on a sounder financial footing because of profit from the War.

At the end of the war, as American soldiers returned from Europe, employment rose. Some of the veterans returned to find themselves without homes or jobs. Overseas, some Black men were organized into a top fighting unit. However, Homeland outrage at the success helped to fuel riots in the notorious "Red Summer" of 1919. Each veteran returned with a certificate promising certain monies for their service; however, the certificate could not be cashed in until 1945.

American After-Effects Of The War

Suffrage For American Women

Suffragists parade in New York City in 1917

An after-effect of the employment of women during the war was the Nineteenth Amendment, giving them the right to vote. There had been a Suffrage movement since the nineteenth century. President Wilson and his contemporaries were reluctant, but conceded it as a quid pro quo. After the servicemen had returned, there were still two million more women in the workforce. However, instead of being in factory jobs, they were largely only permitted in "women's work": the "caring professions" such as nurses or teachers, secretaries or "stenographers," and waitresses, cooks, or washerwomen. These jobs paid little, and women were often expected to quit the job when they got married.

Politically active women still remained excluded from local and national power structures. Their voluntary organizations used tactics that advanced modern pressure-group politics. Issues ranged from birth control, peace, education, Indian Affairs, or opposition to lynching. Women in these associations lobbied legislators to support their causes. At the state level women achieved rights such as the ability to serve on juries.

Increasing Racial Tension

African Americans from the 369th Infantry Regiment who earned the Croix de guerre from France.

A force of African Americans had served in the War:

“	More than 350,000 African Americans served in segregated units during World War I, mostly as support troops. Several units saw action alongside French soldiers fighting against the Germans, and 171 African Americans were awarded the French Legion of Honor. In response to protests of discrimination and mistreatment from the black community, several hundred African American men received officers' training in Des Moines, Iowa. By October 1917, over six hundred African Americans were commissioned as captains and first and second lieutenants.	”
—

Fighting units such as the Harlem Hellfighters proved their mettle. Yet they received no recognition. Upon their return, particularly to the South, they faced resentment and sometimes lynchings.

In 1913, President Woodrow Wilson had segregated the Civil Service, which before had been an employer for black Americans. The war and the Great Migration triggered more oppression and more violence. When Caucasian White Americans were drawn into the army or defense industries, their jobs were sometimes given to black workers, for lower wages. The owners considered this a double good, keeping production going while destroying the workingman unions which agitated for higher pay. But while bosses were dependent, for the moment, on black workers, they did not think they owed anything to these employees.

An influx of unskilled Black strikebreakers into East St Louis, Illinois, heightened racial tensions in 1917. Rumors that Blacks were arming themselves for an attack on Whites resulted in numerous attacks by White mobs on Black neighborhoods. On July 1, Blacks fired back at a car whose occupants they believed had shot into their homes and mistakenly killed two policemen riding in a car. The next day, a full scale riot erupted which ended only after nine Whites and 39 Blacks had been killed and over three hundred buildings were destroyed. The anxieties of war helped fuel violence: Southern and Midwestern war vigilance committees formed the matrix for a revival of the Ku Klux Klan.

The Great Experiment

On August 1, 1917, the Senate voted to send the Eighteenth Amendment to the Constitution to the states for ratification. The vote was bi-partisan, 65 to 20. Section One read, in part,

“

After one year from the ratification of this article the manufacture, sale, or transportation of intoxicating liquors [. . . ] is hereby prohibited.

”

By 1919, the requisite number of states had ratified the Amendment. The Amendment actually came into effect, under its own terms, one year after ratification.

The Temperance movement had been in effect for more than a hundred years, since the Second Great Revival. The late 19th and early 20th century Anti-Saloon League had been successful in turning the discussion from social discouragement of alcohol to legal prohibition of the substance. It was not simply a creature of Protestant or Catholic Churches, but was "united with Democrats and Republicans, Progressives, Populists, and suffragists, the Ku Klux Klan and the NAACP, the International Workers of the World, and many of America's most powerful industrialists including Henry Ford, John D. Rockefeller, Jr., and Andrew Carnegie – all of whom lent support to the ASL's increasingly effective campaign."

But if Prohibition was not a simple reaction to World War I, it drew strength from the conflict. The War was funded by an income tax, thus unlocking saloon profits from the interests of the nation. The Lever Act of 1917, with the aim of feeding soldiers, prohibited grain from being used for alcoholic beverages. There were nationalist concerns, too: the most famous brewers of beer had German last names.

Treaty of Versailles

Woodrow Wilson meeting with the leaders of France, Italy, and the United Kingdom.

The Treaty of Versailles was the peace settlement signed after World War One had ended in 1918 and in the shadow of the Russian Revolution and other events in Russia. The treaty was signed at the vast Versailles Palace near Paris - hence its title - between Germany and the Allies. The three most important politicians there were David Lloyd George, Georges Clemenceau, and Woodrow Wilson. The Versailles Palace was considered the most appropriate venue simply because of its size - many hundreds of people were involved in the process and the final signing ceremony in the Hall of Mirrors could accommodate hundreds of dignitaries. Many wanted Germany, now led by Friedrich Ebert, smashed. Others, like Lloyd George, were privately more cautious.

"The Signing of Peace in the Hall of Mirrors, Versailles, 28th June 1919" by William Orpen

On June 28th 1919, the chief Allied and Associated Powers of the United Kingdom, the United States, France, Italy, and Japan met with the Central Powers in France to discuss a peace settlement. British Prime Minister David Lloyd George, American President Woodrow Wilson, and French President Clemenceau were known as "The Big Three." Each of the Allied and Associated Powers had distinct national interests. The UK wanted to keep the Royal Navy supreme by dismantling the German Navy. The British also wished to end Germany's colonial empire, which might have become a threat to the vast British Empire. Lloyd George wanted to be hard on the Germans to bolster his popular support at home in Great Britain.. Italy wanted the Allies to fulfill their promise of territory given to Rome at the beginning of the war. Clemenceau wanted Germany to be brought to its knees so it could never start another war against France. The French also wanted Germany to compensate Paris for damage inflicted on France during the War. Japan had already largely served its interests by taking over German colonies in the Pacific. President Wilson's main goal for the conference was the creation of a "League of Nations." He believed that such an organization was essential to preventing future wars. Many historians believe that Wilson's concentration on the League, forcing him to sacrifice possible compassion toward Germany, helped contribute to the conditions leading to World War II.

The Treaty of Versailles forced Germany to cede Alsace and Lorraine to France, dismantle its Army and Navy, give up its colonial Empire, pay massive reparations to the Allies, and take full responsibility for causing the war. The conference also led to the creation of the League of Nations. The US Senate, however, did not consent to the Treaty, and the European powers were left to enforce its provisions themselves. This eventually led to violations of the treaty by Germany, which then led to the Second World War. The treaty crippled the Weimar Government in Berlin and led to great bitterness in Germany, which helped to strengthen Adolf Hitler's National Socialist, or Nazi Party.

American Troops in Valdivostok, Russia in 1918. Americans had intervened in the Russian Civil War to protect their own interests, to prevent Japan from taking advantage of the situation to invade Siberia, and to secure an exit for allied Czech troops who had been fighting the Bolsheviks. The expedition ultimately accomplished little and left in 1920.

Questions For Review

1. What extended a conflict between Serbians and the Austro-Hungarian Empire into the globe-straddling World War I?

2. How did the advances of technology lead to trench warfare?

3. What in 1914-1915 led to an economic advantage for America from the War? What were the nation's post-war advantages?

4. Listen to songs from this period: "I Didn't Raise My Boy to be a Soldier." "Oh, How I Hate to Get up in the Morning." "Oh! It's a Lovely War." "Over There." "K-k-k-Katy." What is the song's point of view?

The Roaring Twenties and Prohibition (1920 - 1929)

Politics and Government

Presidency of Warren G. Harding

A new sympathy toward business was shown in the election of Republican Warren G. Harding as president in 1920. His administration helped streamline federal spending with the Budgeting and Accounting Act of 1921, supported anti-lynching legislation (which was, however, rejected by Congress), and approved bills assisting farm cooperatives and liberalizing farm credit.

Scandals

The Harding administration was also known for its scandals. He had had an affair with the wife of an Ohio merchant: the resulting daughter was never officially acknowledged. He also appointed some cronies, who saw office as an invitation to personal gain. One of those men was Charles Forbes, head of the Veterans Bureau. He was convicted of fraud and bribery in connection with government contracts, and was sent to prison. Another crony, Attorney General Harry Daugherty, was involved with an illegal liquor scheme. He only escaped prosecution by refusing to testify against himself.

Teapot Dome Scandal

The most notorious of these scandals was the revelation that the Secretary of the Interior, Albert Fall, accepted bribes to lease government property to private oil companies in the Teapot Dome Scandal. The popular conservation legislation created by Harding's predecessors, presidents Teddy Roosevelt, William Taft, and Woodrow Wilson, had set aside naval petroleum reserves in Wyoming and California. Three naval oil fields, Elk Hills and Buena Vista Hills in California and Teapot Dome in Wyoming, were tracts of public land meant as emergency underground supplies to be used by the navy only when regular oil supplies diminished. Teapot Dome received its name because of a rock resembling a teapot above the oil-bearing land. Politicians and private oil interests had opposed the restrictions placed on the oil fields, claiming that the reserves were unnecessary, and that the American oil companies could provide for the U.S. Navy.

Civil and criminal suits concerning Teapot Dome lasted through the 1920s. In 1927 the Supreme Court finally ruled that the oil leases had been corruptly obtained and invalidated the Elk Hills lease in February of that year and the Teapot lease in October of the same year. The navy regained control of Teapot Dome and Elk Hills reserves. Albert Fall was found guilty of bribery in 1929, fined $100,000, and sentenced to one year in prison. Harry Sinclair refused to cooperate with the government investigators, was charged with contempt, and received a short sentence for jury tampering. Edward Doheny was acquitted in 1930 of attempts to bribe Fall.

The Teapot Dome scandal was a victory for neither political party. It became a major issue in the presidential election of 1924, but neither party could claim full credit for divulging the wrongdoing. It became the first true evidence of government corruption in America. The scandal revealed the problem of natural resource scarcity and the need to protect for the future against emergency depletion of resources. Vice President Calvin Coolidge, who assumed the presidency after Harding's death, handled the problem very systematically, and his administration avoided any damage to its reputation.

Technology

Although there were innumerable technical innovations, the vast changes in American life about this time had two major technical bases, mass production (the assembly line), and mass testing.

In the vast steel factories and in cloth mills individuals had to move together with the machines. Any mistake could lead to an accident, perhaps a fatal one. Henry Ford's assembly line worked on the same principle, but went much further. A car went from station to station, from worker to worker. Each worker had one function—tightening nuts, adding a component—and only that function, as if he were himself a machine. His main interest was in doing those motions which would do his job and do it most efficiently. (In this respect the system drew upon work efficiency experts such as Frederick Winslow Taylor and the Gilbreths.)

The advantages to this extreme systemization were fundamental. As with the cloth factories, the product was produced extremely quickly at all hours of the day or night. Very little training was needed for those jobs. The results of this system were extremely long-lasting. The Model T was seen as a durable car, and "the tin Lizzie" retained public affection even when it was superseded by cars with self-starters. The cars were also affordable, with results as seen below. Henry Ford raised his wages regularly, urging that the men who made the cars also buy them.

A small demerit was that these new cars were extremely ugly. The Stanley Steamer had been sleek, with lines like what would later be called "streamlining." Dusenbergs and Pierce-Arrows had a variety of hues and such extras as bud vases. Ford famously said that his purchasers could have any color they wanted, "so long as it is black." As people became more prosperous, they could shop for colored paint jobs and detailing for their luxury cars. However, creating affordable and beautiful goods was a movement away from Ford's version of the market.

More importantly, working on the assembly line wore on the workers. Standing in one place and squinting, working with a few muscles for hours a day (or night) could be very fatiguing. Human beings weren't made to live like that. When there were a limited set of priorities for working, workers could be easily replaced, just like machines. Not every boss of the assembly line paid as well as Ford.

Mass testing was a requirement for the assembly line—a bad part made a bad product. But it had actually begun as a human policy, in the requirements for the late 19th Century census. It was accelerated in the desire to find sound men for the First World War. Psychologists were employed to create intelligence tests to weed out unfit soldiers. Their weapons had to be carefully inspected, for when shoddy goods reached the front lines, the result could be a disaster.

In the post-war world, Big Business began developing research and development departments. Before a change was implemented, there had to be a prototype, and the effects on the public had to be carefully measured. Economics became a matter, not merely of becoming prosperous, but of selling to the largest number possible. (The term mass market originated in the 1920s.)

The Automobile

A scene from Tampa, Florida. Here Pedestrians, Trollies, and Street cars can be seen crossing a bridge at the same time.

In the 1920s, the United States automobile industry began an extraordinary period of growth by means of the assembly line in manufacturing. Cars began to alter the American lifestyle. In 1929, one out of every five Americans had a car. They began using their own automobiles instead of the street cars. Cars also replaced horses. This made the streets cleaner, because there wasn't as much horse manure. (However, this was replaced by other, more subtle forms of pollution. In the 1920s gasoline companies started adding lead to their fuel to increase engine efficiency.)

The idea of "homes on wheels" was also created around this time. Americans were packing up food and camping equipment in order to get away from home. By the 1920s most automobiles gained cloth or steel roofs, offering a private space for courtship and sex. Women gained from the automobile revolution. Women who learned to drive achieved new-found independence, taking touring trips with female friends, conquering muddy roads, and making repairs when their vehicles broke down. Prosperous African Americans for the first time obtained a limited freedom from local discrimination. A family could drive around and past "closed" White communities, and to beaches, camps, and other holiday destinations. (However, the family car would have to carry its own food, drink and gas, and not stop before it reached its destination. The largest-scale pamphlet for "safe" businesses African Americans could use, the Negro Motorist Green Book, was only published beginning in 1936.) The car was the ultimate social equalizer.

A 1927 Ford Model T

There were 108 automobile manufacturers in 1923 and colors allowed owners to express personal tastes. An abundance of fuel fed these cars. In 1920, the United States produced sixty-five percent of the World's oil. Road construction was extensive. The first timed stop-and-go traffic light was in 1924.

Industries related to the manufacturing and use of automobiles also grew; petroleum, steel, and glass were in high demand, leading to growth and profitability in related sectors. State governments began to build roads and highways in rural areas. Gasoline stations were installed across the country, evidence of the sudden and continued growth of the petroleum industry. Automobile dealers introduced the installment plan, a financing concept that was adopted in many other parts of business. Thus, the automobile industry's growth had repercussions throughout the nation. With a perfected design of Henry Ford's assembly line automobiles began to be more affordable for the common US citizens all over the country. A lot of men were hired to work in car factories.

Health and Life Expectancy

The relation between food and health had long been known. For example, since the 18th century it has been known how to fight scurvy, and mariners have taken fruit on long voyages. Yet the fact that scurvy is caused by lack of vitamin c was only discovered in 1932.

From 1915 to the end of the 1920s most vitamins were discovered. Food regulation began to ensure a safer food supply. People began to have access to and the possibility of choosing more and better food, due to faster transport and refrigeration. Technical information was also more easily transmitted, and by 1930 nutritionists began to emphasize to the public the need for consumption of certain foods, and their constituent vitamins and minerals, on a daily basis. Food companies began marketing their products, on how their products contain certain amounts of your daily vitamins and therefore healthy. However, the advertisements sometimes contained unusual ideas about nutrition. For example, some candy bars were advertised by their "food value." And Welch's Grape Juice marketed their product as containing nutrients and vitamins, but failed to inform the reader of the large amount of sugar also included.

But the emphasis on nutrition and good hygiene made many Americans healthier. This was the decade when penicillin and insulin were discovered. During this time the life expectancy at birth in the United States also increased from fifty-four to sixty percent, and infant mortality rate decreased by one-third. However this was not the case for nonwhites: the mortality rate for nonWhite children was about fifty to one hundred times that of Whites during this era. (Rickets among the poor and among rural African Americans was seen as the result of poor genetics, "bad blood." The American fad for Eugenics and the sterilization movement also grew in this era.) Accident fatalities also increased by roughly 150 percent, for the car was becoming faster and more common.

Elderly Americans and Retirement

As more adults survived into old age, an interest in pensions and other forms of old age assistance grew. In the third decade of the 20th century, one third of Americans sixty-five and older depended financially on someone else. Over the past fifty years many European countries had established state-supported pension systems. In 1923 the Pennsylvania Chamber of Commerce called old-age assistance “un-American & socialistic.” But during the 1920s state resistance to pension plans eroded. Isaac Max Rubinow and Abraham Epstein attempted to persuade legislators and associations such as labor unions to endorse old-age assistance. By 1933 almost every state gave some minimal support to needy elderly.

Culture of the 1920's

Flapper fashion became a symbol of the 1920s

During this time period, new social values emerged. It became difficult to determine what was socially acceptable, as youth frequently took up smoking, drinking, and a new openness about sex. They were being influenced less by their parents and more by their peers and schoolmates. Schools in the cities geared up for mass education, segregating children with others of their same age. The rite of passage, dating without adult supervision, became more commonplace among these youth.

The Flapper was the female symbol of this change, as the raccoon-coated Sheik was the symbol among young men. The dresses then in fashion de-emphasized the bodice, with a flat abdomen, the so-called "boyish figure." Flappers did not have the long hair of their mothers and grandmothers, but short, "bobbed" styles. They drank and smoked like men, knew all the latest dances and songs, and openly swore and talked of sex. It is unknown how frequent the Flapper really was. Bobbed hair was fashionable among women and girls, but there was never a standard measurement of this or any related trend. Movie actresses such as Louise Brooks and Clara Bow were shown drinking on the big screen, and F. Scott Fitzgerald's writings showed a literary interest in the Flapper.

During the War, servicemen became used to lectures on preventing venereal disease, and thus became more comfortable with the idea of contraception. Condoms started to be made with latex instead of animal tissues, and became a product which could be mass-produced on an assembly line. Birth control became more available, and more respectable. With a greater chance for babies to survive infancy, and with the ability to time when they came into the world, the number of children in a middle-class family began to go from four or five to two or three. Unfortunately, this overlapped with the eugenics movement.

As the middle class became more mobile, it was much less able to rely on the advice of grandparents and family, and "expert" child care advice became popular. This advice was different from that commonly used nowadays. John B. Watson, who published his book in 1928, advised against picking up infants, holding them when they cried, or cossetting them or showing them too much affection.

Radio

People using a radio.

Radio had been used for ship-to-shore communication since the Titanic sent out a Morse code S-O-S. It was used by both sides during the First World War. Wilson considered nationalizing the medium, as Great Britain was later to nationalize the British Broadcasting Corporation, but corporate outcry overruled him. By 1920, thousands of curious machines produced screeches for the hobbyist, with an occasional, distant snatch of voices or music. In 1920 the assembly line did its work, producing an RCA "Cat's Whisker" receiver for under four dollars. In October of that year Westinghouse created the first radio station, KDKA. In November it provided running coverage of the Presidential elections.

By the mid-'20s programming ran from morning till night. In 1924, the first radio network, the National Broadcasting Company, began operations between New York and Boston. In 1927, the Columbia Broadcasting System began. The Federal Radio Commission was set up in 1926, and organized in the Radio Act of 1927. Advertisers sponsored programs: one popular music program was The A & P Gypsies, giving coast-to-coast coverage to the A & P grocery stores. The news and entertainment provided was vetted by the sponsor, and anything which would offend sponsors was forbidden. But within those lines much was permitted. One could occasionally find high culture (though the Metropolitan Opera broadcasts only began at the end of 1931), but the aim was to air songs in the middle range of culture; "The Lost Chord," or "Drink to Me Only With Thine Eyes." They played popular music, but not much jazz: Paul Whiteman, the so-called "King of Jazz," was not. (There were exceptions to this rule; some high-powered radio stations in Mexico poured out jazz, "Black music," and ads for toxic patent medicines.) Much of the country's culture was not covered, though the Grand Ole Opry began its broadcasts in 1925. But as electrification expanded, the market for radio grew, and some stations experimented. A pair of White comedians, Freeman Gosden and Charles Correll, created a comic, sentimental serial drama, Amos 'n' Andy. At a time when lynchings of African Americans occurred as far North as Ohio, this was a comedy about two stupid African Americans who mispronounced their words. But it also created sympathy for them. "One episode ended with Amos and Andy in desperate need of a typewriter; nearly two thousand typewriters were immediately sent in by listeners." Yet " Amos 'n' Andy 's popularity was no doubt due to excitement over this new national experience. For the first time Americans could all enjoy the same event at the same moment."

Movies

Charlie Chaplin, a famous British movie star by the 1920s, helped establish an early Hollywood studio.

In the 1920s movies also grew into a popular recreation. By 1922, about 40 million people were going to the movies each week; that number jumped to about 100 million people by the end of the decade. Movie stars such as Douglas Fairbanks, Mary Pickford, and Charlie Chaplin became known around the world.

Eight studios dominated the industry, consolidating and integrating all aspects of a film's development. By 1929, the film-making firms that were to rule and monopolize Hollywood for the next half-century were the giants or the majors, sometimes dubbed The Big Five. The Big Five studios were Warner Bros., RKO, Paramount, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and Fox Film Corporation. They produced more than 90 percent of the fiction films in America and distributed their films both nationally and internationally. Each studio somewhat differentiated its products from other studios.

A movie house was only allowed to play the products of one studio. Thus, for example, the New York Paramount only played cartoons, newsreels, and fiction films created by Paramount Studios. (In the 1920s Paramount distributed the work of Max Fleischer Studios, creator of the Koko the Clown Cartoons.) Each division of the studio was contracted to make so many films each year. If a movie house wanted to get the films of a Gloria Swanson or a Rudolf Valentino, it had to accept a given number of films by a less-liked star. This "block booking" ensured that certain actors got publicity and kept the screens under the thumb of the studio. However, in return each theater was ensured of a weekly change of movies, with the full backing of the studio. In addition to the projectionist, ushers and candy and cigarette sellers, the Paramount Theater employed a grand musician to accompany the silent film on one of the largest theater organs ever created. Its halls were ornamented by hand-painted murals. The top-line theaters were called "movie palaces."

The most popular studio movies often used sweepingly romantic stories set in exotic lands: Argentina in 1921's The Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, Persia in 1924's The Thief of Bagdad. The 1925 movie Ben Hur was shot partially in Italy and partially on huge purpose-built sets in California. It had 42 cameras shooting the still-famous chariot race. Among the famous or yet-to-be-famous figures swelling the scenes as extras were the Barrymore brothers, Lillian and Dorothy Gish, comedian Harold Lloyd, William Randolph Hearst's love Marion Davies, and studio head Samuel Goldwyn. The religious sequences used two-tone technicolor. It was the most expensive film yet made.

Prohibition

Agents pour alcohol into a sewer following a raid.

Although total alcohol consumption halved, some people blatantly disregarded Prohibition. There were loopholes in the Volstead Act, the twenty-two page law which defined Prohibition. Churches could use wine in their ceremonies, and alcohol drunk as a medicine (this was still part of the medical profession) was still allowed. The amount of "religious" and "medicinal" wine suddenly increased.

Some illegal alcohol was imported from Canada, Cuba, and Mexico, which never made alcohol illegal. Some was home-made American. Bootleggers were found in many places throughout the country, from backwoods stills (illegal alcohol production had continued after the Whiskey Rebellion) to urban "bathtub gin." The Volstead Act had said that personal consumption of alcohol in one's own home was legal, though it had prohibited public gatherings to drink. The occasional secret saloons called speakeasies which sprang up in cities were therefore illegal. These required money, and a new criminal underworld rose to fund them and profit from them. Some of this money funded pay-offs to police to stop enforcement of Prohibition. Gangs prospered in this hidden economy. Many jobs came out of Prohibition, both from alcohol and from the "front" legitimate businesses set up to launder speakeasy money. However, these jobs came with great risks, from blackmail and graft to outright violence. Some commentators felt that Prohibition was too harsh and that it made a criminal out of the average American man or woman, who would have bought alcohol legally if it were available.

Gangs and Violence

Machine Gun Kelly, taken in by police

There was obviously a huge market for what in the 1920s was an illegal commodity. Gangsters provided this commodity. Major gangsters in this period included Charles "Lucky" Luciano, Mayer Lansky, and "Dutch" Schultz. Perhaps the most notorious was Chicago's Al Capone. Capone smuggled alcohol all over the Midwest. He was also responsible for drug smuggling and murder, and bribed both police and important politicians.

Despite the deference given Capone by "bought" figures, he had enemies from other Chicago gangs. He rode in an armor-plated limousine, always accompanied by armed bodyguards. Violence was a daily occurrence in Chicago. 227 gangsters were killed in the space of four years. On St Valentine's Day, 1929, seven members of the O'Banion gang were shot dead by gangsters dressed as police officers.

In 1931, the government got around the corrupted regular police by arresting Capone for tax evasion, rather than for his many violent offenses. He got eleven years in jail, and left prison with his health broken.

Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie and Clyde

Bonnie and Clyde were also a famous pair of murderers and thieves in the 1920s during the prohibition era with their gang. Clyde Champion Barrow and his companion, Bonnie Parker, were shot to death by officers in an ambush near Sailes, Bienville Parish, Louisiana on May 23, 1934, after one of the most colorful and spectacular manhunts the nation had seen up to that time. Barrow was suspected of numerous killings and was wanted for murder, robbery, and state charges of kidnapping.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), then called the Bureau of Investigation, became interested in Barrow and his paramour late in December 1932 through a singular bit of evidence. A Ford automobile, which had been stolen in Pawhuska, Oklahoma, was found abandoned near Jackson, Michigan in September of that year. At Pawhuska, it was learned another Ford car had been abandoned there which had been stolen in Illinois. A search of this car revealed it had been occupied by a man and a woman, indicated by abandoned articles therein. In this car was found a prescription bottle, which led special agents to a drug store in Nacogdoches, Texas, where investigation disclosed the woman for whom the prescription had been filled was Clyde Barrow's aunt.

Further investigation revealed that the woman who obtained the prescription had been visited recently by Clyde Barrow, Bonnie Parker, and Clyde's brother, L. C. Barrow. It also was learned that these three were driving a Ford car, identified as the one stolen in Illinois. It was further shown that L. C. Barrow had secured the empty prescription bottle from a son of the woman who had originally obtained it.

On May 20, 1933, the United States Commissioner at Dallas, Texas, issued a warrant against Clyde Barrow and Bonnie Parker, charging them with the interstate transportation, from Dallas, to Oklahoma, of the automobile stolen in Illinois. The FBI then started its hunt for this elusive pair.

Religions and Revivalism

Just as the Religious section of the newspaper had long been popular, the new medium of radio became a way to increase religious visibility. Churches bought broadcasting slots from stations eager to seem like good neighbors. City stations might broadcast programs of interest to Catholics and Jews, as well as from minority faiths or cults. This impinged on listeners, coming into their homes, as printed media did not.

The religious revival had been a feature of both mainline denominations and smaller sects since the turn of the century. Both mainline and independent preachers called upon listeners to give up frivolity and turn to a purer faith. Many of these sermons condemned movies and theatre, novels and card gambling, drinking and modern fashion, including women's short dresses and makeup. Many of them had supported the imposition of Prohibition. The Twenties provided electric lighting, amplification, and radio coverage for revivals. Some popular preachers traveled by train or motor car to cities and towns across the country. Aimee Semple McPherson and Billy Sunday were among the most notable of these, and aroused controversy.

Jazz

Louis Armstrong

Jazz is an American musical art form which originated around the beginning of the 20th century in Black communities in the Southern United States from a confluence of African and European music traditions. The “hometown” of jazz is considered to be in New Orleans. Early jazz musicians would called New Orleans their home even if they have never been there. Jazz employed a number of Black men and women. Jazz spread through America very quickly. The style's West African pedigree is evident in its use of blue notes, call-and-response, improvisation, polyrhythms, syncopation, and the swung note of ragtime. Beginning in 1922, Gennett Records began recording jazz groups performing in Chicago. The first group they recorded was the New Orleans Rhythm Kings, followed in 1923 by King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band with Louis Armstrong. Another indie company in Chicago, Paramount Records, was competing with Gennett and Okeh for jazz talent. The Black community took notice: authors such as Langston Hughes often mentioned the music in his poems, both positively and negatively.

Business Overseas

After the war, many manufacturing companies faced hard times as they attempted to convert from wartime production of weapons and planes to what they had traditionally produced before the war. However, the pro-business policies put in place first by Harding, then Coolidge, allowed business to flourish. While business did well at home—the raising of tariff rates from 27% (under the Underwood-Simmons Tariff) to 41% certainly helped in this regard—many major companies did quite well overseas. Just as these companies had started to do before the war, they set up shop in a variety of countries based around the resources located there. Meat packers like Gustavus Swift went to Argentina; fruit growers went to Costa Rica, Honduras, and Guatemala; sugar plantation owners went to Cuba; rubber plantation owners to the Philippines, Sumatra, and Malaya; copper corporations to Chile; and oil companies to Mexico and Venezuela (which remains today a great source for oil). Steamships and telegraphs made for easy transport and communication.

Organized Labor

Blair mountain miner with rifle. After the Matewan Massacre rallied local unions to take up arms, anti union forces and government troops retaliated against organized labor with violence.

The Organized labor force during the 1920s suffered a great deal. During this time the country was fearful of the spread of communism in America, because of this widespread fear public opinion was against any worker who attempted to disrupt the order of the working class. The public was so anti-labor union that in 1922 the Harding administration was able to get a court injunction to destroy a railroad workers strike that was about 400,000 strong. Also in 1922 the government took part in putting to an end a nationwide miners strike that consisted of about 650,000 miners. The federal and state level of government had no toleration for strikes, and allowed for businesses to sue the unions for any damages done during a strike.

Major Cases

The Sacco-Vanzetti Trial, Leopold and Loeb, the Scopes Trial, and the Black Sox Trial were all significant court cases during the 1920s. Each of these court cases were unique and monumental in their own right, and set a precedent for the years to come.

The Scopes Trial

A photo of the Trial proceedings.

In 1925, John Thomas Scopes, a biology teacher, was tried and convicted in Tennessee for teaching about evolution in his public school classroom as an explanation of the origin of humans, as opposed to the Biblical story of Adam and Eve, which was supported by state law at the time. This was a major dispute and caught the attention of many popular government officials such as William Jennings Bryan, who spoke on behalf of the prosecution. Bryan saw evolution as not only pernicious in its own right, but as a platform for eugenics: the textbook that Scopes used, Civic Biology, advocated "racial hygiene." Although the modernists lost the case, they still were happy to have highlighted the illogical reasoning behind the law that schools could not teach alternative theories for the origin of man. They were also happy that this trial and conviction didn't affect the expansion of fundamentalist ideals. The Southern Baptist Convention, a Protestant group, became one of the fastest growing denominations after the trial showing that it may have even given popularity to the religious denomination. The beliefs of these groups resulted in an independent subculture with their own schools, radio programs, and missionary societies.

Minority Women

During the 1920s there were almost double the amount of minority women than White in the workforce. Women, especially minorities, who held factory jobs held the least desirable and lowest paying jobs in factories. Black women mostly held domestic jobs such as cooking, cleaning, and laundry. There were many openings for educated minority women in the social work, teaching, and nursing fields during this time, however they faced much discrimination. The economic needs of the family brought thousands of minority women into having to work. Mexican women, mainly in the Southwest worked as domestic servants, operatives in garment factories, and as agricultural laborers. This was looked down upon because the Mexican culture traditionally was against women labor. Next to African women, Japanese women were the most likely to hold low paying jobs in the work force, they worked in the lowest paying jobs; they faced very strong racial biases and discrimination on a regular basis as well.

African-Americans and the Ku Klux Klan

Rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan

Southern states segregated public facilities (like buses). In half the South fewer than 10% of the Blacks were allowed to vote.

The Ku Klux Klan flourished 1921–26 with a membership of millions of Protestants. Not only was the Ku Klux Klan big in the south, but in such northern states as Ohio, Oregon, and Indiana. Indiana's governor and an Oregon mayor were both members of the KKK. Many KKK members were women, nearly a half million in women's auxiliary associations. Klansmen organized marches and violence against African-Americans, Catholics, and Jews, as well as bootleggers and adulterers. They gained new support from nativists who had detested the mass immigration to the Northeast in the early 1900s.

The return of the Klan caused a split in the Democratic Party which allowed Calvin Coolidge, a conservative Republican, to take office in 1924.

Blacks were widely persecuted by the Ku Klux Klan, but they were not the only group of people that the KKK targeted because they believed in “Native, White, Protestant supremacy.” They also targeted groups like Mexicans, Jews and Catholics. A Klu Klux Klan newspaper ran a doggerel poem of a dialogue between the Pope and the Devil, with the latter saying the KKK "will make it hotter than I can for you in hell." The Ku Klux Klan would also try and bring justice into their own hands when it came to dealing with bootleggers, wife beaters and adulterers, and even the Knights of Columbus.

The Great Migration

In most cities, the only way Blacks could relieve the pressure of crowding that resulted from increasing migration was to expand residential borders into surrounding previously White neighborhoods, a process that often resulted in harassment and attacked by White residents whose intolerant attitudes were intensified by fears that Black neighbors would cause property values to decline. Moreover, the increased presence of Blacks in cities, North and South, as well as their competition with Whites for housing, jobs, and political influence sparked a series of race riots. The Tulsa Race Riots of 1921 and the Rosewood Massacre of 1923 (where a town was wiped off the map by racist violence) were examples of this extreme of hatred. The Tulsa Race Riots involved the local white community looting a prosperous and thriving black community, and destroying it with arson and an aerial bombing by plane.

The Great Migration ignited hatred toward Blacks in Northern big cities. Blacks migrated to cities such as New York, Chicago, and Detroit, and in Western cities such as Los Angeles and San Diego. Although most of the migrants were poor and lived in cheap urban housing, some were able to afford better houses in White neighborhoods. However, even prosperous people were unable to live where they wanted. Discrimination could be as open as the notice in Wanted ads -- "No Negroes allowed"—or as quiet as the refusal of a real estate agent. The brave Black family who actually bought in those neighborhoods would face snubs from the neighbors, refusal of services from local businesses, and sometimes covert or open violence. (An example of this last is seen in Detroit's Ossian Sweet case of 1925.)

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  Tulsa burns in 1921.
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  Armed soldiers questioning a black resident in Washington D.C. in 1919.
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  White men stone a black man during the 1919 Chicago race riots.
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  A family flees their vandalized home following the riots in Chicago.

Organizing

To fight this discrimination many Black movement groups formed. The Universal Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) was formed by Marcus Garvey, an immigrant from Jamaica living in Harlem. Garvey preached a message of equality that many, including other Black leaders, considered radical. Garvey helped start companies and news papers directed towards the Black community. He gained many followers around the US, especially in cities. Amritjit Singh [1] estimates that Garvey and the UNIA had over half a million followers. Garvey created more racial cohesion and inspired the Black community to stand up. Yet others, including the prominent Black author W.E.B. Du Bois, considered Garvey's approach extreme and believed that it would backfire. Du Bois believed in a "gradualist" strategy, working through education and the legal system. He and some other Black leaders petitioned the U.S. Attorney General and had Garvey deported back to Jamaica. Yet Garvey's message lived on long after he was deported, and he was one of the early inspirations of 1960 civil rights leader Malcolm X.

The Harlem Renaissance

African American Women in Harlem in 1925.

In New York City's Harlem and in half a dozen other Northern cities, a Black culture began to form as a result of the relative economic and educational advantages given through the Great Migration. Black businesses, legal and political systems, and arts societies flourished. Here "the talented tenth" had its own business and fraternal institutions. Poets Langston Hughes, Claude McKay, and Jean Toomer, and musicians such as Chick Webb and Duke Ellington were published in mainstream magazines and heard in White-frequented (though sometimes segregated) clubs. The Harlem Renaissance talked of the contemporary Black community's hopes and fears.

Other races during the 1920's

The Indian Citizenship Act of 1924 gave indigenous people in the United States citizenship.

The Immigration Act of 1924 effectively eliminated immigration from Asia, and limited the immigration of Jews, Italians, and Eastern Europeans.

The End of Prosperity and the Stock Market Crash of 1929

A crowd gathering outside the New York stock exchange following the stock market crash.

In the 1920s, farmers did not do so well. A lot of farms did not have running water or electricity, and pay was low due to surplus. World War I had disrupted farming in Europe and the warring European nations greatly depended on American farming for food. When peace came, demand for crops like cotton and grain suddenly fell but farmers kept planting at wartime rates, so they were left without money to pay off their loans or new devices like tractors.

A lot of farmers were dependent growing cotton. However, in the twenties the price of cotton plummeted because of new man-made materials that entered the market. Matters were made worse by the invasion of the boll weevil, an insect which planted its eggs in the boll (cotton blossom), and ate the cotton. The Southern economy was partially saved through following the urging of inventor George Washington Carver and planting peanuts instead of cotton. In 1925-1927 George Washington Carver patented two uses for peanuts, and hundreds of more inventions from soybeans, pecans, and even sweet potatoes. Some inventions he made from peanuts and soybeans are paper, instant coffee, shaving cream, mayonnaise, soap, and talcum powder. None of these procedures were ever recorded by him in a notebook. He urged increased participation of Blacks in agricultural education.

On October 24, 1929, today known as Black Thursday, the stock market began its downhill drop. After the first hour, the prices had gone down at an amazing speed. Some people thought that after that day, the prices would rise again just as it had done before. But prices kept dropping. On October 29, 1929, Black Tuesday, more than 16 million shares were sold, but by the end of the day, most stocks ended below their previous value, and some stocks became totally worthless. By November 13, the prices had hit rock bottom. The stock AT&T had gone from 304 dollars to 197. Much of America had celebrated unheard of prosperity for eight years, but the Stock Market Crash put an end to that within a few weeks.

Questions For Review

1. Name the economic effects of one of the following: the automobile; mass production as a whole; the boll weevil.

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The Great Depression and the New Deal (1929 - 1939)

The Stock Market Crash

Timeline of the Great Depression

Year	Month	Events
1929	October	The stock market crashes, marking the end of six years of unparalleled prosperity for most sectors of the American economy. The "crash" began on October 24 (Black Tuesday). By October 29, stock prices had plummeted and banks were calling in loans. An estimated $30 billion in stock values "disappeared" by mid-November.
	November	"Any lack of confidence in the economic future or the basic strength of business in the United States is foolish."—President Herbert Hoover
1930	March	More than 3.2 million people are unemployed, up from 1.5 million before the "crash" of October, 1929. President Hoover remained optimistic however stating that "all the evidences indicate that the worst effects of the crash upon unemployment will have passed during the next sixty days."
	November	The street corners of New York City are crowded with apple-sellers. Nearly six thousand unemployed individuals worked at selling apples for five cents apiece, The bill fell to defeat in the Senate, however, 62 to 18. The vets maintained their determination to stay camped out until they got their pay.
1931	January	Texas congressman Wright Patman introduces legislation authorizing immediate payment of "bonus" funds to veterans of World War I. The "bonus bill" had been passed in 1924. It allotted bonuses, in the form of "adjusted service certificates," equaling $1 a day for each day of service in the U.S., and $1.25 for each day overseas. President Hoover was against payment of these funds, saying it would cost the Treasury $4 billion.
	February	"Food riots" begin to break out in parts of the U.S. In Minneapolis, several hundred men and women blew up a grocery market with some C4 and made off with fruit, canned goods, bacon, and ham. One of the store's owners pulled out a gun to stop the looters, but was leapt upon and had his arm broken. The "riot" was brought under control by 100 policemen. Seven people were arrested. Resentment of "foreign" workers increases along with unemployment rolls. In Los Angeles, California, Mexican Americans found themselves being accused of stealing jobs from "real" Americans. During the month, 6,024 of them were deported.
	March	Three thousand unemployed workers march on the Ford Motor Company's plant in River Rouge, Michigan. Dearborn police and Ford's company guards attack, killing four workers and injuring many more.
	December	New York's Bank of the United States collapses. At the time of the collapse, the bank had over $200 million in deposits, making it the largest single bank failure in the nation's history.
1932	January	Congress establishes the Reconstruction Finance Corporation. The R.F.C. was allowed to lend $2 billion to banks, insurance companies, building and loan associations, agricultural credit organizations and railroads. Critics of the R.F.C. called it "the millionaires' dole."
	April	More than 750,000 New Yorkers are reported to be dependent upon city relief, with an additional 160,000 on a waiting list. Expenditures averaged about $8.20 per month for each person on relief.
	May	More than 300 World War I vets leave Portland, Oregon en route to Washington DC to urge Congress to pass the Bonus Bill. It took them eighteen days to reach Washington DC.
	June	Determined to collect their "bonus" pay for service, between 15,000 to 25,000 World War I veterans gather and begin setting up encampments near the White House and the Capitol in Washington, D.C. On June 15, the House passed Congressman Wright Patman's "bonus bill" by a vote of 209 to 176. The bill fell to defeat in the Senate, however, 62 to 18. The vets maintained their determination to stay camped out until they got their pay.
	July	Hoover signs a $100,000 transportation bill to assist "bonus Army" demonstrators in getting home. Hoover set a July 24 deadline for the men to abandon their encampments. On July 28, when some "bonus Army" members resisted being moved from their camps. Violence erupted, leading to the deaths of two veterans. Hoover ordered Federal troops, under the command of General Douglas MacArthur, to assist DC police in clearing the veterans.
		The Reconstruction Finance Corporation is authorized to lend needy states sums from the national Treasury. The money was to target relief and public works projects.
	November	Franklin Delano Roosevelt is elected President in a landslide over Herbert Hoover. Roosevelt received 22,800,000 popular votes to 15,750,000 for Hoover.
1933	March	Before a crowd of 100,000 at the Capitol Plaza in Washington DC, Franklin Delano Roosevelt is inaugurated president. FDR tells the crowd, "The people of the United Slates have not failed. In their need they have registered a mandate that they want direct, vigorous action. They have asked for discipline and direction under leadership. They have made me the present instrument of their wishes. In the spirit of the gift I take it." FDR announces a four-day bank holiday to begin on Monday. March 6. During that time, FDR promised, Congress would work on coming up with a plan to save the failing banking industry. By March 9, Congress passed the Emergency Banking Act of 1933. By month's end, three-quarters of the nation's closed banks were back in business.
		On March 12, FDR delivers the first of what came to be known as his "fireside chats." In his initial "chat" he appealed to the nation to join him in "banishing fear."
	April	President Roosevelt. under the Emergency Banking Act, orders the nation off of the gold standard.
		The Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) is established. Designed as a relief and employment program for young men between the ages of 17 and 27, the CCC was envisioned by FDR as a kind of volunteer "army" that would work in national forests, parks, and federal land for nine-month stints. The first 250,000 young men were housed in 1,468 camps around the country- At its peak in 1935, the CCC would include 500,000 young men.
	May	The Federal Emergency Relief Administration is created by Congress. President Franklin Roosevelt appointed Harry L. Hopkins as its chief administrator. By the end of his first day on the job, Hopkins had Issued grants totaling more than $5 million.
		The National Industrial Recovery Act is introduced into Congress. Under Title 1 of the act, the National Recovery Administration was designated to maintain some form of price and wage controls. Section 7(a) of the act guaranteed labor the right to organize and bargain collectively. As part of the act. The National Labor Board was set up to negotiate disputes between labor and management.
		The Tennessee Valley Authority is created. A federally run hydroelectric power program, the TVA act was considered a huge experiment in social planning. The TVA also built dams, produced and sold fertilizer, reforested the Tennessee Valley area and developed recreational lands. Opponents of the TVA called it "communistic to its core."
	June	Congress passes the Glass-Steagall Act, separating commercial from investment banking and setting up the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation to guarantee bank deposits.
	August	With an eye toward organizing farmers into soil conservation districts, the federal government establishes the Soil Erosion Service. The creation of this service was made necessary by the years of drought and dust that plagued the Southwestern Panhandle states.
	September	In an effort to stabilize prices, the federal agricultural program orders the slaughter of more than 6 million pigs. Many citizens protested this action since most of the meat went to waste.
	October	The Civil Works Administration is established. Devised as a wide scale program that could employ up to 4 million people, the C.W.A was involved in the building of bridges, schools, hospitals, airports, parks and playgrounds- Additionally, C.W.A. funds went toward the repair and construction of highways and roads. Early in 1934, Congress authorized $950 million for the continued operation of the C.W.A.
1934	May	A three-day dust storm blows an estimated 350 million tons of soil off of the terrain of the West and Southwest and deposits it as far east as New York and Boston. Some East Coast cities were forced to ignite street lamps during the day to see through the blowing dust.
	November	Father Charles E. Coughlin establishes the Union for Social Justice. Using the radio airwaves as his pulpit. Father Coughlin railed against "predatory capitalism." His criticism of the banking industry and disdain of communism soon dovetailed into a troubling gospel of anti-Semitism.
1935	April	FDR signs legislation creating the Works Progress Administration. (Its name would be changed in 1939 to the Work Projects Administration). The program employed more than 8.5 million individuals in three thousand counties across the nation. These individuals, drawing a salary of only $41.57 a month, improved or created highways, roads, bridges, and airports. In addition, the WPA put thousands of artists — writers, painters, theater directors, and sculptors — to work on various projects. The WPA would remain in existence until 1943.
		Business Week magazine announces that "Depression is a forgotten word in the automobile industry, which is forging ahead in production, retail sales, and expansion of productive capacity in a, manner reminiscent of the 'twenties.'"
	June	The National Youth Administration is set up to address the needs of young men and women (who were not allowed in the CCC). The NYA worked on two levels: a student work program and an out-of-school program. The student work program provided students with odd jobs that paid them enough to stay in school. The out-of-school program set young people up with various jobs ranging from house painting to cleaning local parks, and eventually came to include vocational training.
	July	FDR signs the Wagner National Labor Relations Act. The goal of the act was to validate union authority and supervise union elections.
	August	The Social Security Act of 1935 is signed into law by FDR. Among the most controversial stipulations of the act was that Social Security would be financed through a payroll tax. Historian Kenneth S. Davis called the signing of the act "one of the major turning points of American history. No longer could 'rugged individualism' convincingly insist that government, though obliged to provide a climate favorable for the growth of business profits, had no responsibility whatever for the welfare of the human beings who did the work from which the profit was reaped."

A worker on the Empire State Building in 1930. Good jobs were hard to come by during this time.

The US stock market crash occurred in October of 1929. The value of common stock and shares dropped by 40% resulting in an unprecedented global depression.

At the beginning of 1929 Herbert Hoover had become president, but he himself had had little responsibility for the crash. The same formula that generated the profits of the 1920s triggered the depression. In the 1920s more middle-class people were buying stocks, traditionally a pastime for the rich. Investors bought shares on margin: instead of paying the whole amount, they only paid for a portion of the purchase, at the same time taking out a loan with their stockbrokers to pay for those shares. The investors hoped that by the time the shares were sold they would make enough money to pay back the loan and interest with some profit remaining for themselves. The banks financing the loans let investors use the stocks as collateral. As failing businesses stopped depositing money in banks, the expected credit for those loans no longer existed. Buying on margin led to an extremely unstable stock market. Investors' uncontrolled purchases on margin eventually led to a collapse of the stock market on October 24, 1929 which became known as Black Thursday.

However, adding to the crash of '29 was the slowing economy. The desire for consumer durables (expensive items such as refrigerators, radios, and automobiles) went down as Americans could not pay for what they had. This was led by housing declines in 1928. The buying spree had been encouraged by short-term payment plans, a pattern begun by car companies. Instead of paying the full purchase price at point of sale, the item was paid for by installments from the purchaser's monthly paychecks. These plans allowed consumer debt services to absorb a greater part of that purchaser's income, resulting in corporate debt being diminished more quickly and effectively. Yet they did not allow for excess purchasing capacity -- lower production by the corporate producers -- which could have absorbed the surplus production more effectively. Now the "convenient payment plan" suddenly became inconvenient, and businesses repossessed partially paid-for items. The decline in the want for new durables in turn affected the companies and workers that produced these items. A downward spiral was set in motion.

The general credit structure further weakened the economy. A panicking bank would call in loans and foreclose mortgages in a desperate attempt to stay afloat. Penniless farmers had to finance the next year's crop by using their homes as collateral: now they lost them. Families lost not only their source of income but their life savings. Farm prices were plummeting, but farmers were already in deep debt, and crop prices were too low to allow them to pay off what they already owed. Banks failed as the contributing farmers defaulted on loans. Some of the nation's largest banks had failed to maintain adequate reserves and made unwise business decisions. The banking system was completely unprepared for a crash.

International influences also contributed to the Great Depression. Still paying off the debts of World War I, nations adopted the practice of Protectionism. This meant that foreign goods were subject to tariffs, or import duties, so that foreign products would cost more and local products would cost less. The reduced cost of local goods would then boost the local economy at the expense of foreign competitors. In reacting against this, and in response to its own isolationism, the United States had enacted extremely high tariffs. American businesses lost several foreign markets.

International credit structure was another cause of the crash. At the end of World War I, Germany and other European nations owed enormous sums of money to American banks. The countries were often unable to quickly repay these debts. The smaller American banks were crippled because farmers could not pay debts, while larger banks suffered because other nations could not pay debts. These international debts affected other nations.

Overproduction, under-consumption, inability to collect debt, and the stock market crash all had a devastating effect on the economy. The Great Depression, the largest collapse of the economy in modern history, changed the lives of millions of Americans.

Depression

A bank run occurring during the depression

For many of the top forty percent of the nation, little changed. However, the farm failures and the closing of factories and businesses resulted in millions of jobs lost. Over eighty-five thousand businesses declared bankruptcy. The steep decline in purchase of manufactured goods resulted in more than 70,000 factories being closed by 1933. As car sales dropped from four and a half million in 1929 to one million in 1933, Ford laid off more than two thirds of their Detroit factory workers. By 1933, almost one fourth of industrial workers were unemployed, and average wages fell by one third. By 1932, unemployment had surged to twenty-five percent, while stock prices plummeted by over eighty percent.

Bank Runs

Banks could not collect debt from bankrupt businesses and began to close, causing the loss of the savings of millions of Americans. Many Americans started pulling their savings from the banks for fear of losing it. Some started investing it in gold while others just simply kept it under their mattresses. Because many people were losing their money they formed crowds outside of banks to demand that the banks pay them their money that was rightfully theirs. These crowds outside of the banks were known as “Bank runs”.

Dust Bowl

A farming family braves a dust storm in Oklahoma.

One result of the farm failure of the '20's was that farmers put more of their lands into farming, plowing deeper and using marginal land in an attempt to make a profit. These practices, combined with a Western drought beginning in 1930, resulted in The Dust Bowl. In large areas of the Southwest, wind storms would sweep the landscape, creating great clouds of dust known as "black blizzards." When a black blizzard arose, children had to wear dust masks as they walked to and from school. Sometimes parents refused to send them out, keeping them in their houses, and hanging wet sheets and rags over the windows in a futile attempt to keep out the dust. It was hard to walk, to eat, and even to breathe. Dust made people sick. It killed the crops The dust storms swept away the rich, black soil that plants could live in. The Dust Bowl combined with other economic factors to reduce farm revenue by fifty percent.

Many farmers went broke, moved to the cities, or were forced further West to find a livelihood. Some of these last had to become wandering farm workers, harvesting other people's crops for a tiny sum. This was when the term migrant labor came into being. “Migrant labor is a term applied in the United States to laborers who travel from place to place harvesting crops that must be picked as soon as they ripen.” Migrant labor is one of the most hazardous of all employments. Their housing and health conditions are the poorest of all occupational groups. Most migrant workers lived in dirty conditions next to irrigation ditches and did such miscellaneous jobs as bailing, picking, and cultivating and harvesting crops.

Hoovervilles

A Hooverville in Oregon in 1936.

People who had come to cities to find jobs, or had been evicted from city homes, had to find new places to live. Shanty towns began springing up in cities in 1930. These were often sardonically called Hoovervilles, after President Hoover. On city parks, trash heaps, and whatever free land existed, people would build houses out of anything they could find: lumber, cardboard, tar paper, glass, canvas, and more. There was very often no water, no bathrooms apart from outhouses, no heat, and no electricity. City police departments would regularly send police in to break up the Hoovervilles and arrest the occupants. The people living there, very often men, were poorly protected from the rain and the wind. Neglected by city health workers, they had no help when they fell ill. Many youths or men in Hoovervilles had left families behind, without their money or protection.

Food Relief

A Chicago Soup Kitchen opened by Al Capone

Hard times in the cities caused the resurgence of two reliefs of the depression of the 1880s, the soup kitchen and the bread line. At the end of the day, some bakeries would hand out the unsold loaves of bread to hungry people. Bread was starch and protein, something to stop a hungry belly. Some charitable organizations would hand out not only bread, but milk and other staples. In a day without government assistance for the unemployed, this was often the only food available to the jobless. A soup kitchen or a meal center was a place where people could come in to get a single meal. These places could hand out entire meals, but soup, hot liquid expanding any vegetables the kitchen had to create a savory meal, was the cheapest and easiest to make. For a great number of poor men, women and children, the meals they received from a soup kitchen would be their only meal that day. One soup kitchen in Chicago was sponsored by gangster Al Capone in an attempt to clean up his image.

Women's employment

Traditional "women's work," including nursing, was less affected by the Depression. Those businesses which were hiring were more willing to take on women, who had traditionally worked for lower wages, and especially to take on Black women. Yet these times also increased racism and other discrimination. Before the Depression women of all classes and races were barred from many jobs and were paid a lot less than men. Although the Depression was an extremely difficult time for White Americans, it was even worse for other races and especially for Blacks. In the south in 1930, one organization called the Black Shirts recruited about 40,000 people but made it known that no Blacks would be given a job. He started the slogan "No Jobs for Niggers Until Every White Man Has a Job!" Northern Blacks suffered about as much as the southern ones. Jobs that White workers had before considered “beneath them” began to seem more desirable. Black unemployment was at almost 50% by 1932. In the Southwest, there were claims that Hispanic workers were “stealing jobs” from Whites. The Labor Department deported 82,000 Mexicans between 1929 and 1935. Almost a half million more returned to Mexico, either voluntarily or after being tricked or threatened into believing they had no other choice. Many of these people had immigrated legally, but lacked the proper documentation to prove it. Officials also ignored that children born in the U.S. were citizens. There were also claims that women were stealing jobs from men. In a survey conducted in 1930 and 1931, 77% of schools refused to hire married women as teachers, and 63% fired female teachers who married while employed there.

Depression Movies

Like other industries during the Depression, the movie business suffered. To counter the effects of the depression, individual theaters resorted to gimmicks: they would lower the price of a ticket to a quarter, give a cash prize to one lucky winner, and give away prizes such as dinner plates. These gimmicks were not the only reason why people kept going to the movies. They wanted to get away from the trouble in their lives for just a couple of hours. The local movie house was also a place where people could go simply to be part of a community. Movies had the reputation of being places where any child with the money could go unsupervised and spend a whole Saturday morning with his or her schoolmates.

The New Deal

Hoover's approach

Through all this, Republican President Herbert Hoover held to a platform of limited federal intervention. He had been the Secretary of Commerce under both Harding and Coolidge, and in this he had been holding to a time-honored administration strategy. His dictum, "The business of America is business," meant that he saw private-owned business as the mainspring of America, keeping it running. Governmental meddling would be ruinous for business, whether this interference came from regulation or support of workers. This meddling would cause a ruinous national debt. Hoover was not a doctrinaire "hands-off" official. When the Depression hit, Hoover put the Smoot-Harley tariff into effect, and advocated public works measures such as the project which would become the Hoover Dam. However, for a large number of the unemployed, the action he did was outweighed by what was seen as neglect. A group of unemployed veterans of World War I, who had still not received their bonuses, marched to Washington in the summer of 1932 asking for money and jobs. Hoover ordered the United States Army, led by General Douglas MacArthur, to evacuate them from their camp. Fires broke out. The resultant coverage in newspapers looked bad for Hoover. (In fact, the result swayed American public opinion so much that in 1936 Congress overruled Roosevelt's veto and gave them their bonuses.)

Rosevelt's New Deal

In contrast, Democratic candidate Franklin Delano Roosevelt supported direct relief payments for the unemployed, declaring that such governmental aid was a matter of social duty. He pledged a New Deal for the American People. After Roosevelt had been elected, a British economist named John Maynard Keynes sent him a copy of his book The Means to Prosperity. Keynes proposed that a national debt could produce prosperity. Public spending on relief in bad times would boost employment and increase morale. As people spent their money, the demand for durable goods would rise. Roosevelt liked this message, and exchanged a correspondence with Keynes.

People were desperate for a leader who would demonstrate some idea of what to do to begin to turn things around. Demonstrations of this desperation ranged from the Bonus Marches through grassroots actions by farmers facing foreclosure to sophisticated agitation by Nazi, Socialist and Communist activists. In a 1933 movie partially produced by William Randolph Hearst, "Gabriel Over the White House," a new president shoots all the gangsters, overturns unemployment, and ends American democracy with the approval of Heaven. As Roosevelt remarked to John Nance Garner, his Vice President, as they rode to the inauguration in January 1933, "I had better be a good president or I will be the last one."

The Hundred Days

After he took office, in a program called the Hundred Days, Roosevelt immediately began to take steps against the Great Depression. On March sixth, two days after taking office as President, he issued an order closing all American banks for four days. Throughout his Presidency he would show himself a master of the use of language: instead of calling it an "emergency bank closure," Roosevelt used the euphemism of "bank holiday." He then summoned Congress for a special session.

When Congress met, Roosevelt suggested the Emergency Banking Bill, which was designed to protect large banks from being dragged down by the failing small banks. This bill authorized the reopening of solvent banks strong enough to survive and the reorganization of banks which were not. This banking plan would only work, however, if people were confident enough to deposit their money into the banks that were reopened. On one of his "Fireside Chats," his regular, "confidential" lectures to the radio public, Roosevelt asked the American people to support this new plan and pledged that if they did it would “restore our financial system.” The next day, when the banks opened, people lined up to deposit their money into the banks. (The stability of banks was increased by the 1933 Banking Act, which created the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation -- the FDIC -- which provided insurance to any monies deposited.) On the day after the passage of the Emergency Banking Act, Roosevelt sent to Congress the Economy Bill. The act proposed to balance the federal budget by cutting the salaries of government employees and reducing pensions to veterans by as much as fifteen percent.

Roosevelt warned that the nation would face a one billion dollar deficit if the bill would fail. Like the Emergency Banking Act, it passed through Congress almost instantaneously.

Agricultural assistance

To protect American farmers, Congress passed the Agricultural Adjustment Act or AAA in May, 1933. Farm incomes, relative to the rest of the economy, had been falling for years. Most importantly, the AAA attempted to increase farm prices. Under the act, producers of seven agricultural products -- corn, cotton, dairy products, hogs, rice, tobacco, and wheat -- would set production limits on themselves. The AAA required the government to then tell individual farmers how much they should plant. The government rewarded farmers who complied by paying them for leaving some of their land unused. The Act was extremely controversial. People argued that it was inappropriate for the government to pay farmers to produce less while many people were starving due to the Depression.

Manual Labor

After Roosevelt was elected President, the Emergency Relief Administration, which Hoover had created in 1932, was renamed the Federal Emergency Relief Administration (FERA). In November of 1933, the Civil Works Administration (CWA) was created under the auspices of FERA. By 1934, the CWA had hired four million construction workers on a temporary basis -- the program only lasted a few months, during the winter of 1933-34. These workers earned $15 a week, and constructed or repaired buildings and bridges. Another work relief program, the Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC), began in 1933. The CCC only hired unemployed, unmarried men between the ages of 18 and 25. The jobs provided were hard work – building dams and roads, constructing parks and creating trails, planting trees, fighting fires, and other outdoor manual labor, work which had often gone to poor Blacks in prison chain gangs who worked without pay. The CCC paid thirty dollars a month (or a dollar a day), and twenty-five dollars of that went to their parents. Minorities were hired and received equal pay, but the program was segregated. 200,000 African-American workers were hired, and there was a separate Indian division which hired 80,000 Native American workers. During the nine years the CCC existed, it employed around two-and-a-half million men.

A carpenter employed by the TVA helps construct a Dam.

Congress and the President created several new government agencies to combat the Great Depression. The Civilian Conservation Corps and the Public Works Administration provided employment for many Americans, hiring people to work on roads, buildings, and dams. The Civilian Conservation Corps offered to pay one dollar a day to unmarried men who would work hard labor. The Civilian Conservation Corps was segregated by race and women were not eligible for the program. It provided work for some 2.5 million men from different backgrounds. The Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA) accomplished similar goals by building an infrastructure in the Southeast to provide electricity to rural, unpowered areas. TVA workers taught farmers ways to improve their crop yields through crop rotation and fertilizer use, replanted forests, controlled forest fires, improved wildlife habitats, and built hydroelectric dams to generate power. It was had authority to build power lines in new areas and set guidelines for electricity distribution. The TVA hired local unemployed white males for conservation, economic development, and such social programs as a library service. The TVA recognized the legitimacy of labor unions –- its blue collar employees were unionized, which was a breakthrough in an area known for corporations hostile to unions. Though women were not hired for construction work, the cheap electricity provided by TVA attracted textile mills which hired women. Electricity and new jobs created new purchasers for new machines. The TVA still exists today over most of Tennessee and parts of Alabama, Mississippi, Kentucky, Georgia, North Carolina, and Virginia. The Securities and Exchange Commission regulated the stock market in an attempt to prevent another crash like that of 1929.

Industrial Assistance

In June, 1933, Congress addressed the problems of the industrial sector with the National Industrial Recovery Act (NIRA). The NIRA established the National Recovery Administration (NRA), which attempted to stabilize prices and wages though cooperative "code authorities" involving government, business, and labor unions. The NIRA also established a national public works program, the Public Works Administration (PWA). The PWA was focused on large-scale public works projects, which were built by private companies who hired workers, rather than directly hiring the unemployed as the WPA did. Between 1933 and 1939 when the PWA was closed down, streets and highways were the most common construction projects, but the agency also funded and oversaw the construction of projects as large as airports, hydroelectric dams, Navy warships, and bridges. PWA projects also were responsible for the construction of seventy percent of new schools and one-third of new hospitals built during this time. Through the PWA, the NIRA lowered unemployment and created infrastructure still in use today.

Worker's Rights

Section 7(a) of the NIRA ensured the collective bargaining rights of workers, allowing them to unionize. These protections granted to workers led to large-scale union organizing, strikes, and violence on both sides. On August 5, 1933, the National Labor Board was established in order to handle labor disputes and enforce the protection of collective bargaining rights provided for by the NIRA. It was abolished on June 29, 1934 and replaced with the National Labor Relations Board (NLRB). The National Labor Relations Act (also known as the Wagner Act, named after the New York senator who proposed it) forced employers to deal with unions elected by their employees in elections overseen by the NLRB, in addition to prohibiting unfair labor practices. Over 3/4ths of these elections were won by either the American Federation of Labor (AFL) or the Congress of Industrial Organizations (CIO).

The NRA Blue Eagle

The NRA adopted a blanket code under which the businesses would agree to a minimum wage of twenty to forty cents per hour, a workweek of thirty-five to forty hours, and the abolition of child labor. (This last was described as a means to open jobs to adult males. It had been nearly one hundred years since the American Industrial Revolution had brought children en masse into the workplace.) Companies that voluntarily complied with the code were allowed to display the NRA "Blue Eagle." Blue Eagle flags, posters, and stickers, with the slogan "We Do Our Part," became common across the country, and were seen at the beginning and end of movies. In addition to blanket codes, codes specific to certain industries were also adopted.

In an attempt to stimulate economic recovery, NIRA inadvertently promoted monopolies, allowing competing businesses to work together to create industry-wide regulations and establish standards like minimum prices for their goods, maximum work hours, and minimum wage. The goal was to eliminate competition between these businesses, in the hopes that it would no longer drive down prices or wages. However, these cartels were dominated by big businesses, which put their smaller rivals at a disadvantage. The NRA was tasked with supervising these groups, but NRA staff did not have the administrative skills or experience necessary to stand up to large corporations. Since the government helped set but did not enforce the NRA guidelines, it was already ineffective by the time it was found to be unconstitutional by the Supreme Court in 1935.

The Second New Deal

Immediately after Roosevelt passed the first New Deal he received a great deal of support from Congress. However, after the "First Hundred Days" a division was revealed throughout the nation. Many people encouraged the government to take so much control over the fight against poverty and inequality, while others argued that the government had too much power and wanted them to stop expanding even further than they already had. This created pressure from all sides for President Roosevelt, who consequently came up with the Second New Deal.

The Works Progress Administration (later renamed the Works Projects Administration) was established after the Emergency Relief Appropriation Act (which Roosevelt called “the Big Bill”) was passed on April 8, 1935. The bill provided $4 billion in new spending, most of it intended to create public works programs. In addition to stimulating economic growth, the WPA put about 1/3 of unemployed Americans to work, who earned an average of $50 a month. These workers built 650,000 miles of roads and highways and 125,000 public buildings. In addition to this, they built bridges, parks, swimming pools, reservoirs, and irrigation systems, as well as teaching 1.5 million adults to read and write. The WPA also had cultural programs that provided jobs for about 40,000 unemployed artists. The Federal Writers Project put over 6,000 writers to work writing pamphlets and articles, as well as guidebooks showcasing the history, landscape, and culture of all 50 states. The Federal Art Project resulted in the creation of thousands of murals, sculptures, and paintings in public buildings. The Federal Theater Project sent actors and crews to perform plays in communities across the nation. Similarly, the Federal Music Project sent unemployed musicians across the nation to perform, teach, and conduct groups of amateur musicians.

In 1935, the Congress passed the Social Security Act. The Act provided for the creation of the Social Security System, under which the unemployed and the unemployable (such as senior citizens) received welfare payments from the government. All eligible workers were required to pay social security taxes on their wages and their employers also contributed an equivalent amount. The workers that paid into social security then received retirement benefits. The Act also granted money to the states for use in their own welfare programs.A program that came about because of Social Security was called the Aid to Families with Dependent Children. This was a program that offered help to families that had children with certain needs and who also had no fathers. Although the social security act did help many people out tremendously, it did have some drawbacks. One big drawback was that the law did not cover agricultural labor, domestic service, and casual labor not in the course of the employer's trade or business. This meant that most people of color who worked as farm laborers or in hospitals and such didn't receive any benefits. This also meant that teachers and nurses, mostly women workers were also not covered.Unemployment had decreased-but 9 million people were still without work. Also in 1935 enormous dust storms enveloped the Southern Plains, killing livestock and driving families like the Montgomery from their land. Millions of Americans still suffered. As their dissatisfaction mounted, so too did the appeal of various demagogues, who played to the prejudices and unreasoning passions of the people.

The National Youth Administration (NYA), established in 1935, funded part-time jobs for 1.5 million high school students and 600,000 college students who were at risk of not being able to afford to stay in school. It also provided full-time employment and education to around 2.7 million youths that were not students.

The efforts of the Democratic President and Congress were opposed by a conservative Supreme Court. In 1933, the Court had ruled in favor of some state New Deal programs. However, by 1935, the Court had begun to rule against the New Deal. For example, the Court ruled in a case nicknamed the Sick Chicken Case that the National Industrial Recovery Act Code relating to the sale of "unfit" poultry, as well as all other codes under the act, were unconstitutional. In 1936, the Court ruled that the Agricultural Adjustment Act was also unconstitutional.

Roosevelt's Re-election

In 1936, Roosevelt won re-election in a landslide, losing only the states of Maine and Vermont. The press did not pick a winner early. They wanted to make it look like an even race even though Roosevelt was far ahead of his opponent. Landon, Roosevelt’s opponent, tried to make Roosevelt look like a dictator. Roosevelt however, did not attack his opponent. This made many people like Roosevelt even more. Roosevelt and Congress proceeded by passing more New Deal legislation. This time, the Supreme Court did not oppose Roosevelt. The Second Agricultural Adjustment Act, for example, replaced the first Act. The Fair Labor Standards Act set minimum wages for workers in interstate industries. The Wagner Housing Act provided for the construction of homes for the poor.

Despite such programs, the New Deal did not end the Great Depression. Even stalwart adherents to Keynesian models admit that Roosevelt's accomplishments only provided much-needed relief to suffering Americans. The real end of the Depression was during the factory expansion of the Second World War, itself financed by Keynes's principles.

Sit-Down Strike

A worker during the Flint strike sleeps on car seats on the assembly line in 1937. Sit down strikes were often long affairs, and factories effectively became living spaces.

Sit-down strikes began among rubber workers in Akron, OH in the early 1930s, and became the method of choice by the mid-30s. This tactic had clear advantages over traditional (walk-out) strikes. Workers stayed in the factories and were able to prevent the use of strikebreakers by doing anything they could to keep the owners and/or police away which included throwing random objects out of windows. They also had shelter, and they weren’t isolated (as they would be in the picket line or working at their stations), often forming a community of sorts with other workers.

One of the most significant sit-down strikes of the era occurred in Flint, Michigan during the winter of 1936-1937. The United Automobile Workers (UAW), formed in 1935, learned that General Motors only had 2 factories that made the dies (industrial tools that use a press to bend, shape, or cut material) used to form their car body components, one in Flint and one in Cleveland. The UAW had planned to start the strike after the New Year, but when workers at the Cleveland plant went on strike on December 30, the UAW announced that they would not settle the Cleveland strike until an agreement covering all GM plants in the nation had been reached. When the UAW learned later that day that GM planned to move the dies out of the Flint plant, they called a meeting during lunchtime at the union hall across the street, explained the situation, and sent their members back across the street to begin the strike.

National Guardsmen outside the Flint plant with a machine gun.

The local police attempted to enter the plant on January 11, but the workers on strike fended them off with fire hoses and thrown car parts. GM got an injunction against the strike in February, but instead of going along with it, the UAW spread the strike to another plant. GM finally got fed up with these sit-down strikes and so they obtained a court order to evict the workers but this did not work because the workers held their ground, risking fines and imprisonment. When this did not work, the Michigan governor was advised to send in the National Guard to end the strike but he refused. GM reached an agreement with the union on February 11 which established the UAW as the official representative for its members who were GM employees. Chrysler followed GM very soon in giving into the UAW's terms. Ford, however, held out until 1941 before they agreed to recognized the unions. The UAW’s membership skyrocketed in the next year. In 1936, there were 48 sit-down strikes. In 1937, there were 477.

Racism in the 1930's

In the 1930s, the Ku Klux Klan was declining after its rebirth in the '10s and '20s. Yet racism was still strong in the South. And the Northern Migration of African-Americans during World War I and the Depression exposed them to resentment in many Northern cities. They need not fear for their lives, as in the Mississippi or even rural Ohio, but they were given dangerous places to live, hired less often than their Caucasian co-workers, and could be fired at the blink of an eye.

Many New Deal programs gave black Americans opportunities they had often lacked in the past, while also helping to bring their daily struggles to light. Such federal programs as The Federal Music Project, Federal Theatre Project, and Federal Writers project enabled black artists to find word during the depression, often times creating art or stories which portrayed the historic and present situation of blacks in the South. Projects chronicling the lives of former slaves were also begun under the auspices of these programs. At the same time competition for WPA (Works Project Administration) jobs in the South during the thirties also brought to light the persistence of inequality even in the government.Since the WPA required that eligible employees not have refused any private sector jobs at the "prevailing wage" for such jobs, African-Americans (who were paid less on average then whites in the South) might be refused WPA jobs which whites were eligible for. Such discrimination often extended to Hispanic-Americans in the Southwest as well. Despite such difficulties, WPA head Harry Hopkins worked with NAACP leaders to prevent discrimination whenever possible resulting in general support for the programs (and the government) by the black community.

Black Americans also received increased visibility during this decade for less auspicious reasons, resulting in bitter political conflict within the Democratic Party. While the South had been solidly Democratic since the Civil War, the Roosevelt administration actively appealed to African-Americans to join their party, thus alienating many Southerners. The growing divide between Northern and Southern Democrats over the issue of race came to a head in April 1937, when a bitter fight over an anti-lynching bill took place in the House of Representatives. In the wake of a gruesome double lynching in Mississippi (only one of more than a hundred which had taken place since 1930)The House passed the anti-lynching resolution, despite the opposition of all but one Southern member. Declaring that the South had been "deserted by the Democrats of the North" former Roosevelt supporters in the Senate carried out a six week long filibuster which resulted in the withdrawal of the bill in February 1938. This bitter political fight was indicative of the racism and regional conflict still firmly entrenched in America in the 1930s.

The 1936 Olympic Games

Jessie Owens Competing in the Olympics.

The 1936 summer olympics were held in Nazi Germany. Jessie Owens, an African-American athlete, was the most successful individual at the event, winning four gold medals.

Memorial Day Massacre

The Memorial Day massacre of 1937

On May 30th, 1937 (Memorial Day), in Chicago, a group of workers and their families marched towards the Republic Steel Plant to support some strikers. However, the police stopped them en route. One of the workers threw something at a policeman. In response, the police attacked and shot the group of workers. 10 men were killed and 30 people were wounded. The injured included women and children. These people received little sympathy from fellow Americans wearied by public violence. Much of the press and public praised the attack for containing disruptive workers.

Even though worker deaths were lost in the wake of strikes and picket lines, organized labor gained ground in the 1930s. The National Labor Relations Board, a New Deal innovation, became very effective in reducing the violence. It mediated disputes instead of letting companies take matters into their own hands, as they had been doing for so long. It disassociated strikes from corporate or union violence. Because of these changes, union workers were able to raise their standard of living. By 1941 they were able to buy not only a new pair of shoes for each of their children every 2 years, but also a new coat for a man and his wife every 6 years. Unionized workers made up about 23% of non-agricultural workers.

The Roosevelt Recession

Between 1933 and 1937, the U.S. economy improved slowly but surely - total personal income of Americans rose from $38 billion in 1933 to $70 billion in 1937. In the same period, employment also rose from 27.9 million to just over 36 million, and unemployment dropped from 12.8 million (25.2% of the American labor force) to 7.7 million (14.3%). However, people were also much more cautious in their spending than in pre-crash years. This and a growing labor force resulted in more goods being produced than consumed, relegating large amounts of unsold goods to warehouse shelves.

In the months between his second inauguration and September of 1937, Roosevelt ordered a reduction in federal spending on emergency employment projects. The number of workers employed on WPA and other projects were cut from 3.7 million to 1.9 million. Funding for PWA projects was also greatly reduced during this period. Unemployment rose from 14.3% in 1937 to 19% in early 1938. In April of 1938, Roosevelt sent a new spending program to Congress totaling $3.75 billion, which they approved. More than $1.4 billion went to the WPA and almost $1 billion went to the PWA, with the rest being split among other federal programs. Although the economy recovered shortly thereafter, unemployment didn’t return to 1937 levels until World War II.

Technology

Consumer Technology

Technology advanced even during the Great Depression. A lot of improvements were due to market forces. The Philco "Baby Grand" radio, now also known as the "Cathedral," was an inexpensive radio for mass sale, loud enough to not need earphones. It sat on a table top or bureau and played its program to the entire room. In 1930, Clarence Birdseye began selling frozen food. And electric guitars and electric lap guitars began to be played by American Hawaiian and swing bands.

1939 World's Fair

The 1939 World's Fair, located in Flushing Meadows, New York, was a showcase for new technologies. The affair was broadcast on American television. (However, the system was less sophisticated than models already being produced in Great Britain, and the distribution was local, coming from one of two New York City area stations.) The International Business Machines (IBM) pavilion showed a punch card computer, a huge machine. The General Motors Futurama pavilion sent audiences soaring over a land of 1960, with impossibly high skyscrapers and four- and six-lane highways (and no walkways) which moved traffic at fifty miles an hour. However, the Fair also underscored political problems with the current world. When Nazi Germany took over Poland and Czechoslovakia, their pavilions closed, and did not reopen for the 1940 season.

Calculators and Computers

In the late 1930's the E6B mechanical flight computer was developed, still a common instrument in Aviation training today.

At Iowa State University in 1937, American Academics John Vincent Atanasoff and Clifford Berry began constructing the world's first digital electric computer, however unlike later computers it was not general purpose.

Questions For Review

1. Explain how foreign loans and domestic tariffs, payment plans, and buying stocks on margin contributed to the stock market crash.

2. Contrast Hoover's quote, "The business of America is business," with Keynes's theory of counter-cyclical spending. Describe the contrasting ideas behind the two thoughts. Were these ideas mission statements for two different administrations or merely markers of theory which were only sometimes adhered to?

Spanish Civil War (1936-1939)

Background

The Great Depression heightened instability in Europe. The Treaty of Versailles had unrealistically addressed war reparations, causing a debt spiral between Germany and the Western Allies and the United States. The German nation felt humiliated by the Treaty's terms. This contributed significantly to the collapse of the world financial markets and led to an economic catastrophe that spawned a political vacuum which allowed new, more radical-than-traditional politicians to emerge on the world scene. These included such men as Adolf Hitler, Franklin Roosevelt, Hideki Tojo, Chiang Kai-shek, and Francisco Franco.

The Spanish Civil War

Fighters in the Spanish Civil War

The Spanish Civil War (July 18, 1936–April 1, 1939) was a conflict in which the incumbent Second Spanish Republic and political left-wing groups fought against a right-wing nationalist insurrection led by General Francisco Franco, who eventually succeeded in ousting the Republican government and establishing a personal dictatorship. It was the result of the complex political, economic and even cultural divisions between what Spanish writer Antonio Machado characterized as the two Spains. The Republicans ranged from centrists who supported capitalist liberal democracy to communists or anarchist revolutionaries; their power base was primarily secular and urban (though it also included landless peasants) and was particularly strong in industrial regions like Asturias and Catalonia. The conservative Basque Country also sided with the Republic, largely because it, along with nearby Cataluña sought autonomy from the central government which would later be suppressed by the centralizing nationalists. The ultimately successful Nationalists had a primarily rural, wealthier, and more conservative base of support, were mostly Roman Catholic, and favored the centralization of power. Some of the military tactics of the war -- including the use of terror tactics against civilians - foreshadowed World War II, although both the nationalists and the republicans relied overwhelmingly on infantry rather than modern use of blitzkrieg tactics with tanks and airplanes.

The number of persons killed in the Spanish Civil War can be only roughly estimated. Nationalist forces put the figure at 1,000,000, including not only those killed in battle but also the victims of bombardment, execution, and assassination. More recent estimates have been closer to 500,000 or less. This does not include those who died from malnutrition, starvation, and war-engendered disease.

Abraham Lincoln Brigade

Re-enactors of the Abraham Lincoln Brigade

The Abraham Lincoln Brigade was an organization of United States volunteers supporting or fighting for the anti-fascist Spanish Republican forces in the Spanish Civil War as part of the International Brigade.

The name "brigade" is something of a misnomer, as there were several American battalions organized under the Fifteenth International Brigade of the Spanish Republican army. This brigade was loosely organized by the Comintern and was made up of volunteers from nations around the globe. The George Washington Battalion, Abraham Lincoln Battalion, John Brown Anti-Aircraft Battery were part of the American contingent. Other U.S. volunteers served with the MacKenzie-Papineau battalion (Canadian), the Regiment de Tren (transport) and in various medical groups. The name Abraham Lincoln Brigade was used to include all the U.S. volunteers, regardless of which unit they served with.

Most of the people making up the Abraham Lincoln Brigade were official members of the Communist Party USA or affiliated with other socialist organizations. The IWW, or "Wobblies", were lightly represented. However, the brigade was made up of volunteers from all walks of American life, and from all socio-economic classes. It was the first unit of soldiers made up of Americans to have an African-American officer, Oliver Law, lead white soldiers.

American volunteers began organizing and arriving in Spain in 1936. Centered in the town of Figueras, near the French border, the brigade was organized in 1937 and trained by Robert Merriman. By early 1937, its numbers had swelled from an initial 96 volunteers to around 450 members. In February 1937 the League of Nations Non-Intervention Committee banned foreign national volunteers.

Self-motivated and ideological, the Lincolns attempted to create an egalitarian "people's army"; officers were distinguished only by small bars on their berets and in some cases rank-and-file soldiers elected their own officers. Traditional military protocol was shunned, although not always successfully. A political commissar explained the politics of the war to the volunteers and tended to their needs and morale. The Lincoln Brigade helped ease the pressure on Madrid, giving the Republic time to train and organize its own popular army. The subject of respectful news reports by such writers as Ernest Hemingway, Herbert Matthews, Martha Gellhorn, and Lillian Hellman, the brigade helped strengthen anti-fascist opinion in the United States. Yet the Lincolns and the Republican military, fighting with inadequate weaponry, could not withstand the forces allied against them. By the end, the Lincolns had lost nearly 750 men and sustained a casualty rate higher than that suffered by Americans in World War II. Few escaped injury. In November 1938, as a last attempt to pressure Hitler and Mussolini into repatriating their troops, Spanish prime minister Juan Negrin ordered the withdrawal of the International Brigades. The Axis coalition refused to follow suit and Madrid fell in March 1939.

The Lincolns returned home as heroes of the anti-fascist cause but enjoyed no official recognition of their deed. Many Lincolns soon aroused bitterness within sectors of the Left when, with the signing of the Hitler-Stalin nonaggression pact in 1939, they supported the CP's call for the United States to stay out of WWII. Once the United States and the Soviet Union entered the war, however, many of the veterans enlisted in the armed forces or served with the merchant marine. In a foreshadowing of the McCarthy period, the armed forces designated the Lincolns "premature antifascists" and confined them to their bases. Many successfully protested and were allowed to see action. Among the core agents of the Office of Strategic Services were Lincoln veterans whose contacts with the European partisans, forged in Spain, were key to OSS missions.

The International Brigade was used by the Loyalist army for several battles in Spain. They unsuccessfully defended the supply road between Valencia and Madrid in the Jarama Valley from February 1937 until June 1937. They were also present at the battles of Brunete, Zaragoza, Belchite, and Teruel.

The Brigade was a cause celebre in the United States, however. Liberal and socialist groups organized fund-raising activities and supply drives to keep the Brigade afloat. News of the Brigade's high casualty rate and bravery in battle made them romantic figures to an America concerned about the rise of Fascism around the world.

The war dragged on and the Fascist forces gained victory after victory over the Spanish Republic. The International Brigade was withdrawn from battle by the Spanish prime minister in spring of 1938. Most of the surviving Lincolns were repatriated promptly afterward, and were welcomed home as heroes.

In the aftermath of the Spanish Civil War, members of the Brigade were castigated as supporters of the Soviet Union. Following World War II, at the height of the "Red Scare", former members of the Brigade were considered security risks, and branded "premature anti-fascists".

The US volunteers of the International Brigades adopted the song "Jarama Valley" as their anthem, which was the older song "Red River Valley" with new lyrics. The song was also translated into Catalan. The effect of the War on Americans can be guessed from Ernest Hemmingway's novel, For Whom the Bell Tolls.

Violence During the Spanish Civil War

The opening weeks of the Spanish Civil War were characterized by horrendous atrocities, most of them inflicted by an inflamed working class upon conservatives in general and Catholic clergy in particular. Ultimately, 12 bishops and hundreds of priests and nuns and seminarians were slaughtered. The reprisals taken by the nationalists were as brutal, though usually less picturesque in their cruelty. Europe looked on in horror as a country once recognized as the center of Western Civilization descended into bloodshed on a scale not seen since the ghastly events of WWI. The new tank warfare tactics and the terror bombing of cities from the air were features of the Spanish Civil War which later was a significant part in the general European War. The Spanish Civil War had cost the nation somewhere between 600,000 - 800,000 lives, counting deaths in battle and executions, as well as civilians killed by bombing, starvation, and disease. Under the new regime thousands more would be condemned to death, imprisoned, or forced into exile. The war ended with the victory of the rebels, who called themselves the Nationalists, the overthrow of the Republican government, and the exile of thousands of Spanish Republicans, many of whom ended up in refugee camps in Southern France. Apart from the combatants, many civilians were killed for their political or religious views by both sides.

America and Europe During the Spanish Civil War

After World War I, U.S. Blacks confronted once again the forces of white supremacy and a revitalized Ku Klux Klan. Yet the appearance of a Communist government in Russia in 1917 opened new vistas for African American militancy. After Lenin's Communist party came to power in the Soviet Union and boldly proclaimed "the wretched of the earth" should rule the world, African American resistance took on new meaning. In Chicago, an African Blood Brotherhood led by Cyril Briggs talked of arming Black men for self-defense and called for unity with white workers to overthrow capitalism and imperialism. In 1924 Briggs led his followers into the U.S. Communist party.

Other African Americans also turned to the Communist party for inspiration and organizational support. The most significant African American Communist of this early era was World War I veteran Harry Haywood. During the 1920s Haywood headed for the Soviet Union. In 1928 at a Comintern conference he embraced a proposal that Blacks who lived in the sixty contiguous southern U.S. counties (where they accounted for a majority of the population) be entitled to self-determination including the right to secede from the United States. Such ideas became the basis of the Communist party's organizing among southern Blacks during the 1930s. Haywood later served briefly as a commissar in the Lincoln Brigade.

World War II and the Rise of the Atomic Age (1939 - 1945)

Conflict in Europe

Formation of the Third Reich

The Reichstag fire in 1933 caused the passing of the enabling act in Germany, greatly reducing the civil liberties of Germans.

In 1933, German president Paul von Hindenberg named Adolf Hitler chancellor. As Civil Liberties began being limited, and the Nazification of Germany began in earnest, the Weimar Republic collapsed and the "Third Reich" began (in German, Großdeutsches Reich). Hitler had outlined his aims years earlier, in his book Mein Kampf(My Struggle). Hitler claimed that Germany had lost its powerful economy, morality, raw materials, land, and resources needed to help it develop as a nation. Hitler blamed "sub-human" peoples such as the Jews for his country's defeat. The superior German people needed "living room," and had a right to claim it. The book called for the elimination of the Jews, and the elimination of homosexuals, the mentally ill, and other "undesirable" elements of German society. Hitler also used this supposed German superiority, as well as German mistreatment by its victors after World War I, to justify the termination of the Treaty of Versailles.

Military Buildup

Mussolini and Hitler, leaders of fascist Italy and Nazi Germany

Hitler began a buildup of the German military. In 1936, he tested German might by supporting the Fascists and German interests during the Spanish Civil War. Then Hitler and Benito Mussolini, the Fascist Dictator of Italy, created a coalition with the dictatorship which had come to power in Japan. The coalition of these three nations later came to be called the Axis.

Appeasement policy

Many of the borders drawn up in the wake of Versailles were fragile. There were German nationalists in many other countries, including the post-war nation of Czechs and Slavs known as Czechoslovakia. In 1938, Hitler used alleged mistreatment of a German minority in another German-speaking nation to annex or take over Austria. Other nations were reluctant to interfere because of Hitler's claim that the relation between Germany and Austria was an internal German concern which had nothing to do with the rest of Europe. Then Hitler took control of a section of Czechoslovakia partially populated by Germans. This time, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain did interfere. In the wee hours of September 30, 1938, Chamberlain and Hitler signed an agreement ensuring that Germany would keep the territory it called the Sudetenland, but would go no further in the country, nor take any German-populated areas in other European nations. The policy which sought to prevent another World War at almost any cost, including the cost of allowing a tyrant to gain more power, became known as appeasement.

Chamberlain called the Munich Agreement "Peace in our time." Hitler had no intention of keeping his word. In 1939, he took over the remainder of Czechoslovakia and demanded Poland. Great Britain and France agreed to come to Poland's aid. Then Germany signed another agreement with the Soviet Union, the confederation of Russia and its supporters under a Communist government. The Nazi-Soviet Pact was an agreement that the two nations would not fight each other. Both countries agreed to take parts of Poland, the Soviet Union securing the Baltic Sea port cities. (It had been a long-term interest of the Soviets to gain ice-free ports for winter trade.) Yet in private, Hitler was already planning to take the Soviet Union over in its turn.

The Beginning of the War

Blitzkrieg

On the first day of September, 1939, Germany declared war on Poland. The British and French responded by declaring war on Germany two days later.

The Germans used the tactic of Blitzkrieg ("lightning war") in Poland to defeat the Polish Army in as little as sixteen days as the British and French sat back in fear of a new World War. With little warning and no provocation, the German Air Force strafed Poland with top-speed planes and sent in tanks and racing artillery on the ground. The Polish had had no time to build the deep trenches seen in the First World War; the Germans had no need to use mustard gas. By the end of the first week of October, the Germans had gained control of half of Poland. The Soviets invaded from the East. With no time to defend themselves, the last Polish troops surrendered in early October.

In the spring of 1940, Hitler attacked the nations of Denmark and Norway. Denmark surrendered, but British and French troops came to Norway's aid.

Germany entered Belgium and the Netherlands on May Tenth, 1940. The Netherlands surrendered on May 15, though the province of Zeeland held out until the 18th. Belgium was overcome on May 28. On the same day, France recalled its troops from Norway, leaving Norway's fate to Germany.

Hitler and other Nazi officials in occupied Paris.

On June Fifth the Germans began their attack on France. To make matters worse, Mussolini declared war on France and Britain on June 10. The French government, meanwhile was taken over by a new Premier, who signed an armistice with Germany on June 17. Germany gained control of the northern part of France, and the Vichy French Government (so called because of the new French capital at Vichy) retained the south. The Italians had a small zone of occupation near the Franco-Italian border.

Battle of Britain

Hitler's Germany was the supreme power on Continental Europe. Only the United Kingdom offered resistance. The Germans intended to invade the United Kingdom, but they first had to contend with the British Royal Air Force. The German Luftwaffe (Air Force) commenced the Battle of Britain in 1940. However, the British used the new technology of radar (Radio Detection and Ranging) to combat the Germans. In September, 1940, the Germans ended the Battle of Britain by indefinitely delaying all plans for invasion. Nonetheless, German airplanes continued to bomb several British cities until the middle of the next year.

Invading the Balkans

Hitler expanded the Axis in the winter of 1940-1941 with the additions of Hungary, Romania, and Bulgaria. In April, 1941, Germany and Italy then attacked Yugoslavia, which surrendered within one week of invasion. Then Hitler and Mussolini turned to Greece, which collapsed by the end of April. By the end of 1942, most of Europe was under control of the Nazis or the Italians.

Lend-Lease Act

In early 1941, the United States abandoned its neutrality and began to aid the British. The Lend-Lease Act allowed the President to lend or lease weapons worth over seven billion dollars to other nations. The first two years of the war overseas saw the American public broadly divided on the issue of potential involvement. Though the danger posed by Germany and Japan was generally recognized, millions of Americans felt that a strong, armed neutrality and oceanic defense without entering the war was the safest course. In contrast, President Roosevelt made it quite clear to those around him that he felt the United States would have to intervene on the Allied side, and planned and acted accordingly, initiating a war industrial buildup and proposing that the US become the "Arsenal of Democracy," supplying ammunition to Great Britain and its Allies.

Conflict in the Pacific

Growing Tensions

The Japanese Invasion of Manchuria in 1931.

On June 22, 1941, the Germans invaded the Soviet Union. The Pact between the two nations was dissolved, and the latter joined the Western Allies. Americans were very reluctant to start any conflict with Germany. Even in the fall of 1941, when shooting took place in the Atlantic between German U-boats and US ships, Roosevelt avoided escalation. After this, however, momentous events in the Pacific plunged the Americans into the war.

The Great Depression had affected Japan as much as it had the Western powers. In 1931 a group of Japanese nationalists had assassinated the current Prime Minister of Japan, leading to a military dictatorship. In the same year Japan invaded the Chinese province of Manchuria. Although the government talked of nurturing international friendship, this was a take-over of Chinese national resources. In 1940 the Japanese marched into Indochina (present-day Southeast Asia), which had formerly belonged to the Dutch and to Vichy France. They now commanded the plantations responsible for the world's supply of rubber. The United States retaliated by attempting to prevent Japanese purchases of oil and steel. Tensions between Japan and the United States grew.

A Date which will live in infamy

The USS Arizona burning following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

To secure resources and sea lanes for the Japanese islands, the Empire of Japan desired to neutralize the American Pacific Fleet, which was stationed at Pearl Harbor in Hawaii. On December Seven, 1941, the Japanese Air Force bombed the large American naval base, destroying or severely damaging over nineteen ships and 292 aircraft. The US Naval aircraft carriers, huge ships serving as mobile bases for airplanes, were then at sea and survived the attack. Yet its results were still dire: 2,403 American soldiers, sailors, and civilians were killed in the unprovoked strike. Japan made simultaneous strikes on Guam, Midway, and British bases. The next day, the United States Congress declared war on Japan, prompting Germany and Italy to in turn declare war on the United States.

Japan continued with its Pacific operations by taking the American colonies of the Philippines, Guam, and Wake Island; the British colonies of Burma, Singapore, Malaya, and Borneo; and the Dutch colonies in the East Indies.

Battle of Midway

An emboldened Japanese navy blundered in June of 1942, attacking Midway Island in the Pacific. After several days of aerial attacks on naval ships, American carrier-based planes defeated the Japanese ships so badly that their navy never recovered. Starving and weakened by disease, they held on for another month before surrendering.

The Home Front

With the mass media of motion pictures and the radio, the American government was able to motivate and move individuals and groups more efficiently than ever before. The government had begun to draft eligible young men in 1940, and the draft was ramped up after Pearl Harbor. There was scattered opposition to this overwhelmingly popular measure among religious pacifists and the Nation of Islam, and among the American Communists until Germany attacked the Soviet Union. Under the streamlined system put in process during 1942, males eighteen years of age and older registered with the government. If the individual's name was drawn during an intermittent lottery, he received a postcard telling him to report to his local draft board, organized by the national Subscription Service. (In addition, many men, and some women, signed up without receiving a notice.) At the draft board men walked through the rooms of various doctors, psychiatrists, and military and civil authorities. An applicant could be refused if he was ill, even with such minor ailments as nearsightedness or flat feet. He might also apply for an exemption if he was the head of a family or in a steel or arms factory. There were also exemptions for pacifism, though the man had to have a letter from his priest or minister saying that he had a religious basis for his pacifism. Quakers and Seventh Day Adventists were both denominations known for non-violence. Conscientious objectors could become medics or work in some other peaceful operation in support of the war. Men who had no letter, and who were unwilling to support the War in peaceful ways, were often put in prison and derided by the public. From the draft board men went straight into Basic Training, from there to become soldiers, sailors or Marines, or airplane pilots. Women could become nurses or join various auxiliary forces such as the Woman's Army Corps (WACs). These were not permitted to fight, but in their capacity as communication and supervisory aides were often on the battlefield.

With many men being shipped overseas to fight in the war, many employment opportunities opened up for women. Thousands of women began to support the war efforts by getting employed in many different factories producing tanks and planes and other sorts of weaponry. Some factories which had been devoted to peacetime production of cars and bicycles were converted to armament factories, and the nascent television stations were shut down. Sales of these items were halted "for the duration." The start of World War II brought the end of the Great Depression due to the supplies and men it takes to win a war.

Part of the war effort was the incorporation of American civilians into efforts showing that they could also make a difference. Victory Gardens were even more abundant than in World War I. These supplemented food and gasoline rations, initiated with the aim of getting supplies to the troops. Public work sites, and even some schools and Boy and Girl Scouts, vied to round up paper, scrap metal, and other supplies. These scrap drives brought in a limited amount of useful material, but helped involve some people who would have felt useless in the big war drive. Some public citizens who had not been permitted to join the military were delegated as air raid wardens, making sure that homes were darkened at night. (Especially during the first few years of the war, there was a real fear that some enemy Axis plane might bomb the American mainland.) Hollywood, still reeling from the Depression, brought itself back with instructional films for the troops and propaganda for moviegoers at home.

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  Precious resources such as food and gasoline had to be rationed.
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  Detroit in 1942, a major industrial city that aided the war effort.
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  Workers assemble B-25 aircraft in Kansas City.
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  Women working to build aircraft during WWII.
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  A woman works on an aircraft in 1943.

Japanese-Americans during WWII

In February 1942, the War Relocation Authority began to establish centers where Japanese-Americans, including those born in the United States and other citizens, were interned. Though this racial discrimination violated constitutional due process requirements, the Supreme Court ruled that such internment was lawful in 1944, when it decided Korematsu v. United States.

One potential factor in the decision to intern Japanese Americans was the results of the Niihau incident, where a few Japanese-Americans living on a Hawaiian island aided a downed Japanese pilot. Despite this, the vast majority of Japanese-American citizens, many of whom had never left America and grew up in America, were loyal to America. Additionally relatively few Japanese-Americans on Hawaii actually endured internment due to protests of local leaders on Hawaii that internment would cripple the economy of the islands.

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  Many Japanese Americans were forced to close their businesses and go into internment.
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  The Mochida's, a normal family, await internment.
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  A dust storm hits an assembly center. Harsh conditions like this were common.
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  A recreation of one of the barracks at Manzanar. Internment camps offered minimal comforts.

Members of the 442nd Regiment in Italy.

Some Japanese Americans were allowed to leave the camps to study or work. The 442nd Infantry Regiment was composed almost entirely of second generation Japanese-Americans with family in the internment camps, yet they served with distinction in the European Theater, becoming one of the most decorated units in American history relative to it's size and service length. Their actions were responsible for saving the Lost Battalion, American troops trapped behind German lines.

Turning back the European Axis

During the summer and fall of 1941, the Germans kept up their amazing pace into the heart of Russia. By December they had reached Moscow, and Leningrad was under siege. The Soviets sent in reserve troops from Siberia, and launched a counter attack. It succeeded, and Moscow was saved.

In the spring of 1942, Hitler ordered an attack into the Caucus Mountains, and Stalingrad. As they had done before, the Germans quickly advanced, breaking through the Russian lines. In Stalingrad, there was street to street, and house to house fighting. The Germans controlled over 90% of the city, but the Russians refused to surrender. A Russian reserve division encircled the Germans into the city, and 250,000 German soldiers were captured. It was one of the bloodiest battles in history.

In 1943, the President of the United States for an unprecedented third term, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, Winston Churchill held a Conference at Casablanca. The two nations then set up a plan of action for the next stages of the war. Meanwhile, the Russians continued to hold back the Germans, inflicting a crucial and massive defeat on Hitler's armies at the battle of Stalingrad in the winter of 1942-43. After a further major Russian victory at Kursk the following summer, the Germans were forced into retreat back towards Europe.

Tank warfare in north Africa.

In Africa, Axis troops led by Erwin Rommel had pushed into Egypt, just 70 miles west of Alexandria. However, British troops led by General Montgomery decisively defeated the Italian and German troops at the Battle of El Alamein. They were pushed out of Egypt, all the way across Libya, and into Tunisia. In November 1942, the Americans launched operation Torch and drove the French troops out of Algeria and Morrocco. After a long battle with Axis troops in Tunisia, they were driven out of Africa in May 1943.

The Allies then decided to invade Sicily, in hope of knocking Italy out of the war. In early July the invasion began. For the next month, the British and Americans led a bloody campaign in which Sicily was finally taken in early August. During the invasion Mussolini was overthrown and arrested. Hitler had him rescued and put him in charge of the new Italian Social Republic. Following the Invasion of mainland Italy in early September, the Italian government signed an armistice with the Allies. The fall of Italy signaled the beginning of the end of World War II. However, Mussolini was rescued by the Germans and had established an Italian Social Republic. Near the end of the War, Germany tries to fight for a last stand with the Allies. It became to be Germany's only hope for turning the war around. The battle took place in a 60 mile deep 40 mile wide "Bulge". Therefore giving the name of the battle, battle of the Bulge. After weeks of fighting in the cold winters the Allied forces came out victorious. Months after this battle the Allied forces had the Germans pushed all the way back into Berlin.

Antisemitism and The Holocaust

The prejudice of racism in America -- though the term racist is a misnomer: we are all members of the human race -- was evident from the days of Christopher Columbus onward. Antisemitism was a powerful motivating force in American history. The limits on immigration set in the early 1920s was in part a reaction against [Jewish] immigrants from Eastern Europe. The prosecutors of "Red Summer" had a dread of Blacks, Jews, and atheists, and sometimes of a nightmare conglomeration of all three.

But some antisemitism was an alien import. The Protocols of the Elders of Zion (Russian: "Протоколы сионских мудрецов", or "Сионские протоколы", see also other titles) is an antisemitic and anti-Zionist plagiarism and literary hoax first published in 1903 in Russian, in Znamya; it alleges a Jewish and Masonic plot to achieve world domination. A translation, taken as the literal truth, was published and popularized by the American industrialist Henry Ford. In the 1930s, the American Bund attempted to increase Nazi German influence, and to amplify the antisemitic messages coming from Berlin.

President Roosevelt treated the topic with care. Ethnographers and other scientific experts were drafted into the War effort, emphasizing that Americans came from every ethnic background. Jews were in every branch of the service, and rabbis were among the chaplains brought to aid them. But what came to be known as The Final Solution -- Hitler's plan to eliminate what Mein Kampf had called "the Jewish Question" -- was unknown to the American public. American newspapers had printed accounts of German oppression of its Jewish citizens, from Kristallnacht in 1938 onward. They had occasionally mentioned persecution of its Gypsies, Slavs, and other "non-Aryans," and the dreadful punishments meted out to those who opposed the Nazi regime.

In January, 1945, Soviet troops liberated Auschwitz, the largest of the Nazi Concentration Camps. On April Eleventh, 1945, Allies liberated the Death Camp at Buchenwald, near Weimar, Germany. On the 12th, several journalists arrived, including Edward R. Murrow, one of the most lauded journalists of the time. He sent out a broadcast for American audiences on the Fifteenth describing what he had seen and heard. "There surged around me an evil-smelling stink, men and boys reached out to touch me. They were in rags and the remnants of uniforms. Death already had marked many of them, but they were smiling with their eyes. I looked out over the mass of men to the green fields beyond, where well-fed Germans were ploughing..." On May third, Americans first saw newsreels of the camp. (Newsreels, film of weekly news reports shown in movie theaters, were major sources of information in the days before TV became popularized.) There they heard that the recent death rate had been about two hundred a day. They saw people in the last stages of malnutrition, disease, and "constant hard work, beatings, and torture." The camera also showed corpses of men stacked like cords of wood, and the crematoria where the dead had been burnt.

Now for the first time the majority of Americans could guess at the extent of The Holocaust, one of the most ghastly episodes in the modern history of mankind. In April of 1933, three months after Hitler took power, the Nazis issued a decree ordering the compulsory retirement of "non-Aryans" from the civil service. This is known as the spark of the Holocaust. Before Germany was defeated, there were some eleven million people that had been slaughtered in the name of Nazi racial purity. Although the Jews were the favored targets and are the victims we most hear about when talking about the Holocaust, they were not the only victims. There were also millions of Russians, Poles, gypsies and others that were also murdered. Although the deprivation of the Jews started in the years following 1933, the mass killings didn't begin until 1941.

The effect of this knowledge was augmented by the Nuremburg trials of 1945-1946. There many German officials, and some Concentration Camp governors, were put to trial for committing these murders, called crimes against humanity. American antisemitism has continued since that time, but it is at least officially frowned upon. The American eugenics movement also suffered a setback from which it has not yet recovered.

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  Kristallnacht (The Night of Broken Glass) aftermath in November 1938. Here Jewish shops were looted. Other buildings connected to Jewish residents, including Synagogs were also targeted.
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  Jews in Nazi occupied areas were required to identify themselves by wearing clothing marked with a yellow Star of David, making it easier for Nazis to discriminate against them.
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  Auschwitz II-Birkenau in 1944. The Inhumane treatment of holocaust victims played a major role in how human rights are considered, as well as in the Nuremberg trials following the war.
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  Aerial photo of Auschwitz in 1944. The horrific scale of the Holocaust is hard to picture - This is just one of many concentration camps.
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  Bodies being burned, following killings in Gas Chambers.
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  The Judges panel at the Nuremberg trials, where Nazi officials involved in the Holocaust were put on trial following the war.
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  Auschwitz I in 2010, a symbol of a dark chapter in history.

Operation Overlord

D Day proved to be a critical point during the war.

In November, 1943, Prime Minister Churchill and President Roosevelt held another Conference at Tehran. Joseph Stalin, who held the title of General Secretary of the Communist Party of the USSR, but was actually a Dictator of the Soviet Union, joined them there. The three leaders agreed to a plan codenamed Operation Overlord, under which an attack would be launched on the northern coast of France from the English Channel. In preparation for an invasion of France, Hitler cut off all support for the German armies remaining in the Soviet Union. Thus disabled, the German Army was forced to withdraw from Russia in the winter of 1943-1944.

On June 6, 1944 ("D-Day,") in the early morning hours, American and British paratroopers were dropped into Normandy. Hours later, American, British, French and Canadian soldiers landed at Normandy on the north coast of France. The troops landed near Caen, but Hitler wrongly felt that they would attack at a location to the north of that city. The Allies took advantage of Hitler's miscalculation; by the end of the month, the Allies had over eight hundred thousand soldiers in Normandy.

Meanwhile, Russian troops, which had been on the defensive, began their offensive on German-controlled territories. In the middle of July, the Soviets won their first major victory by taking the territory of Belorussia. At this time, concern began to grow in the West about Soviet domination replacing German in eastern Europe, especially in Poland. Despite these worries, Roosevelt felt that he had little influence in that area over Stalin, whose armies were bearing a huge brunt of the fight.

By the end of July, the Allies expanded their base at Normandy by breaking out into the rest of France. Pushing through the nation, the Allies had gone far enough to liberate the city of Paris on August 25. On September 11, some Allied troops entered Germany, taking Antwerp, Belgium on the way. German resistance then hardened, however. British Field Marshall Montgomery attempt to "end the war by '44" with Operation Market Garden, a plan to liberate Holland and bypass the German border defenses, failed. The British and American armies would make little more progress for the rest of 1944.

Meanwhile, Russian troops pushed toward Germany, defeating Germany's Axis partners on the way. In August, Romania surrendered, followed by Bulgaria and Finland in September.

Yalta and German Surrender

German Counteroffensive

Allied air bombing of German industries and cities had been ongoing and savage since 1943, but did not have the intended effect of crushing the German will to fight. Indeed, Hitler was able to field new advanced weapons in 1943-45, such as the world's first jet fighter aircraft, the V-1 flying bomb, the V-2 ballistic missile, and new types of tanks and submarines. The new weapons, however, proved of little use against Allied numbers and economic superiority, with American industrial production for the war effort massive and untouched by Axis attack. Germany forced millions of prisoners into slave labor, under the most brutal conditions, to keep its own war effort going.

In December 1944, Germany launched a massive counter-attack on the light defended American positions in Belgium. The Germans hoped to cut off the Allied supply lines, however, after reinforcements arrived, the "Bulge"(today it is know as the Battle of the Bulge) was flattened out. Meanwhile, the Soviets were on the verge of entering Germany from the east en masse, having taken control of Poland. Hitler's troops were exhausted, millions dead or captured, and with the fall of the Romanian oil fields, German armies were running out of gasoline. A final call-up began of old men and boys for a last-ditch defense of Germany. Many German civilians fled, fearing the revenge the Russians would put on them after what the Germans had done in Russia. Thousands of German noncombatants were raped, and many of these were then killed.

The Yalta Conference

The Yalta Conference

In early February 1945, United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt, British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, and Soviet leader Josef Stalin, the three leaders of the anti-Nazi alliance, met at Yalta in the U.S.S.R. The leaders of the Allied powers, "The Big Three," were planning for the end of the war. This was a follow-up to the meeting of the three powers in November 1943 in the Tehran Conference.

At Yalta the countries contended on what to do with Germany. Churchill and Britain wanted to protect their colonial possessions and to keep the Soviet Union from having too much power. Stalin and the Soviet Union wanted Germany to pay them to help start the rebuilding of their country. Stalingrad, a byword for Soviet military resistance of Hitler, was now in ruins. Two wars of German aggression had been too much, and the country needed to be permanently restrained. The United States wanted to influence Germany toward democracy and to keep the peace. The Yalta conference decided the division of defeated Germany into zones for reconstruction. The leaders agreed to punish Nazis for war crimes, including the Holocaust. Other topics included Soviet Russia's entry into the war against Japan, composition of the post-war government of Germany, voting arrangements in the new United Nations organizations, and the future of the liberated governments of Eastern Europe. The Yalta Declaration on Liberated Europe, which called for free elections and constitutional liberties in Eastern Europe, was the most controversial topic of the Yalta Conference.

Race to Berlin

Allied Aircraft passing over the Rhine in 1945.

The Allies first attempted to reach the Rhine River in their quest to take over Germany. In March, this goal accomplished, the Americans and British opposed the Soviets in the Race for Berlin. The Race determined who would control Berlin, a city that would prove important in the reconstruction of Germany. The Americans allowed the Soviets to win the Race for Berlin. Fierce fighting erupted in and around the city as motley German units made their last stand against the powerful army groups of Russian marshals Zhukov and Koniev. His capital surrounded and his loyal minions deserting him, Adolf Hitler committed suicide in his Berlin command bunker on April 30, 1945. Benito Mussolini was executed by Italian Partisans on April 28. The new leader of Germany, Karl Doenitz, agreed to surrender. On May 8, Germany formally signed an unconditional surrender, dissolving the Axis and leaving only Japan to be defeated.

The End of the FDR Era

One of only a few photos of FDR in his Wheelchair. His dog, Fala, sits on his lap.

The public was never informed of the extent of President Roosevelt's paralysis. Though he admitted that he had suffered polio, no newsreels showed him pulling himself along with his crutches. At press conferences the photographers were led in when he was already in a chair or in his car seat. Compensation for the leg disability, and the physical activity the Roosevelts were known for, had made his upper arms strong and muscular. However, his physical strain combined with the burden of the Presidency to weary him. Speaking to Congress in the wake of Yalta, he made a rare admission of how much this affected him: "I hope that you will pardon me for this unusual posture of sitting down during the presentation of what I want to say, but . . . it makes it a lot easier for me not to have to carry about ten pounds of steel around on the bottom of my legs; and also . . . I have just completed a fourteen-thousand-mile trip."

Roosevelt was ill, and had been frail even before his re-election in 1944. The Republican party had objected to the President even running for a fourth term. The Republican Candidate, Thomas E. Dewey, accused him of running a corrupt autocracy and of feigning good health. In response to accusations of corruption, Roosevelt dropped former Vice President Henry A. Wallace and picked up newcomer Harry S. Truman, who had risen in a War anti-fraud committee in the Senate. He also campaigned vigorously in the cities, which may have hastened his death.

Roosevelt died of a stroke on April 12th, 1945. After FDR's death Harry Truman became president. The day after Roosevelt's death Truman sought out old friends to ask for their help in this "terrible job."

The Atomic Bomb and the End of World War II

Island Hopping & Kamikaze

After the Battle of Midway the United States surely retook the Asian Pacific nations, fighting the Japanese empire island by island, by gun, by shell, and by flame thrower. Though the Japanese continued to fight, its armed forces were in a hopeless situation. Its armaments became fewer. Kamikaze (the Japanese word for "Sacred Wind"), pilots who hoped to destroy American ships by intentionally crashing their own planes into them, became more dominant in Japanese opposition.

The Manhattan Project

The Trinity test in New Mexico was the first test of a nuclear weapon. Nuclear weapons became a precarious factor to geopolitics which remains to this day.

The United States had become involved in a competition with Nazi Germany to find technologies which would win the war. Among these technologies was nuclear fission, the splitting of a highly electronegative atom into smaller ones, which gives off ten times as much power. With cooperative or captive scientists and slave labor, the Nazis were attempting to use uranium to create an atomic bomb. During the same time, America had become the home for dissident German and Jewish scientists. Native-born and newly-emigrated American physicists were also talking about the possibilities of fission. One of the latter, Albert Einstein, sent a letter to President Roosevelt in 1939 explaining the developments in the nuclear chain reactions which would result in an atomic explosion.

In 1942, a number of the top minds in physics were relocated to a secret location in New Mexico. These men volunteered to work at what was code-named the Manhattan Project, a secret attempt to bring to fruition what Einstein had posited in 1939. At its height the Manhattan Project employed more than 600,000 workers, the majority of them not realizing what they were really working for. After spending more than two billion dollars, the Project created the first atomic bomb.On July 16, 1945, this bomb was successfully tested in New Mexico.

In the interim, Germany had been defeated. President Roosevelt had died, and had been replaced in office by his Vice President, Harry S. Truman. President Truman listened to experts who forecast two more years of war against Japan, and the prospect of a bloody American invasion. Truman chose to use the atomic bomb instead of an invasion.

Hiroshima and Nagasaki

On August sixth, an A-bomb with the name Little Boy was dropped on Hiroshima, Japan, by a B-29 aircraft piloted by Col. Paul Tibbets. The explosion formed a mushroom cloud. Dust and debris shot into the sky and was seen miles away. Many people died instantly, but others fell sick a few days later from effects on the radiation on living tissue. The American press was told about the detonation of the bomb on a population of civilians, but not about its full effects. The Japanese government did not give in. On August ninth a bomb called Fat Man was dropped on the weapon-producing city of Nagasaki, again upon civilians. Together, the bombs killed over one hundred thousand people. Between the two bombings, meanwhile, the Soviet Union had joined in the war on Japan. The Americans threatened a third bombing on Tokyo, though they had not yet had time to create a new bomb. Now Japan unconditionally surrendered, officially ending World War II. Officials signed a treaty for surrender on September 2, 1945, aboard the USS Missouri.

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  The Enola Gay and Crew.
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  Hiroshima prior to bombing.
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  The same area of Hiroshima after bombing.
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  Atomic cloud over Hiroshima.
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  The aftermath of the Atomic Bomb on Hiroshima. The human cost of the bomb was immense. The bomb warped the city into a deadly hellscape, leaving little more than rubble, a few scattered ruins, and radiation once the fires died down.
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  A heavily injured person receives medical treatment.

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  Nagasaki prior to bombing.
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  The same area of Nagasaki after bombing.
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  Atomic cloud over Nagasaki
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  A person carbonized by the blast. Horrific deaths like this were common as a result of the bombing.

Death Toll

The death toll of the Second World War was greater than that of the First. At least sixty-one million people died from the Allied nations of the Soviet Union; the United States and its colonies; Great Britain, its colonies and Canada; France and its colonies; the Netherlands and its colonies; Belgium and its colonies; and Poland, Norway, and Greece. In contrast, the main Axis powers of Germany, Italy and Japan only suffered twelve million casualties.

Truman and the Cold War (1945 - 1953)

Bitter Aftermath of Victory

Soviet Union

Destroyed buildings in Stalingrad. The Soviet Union was heavily damaged, both materially and through human costs, defending itself from Nazi Germany.

At the end of World War II, the Soviet Union controlled the largest army the world had ever known. Yet the "Mother Country" lay ravaged: nearly one third of its wealth had been destroyed. 32,000 factories were in ruins, 65,000 kilometers (40,000 mi) of railway track were now useless, and an untold number of citizens had been killed. 17,100 townships had been destroyed; 70,000 villages and hamlets had been burned to the ground; 100,000 collective farms had been completely demolished in the military occupation. Citizens who had survived were now starving and resorting to barbaric ways of survival.

After years of struggle with the Wehrmacht, the Soviets were widely regarded as having borne the brunt of destroying Nazism, creating immense respect for the Red Army. "Uncle Joe" Stalin had become a popular figure in Europe and in the United States. Many Europeans thought that having won the war, Stalin could now win the peace.

United States

After the war, America's economy was ready to expand into markets on every continent. During the war, much of the world had built up a debt to the United States, and many ex-allies turned towards America for financial relief. Britain negotiated a loan of $3.75 billion. Even the Soviet Union discussed with Washington about the possibility of a $6 billion loan for desperately needed reconstruction.

During the Bretton Woods Conference on the postwar global economy in 1944, the dollar was established as the worlds principal trading currency, while the pound was relegated to second place. Because the dollar was the only currency freely convertible throughout the world, many nations hoped for loans and assistance from the United States. And since the United States was the only power possessing the atom bomb, America seemed to have the advantage in both military and economy when it came to determining the future shape of the world.

During the Cold War the United States opened up many different job opportunities to help out other countries who agreed not to favor communism. This began to become very beneficial to the United States because many countries came to the United States aid to help fight against communism.

President Harry S. Truman

President Truman

Harry S. Truman had been vice president for only 82 days when President Roosevelt died, on April 12, 1945. He told reporters, "I felt like the moon, the stars, and all the planets had fallen on me." He had had very little communication with Roosevelt about world affairs or domestic politics and was uninformed about major initiatives relating to the war and the top secret Manhattan Project, which was about to test the world's first atomic bomb. Truman was much more difficult for the Secret Service to protect than the wheel chair–bound Roosevelt had been. Truman was an avid walker, regularly taking walks around Washington. Truman was President from April 12, 1945 to January 20, 1953. Deciding not to run again, he retired to his home town of Independence, Missouri.

Truman Doctrine

World War II changed the balance of power in the international community by reducing the influence of France and the United Kingdom, while increasing the influence of the United States and the Soviet Union, which became the world's superpowers. The initial sentiments of the US government towards the avowedly socialist Soviet Union were friendly. In the aftermath of the war, however, relations between the two powers quickly deteriorated. At the end of World War II, a number of entities were established by Allied nations to help maintain international order; the most notable of these was the United Nations. Within the framework of the UN, the United States and Britain advocated for the creation of a regulatory entity for the world's monetary system which would help avoid another worldwide depression similar to that seen during the Great Depression before the war. Talks among Allied delegates were held in 1944 which resulted in the creation of the International Monetary Fund and what would eventually become the World Bank, organizations established to make currency exchange easier and to regulate international debt. The Soviet government was highly suspicious of these entities -- it viewed them as a tool for the western world to force capitalism on socialist member-states -- and it refused to support them.

The USSR's refusal to support the IMF and the World Bank set off a diplomatic chain reaction that would eventually grow into what became known as the Cold War.

The Soviet Union believed that its control of Eastern Europe was vital to its security, and said that it was right for it to do so, for "we suffered at Stalingrad". As agreed at the Yalta Conference, the World War II Allies divided Germany into four zones, giving one zone each to the United Kingdom, France, the United States, and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union's zone, known as East Germany, was later transformed into a Communist state, after an agreement on a unified Germany could not be reached. The other three zones, West Germany, were joined - at first economically through a currency reform - during the implementation of the Marshall Plan in 1948. The city of Berlin, which was surrounded by East Germany, was divided in two parts between East and West Germany. Critics correctly pointed out that the Soviet Union was little involved in the Greek Civil War, that the communists in Greece were more pro-Tito than pro-Stalin, and that the resistance movement had non-communists as well as communist members. Nor was The Soviet Union threatening turkey at the time. Others suggested that such aid should be channeled through the United Nations.

In 1947, Greece became the focus of the Cold War. The Greek monarchy had been supported by Great Britain since 1945. Greek Communists threatened to overthrow this regime, which was corrupt and not representative of the people. In order to "shock" the American public into accepting American involvement in order to help other peoples resist the "communist threat" and secure the strategically and economically important Middle East for US influence, President Harry Truman issued the Truman Doctrine. The Doctrine suggested that the US would aid nations threatened by revolutionary forces. Congress agreed and appropriated $400 million in aid for Greece and Turkey. By 1949, the Communists in Greece were defeated. In 1952, Greece and Turkey entered the NATO.

The Marshall Plan

A photo of some Marshall Plan aid being delivered to Greek areas by donkey.

The Marshall Plan was the first attempt to achieve the goals that America set in western Europe. The European nations were still unstable, both in politics and in economics, and so they did not have the money to purchase the good that they required from the U.S. The people and government of America were all extremely worried that if Europe's funds continued to be so unstable, this would trigger another great depression. With the memories of all the hardships and economic ruin of the Great Depression in the 1930s fresh in the American people's minds, the government decided they needed to do something. In order to make sure that there was not another worldwide depression, in 1948 the American government decided to launch a massive European recovery program called the Marshall Plan which sent 12.4 billion dollars to western Europe. A condition of this program was that Europe would spend this foreign-aid money on American products. This program ended in 1951. The Marshall Plan was a mixture of failure and success. In Europe, it assisted to further divide eastern and western Europe and it caused inflation which did nothing to solve the balance-of-payment problem. However, this program did succeed in spurring western European industrialization and investment.

Reconstruction of the New World

Hungry, and cold Germans protesting for bread and coal during the winter of 1947. The situation in Europe was dire following the war.

The leadership in the United States by contrast, came out of war extremely confident about the immediate security of the country’s borders. Separated from the other world powers by two vast oceans, the American home base had been virtually immune from attack during the fighting—only the occasional shell from a submarine or a hostile balloon reached the shores of the continental United States American casualties were fewer than those of any other major combatants—hugely so in comparison with the Soviet Union. With its fixed capital intact, its resources more plentiful than ever, and in lone possession of the atomic bomb, the United States was the strongest power in the world at war’s ends.

Yet this was no time for complacency, Washington officials reminded one another. Some other power — almost certainly the USSR — could take advantage of the political and economic instability in war-torn Europe and Asia, and eventually seize control of these areas, with dire implications for America’s physical and economic security. To prevent this eventuality, officials in Washington sought forward bases overseas, in order to keep a airborne enemy at bay. To further enhance U.S. security, American planners, in direct contrast to their Soviet counterparts, sought the quick reconstruction of nations—including the former enemies Germany and Japan—and a world economy based on free trade. Such a system, they reasoned, was essential to preserve America’s economic well being.

The Soviets, on the other hand refused to join the new World Bank and International Monetary Fund, created at the July 1944 Bretton Woods Conference by forty-four nations to stabilize trade and finances. They held that the United States dominated both institutions and used them to promote private investment and open international commerce, which Moscow saw as capitalist tools of exploitation. With the United States as its largest donor, the World Bank opened its doors in 1945 and began to make loans to help members finance reconstruction projects; the IMF, also heavily backed by the united states, helped members meet their balance-of-payment problems through currency loans.

Reconstruction of Japan

Tokyo in 1946. The reconstruction of Japan eventually lead to a postwar economic boom.

After Japan's surrender in 1945, the United States military was directed to reconstruct the nation. American General Douglas MacArthur headed the Reconstruction effort. However, he was aided at every stage by anthropologists and specialists on Japanese history and culture. This effort was not simply an attempt to make the defeated Japanese knuckle under, but a sensitive reconstruction of the whole society for both political modernization and cultural continuity with the pre-Dictatorship history.

MacArthur was dealing with a society in physical and cultural shock. The Japanese Dictatorship had used the Emperor's position as the head of Shinto religion, and his people thought of him as a god. They heard his voice for the first time over the radio announcing their nation's capitulation. Bombing of Japanese infrastructure, and months of shortages, had ruined electrical, water, and sanitary systems. Before Fat Man and Little Boy, an American campaign of bombing Tokyo had killed, wounded, and dismayed civilians. The A-bombs had left areas of Hiroshima and Nagasaki radioactive. Those who had not been killed outright were dying of radiation poisoning and cancer.

In 1947, a new Constitution for Japan was created. The Constitution entirely changed the role of the Emperor from an active leader to a passive symbol of the nation. The Diet, or legislature, was modeled on the British Parliament. The Constitution granted an enormous number of rights to Japanese citizens. Finally, the Constitution formally denounced all military conflict and prohibited Japan from keeping any armed forces.

The Reconstruction of Japan made other sweeping changes. For example, the Reconstruction introduced labor unions and reduced the influence of monopolistic businesses.

During the Cold War, America was determined to make an ally out of the Empire of Japan. The Reconstruction made an about-face, reversing its policy of reducing the power of large businesses. More regulations regarding the economy were made. In 1951, the US agreed to grant Japan full independence and autonomy. The treaty, however, did permit the US to maintain parts of its military in Japan. The treaty became effective in 1952.

The Rise of Communism in China

After the fall of the Qing Dynasty, China was in a state of confusion and unrest. The nation saw the worst nightmares as the people were without stable unified authority, fragmenting into a rudderless giant. Many land lords (ward lords, since the standing was imposed and established by force of arms) took advantage of the situation aiming to expand their influence and so fought against each other regardless of common statehood ideas or national purpose and gradually the situation became chaotic. This was the period of warlordism in China, it lasted from 1916 to 1927, a dark period in China’s history.

Meanwhile the principles of communism began to spread in the country and those ideals attracted a majority of the people. The people who belonged to the lower strata were for these principles especially for the law of equality.

The rise of Communism in China is mainly due to a man named Mao Zedong. The son of a farmer, Mao was highly intelligent. Zedong left home for school and had become a member of the Nationalist Army as the Revolution began around 1911. He was soon introduced to and became powerfully influenced by the philosophies of Marxism.

After decades of civil war and invasion by Japan, the communists under Mao prevailed. The opposition nationalists fell and barely managed to retreat offshore to Taiwan. Communism came to power in 1949 under the power of Mao. Communism began as a movement that paved the way for the liberation of the proletariat. Proletariat is that class of society which lives entirely from the sale of its labor and does not draw profit from any kind of capital; whose weal and woe, whose life and death, whose sole existence depends on the demand for labor – hence, on the changing state of business, on the vagaries of unbridled competition. The proletariat, or the class of proletarians, is, in a word, the working class of the 19th century.

Anarchy was to some extend controlled by Mao but he faced failure many times. Mao’s initiatives did cause a kind of equality to emerge in China, but it was not one in which all the inhabitants of China benefited. Contrarily, many of them suffered extreme poverty and greatness was lost in the realms of academia, science, and technology which hindered China’s ability to become a modern nation capable of interacting on the global scale.

The Red Scare and McCarthyism

Joseph Welch and McCarthy. During McCarthy's investigation of Communists in the Army Welch asked McCarthy "At long last, have you left no sense of decency?"

When China fell to Communism, suspicion of the ideology's influence in the American government became a pandemic. Many experts on China and the regions around it were fired as in some way causing the change. This became a problem during the Korean War. What became known as the Red Scare proved costly in American life.

Congress passed the McCarran Internal Security Act in 1950, overriding President Truman's veto. The Act created a public body known as the Subversive Activities Control Board; the Board was charged with monitoring and investigating Communist Activities.

In Congress, meanwhile, Wisconsin Senator Joseph McCarthy accused certain government officials of being Communists and disloyal. While a Communist conspiracy involving State Department employees was eventually uncovered, many of the accusations were baseless. The word McCarthyism refers to a vindictive persecution of the innocent.

Documents from the Venona counterintelligence project suggest that a few targets of McCarthyism were indeed working with the Soviet Union. Historians continue to debate this topic.

The House of Representatives had established a Committee on Un-American Activities in 1947. The Committee performed actions such as investigating actors, directors, and writers. As was the case with Red Summer, it was not mere membership in the Communist party which caused suspicion. Individuals were sometimes grilled for belonging to the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People or the American Civil Liberties Union. It was not enough to confess innocence: you had in turn to accuse others of Communism. A few in the dragnet had actually been Communists, either because they had actually believed in its aims or as part of the polarization of American society in the era of the Spanish Civil War.

However, the opponents of the Committee were not all Communist. Some accused it of violating the Constitutional rights against self-incrimination and for freedom of belief. The entertainment industry, fearful of an investigation, fired many people who had become shadowed by the hearings, or by a pamphlet called "Red Channels." Men and women lost their livelihood, in some cases fleeing to Europe and elsewhere, in others even committing suicide over their lost lives. Ten individuals refused to name names, including screenwriters Dalton Trumbo and Ring Lardner, Jr., and were all duly blacklisted as the Hollywood Ten.

Some local communities banned literature that they feared would encourage Communism. Public servants and teachers were forced to take a so-called "loyalty oath": those who refused, for whatever reason, were not hired. Others lost their jobs due to unfounded accusations of disloyalty. FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, who had come to power in the wake of the first Communist scare, had Americans followed on suspicion of Communism. Scientist J. Robert Oppenheimer, who had helped develop the atomic bomb, was fired from his high-security job because of his former associations with the Communist party. Yet the career of Joseph McCarthy was also derailed during the Red Scare: in 1954, the Senate formally censured him for abusing his powers and using unfair tactics in targeting innocent government officials.

Even at the height of the McCarthyist furor in the early 1950s, the anti-Communist crusade was relatively mild. Many prosecutions faltered on appeal and only a few foreign-born radicals were actually deported. Only Julius and Ethel Rosenberg were put to death. Of the roughly 150 people who went to prison, most were released within a year or two. Yet the after effects lasted for decades. When the United States later fought a war in Vietnam, it was often in the dark because a number of regional experts had been lost to the Red Scare.

The Korean War

Background

After World War II, the US attempted to curb Soviet influence on the Korean Peninsula by occupying southern part of that area. The area occupied by the US became South Korea, while the other part became North Korea. North Korea soon passed into the control of the Communist Party.

North Korean Offensive

South Korean refugees flee the North Korean army.

In May, 1949, fighting between North and South Korean troops broke out near the border between the two nations. In an attempt to add South Korea to the Communist World, North Korea invaded South Korea in 1950. The People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union lent their support to North Korea, while the United States did the same to South Korea. On June 25, 1950 a large military force moved across the 38th parallel in the Republic of Korea. Since 1910, Korea had been divided into two by the powers of Japans victory in 1945. The Korean war was seen as an internal struggle, with the north heavily armed and backed by China and the Soviet Union invading the lightly armed south. The two parts moved along the temporary border while the anti-government fighting began to flare into the south.

On June 27, 1950 the United Nations security Council first adopted a ceasefire resolution. When the United Nations Security Council voted to aid South Korea in stopping North Korean aggression, the United States agreed to send troops to the Korean Peninsula. General Douglas MacArthur was given the command of UN troops in Korea. The United States agreed to send troops over on June 30 along with increasing aid to the French fight against Communists rebels in Indochina. MacArthur was placed in command on July 8. At the beginning the U.S. troops were lacking training and were out of shape. In the first few weeks of fighting the U.S. troops were pushed back to a defensive perimeter at Pusan.

Back and Fourth

American troops in Korea

By the autumn of 1950, North Korean troops were forced out of South Korea. In October, General MacArthur ordered troops to cross into North Korea. In the third week of that month, the US took the capital of North Korea, Pyongyang.

Refugees flee Pyongyang on a destroyed bridge.

However, just six days after the United Nations forces took Pyongyang, the People's Republic of China sent a quarter million men on a series of counterattacks. In December, Chinese "volunteers" took over Pyongyang and by January 1951 they had taken the South Korean capital, Seoul.

The US intended to do whatever it took to win the Korean War. It even planned on using the atomic bomb. However, President Truman did not trust General MacArthur to follow orders when using the atomic bomb. Therefore, he asked for MacArthur's resignation; MacArthur complied.

Stalemate

In 1953, Dwight D. Eisenhower became President of the US. Having promised during the election campaign to end the Korean War, he fulfilled this promise by continuing negotiations with the North and South Koreans, Chinese, and the Soviet Union and using "brinkmanship" to reach an agreement acceptable to all countries involved except for South Korea, which tried to induce the US to help unite Korea.

Weapons of the Cold War

Nuclear Weapons

Ivy Mike, the first Hydrogen Bomb, was tested November 1st, 1952. The testing site, Elugelab island, became an underwater crater following the test. It's yield of 10.4 megatons of TNT dwarfed that of Fat Man, which only had a yield of 20 kilotons.

The nuclear arms race was central to the Cold War. Many feared where the Cold War was going with the belief that the more nuclear weapons you had, the more powerful you were. Both America and The Soviet Union massively built up their stockpiles of nuclear weapons.

The world greatly changed when USA exploded the H-bomb in 1952. This one bomb was smaller in size than the Hiroshima atomic bomb but 2500 times more powerful. The Soviets produced an H-bomb in 1953 and the world became a much more dangerous place.

Nuclear Triad

Innovations in weapon delivery platforms played a major role in the Cold War

The Cold War also saw innovation in delivery platforms. By using land based, sea based, and air based weapons platforms, a Nuclear triad could be established. This made it difficult to ensure all of a nations nuclear weaponry could be destroyed in a surprise first strike.

Deterrence

By April of 1950 the US Department of State had concluded that the Soviet Union was a significant hostile threat, and through it's NSC-68 report advocated that deterrence through an arms build up would be the best way to counter that threat. By building up a number of weapons, it was hoped that the Soviet Union would be detered from waging a nuclear war.

USA produced a bomber - the B52 - that could fly 6,000 miles and deliver a nuclear pay-load. Such a development required massive financial backing from the government - something which America could afford to do and which The Soviet Union could not. The Soviet Union concentrated on producing bigger bombs - a far more cost effective procedure.

In October 1957, the world was introduced to the fear of a missile attack when the Soviet Satellite Sputnik was launched. This was to lead to ICBM’s : Inter-continental ballistic missiles. As a result, America built the DEW line around the Arctic - Distant Early Warning system.

At the end of the 1950’s, American Intelligence estimated that in a Soviet missile attack, 20 million Americans would die and 22 million would be injured.

During the 1960’s, the Soviet's put their money into producing larger missiles, Eventually creating Tsar Bomba, the biggest Nuclear Weapon ever created. America built fewer but technologically superior missiles - the Atlas could go 5,000 miles at a speed of 16,000 mph. By 1961, there were enough bombs to destroy the world.

Despite this, great emphasis was put on new weapon systems - mobile missile launchers were built, missiles were housed underground in silos and in 1960 the first Polaris submarine was launched carrying 16 nuclear missiles. Each missile carried four warheads which could targeted on different cities; hence one submarine effectively carried 64 nuclear warheads.

During the 1960’s the theory of MAD developed - Mutually Assured Destruction. This meant that if The Soviet Union attacked the west, the west would make sure that they would suitably retaliate i.e. there would be no winners.

A MIRV test in 1984.

By 1981, USA had 8,000 ICBMs and USSR 7,000 ICBMs

By 1981, USA had 4,000 planes capable of delivering a nuclear bomb. the USSR had 5000.

USA defense spending for 1981 = 178 billion dollars. By 1986, it was 367 billion dollars.

By 1986, it is estimated that throughout the world there were 40,000 nuclear warheads - the equivalent of one million Hiroshima bombs.

British Intelligence estimated that just one medium sized H-bomb on London would essentially destroy anything living up to 30 miles away.

Confronted by such awesome statistics, world leaders had to move to a position where they trusted each other more. Throughout the 1960's and 1970's "detente" had been used to ease bad relations between the superpowers. This was to culminate in the Reykjavik meeting between presidents Reagan and Gorbachev that started real progress in the cut in nuclear weaponry in future meetings (if little was actually gained at the meeting in Reykjavik).

Eisenhower, Civil Rights, and the Fifties (1953 - 1961)

Eisenhower

President Eisenhower

Civil Rights Movement under Eisenhower and Desegregation

The first events that would spark off the entire Civil Rights movement happened during the Eisenhower administration. In the south, there were many statewide laws that segregated many public facilities ranging from buses to water fountains. Southern African Americans now felt that their time had come to enjoy American democracy and they fought hard to end southern segregation policies.

Brown v. Board of Education

In 1952, seven year old Linda Brown, of Topeka, Kansas, wasn't permitted to attend a white-only elementary school that was only a few blocks from her house. In order to attend her coloreds-only school, Brown had to cross dangerous railroad tracks and take a bus for many miles. Her family sued the Topeka school board and lost, but appealed the case all the way to the Supreme Court. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas came to the Supreme Court in December 1952. In his arguments, head lawyer for the NAACP, Thurgood Marshall, challenged the "Separate But Equal" doctrine established in Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896. He argued that schools could be separate, but never equal. On May 17, 1954, the Court gave its opinion. It ruled that it was unconstitutional to segregate schools, and ordered that schools integrate "with all deliberate speed."

Central High Confrontation

Paratroopers were able to secure access to the school by the Little Rock Nine.

Integration would not be easy. Many school districts accepted the order without argument, but some, like the district of Little Rock, Arkansas, did not. On September 2, 1957, the day before the start of the school term the Arkansas Governor, Orval Faubus, instructed the National Guard to stop any black students entering the school. He claimed this was to protect the property against violence planned by integration protesters.

The federal authorities intervened and an injunction was granted preventing the National Guard from blocking the school and they were withdrawn on September 20. School restarted on 23 September, with the building surrounded by local police officers and nearly one thousand protesters. The police escorted nine black students, later known as the Little Rock Nine, into the school via a side door. When the crowd discovered the students had entered the building, they tried to storm the school and the black students were hurried out around lunch time.

Congressman Brooks Hays and the Little Rock mayor, Woodrow Mann, asked the federal government for more help. On September 24, Mann sent a message to President Eisenhower requesting troops. Eisenhower responded immediately and the 101st Airborne Division was sent to Arkansas. In addition, the President brought the Arkansas National Guard under federal control to prevent its further use by the Governor.

On September 25, 1957, the nine black students finally began their education properly, protected by 1,000 paratroopers.

Montgomery Bus Boycott

The bus Rosa Parks made history on.

On December 1, 1955, Rosa Parks, a seamstress and secretary of the Montgomery, Alabama, the chapter of the NAACP, boarded a city bus with the intention of going home. She sat in the first row of seats in the "colored" section of the segregated bus. At the next stop, whites were among the passengers waiting to board but all seats in the "white" front dividing the black and white sections to accommodate the racial makeup of the passengers at any given moment. So he ordered the four blacks sitting in the first row of seats in the "colored" section to stand and move to the rear of the bus so the waiting whites could have those seats. Three of the passengers complied; Mrs. Parks did not. Warned again by the driver, she still refused to move, at which point the driver exited the bus and located a policeman, who came onto the bus, arrested Mrs. Parks, and took her to the city jail. She was booked for violating the segregation ordinance and was shortly released on bail posted by E. D. Nixon, the leading local civil rights activist. She was scheduled to appear in municipal court on December 5, 1955.

Mistreatment of African Americans on Montgomery's segregated buses was not uncommon, and several other women had been arrested in similar situations in the months preceding Parks's. However, Mrs. Parks was especially well-known and well-respected within the black community, and her arrest particularly angered the African Americans of Montgomery. In protest, community leaders quickly organized a one-day boycott of the buses to coincide with her December 5 court date. An organization, the Montgomery Improvement Association, was also created, and the new minister of the Dexter Avenue Baptist Church, the 26-year-old Martin Luther King, Jr., was selected as the MIA's president. Word of the boycott spread effectively through the city over the weekend of December 3–4, aided by mimeographed fliers prepared the Women's Political Council, by announcements in black churches that Sunday morning, and by an article in the local newspaper about the pending boycott, which had been "leaked" to a reporter by E. D. Nixon.

On the morning of Mrs. Parks's trial, King, Nixon, and other leaders were pleasantly surprised to see that the boycott was almost 100 percent effective among blacks. And since African Americans made up 75% of Montgomery's bus riders, the impact was significant. In city court, Mrs. Parks was convicted and was fined $10. Her attorney, the 24-year-old Fred D. Gray, announced an appeal. That night, more than 5,000 blacks crowded into and around the Holt Street Baptist Church for a "mass meeting" to discuss the situation. For most in the church (and listening outside over loudspeakers), it was their first time to hear the oratory of Martin Luther King, Jr. He asked the crowd if they wanted to continue the boycott indefinitely, and the answer was a resounding yes. For the next 381 days, African Americans boycotted the buses, while the loss of their fares drove the Chicago-owned bus company into deeper and deeper losses. However, segregationist city officials prohibited the bus company from altering its seating policies, and negotiations between black leaders and city officials went nowhere.

With bikes, carpools, and hitchhiking, African Americans were able to minimize the impact of the boycott on their daily lives. Meanwhile, whites in Montgomery responded with continued intransigence and rising anger. Several black churches and the homes of local leaders and ministers, including those of Nixon and King, were bombed, and there were numerous assaults by white thugs on African Americans. Some 88 local black leaders were also arrested for violating an old anti-boycott law.

Faced with the lack of success of negotiations, attorney Gray soon filed a separate lawsuit in federal court challenging the constitutionality of the segregated seating laws. The case was assigned to and testimony was heard by a three-judge panel, and the young Frank M. Johnson, Jr., newly appointed to the federal bench by Republican President Dwight D. Eisenhower, was given the responsibility for writing the opinion in the case. Johnson essentially ruled that in light of the 1954 Brown v. Board of Education decision by the U.S. Supreme Court, there was no way to justify legally the segregation policies, and the district court ruling overturned the local segregation ordinance under which Mrs. Parks and others had been arrested. The city appealed, but the U.S. Supreme Court affirmed the lower court ruling, and in December 1956, city officials had no choice but to comply. The year-long boycott thus came to an end.

The Montgomery Bus Boycott made Mrs. Parks famous and it launched the civil rights careers of King and his friend and fellow local minister, Ralph Abernathy. The successful boycott is regarded by many historians as the effective beginning of the twentieth-century civil rights movement in the U.S.

Foreign Policy

In addition to his desire to halt the advance of “creeping socialism” in U.S. domestic policy, Eisenhower also wanted to “roll back” the advances of Communism abroad. After taking office in 1953, he devised a new foreign policy tactic to contain the Soviet Union and even win back territory that had already been lost. Devised primarily by Secretary of State John Foster Dulles, this so-called New Look at foreign policy proposed the use of nuclear weapons and new technology rather than ground troops and conventional bombs, all in an effort to threaten “massive retaliation” against the USSR for Communist advances abroad.

In addition to intimidating the Soviet Union, this emphasis on new and cheaper weapons would also drastically reduce military spending, which had escalated rapidly during the Truman years. As a result, Eisenhower managed to stabilize defense spending, keeping it at roughly half the congressional budget during most of his eight years in office.

The doctrine of massive retaliation proved to be dangerously flawed, however, because it effectively left Eisenhower without any options other than nuclear war to combat Soviet aggression. This dilemma surfaced in 1956, for instance, when the Soviet Union brutally crushed a popular democratic uprising in Hungary. Despite Hungary’s request for American recognition and military assistance, Eisenhower’s hands were tied because he knew that the USSR would stop at nothing to maintain control of Eastern Europe. He could not risk turning the Cold War into a nuclear war over the interests of a small nation such as Hungary.

The Warsaw Pact and NATO

1955 saw the division of Europe into two rival camps. The westernized countries of the free world had signed NATO 1949 and the eastern European countries signed the Warsaw pact.

NATO

President Truman signing the North Atlantic Treaty.

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization was created as a response to the crisis in Berlin. The United States, Britain, Canada, France, Portugal, Italy, Belgium, Luxembourg, Norway, Denmark, Iceland, and the Netherlands founded NATO in April 1949, and Greece, Turkey and West Germany had joined by 1955. The countries agreed that "an armed attack against one or more of [the member states] in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all," and was created so that if the Soviet Union eventually did invade Europe, the invaded countries would have the most powerful army in the world (the United States' Army) come to their defense. When the Korean War broke out, NATO drastically raised its threat level because of the idea that all the communist countries were working together. As the number of communist countries grew and grew, so did the NATO forces. Greece and Turkey eventually joined NATO in 1952. The USSR eventually decided to join NATO so that there would be peace, but NATO declined them because they thought that the USSR would try to weaken them from the inside.

The Warsaw Pact

The Soviet Union responded in to the addition of West Germany to NATO 1955 with its own set of treaties, which were collectively known as the Warsaw Pact. Warsaw Pact was also known as “The Treaty of Friendship”. The Warsaw Pact allowed East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Albania, Romania, and Bulgaria to function in the same way as the NATO countries did. The Soviet Union used this Warsaw Pact to combine the military forces unified under it. The Pact was supposed to make all the countries in it, equal. However, the Soviet Union took a little advantage of this by using the allied countries military wherever they wanted. Unlike NATO, Warsaw forces were used occasionally.

CIA

As an alternative, Eisenhower employed the CIA to tackle the specter of Communism in developing countries outside the Soviet Union’s immediate sphere of influence. Newly appointed CIA director Allen Dulles (the secretary of state’s brother) took enormous liberties in conducting a variety of covert operations. Thousands of CIA operatives were assigned to Africa, Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East and attempted to launch coups, assassinate heads of state, arm anti-Communist revolutionaries, spread propaganda, and support despotic pro-American regimes. Eisenhower began to favor using the CIA instead of the military because covert operations didn’t attract as much attention and cost much less money.

The 1953 coup in Iran

A CIA-sponsored coup in Iran in 1953, however, did attract attention and heavy criticism from liberals both at home and in the international community. Eisenhower and the Dulles brothers authorized the coup in Iran when the Iranian government seized control of the British-owned Anglo-Iranian Oil Company. Afraid that the popular, nationalist, Soviet-friendly prime minister of Iran, Mohammed Mossadegh, would then cut off oil exports to the United States, CIA operatives convinced military leaders to overthrow Mossadegh and restore Mohammed Reza Shah Pahlavi as head of state in 1953. Pahlavi returned control of Anglo-Iranian Oil to the British and then signed agreements to supply the United States with almost half of all the oil drilled in Iran.

The following year, a similar coup in Guatemala over agricultural land rights also drew international criticism and severely damaged U.S.–Latin American relations.

Vietnam

Hồ Chí Minh (Standing, third from left), posing with members of the Office of Strategic Services in 1945, a predecessor organization to the CIA. Ho Chi Minh had worked with Americans during World War II to collect intelligence against the Japanese, and hoped America could help create a Vietnam independent from French rule.

All men are created equal. They are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among them are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness.

—Hồ Chí Minh, Declaration of independence of the Democratic Republic of Vietnam in 1945.

In 1945 many colonies, including French Indochina, hoped for independence following the War. When Japan surrendered to the allies a Vietnamese man, Ho Chi Minh, declared independence for Vietnam in Hanoi, quoting America's own Declaration of Independence in the very first lines of his speech in hopes of gaining American support for a Vietnam free from French rule. However, with containing communism in Europe being seen as a more important issue, America took a stance of neutrality from 1946 to 1950.

In the early 50's, Vietnam was rebelling against French rule. America saw Vietnam as a potential source of trouble, as rebels (known as the Việt Minh) led by Communist leader Ho Chi Minh were gaining strength. America loaned France billions of dollars to aid in the war against the Vietnamese rebels, but despite the aid, France found itself on the verge of defeat, and appealed to America for troops, but America refused, fearing entanglement in another costly Korean War, or even a war with all of communist Asia.

France surrendered, and the VietMinh and France met in Geneva, Switzerland to negotiate a treaty. Vietnam was divided into two countries: the Vietminh in control of the North and the French-friendly Vietnamese in control of the South. In 1956, the two countries would be reunited with free elections.

Eisenhower worried about South Vietnam. He believed that if it also fell to the Communists, many other Southeast Asian countries would follow, in what he called the domino theory. He aided the Southern government and set up the Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) in 1954. The nations included in the alliance were America, Great Britain, France, Australia, Pakistan, the Philippines, New Zealand and Thailand, and they all pledged to fight against "Communist aggressors".

Cuban Revolution

Che Guevara and Fidel Castro.

In 1958 and 1959, anti-American feeling became a part of the growing Cuban revolution. In January 1959, the dictator of Cuba, Fulgenicio Batista, was overthrown by the rebel leader Fidel Castro, who promptly became the leader of Cuba.

At first, America supported Castro because of his promises of democratic and economic reforms. But relations between the two countries became strained when Cuba began seizing foreign-owned land (which was mostly U.S. owned) as a part of its reforms. Soon, Castro's government was a dictatorship, and was being backed by the Soviet Union. In 1961, Eisenhower cut diplomatic ties with Cuba, and relations with the island nation have been difficult ever since.

Suez Canal

British and French forces make a move on Port Said during the crisis.

Back in 1948, Israel was created as a sanctuary of sorts for the displaced Jews of the Holocaust. At the same time, many Arabs living in the area were displaced. Tensions had been high in the Middle East ever since Israel had been attacked just after its founding. The stage was set for superpower involvement in 1956; the United States backed Israel, the Soviet Union backed the Arabs, and the Egyptian president Gamal Abdel Nasser had nationalized, or brought under Egypt's control, the Suez Canal, which had previously belonged to Britain.

France and Britain worried that Egypt would decide cut off oil shipments between the oil-rich Middle East and western Europe, so that October they invaded Egypt, hoping to overthrow Nasser and seize the canal. Israel, upset by earlier attacks by Arab states, agreed to help in the invasion.

U.S. and Soviet reactions to the invasions were almost immediate. The Soviets threatened to launch rocket attacks on British and French cities, and the United States sponsored a United Nations resolution for British and French withdrawal. Facing pressures from the two powers, the three invaders pulled out of Egypt. To ensure stability in the area, United Nations troops were sent to patrol the Egypt-Israel border.

Space Race

President Eisenhower meets with Dr. Wernher von Braun in 1960.

The Space Race has its origins in an arms race between the United States and the Soviet Union. After the Soviet Union tested its first atomic bomb in September 1949, the fear of nuclear war began to spread. The ensuing arms race led to the creation of intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs), long-range rockets designed to deliver nuclear warheads from land- or submarine-based launch sites. The first successful ICBM test flight was on August 21, 1957, when the USSR launched an ICBM with a dummy payload over 4,000 miles to an isolated peninsula on Russia’s east coast that had been declared a military zone (Kamchatka Peninsula, which remained closed to civilians from 1945–1989).

On October 4, 1957, the Soviets successfully put the first man-made satellite, Sputnik, into orbit. Americans were horrified. They feared that the Soviets were using the satellite to spy on Americans, or even worse, that the Soviet Union might attack America with nuclear weapons from space. America responded with the launch of its own satellite, Vanguard. Hundreds of spectators gathered, only to watch the satellite rise only a few feet off the launch pad, and then explode.

The failure spurred the government to create a space agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA). NASA succeeded in launching the Explorer in 1958, and thus, the Space Race was initiated. With the creation of Project Mercury, a program to put an astronaut in space, America was pulling ahead. Nonetheless, the USSR was the first to put a man in space, when Yuri Gagarin was launched into orbit in 1961. For the next 14 years, the U.S and the Soviet Union would continue to compete in space.

Many Americans were frightened during the start of the space race because this gave the Soviet Union a better ability to launch a surprise attack on the states. The United States of course immediately jumped on the bandwagon and did its best to become the first country to land on the moon.

Domestic Policies

Under the Eisenhower Administration Project Greek Island was started to create a covert bunker beneath a resort near Washington DC where the government could continue to operate in the event of Nuclear War. Completed in 1962, it's existence was revealed to the public in 1992 by a Washington Post expose.

Alaska and Hawaii were admitted as states during the Eisenhower administration.

Eisenhower established the Interstate Highway System in 1956 to bolster the economy, and to facilitate rapid mobilization of defense forces in the event of an emergency.

At the end of his administration, Eisenhower warned of the dangers of a Military Industrial Complex, fearing undemocratic influence from a rapidly growing defense sector.

Everyday life in the 1950's

The third McDonald's restaurant, and the oldest operating McDonald's. The aesthetics of this location are nearly unchanged from when it opened in 1953.

With the rise of television ownership came the rise of television shows. Emerging genres like Sitcoms (Situational comodies), talk shows, and game shows enjoyed widespread popularity. Easy to cook, ready made meals called TV dinners were introduced during this time

The construction of the interstate system firmly established a car culture in America. Fast Food had existed prior to the 1950's, but the 1950's were when it really became a phenomenon, when franchising locations of popular restaurants became common, eventually leading to the formation of chains with uniform quality and items nationwide.

In the 1950's Pizza became an common staple outside of the Italian-American community, spurred by American troops returning from Italy, references to pizza in popular culture, and the establishment of chain pizza restaurants.

Rise of the Middle Class

In the late 1940s and 1950’s led to a rise of the middle class in the United States. With troops coming home from the war soldiers were quick to start families. The GI bill allowed for upward mobility for veterans. With free college and over four billion dollars given to trips the economy continued to succeed. With war savings and a host of new consumer goods on the market, America quickly turned into a consumer market. The best example of this would be automobiles and the television. In 1955, $65 billion was spent on automobiles. This represented 20% of the Gross National Product. In 1950 50% of American homes had a television. By 1960 this number was raised to 90%.

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  Homes in Levittown, the first mass produced suburb in the United States. Ownership of a house became one of the defining characteristics of the middle class, and mass produced suburbs like this helped meet demand.
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  A family watching television in 1958.
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  An American made transistor radio from about 1958. For the first time, Americans could have easy access to portable music.
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  A 1957 Chevrolet Bel Air convertible, an iconic car of the 50's.

Rock and Roll

Chuck Berry in 1957.

The term “rock and roll” was originally a nautical phrase referring to the motion of a ship at sea. In the early 20th century, it gained a religious connotation (referring to the sense of rapture felt by worshippers) and was used in spirituals. After this, “rocking and rolling” increasingly became used as a metaphor for sex in blues and jazz songs.

The origins of rock and roll lie primarily in electric blues from Chicago in the late 1940s, which was distinguished by amplification of the guitar, bass, and drums. Electric blues was played by artists like Muddy Waters, Willie Dixon, and Buddy Guy, who were recorded by Leonard and Phil Chess at Chess Records in Chicago. They inspired electric blues artists in Memphis like Howlin’ Wolf and B.B. King, who were recorded by a Memphis-based record producer named Sam Phillips, also the owner of Sun Records. He later discovered Elvis Presley in 1954, and he also recorded early songs by Jerry Lee Lewis, Johnny Cash, Roy Orbison, and Carl Perkins.

Rhythm and blues artists such as Little Richard, Chuck Berry, Bo Diddley, and Ray Charles incorporated electric blues as well as gospel music. In the early 50s, R&B was more commonly known by the blanket term “race music”, which was also used to describe other African-American music of the era such as jazz and blues. Billboard didn’t replace the “race records” category with “rhythm and blues” until 1958. Doo-wop was a mainstream style of R&B, with arrangements favoring vocal harmonies. Other types of music that contributed to early rock and roll include African-American spirituals, also known as gospel music, and country/folk, which was primarily made by poor whites in the South.

Arguably, the first rock and roll song ever made is “Rocket 88”, recorded at Sam Phillip’s studio in Memphis in March 1951. It was credited to “Jackie Brenston and his Delta Cats,” a band that didn’t actually exist—the song was put together by Ike Turner and his band, the Kings of Rhythm. Jackie Brenston was the vocalist on the song, who also played saxophone in the band. What really sets “Rocket 88” apart is the distorted guitar sound: it was one of the first examples of fuzz guitar ever recorded. The amplifier they used to record the song was damaged on the way from Mississippi to Memphis. They tried to hold the cone in place by stuffing the amplifier with newspaper, which created the distortion. Sam Phillips liked the sound and decided to keep it in the song. Although “Rocket 88” was recorded by Sam Phillips, it wasn’t released by Sun Records, which didn’t exist until 1952. From 1950-1952, Phillips ran the Memphis Recording Service, where he would let amateurs perform and then sell the recordings to large record labels. He sold “Rocket 88” to Chess Records, which released predominately blues, gospel, and R&B. The Chess brothers started Checker Records in 1952, because radio stations would only play a certain number of tracks from each label.

Alan Freed (also known as “Moondog”) was a radio DJ who started playing R&B records on WJW in Cleveland in 1951. He is credited with introducing rock and roll to a wide audience for the first time, as well as being the first to use the phrase “rock and roll” as the name of the genre. He also promoted and helped organize the first major rock and roll concert, The Moondog Coronation Ball, which occurred on March 21, 1952. The concert was so successful that it became massively overcrowded – there was a near-riot and it had to be shut down early. Freed’s popularity soared, and he was immediately given more airtime by the radio station. His promotion of rock ‘n’ roll is one of the main reasons it became successful, and in recognition of his contributions to the genre, the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame was built in Cleveland.

“Payola” refers to the practice of record company promoters paying radio DJs to play their recordings in order to boost their sales. Payola had been commonplace since the Vaudeville era in the 1920s, but it became a scandal in the 1950s due to a conflict between the American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers (ASCAP) and radio stations. Prior to 1940, ASCAP had made huge amounts of money from the sales of sheet music, but when radio started gaining popularity, recorded music became more profitable than sheet music. ASCAP demanded large royalty payments from radio stations that played their recordings. Instead, stations boycotted ASCAP recordings and created their own publishing company called Broadcast Music Incorporated (BMI). ASCAP tended to ignore music composed by black musicians or “hillbillies”, which gave BMI control of these areas. When rock ‘n’ roll became more and more popular, BMI became more and more successful. ASCAP (in addition to many others) believed that rock ‘n’ roll was the music of the devil, that it was brainwashing teenagers, and that it would never have been successful without payola. This was just after the quiz show scandal (when it was found that certain shows were rigged), and ASCAP urged the House Legislative Committee which had investigated that scandal to look into payola. The hearings that followed destroyed Alan Freed’s career, although it didn’t eliminate rock ‘n’ roll altogether as ASCAP had hoped.

Elvis Presley promoting Jailhouse Rock in 1957.

Several factors contributed to the decline of early rock and roll. Chuck Berry and Jerry Lee Lewis were both prosecuted in scandals involving young women. Elvis Presley was inducted into the U.S. Army in 1958, and after training at Fort Hood, he joined the 3rd Armored Division in Germany, where he would remain until 1960. Three rock and roll musicians –- Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and “The Big Bopper” –- died in a plane crash on February 3, 1959 (“The Day the Music Died”). Little Richard retired from secular music after a religious experience. He ran a ministry in Los Angeles, preached across the country, and recorded gospel music exclusively until 1962.

Rock and roll music is associated with the emergence of a teen subculture among baby boomers. Teenagers bought records and were exposed to rock and roll via radio, jukeboxes, and television shows like American Bandstand, which featured teenagers dancing to popular music. It also affected movies, fashion trends, and language. The combination of white and black music in rock and roll –- at a time when racial tensions were high and the civil rights movement was in full-swing –- provoked strong reactions among the older generation, many of whom worried that rock and roll would contribute to social delinquency among teenagers. However, it actually encouraged racial cooperation and understanding to some extent—rock and roll was a combination of diverse styles of music made by different races, and it was enjoyed by both African-American and Caucasian teens.

Kennedy and Johnson (1961 - 1969)

President John F. Kennedy 1961-1963

President John F. Kennedy

John F. Kennedy was the 35th President of the United States. Of Irish descent, John was born May 29, 1917 in Brookline Massachusetts. John was married to Jacqueline Lee Kennedy. They had four children Arabella, Caroline, John Jr., and Patrick. President Kennedy took office January 20, 1961 and served till he was assassinated in November 22, 1963 by Lee Harvey Oswald. He was 46 when he was assassinated in Dallas, Texas. Kennedy is the only Catholic President we have ever had in the United States. President Kennedy was a Democratic and served in the United States House of Representatives before becoming President. Graduating from Harvard in 1940, before becoming elected into the House of Representatives John Kennedy served in World War Two in the Navy. In 1943, when his PT boat was rammed and sunk by a Japanese destroyer, Kennedy, despite grave injuries, led the survivors through perilous waters to safety. After serving in the House of Representatives where he served three terms as a representative for Boston, Kennedy then became elected into the Senate in 1952. In 1955, while recuperating from a back operation, he wrote Profiles in Courage, which won the Pulitzer Prize in history. In 1956 Kennedy almost gained the Democratic nomination for Vice President, and four years later was a first-ballot nominee for President. Millions watched his television debates with the Republican candidate, Richard M. Nixon. Winning by a narrow margin in the popular vote.

Before President Kennedy left to fight in WWII he studied at Harvard University. He wrote a thesis in 1940 called Why England Slept which became a best seller. President Kennedy wrote again in 1956 and the piece was called Profiles in Courage which won the Pulitzer Prize.

Kennedy and His Advisers

As a Democrat, John F. Kennedy inherited the New Deal Commitment to America’s Social Welfare System. He generally cast liberal votes in line with the pro-labor sentiments of his low-income, blue collar constituents. Kennedy’s rhetoric and style captured the imagination of many Americans. Another attribute that made him more appealing was the fact that his advisers were mostly young and intellectual as well. Unfortunately though, Kennedy avoided controversial issues such as civil rights and the censure of Joseph McCarthy. From the beginning, Kennedy gave top priority to waging the Cold War. In the campaign he had criticized Eisenhower’s foreign policy as unimaginative, accusing him of missing chances to reduce the threat of nuclear war with the Soviet Union and of weakening America’s standing in the Third World. Kennedy’s advisers had one thing going for them, and that was confidence. Kennedy, along with his advisers were firm in the sense that they were going to change things, and by doing so, they developed a multi-million dollar Alliance for Progress in 1961 to spur economic development in Latin America. In that same year the Peace Corps was also created. Critics later dismissed the Alliance and Peace Corps as Cold War tools by which Kennedy sought to counter anti-Americanism and defeat communism in the developing world. The programs didn’t have those aims, but both were recognized as being born of genuine humanitarianism.

Foreign Development

Under the Kennedy Administration, the United States created several agencies dedicated to international development. After an Impromptu speech at the University of Michigan, President Kennedy created the Peace Corps in 1961 by executive order to help assist those in developing nations. The Foreign Assistance Act of 1961 passed by Congress and spearheaded by President Kennedy created the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), which sought to assist developing countries.

Kennedy and Soviet-American Tensions

Kennedy meets with Khrushchev in Vienna.

Kennedy had little if any success in establishing relations with the Soviet Union. He met with Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna in June 1961. The meeting went poorly with both leaders; due to the fact that they were disagreeing over the preconditions for peace and stability in the world. Consequently, the administration’s first year witnessed little movement on controlling the nuclear arms race of even getting a superpower ban on testing nuclear weapons in the atmosphere or underground. Instead, both superpowers continued testing and accelerated their arms production. In 1961, the U.S. military budget shot up 15%; by mid-1964, U.S. nuclear weapons had increased by 150%. Government advice to citizens was to build fallout shelters in their backyards and this only resulted in intensified public fear of devastating war. If war occurred, many believed it would be over the persistent problem of Berlin. In mid-1961, Khrushchev ratcheted up the tension by demanding an end to Western occupation of West Berlin and the reunification of East and West Germany. Kennedy stood his ground and remained committed to West Berlin and West Germany. In August the Soviets, at the urging of the East German Regime, erected a concrete and barbed wire barricade across the divided city to halt the exodus of East Germans into more prosperous and politically free West Berlin. The Berlin Wall inspired protests throughout the non-communist world, but Kennedy proclaimed that, “a wall is a hell of a lot better than a war.” The ugly barrier shut off the flow of refugees, and crisis passed.

The Bay of Pigs Invasion and the Cuban Missile Crisis

The Cuban Revolutionary Armed Forces counterattack during the Bay of Pigs.

On April 17, 1961, President John F. Kennedy launched an attack on Cuba, using 1,500 CIA-trained Cuban exiles. The exiles were to invade Cuba through the Bay of Pigs in southwestern Cuba. The forces made many mistakes, and at the last moment, Kennedy was advised not to send air support, and he did not. The invasion was a complete failure and within days, Cuban forces crushed the U.S. troops. Kennedy never trusted military or intelligence advice again, and the Soviet Union concluded that Kennedy was a weak leader. The invasion also angered many Latin-American nations.

In 1962, the Soviet Union was desperately behind the United States in the arms race. Soviet missiles were only powerful enough to be launched against Europe but U.S. missiles were capable of striking the entire Soviet Union (missiles were located in Turkey). In late April 1962, Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev conceived the idea of placing intermediate-range missiles in Cuba. A deployment in Cuba would double the Soviet strategic arsenal and provide a real deterrent to a potential U.S. attack against the Soviet Union.

Meanwhile, Fidel Castro was looking for a way to defend his island nation from an attack by the U.S. Ever since the failed Bay of Pigs invasion, Castro felt a second attack was inevitable. Consequently, he approved of Khrushchev's plan to place missiles on the island. In the summer of 1962 the Soviet Union worked quickly and secretly to build its missile installations in Cuba.

Annotated U-2 photograph of a Cuban missile site.

The crisis began on October 15, 1962 when U-2 reconnaissance photographs revealed Soviet missiles under construction in Cuba. The next morning, Kennedy was informed of the missile installations. Immediately the executive committee (EX-COMM) made up of twelve of his most important advisers was formed to handle the crisis. After seven days of guarded and intense debate, EX-COMM concluded that it had to impose a naval quarantine around Cuba, which would prevent the arrival of more Soviet offensive weapons on the island.

On October 22, Kennedy announced the discovery of the missile installations to the public and his decision to quarantine the island. He also proclaimed that any nuclear missile launched from Cuba would be regarded as an attack on the United States by the Soviet Union and demanded that the Soviets remove all of their offensive weapons from Cuba. It was at this time that the United States had warships that were on the Caribbean Sea and also had B-52's that were ready to with nuclear bombs flying in the sky.

On the 25th Kennedy pulled the quarantine line back and raised military readiness to DEFCON 2.

On the 26th EX-COMM heard from Khrushchev in an impassioned letter. He proposed the removing of Soviet missiles and personnel if the U.S. would guarantee not to invade Cuba.

October 27 was the worst day of the crisis. A U-2 was shot down over Cuba and EX-COMM received a second letter from Khrushchev demanding the removal of U.S. missiles in Turkey in exchange for Soviet missiles in Cuba. Attorney General Robert Kennedy suggested ignoring the second letter and contacted Soviet Ambassador Anatoly Dobrynin to tell him of the U.S. agreement with the first.

Tensions finally began to ease on October 28 when Khrushchev announced that he would dismantle the installations and return the missiles to the Soviet Union, expressing his trust that the United States would not invade Cuba. Further negotiations were held to implement the October 28 agreement, including a United States demand that Soviet light bombers be removed from Cuba, and specifying the exact form and conditions of United States assurances not to invade Cuba.

NASA

NASA is a branch of the United States government, established by the National Aeronautics and Space Act on July 29, 1958, during the Cold War, as a replacement of its predecessor, the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA), as an instrument of geopolitics, responsible for the nation's civilian space program and for aeronautics and aerospace research.

The USSR was ahead of the United States in the space race, in presence and technology. After the launch of Sputnik and the success of Yuri Gagarin, America was behind in the Space Race. The United States would not allow this, and decided to implement their own space program. Eventually the United States became successful and landed two men on the moon. In May 1961, Alan Shepard Jr. became the first American to make a space flight. Kennedy lobbied for increased funding for space research. In an address to congress on May 25, 1961, Kennedy said, "I believe that this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the moon and returning him safely to the Earth. No single space project in this period will be more impressive to mankind, or more important for the long-range exploration of space; and none will be so difficult or expensive to accomplish."

NASA's first high-profile human spaceflight program was Project Mercury, an effort to learn if humans could survive the rigors of spaceflight. On May 5, 1961, Alan B. Shepard, Jr. became the first American to fly into space, when he rode his Mercury capsule on a 15-minute suborbital mission. He launched from Complex 5 at Cape Canaveral aboard a Redstone rocket. His Freedom 7 capsule reached an altitude of 116 miles during this suborbital flight and splashed down some 304 miles out into the Atlantic. The six flights in the Mercury program concluded with Gordon Cooper's launch on May 15, 1963. John H. Glenn, Jr. became the first U.S. astronaut to orbit the Earth on February 20, 1962. With six flights, Project Mercury achieved its goal of putting piloted spacecraft into Earth orbit and retrieving the astronauts safely.

August 12, 1961, NASA announced that it intends to expand the Cape Canaveral facilities for manned lunar flight and other missions requiring advanced Saturn and Nova boosters by acquiring 80,000 acres of land north and west of the Air Force Missile Test Center facilities at the Cape. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers was designated to act as real estate acquisition agent for NASA, and the Lands Division of the Justice Department was designated to handle the legal aspects.

July 1, 1962, Dr. Kurt H. Debus was named director of the Launch Operations Center which later became the John F. Kennedy Space Center. Having supervised the development and construction of launch facilities at Cape Canaveral from 1952 to 1960 for the U.S. Army, he was the natural choice to direct the design, development and construction of NASA's Apollo/Saturn V facilities at KSC. He retired in November 1974, having been responsible for the launches conducted during the Mercury, Gemini, Apollo, and Skylab programs.

The American space race against the Soviets required a large amount of funding which then later brought jobs, new technology, science and general know how. America was in high pursuit to be the first country to reach the moon and failed, but the possibility of a manned mission made it possible to eclipse all the USSR achievements in space science. Billions of dollars were spent on hiring many research workers and engineers to be able to put a man on the moon. While directly the NASA program did not necessarily help the lower-class people find work, it permitted a generational leap and generated motivation for high level education that still is at the core of a leadership role it has in space science that includes many aspects from space law to telecommunications and armament, ultimately satisfying the reason for NASA's creation as a geopolitical tool.

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  Alan Shepard, the second person and the first American to enter space, just prior to launch.
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  Freedom 7 during the launch.
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  President Kennedy watches the flight of Alan Shepard on Television.
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  Earth observation from Freedom 7
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  The capsule containing Alan Shepard is recovered.
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  President Kennedy meets Alan Shepard on May 8th, 1961.

American Tragedy

President Kennedy in Dallas, Texas

On November 22, 1963, President Kennedy was at a campaign rally in Dallas, Texas. Kennedy and his wife rode through the streets in an open car, turning into Dealy Plaza at Houston and Elm, and suddenly several shots rang out. Kennedy fell against his wife. The car sped to the nearest hospital, Parkland Memorial, but it was too late; the beloved President was dead. Tears ran down the cheeks of CBS anchorman Walter Cronkite as he told the nation their president was dead. The word spread quickly, in whispered messages to classroom teachers, by somber announcements in factories and offices. The nation was stunned. Shortly after, while on Air Force One, Vice President Lyndon B. Johnson took the oath of office as President.

Although many "conspiracy theories" exist concerning this assassination, the rough consensus is that Kennedy's assailant, a young drifter and loner named Lee Harvey Oswald with left-wing sympathies, shot the President acting alone. Lee Harvey Oswald was charged for the murders of Kennedy and J.D. Tippit, a Dallas police officer. Owsald was first spotted three miles from the plaza in which he was called to the squad car of officer Tippit, where he then panicked and shot Tippit four times. Oswald was later arrested forty minutes later in a near by theater, and just two days later Oswald was shot dead in full view of millions of TV viewers. Kennedy was pronounced dead at 1 pm.

Hippies and Counterculture

Many of those who made up the New Left also made up the counterculture, a movement that questioned basic American values and social customs. Parents found themselves increasingly disagreeing with their children. The counterculture was also expressed in pop culture, with many icons expressing the need for peace and reform.

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  Woodstock was a major music festival held in 1969, and became an icon of the counterculture movement.
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  Some Hippies at Woodstock.
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  A tye dye shirt, a popular clothing option for Hippies.
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  Musicians perform during the Summer of Love in 1967
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  Hippies in 1967 sharing a joint.

The Vietnam War

Kennedy on Vietnam

Like Eisenhower, Kennedy had viewed Vietnam as a crucial battle in the fight against communism. He sent many special forces troops to South Vietnam to train South Vietnamese troops. Kennedy also put pressure on South Vietnamese leader Ngo Dinh Diem to make political and economic reforms that would prevent communism from taking root in South Vietnam. After Diem refused to comply and restricted the rights of Buddhists (the majority religion in South Vietnam), he lost support, and a political coup ensued. Diem was assassinated on November 1, 1963.

Escalation

In the month of February 1965, President Johnson ordered Operation Rolling Thunder to take place. It was ordered due to the Vietcong Attacks on American installations in South Vietnam which was responsible for the deaths of thirty-two Americans. Operation Rolling Thunder was a bombing program that started in 1965 and continued on until October 1968.

At the end of November, the United States had almost 15,000 troops in Vietnam as advisers. The U.S. sent the Secretary of Defense on a fact-finding mission to find if involvement was still needed in Vietnam. He concluded that the South Vietnamese could not hold off the Vietcong, or Vietnamese communists, without more American backing. In 1964, Johnson claimed that North Vietnamese patrol ships attacked American ships in the Gulf of Tonkin, and Congress passed the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, which gave the President broad control over troops in Vietnam.

In 1965, Johnson gradually built up the involvement of America in Vietnam. At the end of 1965, about 180,000 troops were in Vietnam. By 1967, there were over 500,000. The U.S. also began a bombing campaign in North Vietnam, and by 1968, more bombs had been dropped than the U.S. had dropped in World War II.

The Vietnam War became “Americanized” and the troop increase and Operation Rolling Thunder played part in doing so. Instead of the war being a civil war between North and South Vietnam it ended up becoming an American war against the communist government in Vietnam.

Frustration

As Americans fought the war, frustration mounted. Soldiers had to fight through dense jungles and muddy land. It also seemed that for every Vietcong or North Vietnamese killed, many more would be replacements. The bombing campaign in the North actually heightened the morale of the North Vietnamese rather than lowering it, and the United States' losses increased. By the end of the decade, many outraged American citizens angrily opposed and protested the war. Opposition to the war was growing in the capital, too. Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara no longer believed that the war could be won.

At home, protesters, especially college students, became increasingly bitter about the war. Others who tended to be older and more conservative, defended the war and sought to suppress the "traitors." This division between the young and the old became known as the generation gap. Officials at the University of California tried to limit recruiting efforts of protesters, and students were outraged. They held a protest that stopped the school for days. This type of protest spread across the nation, and many related ideas and activists became known collectively as the New Left.

Eventually, some adults came to resent the war. As adults began to disagree about the war more, they were called doves (those who wanted peace) and hawks (those who supported the war). Students also had a major gripe about the war: if the legal age to be drafted to go to war was eighteen, why was the legal voting age as high as twenty-one? Eventually, the twenty sixth amendment was passed in 1971, which met the demands of the students and lowered the legal voting age to 18.

Division in the country about the war became increasingly harsh and bitter. In October 1967, 50,000 people opposed to the war marched to the Pentagon in Washington D.C. to protest. Many students stuck flowers or other symbols of peace in the barrels of the guns held by those who guarded the pentagon. By the beginning of 1969, well over fifty percent of the nation opposed the war.

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  North Vietnamese transport goods on the Ho Chi Minh trail.
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  White Phosphorous being dropped on a Viet Cong Position in 1966.
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  Riverboat shooting napalm
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  American troops wading through mud in Vietnam in 1967.
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  Operation Rolling Thunder, 1966
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  An American soldier prepares to check a tunnel, with a flashlight and a pistol.
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  A Viet Cong base is burned, 1968.
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  The Vietnam war saw common use of Helicopters for transport.
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  Use of Agent Orange would cause birth defects and other issues long after the end of the war.
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  The Mỹ Lai Massacre was a shocking event that saw American troops kill hundreds of civilians. Intervention by Hugh Thompson Jr. stopped it from getting even worse.

Lyndon B. Johnson

Lyndon Baines Johnson (August 27, 1908 – January 22, 1973), often referred to as LBJ, was a US politician who served as the 36th President of the United States (1963-1969) after his service as the 37th Vice President of the United States (1961-1963). He is one of four people who served in all four elected federal offices of the United States: Representative, Senator, Vice President and President. Johnson, a Democrat, served as a United States Representative from Texas, from 1937–1949 and as United States Senator from 1949–1961, including six years as United States Senate Majority Leader, two as Senate Minority Leader and two as Senate Majority Whip. After campaigning unsuccessfully for the Democratic nomination in 1960, Johnson was asked by John F. Kennedy to be his running mate for the 1960 presidential election.

The "Great Society" and Civil Rights Under Lyndon B. Johnson

In January 1964, the new President Johnson made a series of proposals which he called the "Great Society" and began a "war on poverty." He signed many programs into law that helped Americans in poverty, that is, those who do not make enough money to survive. During this time two of the most important programs signed into law were Medicare and Medicaid. Medicare provided cheap health insurance to senior citizens and Medicaid provided health insurance for the poor.The War on Poverty made much difference to the poor people living in America. It helped change and improve the way poor people were living in homes as well as changing and improving the health care that was being offered to them. Cities and school also received boosts with the creation of the Department of Housing and Urban Development and the signing of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965.

President Johnson's “Great Society” really helped change things in America during the 1960's. During his presidency Johnson took 45 domestic social programs and transformed that number to 435 programs. “The Great Society” was designed to help the people in America and it did just that; the poverty number in America changed from 22 percent of the population to 13 percent.

Equal Rights

Martin Luther King Jr. delivers his 1963 speech in Washington DC

Protests were growing in the 1960s. Blacks and whites in high schools and colleges in the South and the North staged sit-ins, protests that are accomplished by sitting down and not being productive or letting people pass.

Another kind of protest was growing in the South. In 1961, groups of African Americans began riding buses from Washington D.C. that were bound for New Orleans to make sure that the Rosa Parks Supreme Court decision was being enforced. These bus riders were known as freedom riders. The rides went smoothly until the buses reached Alabama, where the freedom riders would be greeted with violence from angry whites.

In the spring of 1963, the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and Martin Luther King Jr. targeted Birmingham, Alabama for segregation protests. Birmingham, a city in the deep South, was a hotbed for racism and segregation. City police arrested hundreds of protesters, as well as King himself, but protests continued. National television showed snarling dogs being set on the unarmed protesters and children being washed away on the impact of the water from fire hoses. As the nation watched in horror, President Kennedy announced a civil rights bill that would outlaw segregation nationwide.

On August 28, 1963, nationwide support for the civil rights bill boiled over. Over 200,000 people of all races and colors came to Washington D.C. to participate in a massive march organized by the SCLC and Mr. King. There, on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial, King read the words that would become one of history's greatest speeches:

" I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal.'...I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character...When we let freedom ring, when we let it ring from every village and every hamlet, from every state and every city, we will be able to speed up that day when all of God's children, black men and white men, Jews and Gentiles, Protestants and Catholics, will be able to join hands and sing...'Free at last! free at last! thank God Almighty, we are free at last!' "

The crowd at Dr. Martin Luther King's I have a dream speech.

After Kennedy's death, Johnson, a firm believer in equal rights, promised that the bill would be signed into law. In the first July of Johnson's term, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. The law made discrimination illegal against African Americans in employment, public accommodations, and voting. The act not only protected African Americans, but it also prohibited discrimination by sex, religion, and ethnicity. It was followed in 1965 with the Voting Rights Act. The Voting Rights Act eliminated poll tax which is the 24th Amendment to the constitution, and literacy tests, therefore helping not just blacks, but all Americans gain equal rights. A very big tragedy stood out during the sixties. On February 21, 1965, Malcolm X was killed. Malcolm, who had to deal with watching his house burn to the ground as a child, later spoke out against the inequality against the blacks of this nation. He soon appealed to both black and white, as he continued to speak out against racial inequality. He continued to speak out until he was shot and killed, but no one knew who killed him, It may have possibly been the work of other black Muslims.

Martin Luther King Jr. was a very influential person during the sixties, maybe the most influential. He had preached on non-violent protest and had developed many followers, both black and white. He was put in jail several times, but managed to continue his preaching by writing a book. Martin Luther King Jr. was president of the Southern Christian Leadership Council. He and his followers organized numerous marches, rallies, and strikes to call attention to the systematic discrimination against minorities that was endemic in American society. His belief was in nonviolent confrontation with the authorities and a prodding of the conscience of the white majority to effect social change. He convinced President John F. Kennedy and later President Lyndon B. Johnson to push for legislation to end discrimination and was awarded the Nobel Peace prize in 1964. Although the deaths of Kennedy and Malcolm X were a huge deal, there was another huge tragedy in the sixties. On April 4, 1968, Martin Luther King Jr. was killed. He was shot on the balcony of his motel room that he was staying at in Memphis, Tennessee.

The Nation of Islam

The Nation of Islam ("NOI") was founded in Detroit, Michigan, by Wallace D. Fard Muhammad in July 1930. He set out to improve the spiritual, mental, social, and economic condition of the Black men and women of America. From 1934-1975, the NOI was led by Elijah Muhammad, who established businesses, large real estate holdings, armed forces and schools.[1] the Nation of Islam made lasting effects on blacks in the 1950’s and beyond. Their outspoken activist, Malcolm X,became a prominent minister and leader in the NOI. Before his assassination in 1965, he had moved to non-separatism and orthodox Sunni Islam after his experience of having made Hajj to Mecca. The Nation of Islam, referred to as Black Muslims, took factors of orthodox Islam to form a new sect. Originally the Nation preached segregation and hate towards white people. They said that the white man was cursed for eternity by Allah. Malcolm X often suggested complete separation of blacks and whites and thought that blacks should have their own land to live on separate from all whites. Under Malcolm X’s leadership the Nation grew from 500 members to as many as 30,000 to over 100,000 members in the early 60’s. They converted many famous black figures, most notably Muhammad Ali. The Nation offered a much more radical and less subservient message to oppressed blacks than Martin Luther King, Jr. did. Malcolm X’s most infamous words were “By any means necessary.” Just as the Nation of Islam had risen with the help of Malcolm X, so did they fall. In 1963, when Malcolm X found out about the morality problems of his prophet and idol, Elijah Muhammad, they began to separate. Malcolm X took notice of Elijah’s sexual relations with as many as six females of the Nation, an act which the Koran directly forbids. After Malcolm X made a highly criticized statement about John Kennedy’s death, Elijah took his opportunity to silence X. After this Malcolm X converted to orthodox Islam and parted ties with the Nation of Islam, crippling the amount of influence the Nation had on the world.

A Second Tragedy

The Lorraine Motel, site of the assassination of Martin Luther King, Jr.

On the morning of April 4, 1968, King was preparing to lead a march from the balcony of a hotel when shots rang out. Friends inside rushed outside to find King shot in the jaw. The shooter was a sniper. Martin Luther King, Jr. was pronounced dead a few hours later. The nation was in complete shock. There were many riots that happened throughout the country. There were at least 110 cities throughout the United States that had violence the following day. The worst riots happened in Chicago, Baltimore, and Washington D.C. This was the largest domestic civil disturbance that has happened in the United States. About 22,000 federal troops and 34,000 national guards were sent out. Shortly thereafter, rioting plagued America's streets as a profound sadness and anger gripped the nation. This would be one of many assassinations that would befall the country, including those of, Dr. Martin Luther King, Robert F. Kennedy, and Malcolm X.

Malcolm X was assassinated on February 21st, 1965 in Manhattans Audubon Ballroom. It all started when a man ran up to Malcolm and shot him with a sawed off shotgun. After that two other men charged Malcolm and shot him with pistols about sixteen times. All three men were eventually caught and charged with murder.

Pop Culture in the '60s

Andy Warhol became a leading figure in Pop Art during the 1960's

While wars were being fought over race and democracy, a group of people in America stayed relatively unaffected by it: the rich. The 1960’s provided a peak in American culture with movies, music, art and literature. Possibly the climax of pop culture in the 1960’s was author Truman Capote’s Black and White Masquerade Party.

Truman Capote was a critically acclaimed author and good friend to all the stars and socialites of the time. Capote kept enough friends to fill an entire phone book, and almost all of them were rich, famous, and intriguing. In 1966, coming off the success of his book, In Cold Blood, about a Kansas murder, Capote decided to throw a masquerade party. Capote planned the party for over a year and developed one of the most select and exclusive guest lists. With everyone wanting an invitation, Capote only handed out 500 invites to guests. Guests were not allowed to bring uninvited escorts, so only the “who’s who” of people were allowed to attend. Many stars felt spurned when they did not receive invitations.

On November 28th, 1966 the ball took place. The guest list included Frank Sinatra, Andy Warhol, and Norman Mailer. The party was a complete success. The publicity that the ball received before the event was somehow exceeded by the publicity it received after. It was immediately declared the party of the century, and all the stars raved about it. In the years that followed the ball Capote’s popularity disintegrated, and posthumously he is remembered as much for the Black and White Ball itself as he is his writing career.

The Stonewall Riots

The Stonewall Inn in 2010.

Perhaps aided by the Civil Rights Movement, or at least motivated by it, the Gay Rights Movement largely got its start in the early 1970s. The first sign of gay people fighting for their rights as human beings started with the Stonewall Riots of 1969. In New York City, after a gay bar was raided by the police, over a thousand gay people took a stand and began to revolt against the police. It is not clear how the riot first started. According to a veteran gay activist, the incident just involved a lot of people who all got angry at the same time. The cops went into the bars and asked everyone for their identification. Many people were being pushed out of the bars and into a paddy wagon. Not sure how it started, the stonewall riot worked like a domino effect. However it started, it ignited many others to fight for their rights against the police. Like many racial humans, the gays would go around and chant “gay power” throughout the streets. Throwing rocks and bottles at the police officers, the crowd chanted for gay rights. After news of the riot spread, riots began happening across the nation for three days. The Stonewall Riots are known as one of the most significant moments at the start of the Gay Rights Movement.

Paramedics

The Freedom House Ambulance Service was established in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania as one of the first modern Ambulance services in the Nation, and was staffed mostly by African American workers. The 1970's and 1980's would see the modernization of Ambulance services nationwide.

Fact's and Figure in the '60s

The sixties were an age of youth, as 70 million children from the baby boom became teenagers and young adults. Trends shifted away from the conservative fifties and resulted in revolutionary ways of thinking and real changes in the cultural foundation of American life. Young people wanted change and the changes affected education, values, lifestyles, laws, and entertainment. All of the changes mentioned above were a major factor in the figures below.

• Population 177,830,000
• Unemployment 3,852,000
• National Debt 286.3 Billion
• Average Salary $4,743
• Teacher's Salary $5,174
• Minimum Wage $1.00
• Life Expectancy: Males 66.6 years, Females 73.1 years
• Auto deaths 21.3 per 100,000

An estimated 850,000 "war baby" freshmen enter college; emergency living quarters are set up in dorm lounges, hotels and trailer camps.

In the 1960’s several music songs came into popularity like: “Cathy’s Clown,” “Spanish Harlem,” “Only the Lonely,” “Moon River,” “I Fall to Pieces,” “I Left My Heart in San Francisco,” “I Want to Hold Your Hand,” “Louie Louie,” “Hello Dolly,” “Satisfaction,” “Stop in the Name of Love,” “California Dreamin,” “Respect,” “Mrs. Robinson,” and “Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In.”

Also, as times advanced throughout the 1960’s so did technology and numerous TV Shows: The Super Bowls, Star Trek, Rowan and Martin’s Laugh-In, Sesame Street (premieres on PBS in 1969), The Smothers Brothers, and The Dick Van Dyke Show.

In the 1960s in the post war era automobiles production was increased a great deal. Of the cars that were produced among the most popular during the decade: Volkswagen bug, ’64 Ford Mustang, ’63 Corvette Sting Ray, Chevy Bel Air, ’64 Plymouth Barracuda, and ‘64 Pontiac GTO.

Also, during the 1960’s the society as a whole had a very free spirit way of thinking, and several fads broke in that included: face painting, wearing flowers in one’s hair, the Twist (hair-do), the jerk (dance), lava lamps, waterbeds, Day-Glo and black light, posters, and flashing the peace sign.

Elections of the 1960s

1960

The presidential election of 1960 featured a race of John F. Kennedy (Democrat) vs. Richard M. Nixon (Republican). Both candidates had similar political stances in believing they wanted a strong military front and both supported funding numerous welfare programs for the poor. Kennedy promised to lead Americans to a New Frontier. Kennedy ultimately won the election over Nixon by a narrow margin of electoral votes 303 to 219.

1964

LBJ on election night 1964.

The presidential election of 1964 featured a race of Lyndon B. Johnson (Democrat) and Barry Goldwater (Arizona). Goldwater's brand of politics scared many Americans. He opposed civil rights, legislation, wanted to make Social Security voluntary, and proposed deep cuts in social programs. Furthermore, Goldwater made a comment that suggested he was willing to use nuclear weapons to win Vietnam, which Johnson made a very successful campaign ad in response to. The Ad, known as "Daisy" featured President Johnson pleading for a more peaceful approach.

These are the stakes. To make a world in which all of God's children can live, or to go into the dark. We must either love each other, or we must die.

—Lyndon B. Johnson, Daisy

Johnson's slogan for the campaign was "All the way with LBJ." Johnson won in a landslide of votes 486-52.

The Women's Movement

In the year 1963, Betty Friedan fueled the fire for women's rights when she wrote her book called "The Feminine Mystique." This book became unexpectedly popular among women. Friedan decided to tackle the problem that she called "the problem with no name." This problem was the lack of education that middle-class wives and mothers received. These women looked at their homes and their lives and wondered if that was all life had to offer. Women across the country became more and more dissatisfied with their stay-at-home life. Friedan's approach was different than the typical argument for a women's movement, however, because she blamed the women for being unable to adjust to their role in the home rather than blaming society for creating that role for women.

The women's movement began an organized liberal group in 1966 called National Organization for Women, also known as NOW. This group was mainly comprised of educated and professional women. Since the EEOC was more focused on racial rights and discrimination, they did not pay much attention to gender discrimination. Because the rights of women were being ignored, NOW made it one of their main purposes to pressure the EEOC into hearing them out and enforcing their rights that were given to them in the 1964 Civil Rights Act. Unfortunately, the EEOC basically considered NOW and the idea of women's rights to be a joke and even went as far as laughing at the idea when asked about it by a reporter. This made women in the work force that had to deal with discrimination, very angry. By 1970, NOW had more than 3,000 members across the nation.

Women at this time craved social change and justice and became more radical. More and more women were noticing and getting fed up with being treated as second-class citizens. These women began to look beyond the roles that they were being forced into and looked at the roles that they willingly put themselves into. In 1968, a large group of women went to protest the Miss America Pageant that was being held in Atlantic City. These women were against “degrading mindless-boob girlie symbol” that the beauty pageant represents and promotes. The women would take “enslavement” items such as: girdles, bras, high heels, and curlers, into the “Freedom Trashcan.” Even though nothing was actually burned, feminists of this time were consequently received the demeaning nickname “bra-burners.”

The women who firmly believed in feminism and fought for women’s rights never really had a firm set of beliefs and many times used arguments on the opposite side of the board. On one side they argued that women were more sensitive than men and that this sensitivity would greatly improve every aspect of America including foreign diplomacy, government, businesses, and alike. They argued that men could not bring this quality to the table. However, on the other side, women argued that women and men were equal and therefore deserved equal treatment and that socially imposed roles were unfair. Charlotte Bunch, a feminist author, writes that “there is no private domain of a person’s life that is not political, and there is no political issue that is not ultimately personal.” They called this “personal politics” and many radical feminists jumped onboard with this idea very quickly. Women began “consciousness-raising” groups in order to discuss the fact that in their everyday lives, at work, and in the home, they were subordinated by men and how they lived in a highly patriarchal society. Women all across the country began these groups everywhere, in college dorms, churches, and suburban kitchens to discuss the topics of male dominance in work, healthcare, romance, marriage, sexuality, abortion, and family.

Nixon presidency and Indochina (1969 - 1974)

President Nixon

Violence and the Election of 1968

Demonstrators at the White House, following the death of Martin Luther King Jr.

There were 3 major assassinations in the 60s, John F. Kennedy, Martin Luther King Jr. and Robert F. Kennedy. Many conspiracy theories regarding the assassinations are still popular, especially those suspecting government interference, which had a profound effect on how some Americans viewed their government, helping further divide Americans.

After the assassination of Dr. King in Memphis, riots broke out in over 100 cities. Troops were called in to control the mobs of people. Stunned and saddened by Dr. King's death, the nation worried about renewed homeland violence.

Racism

The late 1960s and early 1970s saw a number of significant mobilizations against racism. The first sizable demonstration of Asians took place in 1972 over yet more anti-immigration laws. There were increasing numbers of protests against the National Front (NF), which was slowly building support by 1974. There was also a host of protests and campaigns against police harassment and racist educational policies. It was the concentration of anti-racist forces in a campaign against the NF, led by the Anti Nazi League (ANL), that shattered the upsurge of racism. In alliance with Rock Against Racism it was able to put on not just two huge carnivals, but countless events that drew black and white young people together.

Robert Kennedy is Assassinated

Robert Kennedy at the Ambassador Hotel.

In the race for the Democratic nomination, Vice President Hubert H. Humphrey, Eugene McCarthy, and Robert Francis Kennedy (brother of John F.) were competing in a close match. In most primaries, Kennedy edged out McCarthy, and meanwhile, Humphrey garnered the support of Democratic party leaders, who chose the delegates to the national convention. In June 1968, Kennedy won the primary in California, the state with the most delegates to the convention. Bobby Kennedy was trying to become president and follow in his brother's footsteps. At a celebration rally on the night of the victory, Kennedy was shot and killed by Sirhan B. Sirhan, who claimed that he did not remember shooting Bobby Kennedy. Sirhan shot Kennedy with .22 pistol. Kennedy was hit multiple times and five others were wounded. The nation was sent reeling into another shock from the new violence. Kennedy's body lay in repose at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York for two days before a funeral mass was held on June 8. His body was interred near his brother John at Arlington National Cemetery. His death prompted the protection of presidential candidates by the United States Secret Service. Hubert Humphrey went on to win the Democratic nomination for the presidency, but ultimately narrowly lost the election to Richard Nixon.

The Democratic Convention

Because of his support among leaders and delegates from the Democratic Party, it appeared that Humphrey had enough votes to win the nomination at the convention in Chicago. Humphrey, however, was a supporter of Johnson's policy in Vietnam, so he was perceived as a war supporter.

Anti-war Democrats, most of whom had supported Kennedy, felt left out of the convention. Angry, they flocked to Chicago to protest Humphrey's nomination. On the first and second nights of the convention, the protesters were generally subdued and the Chicago police made few arrests. On the third night, however, protesters planned to march to the convention site to protest.

Fearing another outbreak of violence, the mayor of Chicago made the police block the protesters at the hall. When they tried a different route, protesters were blocked again. Outraged, protesters started throwing objects at the police. The police threw tear gas into the crowd and charged the protesters, beating some and taking others into custody.

Humphrey won the nomination, but the violence hurt his campaign. The nation saw all the anger and outrage on television. It seemed that Democrats could not control their own party.

The Election

Nixon campaigns in Paoli, Pennsylvania during the 1968 election. Nixon's support of the "silent majority" won him support in rural and suburban areas like this.

Nixon, the former Vice President, had quietly been nominated by the Republicans as their candidate. Nixon claimed to represent the "silent majority" in America; that is, those that had begun to take on a more conservative approach to politics and disliked the "hippie" and civil rights movements. Nixon also promised to end the war in Vietnam, although he never said he would win it.

Because of his promises about Vietnam, Nixon was able to gain support from antiwar Democrats and Republicans alike. In a huge political comeback (Nixon was defeated in the election of 1960 and lost the race for the governor of California in 1962), Nixon barely won the popular vote, gaining only 500,000 more votes than Humphrey. He won by a larger margin in the electoral college, gaining 301 votes, while Humphrey only had 191.

Also note that Nixon made the statement on November 3rd 1969, almost a year after his election. He cribbed it from a speech his vice president, Spiro Agnew, had made on May 9th of that year. Agnew's writers may have been taking it from President Kennedy's 1956 book Profiles in Courage. The original phrase goes back to Edward Young's 1721 poem "The Revenge":

"Life is the desert, life the solitude;
Death joins us to the great majority."

It became an in-joke among Democrats and protesters to hear Agnew and Nixon claim to represent the dead, perhaps as envoys of the Undead. This was only two years after Caesar Romero's Night of the Living Dead came out.

Foreign Policy

Nixon, in an attempt to bring stability to the nation, made many changes in foreign policy. He appointed Henry Kissinger as his national security advisor and later as his Secretary of State. Both believed in the philosophy of realpolitik, which put national interests in front of leaders' political ideologies and reasoned that peace could only come from negotiations, not war. During Nixon's presidency, he and Kissinger would work to try to ease the cold war.

Vietnam

Vietnamization

American troops clear mines in Cambodia.

Nixon promised to ease the United States out of the Vietnam war, and for the most part, he kept his promise. He and Kissinger called their plan to hand the war over to the South Vietnamese: Vietnamization. By the end of 1970, the number of troops in Vietnam had fallen from 540,000 in the beginning of 1969 to 335,000. By January of 1970, the Vietnam conflict had become the longest in American history and, with 40,000 killed and over 250,000 wounded, the third most costly foreign war in the nation's experience. In 1971 there were only 60,000 troops in Vietnam.

In order to compensate for the loss of troops in Vietnam, Nixon hiked up the bombing campaign. The Ho Chi Minh Trail, which bordered and sometimes ran into the countries of Laos and Cambodia, was bombed. Nixon wanted to keep his public image as a peace President, so the bombing of Cambodia was kept a secret. The Vietnam War was one of the first wars to be publicized on television. This raised awareness to Americans around the country because they were more aware of the inhumane acts of war.

The war seemed to be fought both over in Asia and back in the states. Thousands of protesters mostly young college students were against the war and were beginning to get war weariness during the later years of the war. Many of the youth were drafted to fight overseas during this war, the lucky ones were able to escape if they could afford a college education.

The Vietnam War polarized opinion in the United States. Some people believed the war was immoral, others that it would not serve US interests while some felt it was necessary to stop the advance (as they saw it) of communism.

The Vietnam war brought both violence but also opened up many job opportunities as well both at home and overseas. The draft was issued and thousands of men were sent to go fight in Vietnam along with thousands of other volunteer soldiers. With all these men fighting overseas many small businesses and factories were in need of employing new workers which opened up many job opportunities for other Americans at this time.

The End of the War

A Marine provides security for evacuations immediately prior to the fall of Saigon.

In the fall of 1972, it seemed that peace was at hand. But at the last minute, the negotiations fell through because the South Vietnamese refused to have North Vietnamese forces in their country. Nixon decided to launch a last aggressive bombing campaign to try to scare the North Vietnamese into stopping the war, but they were persistent and continued to fight. In the beginning of 1975, the North Vietnamese launched a final major offensive. The South Vietnamese army collapsed, and soon, Saigon, the capital of South Vietnam, was in the Vietcong's grasp. Americans scrambled to evacuate from the country, and on April 29, Americans were evacuating by helicopter off the roof of the American embassy. In the early hours of April 30, 1975, Saigon fell to the Vietcong. Soon after, South Vietnam surrendered.

Upon return, the American troops had no welcome. Many Americans, angered at the outcome of the war or just angry that the war ever had to happen, just wanted to forget the ordeal. Vietnam lay in ruins, and almost 1.4 million Vietnamese lives (on either side) were claimed. Also, 58,000 Americans had died, 300,000 were wounded, and the U.S. had wasted $150 billion on the war.

China

In 1969, Nixon wanted to ease the tensions of the Cold War to help the nation heal from the tragedy of Vietnam. He and Kissinger used realpolitik, the practice of basing decisions on the interests of the nation rather than the leaders' beliefs, to shape a new foreign policy. Nixon formed a foreign policy plan of détente, a plan of relaxing international tensions. Nixon's ultimate goal in his new plan was to achieve a so-called "balance of power" between the U.S., Europe, Soviet Union, China, and Japan so that no one nation could grow too strong.

To kick off his new plan, Nixon began to express friendliness to the People's Republic of China. The United States had severed ties with China after communists took control of the government in a political coup d'etat (a sudden change of government by force) in 1949. In 1970, Nixon began hinting at new relations with China, and he stopped referring to the country as "Red China," which was an offensive term for the nation. By increasing relations with China, Nixon hoped that the Soviets would become more cooperative in talks with the U.S. because it would fear a U.S.-China alliance.

Realizing the change in U.S. sentiment, China invited a U.S. table tennis team to visit the country in April 1971, and a week later, the U.S. opened trade between the two countries. After sending Kissinger on a secret visit to China, Nixon announced that he would go to Beijing, the Chinese capital. In February 1972, Nixon finally came to Beijing. Pictures of him at the Great Wall and attending Chinese banquets were in international news. In another seven years, Chinese relations would be fully restored.

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  President Nixon visiting the Great Wall of China.
• 
  President Nixon shakes hands with Mao Zedong
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  President Nixon and Primer Zhou toast.

The Soviet Union

Nixon was right about the Soviet Union. Fearing a Chinese alliance with America, Soviet leader Leonid Brezhnev agreed to meet with Nixon in Moscow in May of 1972. Again, pictures of Nixon with communist leaders filled the news. While in Moscow, Nixon signed the SALT I Treaty, or the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty. The treaty limited the number of nuclear arms that the Soviet Union and the U.S. could possess.

Feeling that the Soviet Union was in scientific decline, Brezhnev agreed with the U.S. to work with it in trade and information. This way, the Soviet Union could also gain access to desperately needed American grain. As a result of the talk, the Arms Race slowed and international tensions eased.

Home Front of the Vietnam War

Kent Four and Jackson Two

Vietnam war protestor offers a flower to Military Police.

A diagram of the Kent State Shootings.

Nixon tried to end the war through peace talks with North Vietnam, but generally, these stalled because the North Vietnamese had a wait and see attitude towards the war. They believed that opposition to the war within America would eventually grow so strong that Nixon would be forced to remove American troops from the country.

Nixon tried to appeal to his "silent majority" and renew support for the war, but then, Cambodia fell into a civil war between Communist and non-Communist forces. Nixon decided to send troops into Cambodia to destroy Communist strongholds, and Americans were outraged that their leader, who had strived for an end to the war, had attacked a neutral country. Opposition, especially in colleges, grew stronger.

Kent State

Background

This was especially true in Kent State University in Ohio. On May 1st, Students began protesting, resulting in some broken windows downtown, and riot police retaliating with tear gas. When students burned down the ROTC building on the Kent State campus, and then cut the hoses of firemen to prevent them from extinguishing it on May 2nd, the Ohio governor declared martial law, or emergency military rule. The national guard responded by forcing everyone on campus, including non-students, into dorms. By May 3rd, many outsiders had arrived to observe the protests. On the night of May 3rd protests resumed in hopes of meeting with officials, instead they were met with more tear gas.

They’re worse than the "Brown Shirts" and the communist element and also the “night riders” in the Vigilantes. They’re the worst type of people that we harbor in America

—Ohio Governor James A. Rhodes., Statement regarding the protestors on May 3rd.

Kent Four

Classes resumed on Monday May 4th, where two thousand people staged an initially peaceful rally on the Kent commons, despite the rally being banned. The National Guard troops told the students to disband, and shot tear gas into the crowd, though the winds that day made it ineffective, and the agitated crowd had begun to throw rocks at the guardsmen. Thus the troops thus advanced with bayonets to push the majority of protestors into a fenced in field, while taking a position on a hilltop. For unknown reasons, the troops then turned around and 28 guardsmen fired for 13 seconds on a smaller group, taking between 61 and 67 shots in total. Four students were killed and thirteen others were wounded.

Furious and in disbelief at the attack, several hundred protestors regrouped as National Guardsmen retreated to the commons. By this point, it was clear that those remaining were willing to die for their cause, and the National Guardsmen were willing to fire on students. Fearing the worst, Faculty pleaded with the National Guard to allow them to speak to the remaining students, and after 20 minutes of impassioned pleas were able to disperse those remaining.

I am begging you right now, if you don’t disperse right now they’re going to move in and it can only be a slaughter!

—Professor Glenn Frank, Plea following the shootings

The University President and the County Prosecutor both ordered the campus closed following the shooting. Despite this, Professors secretly finished the semester using facilities at other nearby colleges, and by using their own homes to house and teach students.

Aftermath

Initially, much of the American public sided with the National Guardsmen.

Jackson Two

Violence again struck at Jackson State in Mississippi. After a night of campus violence, police were called in to control the students, but eventually police opened fire on the students and two were killed. Witnesses recalled the police recklessly blasting the school's residence hall with their guns. The police claimed to be defending themselves from snipers.

Refugees

Because people's homes and fields were destroyed in the war in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos thousands of refugees flooded out of the country on boats. Many came to the United States, but they weren't met with open arms by most Americans.

The Hmong people of Laos had sided with America in the war effort against communists, and had to flee following communist retaliation for their involvement in the war effort. The Hmong began significant immigration to America in 1976, mostly to California and Minnesota. Their culture of traditional agriculture did not translate well to modern mechanized agriculture, but over time they slowly began to adapt. Hmong did not initially fare well in American Hospitals, but their initial poor experiences lead to medical professionals improving communication between doctors and patients.

Cambodians refugees fleeing the genocide of the Khmer Rouge often settled in California, where they had a profound influence on the doughnut culture of Los Angeles.

The Women's Movement

A women's liberation march in Washington DC, 1970

In the 1970s, women in “The Women’s Movement” claimed that they had achieved a great deal through all their efforts in the past decades. These achievements consisted of: married women receiving the right to have their own credit in their own name instead of just in their husband’s name, unmarried women receiving the right to get birth control, women receiving the right to serve on a jury panel, and women receiving the right to list their help wanted ads alongside men’s help wanted ads.

One of the goals these feminists had set was to change the view and laws on rape. Before this time, psychiatrists would claim that “A woman sometimes plays a big part in provoking her attacker by . . . her overall attitude and appearance.” Statements and beliefs like this made it easy for people to have a less sympathetic view towards victims of rape. However, by the end of the 1970s, activists worked on state levels to create crisis centers for rape victims, educate people such as police and hospital security about how to handle and take care of women who have been raped. These women even succeeded in changing some laws.

Roe v. Wade

The Case

In March 1970, a Texas woman by the name of Norma McCorvey, unmarried and pregnant, decided to sue the state of Texas by the recommendation of Sarah Weddington, a young attorney. At the time, the vast majority of the other states had similar laws. At the time, Texas had a law in place that banned abortion, with the exception of women with life-threatening pregnancies. As part of standard court procedure, McCorvey was renamed Jane Roe, because she did not want her identity to be known by the court.

With rulings favoring both Roe and Dallas Country district attorney Henry Wade in various levels of the courts, the case eventually landed in the Supreme Court. Argued first on December 13, 1971 and again on October 11, 1972 (at the court's request), Weddington contended that the Texas law (and therefore all abortion banning laws) were in violation of the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments, which gave a citizen the right to privacy, and that abortion laws violated the privacy of women.

The case was decided on January 22, 1973, with Harry Blackmun writing the ruling. With a 7-2 majority, the Court ruled that the First, Fourth, Fifth, Ninth, and Fourteenth Amendments did indeed collectively give a citizen the right to privacy, and that abortion laws did indeed violate the right to privacy of women.

Roe v. Wade was decided primarily on the Ninth Amendment to the United States Constitution, a part of the Bill of Rights. The Court's decision in this case was that the Ninth Amendment, in stating that "the enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people," protected a person's right to privacy.

Having recently appointed Warren Burger (the Chief Justice), Harry Blackmun, Lewis Powell, and William Rehnquist, Nixon was disappointed in the ruling. All of them Republicans, Nixon had presumed that the judges would rule conservatively. Only Rehnquist would dissent with the majority. The other dissenting vote was Byron White, who had been appointed by John F. Kennedy.

The Effects

The ruling continued the abortion divide that still exists today. It gave the general pro-choice sentiment among the more liberal and progressive Democratic Party and the pro-life sentiment among more conservative and religious Republican Party. The case was reopened in 1992, only to reaffirm the ruling.

Roe vs Wade was not only a turning point in the legalization of abortion, it was a turning point in many other debates. It caused people to ask when a person becomes a person. To some, it was a symbol of liberation and freedom because women could control when or if they had a full pregnancy, which is no small burden, and by extension women could have more control over her life. To others allowing abortions was a violation of the teachings taught by their religion, with many critics of abortion calling the procedure murder, and protesting outside clinics that performed it or lobbying for laws that limited the ability of clinics to operate.

American Indians

Many American Indians, especially those who were a part of the American Indian Movement conducted a number of protests and occupations, notably occupying Alcatraz Island in 1969 and Plymouth Rock on Thanksgiving Day, 1970.

Domestic Policy

Sewage being dumped into the Cuyohoga River in Cleveland, Ohio. This river was so polluted that it caught on fire numerous times, with news coverage of the 1969 fire helping to spur the creation of the EPA.

The Environmental Protection Agency was founded in 1970 during the Nixon Administration to help more responsibly manage environmental resources.

The Postal Reorganization Act of 1970 transformed the Post Office Department into the United States Postal Service.

In 1971 the National Railroad Passenger Corporation, also known as Amtrak, was established, combining 20 passenger rail services into one publicly supported national network.

Watergate and the Election of 1972

McGovern's Campaign

The 1972 election ended in a landslide for Richard Nixon, with McGovern only winning Massachusetts and Washington DC.

In 1971, Nixon had many doubts about the 1972 election. But this was before Nixon and Kissinger had vastly improved relations with the Soviet Union and China. By the time those tasks had been accomplished, much of the nation approved of Nixon. Even more in his favor was the Democratic disunity and the controversial nomination of George McGovern. The positions of McGovern, including immediately ending the Vietnam War, and creating a guaranteed minimum income, were seen by many at the time as too radical. Southern Democrats went so far as to form an "Anybody but McGovern" coalition during the Democratic Party primaries.

The White House Plumbers

The Watergate Complex

Even so, Nixon's paranoia and the stress of the presidential campaign would conspire to send the nation reeling and his administration into crisis. Much later, it would be found that Nixon's campaign would stretch the truth, the law, and ethics.

To start his campaign, Nixon asked a group of only the most loyal aides to create an "enemies list," a list of political opponents to the Nixon administration. Then, Nixon asked the IRS and the FBI to investigate those on the enemies list, and justified his actions by saying that he believed that those investigated were a threat to national security. Nixon was slowly changing his campaign from a campaign for the presidency to a campaign against enemies. Nixon was the renominated Republican nominee running with Sprio T. Agnew. They were running against the democratic nominee, Senator George McGovern of South Dakota. McGovern was running with Senator Thomas Eagleton for vice president. Eagleton was shortly replaced with Sargent Shriver after the press discovering Eagleton had been treated for psychological problems. Nixon was also running against longtime segregationist, George Wallace. On May 15, 1972, Wallace became a victim of an assassination attempt that left him paralyzed from the waist down. Wallace was shot by twenty-one year old, Arthur Bremer. Bremer had also shot three others and was sentenced to 63 years in prison.

Using some of the money allotted for his campaign, Nixon funded a secret group of "plumbers," who "plugged" information leaks that were damaging to the administration. Money also funded dirty tricks against Nixon's Democratic opponents.

In November of 1972, an unknowing public headed to the polls to cast votes for the President. Nixon won the election by a landslide, with almost 61 percent of the popular vote and 520 out of 537 electoral votes.

Things were quiet for a while after the election. In late 1973, countries in the Middle East imposed an embargo, or refusal to trade, on oil to the U.S. after the U.S. supported Israel in a short war against Egypt (the most powerful country in the region) and Syria. Prices for gas shot up in the U.S. and stations had to ration the gas, putting restrictions like "ten gallons per customer." Many people were laid off. Nixon worked to help relations with the Middle East, and in March 1974, the embargo was lifted. He was also able to get the U.S. out of Vietnam. Because of his work, Americans generally approved of Nixon.

Voters did not know that a little while after midnight on June 17, 1972, a security guard named Frank Wills had been patrolling in the parking garage of the Wartergate complex, the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee, and found tape on the locks to doors leading into the building. He removed the tape and thought little of it, but an hour later, he would find it replaced. He would call the police, and they would arrest five robbers inside the complex.

The subsequent arrests of "plumbers" Gordon Liddy and E. Howard Hunt would slowly but surely send tremors through the presidency. Initially, the Nixon administration denied that it had anything to do with the two plumbers or the bugs that the five men were trying to plant in the telephones of the Democratic headquarters (bugs are telephone listening devices, commonly used by spies and others in the field of espionage) when investigators gathered info that suggested it did. Ronald Ziegler, Nixon's press secretary, decried the break-in a "third rate burglary."

Hearing of the incident at the Watergate complex, the Washington Post, a prominent Washington D.C. newspaper with a national circulation, started publishing a series of articles linking Nixon to the burglary. Also, after questioning, one of the burglars confessed that the White House lied about its involvement in the break-in. Still, only about half of Americans had even heard of the robbery.

The Saturday Night Massacre

In early 1973, the Senate voted to hold hearings on the Watergate break-in. They asked the Department of Justice to hire a special prosecutor outside of the Nixon-influenced department to investigate Watergate. Slowly, Cox and Senator Sam Ervin of North Carolina would reveal the massive scandal going on in the White house. In May, former deputy White House counsel John Dean, a source close to Nixon, would testify that there indeed had been a cover up and that it had been directed by Nixon himself.

The extent of Nixon's desperation would become evident in October 1973 when Cox ordered that Nixon hand over tapes from a secret taping system that recorded conversations in the President's office. He refused on executive privilege grounds, contending that the release of the tapes would compromise national security.

When Cox tried to get an injunction for the release of the tapes, Nixon ordered Elliot Richardson, the attorney general, to fire Cox (after all, it was the Justice Department that had hired Cox), but Richardson refused and resigned. Nixon then ordered Deputy Attorney General William Rickelshaus to fire Cox, but he, like Richardson, refused and resigned. Finally, Nixon got a minor Justice Department official, Solicitor General Robert Bork, to fire Cox. The series of resignations and the firing of Cox became known as the Saturday Night Massacre. The public was outraged.

At the height of the Watergate scandal, the Department of Justice uncovered another: Vice President Spiro Agnew had accepted bribes as the governor of Maryland. He resigned on October 10, 1973. Nixon nominated Michigan congressman Gerald Ford as his Vice President, who was quickly confirmed.

Impeachment Proceedings & Resignation

Richard Nixon leaving the White House.

The House of Representatives decided to initiate the impeachment process as public outrage mounted over the Saturday Night Massacre. If a majority voted to charge the President of high crimes and misdemeanors, he would be tried by the Senate and the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court would preside over the trial. If 67 of the 100 senators voted to find Nixon guilty, he would be expelled from office.

In April of 1974, Nixon decided to release heavily edited transcripts of the tapes to try to improve his image. This only led to more public protest, and the Supreme Court eventually ruled that Nixon had to hand over the tapes. After a conversation on one of the tapes revealed that Nixon had ordered a cover up of the robbery, the public was stunned and the House mulled impeachment. Before any more damage could be done, Nixon resigned on August 9, 1974. He would be the first and (so far) only president to resign and Gerald Ford would become the only president not elected to the office of president or vice president.

The impact of the scandal was wide and far-reaching. Among other things, Congress passed a series of laws sharply limiting a president's power to wage undeclared war, limiting campaign spending and strengthening public access to government information. Also, it proved that the Constitution's system of checks and balances could work to bring an abusive or tyrannical president out of power. But by far the biggest impact of the crisis was the loss of the public's faith and trust in politicians and elected officials; cynicism concerning the ethics, behavior, and motives of elected officials would be deep and lasting. Because of Nixon's party affiliation and the outrage over a preemptive pardon that Ford granted Nixon after he became president, people associated corruption with the Republican party. Decades of gerrymandering by New Dealers and their successors had assured nearly-impregnable overwhelming Democratic majorities in both houses of Congress since the 1930s. Fallout from Watergate assured that this trend would continue in the midterm elections of November 1974. The Republicans would pay the ultimate price for Watergate in 1976, with Ford losing the White House to a relative political newcomer.

Ford, Carter and Reagan presidencies (1974 - 1989)

Introduction: The "New Right", Conservatism, and Demographic Shifts

The New Right

Ever since the 1964 election, in which the conservative Barry Goldwater failed to defeat incumbent Lyndon B. Johnson, a grassroots (beginning on the local level) movement among other conservatives began growing. Slowly, a group of conservatives began changing their policies and marketing strategies until finally, President Reagan (the culmination of this movement) was elected in 1980. And so, the product of this reformation of the right wing of the political spectrum (the conservative side), became known as the New Right.

This new breed of conservatism emphasized, above all, "smaller" government. This entailed lowering taxes as a catalyst for increased consumer spending, and thus economic growth, at the cost of cutting governmental programs and welfare. Conservative economists pushed "supply side economics" and openly advocated doing away with the tax-funded welfare state created mostly by the New Deal reforms of the 40s in order to keep more money in the hands of consumers instead of the coffers of welfare programs. Additionally, while Goldwater openly opposed the involvement of religion in politics, Reagan ushered in a generation of evangelical Christian activists along with the New Right. During the 1980 election, Reagan openly expressed his commitment to his religion, and during his presidency spoke out strongly against abortion and in support of other issues dear to the religious. The New Right conservatives also notably supported a more hawkish, aggressive foreign policy in the face of communism. They mostly did away with Nixon's detente strategy in favor of a more threatening American world presence.

Sun Belt

A map with areas commonly considered to be in the sunbelt highlighted.

Meanwhile, a band of states in the south and southwest (called the "Sun Belt" because of their sunny climates) had been, since the 50s, experiencing growth that far outpaced the rest of the country. A number of factors contributed to this rapid relative growth. Southern states such as Florida and Texas and areas in the southwest such as southern California, Arizona, and New Mexico had year-round warm, sunny climates and large expanses of flat land suitable for building long tracts of suburban housing. With the widespread adoption of air conditioning by the 1950s, new housing in warm Sunbelt suburbs attracted those living in more seasonably cold climates, and in particular the Northeast. Retirement in the Sunbelt was also an attractive prospect to many of the elderly, and places such as southern Florida became popular places for retirees to relocate.

White Flight

Simultaneously, the racially-charged phenomenon known as "white flight" was underway by the 1950s as an indirect result of court decisions (specifically Brown v. Board) and new laws encouraging the desegregation of urban neighborhoods. As blacks moved into predominantly white urban neighborhoods, white families, sometimes worried that as a result of desegregation property values would fall, would put their houses up for sale and move to the suburbs, which were often quieter, safer, and demographically whiter than inner cities. This contributed to the construction of suburbs around major Sunbelt cities such as Los Angeles, Phoenix, Miami, Tampa, Orlando, Atlanta, Houston, and Dallas in the 50s, 60s and 70s. Many families fleeing northern inner cities would eventually settle in these new suburbs.

Car Culture

Heavy Traffic on a Virginia highway in 1973.

At the same time, the construction of long-distance, high-speed, high-capacity, limited-access roadways, such as those built as a part of Eisenhower's Interstate highway system, facilitated a lifestyle more dependent on the automobile--that is, it became practical and economical for most members of the workforce to live farther away from their jobs than they had ever lived. Whereas earlier in the century the norm had often been for workers to live near their jobs in cities and take a relatively short drive, ride public transportation, or even walk to work, in the second half of the century it became far more common to live in suburbs miles away from jobs (which often remained in dense urban areas) because expressways and inexpensive gasoline facilitated much longer commutes. As suburbs grew, so did American oil consumption. Traffic, environmental, and indirect health problems often arose as suburbs grew beyond the capacity of the infrastructure already in place. This trend would have important bearings on U.S. energy and environmental policy in the 70s and in the new millennium.

Demographics

Importantly, some Sunbelt growth was also attributed to immigration from Mexico, and in places like southern California tensions would flare over the employment and taxpayer-funded welfare of illegal immigrants. Southern Florida's growth in the 70s and 80s also had a notable component of immigrants from Cuba, which fell to communism in 1959.

California experienced the greatest growth and surpassed New York as the most populous state, as did Texas (which became the second most populous state). Florida also exhibited very rapid growth. The Sun Belt was (and still generally is, with the notable exception of California and to a lesser extent Florida) committed to conservatism, and in part contributed to Nixon's and Reagan's electoral successes. The growth of this region was at the expense of the Northern cities. The effects of this period on cities are discussed in the final section of this chapter.

Other important demographic shifts were taking place during this period as well. Beginning in the early 60s, fertility rates began a sharp decline from an average of almost four children per family in the late 50s to an average of less than two by the 70s, signaling the end of the post-war baby boom and the birth of what is widely known as "Generation X," the generation that came of age during the 80s and early 90s. This relative drop in fertility rates would later have extremely important repercussions for Social Security, Medicare, and the U.S. health care system as a whole.

Ford and Rockefeller

President Ford

The world watched as Gerald Ford turned back towards the White House after seeing off former President Nixon in his helicopter. There, he took the oath of office and became the thirty eighth president of the United States. Washington was relieved to put the Watergate crisis behind it. He appointed Nelson Rockefeller, a popular Republican and the former governor of New York, as his Vice President. Many were excited of what would come of Ford's presidency.

Controversy

One of Ford's first acts in office would stun the nation. Using executive powers granted to him by the Constitution, Ford granted Nixon a pardon, on September 8, 1974, for any misconduct he may have exhibited as president. Even though Ford fiercely defended his actions, he never regained the popularity that he had in his first days in office. Many believed that Nixon and Ford had worked out a bargain in advance, with Nixon's resignation in exchange for a pardon from Ford.

Later that year, it was leaked to the American public that the CIA had been spying and keeping secret files on legitimate American citizens. Months later, it was leaked that the FBI was doing the same thing. Ford appointed a commission to investigate the inner workings of the two agencies. He, with the help of Congress, passed legislation to keep the agencies in check.

After recovering some trust, the President would again stir up controversy. He offered amnesty, or protection from the law, to those who had avoided the draft or deserted during the Vietnam War. While many approved, others did not, believing that the policy was far too lenient; after all, their loved ones had obeyed the law.

Foreign Affairs

Ford meeting with Brehzney, a major event in deescalating the Cold War.

Ford did not have major diplomatic experience, so he relied on Kissinger, who continued Nixon's policies. In 1974, Ford met with Brezhnev to again discuss nuclear weapons. In July 1975, Ford signed the Helsinki Accords, a pledge between the western world and the Soviet Union to respect human rights. Ford also continued to work with China. The Chinese communist leader, Mao Zedong, died in 1976, and a more moderate, centrist government came to power. As a result, the U.S. and China continued to move closer. Ford’s main issues during his presidency were the North Vietnamese victory over South Vietnam (1975), the Mayaguez Incident, Detente and human rights policy, the Middle East crisis, Arab oil power, and the first international economic summits. His actions to re-assert U.S. ability and prestige following the collapse of Cambodia and the humiliating Fall of Saigon in South Vietnam were energetic. On May 12, 1975, the American Merchant Marine ship, S.S. Mayaguez, with 39 crewmen aboard, was captured in international waters by Cambodian gunboats. The ship was retrieved and all crewmen were saved, but at the cost of 41 American servicemen's lives.

Recession and Inflation

As the 1970s progressed, it seemed that Europe and Japan might pass the United States in economic power. Japanese cars were popular throughout the nation and European made goods were strong competition to American made goods. Many factories were forced to close, and soon, many Americans were unemployed or underemployed, that is, when one works in a job for which he is overqualified. Another contributing factor to the economic hardships were the actions of the middle-eastern OPEC (Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries). Even though the oil shortage had been for the most part resolved, OPEC kept its prices high, and the high prices led to inflation (the loss of value of a currency).

To help to reduce inflation, Ford launched Whip Inflation Now (WIN), which promoted the saving of money and advised people to grow their own vegetable gardens in an effort to avoid high food prices. The program led to a small but insignificant drop in inflation; the economy was still plunging into recession. Ford also tried to control inflation by cutting government spending. He vetoed many appropriations bills from Congress that allowed for more spending.

To stimulate the economy, Ford pressed Congress to pass a tax cut, believing that with the extra money saved on taxes, Americans might spend more money. Ford was right, but with less tax revenue, the federal deficit widened. Despite the things he tried, he could not make the economy recover.

1976 Election

The Electoral College results of the 1976 election.

In November 1975, Ford again was determined to win single handedly, noted that he would be competing in every primary. He vowed to, “go right down to the wire in the convention in Kansas City and win there.” Ford was treated as a joke, just as Tom Branden had pointed out, that when "the nation’s end men begin to treat a serious politician as a joke, he is though.” It all began during his trip to Australia in the Spring of 1975, Ford slipped on a rain-slickened ramp while getting off a plane in Salzburg and fell on the stairs. This incident happened in front of various cameramen and reporters, which meant it happened in front of the entire world. Instead of his presidency, Ford became famous for his social blunders, whether they were authentic or fabricated.So going into the 1976 election Ford hoped that, as the incumbent, he would win the election despite his past.

Americans had not quite forgotten about the Watergate crisis and Ford's subsequent actions, though. The Watergate Scandal opened the eyes of American people to see the corruption that was taking place in their own government. The scandal and the state of the economy hurt the Republican party and gave Carter the advantage of being viewed as a newcomer and a reformer.

The 1976 election hollowed the financially conservative Ford against the more liberal Carter. The economic policies of the candidates’ became extremely important as the economy’s recovery from one of the worst post-WWII recessions slowed down. Ford held up a slow-growth policy to fight inflation, while Carter advocated stronger growth at the risk of inflation.

Jimmy Carter, a little known Democrat, slowly gained recognition in primaries, and he eventually won the Democratic nomination. Ford, on the other hand, struggled to win the nomination from his party, almost losing it to former California governor Ronald Reagan. On Election Day, the race was very close, but Carter eked out a victory over Ford, winning 50 percent of the popular vote to Ford's 48.

Carter

President Carter

Background

Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.), the thirty-ninth president of the United States, was born October 1, 1924, in the small southwest Georgia farming town of Plains, and grew up in the nearby community of Archery. The first president born in a hospital,[6] he is the eldest of four children of James Earl Carter and Bessie Lillian Gordy. His father, James Earl Carter, Sr., was a farmer and businessman; his mother, Lillian Gordy Carter, a registered nurse. He had been a peanut farmer from a tiny town called Plains. He attended Georgia Southwestern College and the Georgia Institute of Technology, and received a bachelor of science degree from the United States Naval Academy in 1946. In the Navy, he became a submariner, serving in both the Atlantic and Pacific fleets and rising to the rank of lieutenant. Before he became president, Carter served two terms as a Georgia State Senator and one as the Governor of Georgia (1971-1975).

Carter ran with Senator Walter Mondale of Minnesota as his vice presidential candidate. Carter ran for president against Gerald Ford who had won the Republican nomination against Ronald Reagan by a slim margin. Carter defeated Ford in the election of 1976. During his presidency, Carter sought to conduct the presidency on democratic and moral principles. Carter, building his campaign on the fact that he was an "outsider," had little experience with politics on the national level. From the start of his presidency, Carter was very down-to-earth and informal; not very much like most politicians.

In 2002 President Carter was given the Nobel Peace Prize. He is the only American president to ever get a Nobel Peace Prize after his presidency. Carter was also against the death penalty in the United States. His thoughts on it were to replace the death penalty with life in prison. He offered amnesty to Americans who had fled the draft and gone to other countries during the Vietnam War.

Deregulation

During his administration, Carter worked to deregulate many key sectors of the nation's economy, particularly the transportation and travel industry. The first major deregulation act passed during his presidency was the Airline Deregulation Act of 1978, which removed much of the Civil Aeronautics Board's control over commercial aviation. Before the passage of the act, airlines had to receive government approval of routes, sometimes waiting ten years before getting a decision. Many requests were rejected because, for example, the case had become "stagnant." The Staggers Rail Act, passed in 1980, had a similar effect on the railroad industry.

Another key piece of legislation passed during the Carter presidency was the Depository Institutions Deregulation and Monetary Control Act, passed in 1980. It lessened government control on the interest rates for money deposited and saved in banks, so that with higher interest rates, people would be encouraged to save their money.

Energy & Inflation

The energy crisis of 1979 made gas difficult to purchase.

High prices on oil imports caused inflation to skyrocket during the Carter administration by as much as 12 percent per year. A widening trade deficit (a higher value on imports than on exports) also contributed to the inflation. To stress the need to conserve energy, Carter symbolically turned down the thermostat in the White House. Five laws passed in 1978, collectively known as the National Energy Plan, created a Department of Energy, allotted money from the U.S. budget to go to alternative energy research and created tax incentives to encourage domestic oil production and energy conservation.

In March 1979, nuclear power would also become part of the nation's energy crisis. Nuclear power, which involves splitting atoms and releasing energy while creating hazardous radioactive material, made up more than ten percent of the nation's electricity. A partial meltdown at Three Mile Island near Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, released radiation into the environment, alerting the nation to a potential hazard. Soon a protest movement against nuclear power spread, and while no further nuclear power plants were ordered in the United States, most already in operation continued in operation and most then under construction eventually went into operation.

Camp David Accords

President Carter meeting with Egyptian president Anwar Sadat and Menachem Begin, the Prime Minister of Isreal

During the 1976 election, peace talks between the middle east, Israel, and the U.S. had stalled. The newly-elected president Carter moved to restart these talks, but when the right-wing Likud Party of Israel took control of the government in an electoral sweep, hopes for continued peace talks seemed all but lost. But Egyptian president Anwar Sadat, frustrated with the stalled process and motivated by prospects that the U.S. might help its anemic economy, decided to visit Israel, thereby recognizing its existence. Israel received Sadat's initiative, and the two countries soon went into bilateral (instead of the multilateral talks with the entire Arab world that Carter and Sadat had hoped for) talks, witnessed by the president at Camp David in Maryland.

The secret negotiations were heated and dramatic, and the two countries had threatened to walk on multiple occasions. Carter had personally appealed to Sadat and Israel leader Menachem Begin to stay in the talks. After twelve days, an agreement was reached, and on September 17th, 1978, the Camp David Accords were signed at the White House.

Hostage Crisis in Iran

In the '70s, Iran was a very strong Persian Gulf ally to the U.S. The Iranian Shah, Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, had built up a powerful military with U.S. help. Many Iranians complained about government corruption and the negative influence that the West had on Muslim values. In 1979 however, the shah was forced to leave the country after Islamic fundamentalists, (those who believe in very strict obedience to religious rules) led by the new Iranian ruler Ayatollah Khomeini, took control of the government.

Supported by the fundamentalists, Iranian students took over the U.S. embassy in Tehran, the capital of Iran, and took 52 U.S. citizens hostage. The United States was horrified. Negotiations to release the hostages failed and a rescue attempt in the country ended with the death of eight U.S. soldiers.

Though fear of an American-backed return by the Shah was the publicly stated reason, the true cause of the seizure was the long-standing U.S. support for the Shah's government. Reza Pahlavi ruled Iran from 1941 to 1979, with a brief period of exile in 1953 when he fled to Italy due to a power struggle with Prime Minister Mohammed Mossadegh. Because Mossadegh's policies and announcements created concern over access to Iranian oil, oil prices, and possible Soviet influence in Iran, the United States and British intelligence services aided Iranian military officers in a coup to overthrow the Prime Minister. After his return to power, the Shah established a very close alliance with the United States. The U.S. supplied weapons, training, and technical knowledge that aided the Shah in modernizing his country. However, the Shah ruled as a dictator, using SAVAK, his secret police, to terrorize his political enemies. The Shah was opposed by both the Marxist Tudeh Party, and by fundamentalist Islamic leaders who believed his policies and his reliance on the Americans were corrupting Iranian society.

The hostage crisis in Iran greatly lowered the public opinion of Carter, even though there was little else that Carter could do about it. The ordeal took a toll on his campaign for reelection in 1980; the public saw as a president who bargained with terrorists, and he lost to Ronald Reagan, 489 to 49 in the electoral college. An even greater disappointment for his failed campaign came in the last weeks of his term, in January 1981: with hard work, Carter secured the release of the hostages.

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  Iranian students at the US Embassy in Tehran.
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  Two of the hostages during the crisis.
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  Anti-Iranian protester in Washington DC, held November 1979.

Iran-Iraq War

During the war in 1987 two Iraqi missiles were fired at the USS Stark, killing 37 US Sailors.

The Iran-Iraq War permanently altered the course of Iraqi history. It strained Iraqi political and social life, and led to severe economic dislocations. Viewed from a historical perspective, the outbreak of hostilities in 1980 was, in part, just another phase of the ancient Persian-Arab conflict that had been fueled by twentieth-century border disputes. Many observers, however, believe that Saddam Hussein's decision to invade Iran was a personal miscalculation based on ambition and a sense of vulnerability. Saddam Hussein, despite having made significant strides in forging an Iraqi nation-state, feared that Iran's new revolutionary leadership would threaten Iraq's delicate Sunni Shia balance and would exploit Iraq's geostrategic vulnerabilities--Iraq's minimal access to the Persian Gulf, for example. In this respect, Saddam Hussein's decision to invade Iran has historical precedent; the ancient rulers of Mesopotamia, fearing internal strife and foreign conquest, also engaged in frequent battles with the peoples of the highlands.

The Iran-Iraq War, also known as the Imposed War by Iraq, began when Iraq invaded Iran on 22 September 1980 following a long history of border disputes and fears of Shia insurgency among Iraq's long suppressed Shia majority influenced by Iran's Islamic revolution. Although Saddam's Iraq hoped to take advantage of revolutionary chaos in Iran and attacked without formal warning, they made only limited progress into Iran and within several months were repelled by the Iranians who regained virtually all lost territory by June 1982. For the next six years Iran was on the offensive. Despite several calls for a ceasefire by the United Nations Security Council, hostilities continued until 20 August 1988. The last prisoners of war were exchanged in 2003.

The war is noted for being very similar to World War I. Tactics used included trench warfare, manned machine-gun posts, bayonet charges, use of barbed wire, human wave attacks and Iraq's extensive use of chemical weapons (such as mustard gas) against Iranian troops and civilians as well as Iraqi Kurds.

Terrorism

At the turn of the 19th century, terrorism in the form of political assassination became a major global phenomenon. In the post-World War II years, other types of terrorism became strategies of choice for nationalist groups across the globe in their struggles for independence.

In predominantly agrarian societies, this terrorism took the form of guerrilla warfare, with China and Indochina as the classic examples. A number of these national political movements, which owed much of their success to violence, adopted a strategy in the war of semantics surrounding the use of violence. These newly created Third World Countries, as well as their brethren from the communist states, advanced the argument that their fight against colonial oppression was not terrorism but rather the hard work of dedicated freedom fighters.

A significant turning point in the history of terrorism was the formation of Hezbollah (Party of God), formed in 1982 in response to the Israeli invasion of Lebanon. This Lebanon-based radical Shi’a group takes its ideological inspiration from the Iranian revolution and the teachings of the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini. Its members were not only interested in carrying out the goals of the revolution but were also concerned with the social conditions of their fellow Shiites throughout the Middle East. Hezbollah’s outreach in Lebanon during the 1980s solidified Lebanese Shiite support and helped spawn smaller terrorist groups, the most recognizable of which was the Islamic Jihad.

Reagan

Ronald Reagan challenged Gorbachov to tear down the Berlin Wall in 1987

Reaganomics

President Regan explaining his tax plans in an address to the nation.

I have only one thing to say to the tax increasers. Go ahead, make my day.

—President Ronald Regan, Address to American Business Conference

In the years before and following Reagan's election, a conservative movement grew which complained that the government spent too much money and collected too many taxes. So, Reagan decided to cut taxes and spending. Reagan's policy of supply-side economics (increasing supply and services to stimulate the economy) soon became known simply as "Reaganomics." Reagan took over the worst economy since the Great Depression, one marred by Stagflation with unemployment of 13% and inflation of 17%. "Reaganomics" cut the top tax rate by half and lowered all other tax rates by a significant margin. The deals struck with the Democratic controlled congress caused an increase in spending and the decreased revenue from the tax cuts and smaller tax shelters could not cover the increases in spending on defense Reagan demanded. The largest increase in spending was defense in a plan to bankrupt the Soviet Union. By 1983, the economy began a steady growth, doubling tax revenue and increasing GDP by 2 trillion dollars. However critics of Reganomics note that the policies caused the national debt to increase significantly, as well as create significant income inequality.

The Reagan Revolution

During his Presidency, Ronald Reagan pursued policies that reflected his optimism in individual freedom, expanded the American economy, and contributed to the end of the Cold War. The "Reagan Revolution", as it came to be known, aimed to reinvigorate American morale, and reduce the people's reliance upon government

Air Traffic Strike

In 1981 Air Traffic Control workers began to strike, hoping to achieve better pay, better conditions, and less hours. Without air traffic control to guide planes, flights could not safely take place sending air travel to a halt. Furthermore, as federal employees, the air traffic controllers were violating the law by striking.

Regan was a former union leader and gave a grace period of 48 hours for strikers to quit striking and return to their duties at Air Traffic Control. While most striking workers did not return to work, a few did. This coupled with policy changes was able to restore about 50% of previous flight capacity during the strike.

Ultimately, Regan fired over 10,000 striking air traffic control workers, and banned them from future federal service, though some were later able to return. The strike was broken, the union dissolved, and it took about a decade to recover staffing of air traffic control positions to previous levels.

Sandra Day O'Connor Supreme Court nomination

O'Conner being sworn in as the first female Justice of the Supreme Court.

In 1980, Ronald Reagan promised to nominate the first woman to the Supreme Court should he be elected. Then, on July 3, 1981, Associate Justice Potter Stewart, who had been appointed by Dwight Eisenhower in 1958, retired. Reagan fulfilled his promise and nominated Sandra Day O'Connor, a judge on the Arizona Court of Appeals. The Senate confirmed her unanimously, and on September 25, 1981, she became the first woman to serve on the Supreme Court. She served as Associate Justice until January 31, 2006, when her successor, Samuel Alito, was confirmed.

Reagan nominated two other Justices to the Court. In 1986, he successfully nominated Antonin Scalia, and in 1988, he nominated Anthony Kennedy.

Defense

Artist's depiction of part of the Strategic Defense Initiative, nicknamed Star Wars.

Arms Race

As promised in his campaign, Reagan drastically increased military spending to a level of about $1.6 trillion in five years. This triggered a secondary arms race between the United States and the USSR, and relations between the two fell to levels not seen since the 60s. While Reagan favored drastically increasing spending on the military, the US confidence in full-scale ground war had been broken with the loss of Vietnam in the 70s. Because of this, Reagan favored funding trained insurgents to fight enemy governments instead of committing the army full-scale.

Grenada

The first major military conflict during Reagan's administration was 1983's Operation Urgent Fury, the invasion of the Caribbean island nation of Grenada. When the island was taken over by Marxist Bernard Coard in a coup, Reagan used the safety of 500 U.S. medical students working in the government as a pretext for the invasion. The new government was quickly overthrown in just four days, and served as a model for future conflicts.

Insurgencies

Reagan also, with the help of South Africa, funded insurgent groups fighting Soviet-backed regimes in the African nations of Mozambique and Angola. In Afghanistan, which had been invaded by the Soviet Union to the north, the U.S. government provided arms and humanitarian aid to mujahideen rebels fighting the Soviet-backed government. In 1985, Mikhail Gorbachev, a Communist party reformer, assumed leadership of Russia. Realizing that his Soviet troops were bogged down in a costly guerrilla war, and wanting to regain face with the international community, he announce in 1987 that the Soviet army would be withdrawing from the country, and had completely left by 1989.

Central America and Iran Contra

Contra rebels in 1987

Hostage takings in the middle east did not end after the 1979 Iran hostage crisis. In 1983, members of an Iranian militant organization were arrested for truck bombings in Kuwait, and an ally militant organization retaliated for the arrests by taking thirty hostages in Lebanon, six of whom were American. In order to free the hostages, the administration decided that it would secretly sell arms to Iran, one of America's greatest enemies, which was in the middle of a war with Iraq. Few countries were willing to supply Iran with weapons, and the United States sold the arms to Iran in the hopes that Iran would pressure the militants in Lebanon to free the hostages. This sale had the explicit approval of Reagan himself.

At the same time, a coup d'état in Nicaragua brought to power the socialist Sandinista government. The country had formerly been friendly territory for multinational corporations and a wealthy ruling class, and this resulted in a large poor class willing to hand power over to left-wing leaders. American interests in Central America seemed in jeopardy with the Sandinista government in power. When the CIA decided to conduct sabotage missions against the Sandinistas without congressional approval, the Republican senate angrily passed the Boland Amendment, which banned the funding of the anti-Sandinista Contra rebels by certain governmental agencies.

Because of this, a few in the Reagan administration decided to, possibly without the President's knowledge, use the proceeds from the secret weapons sale with Iran to secretly fund the Contra rebels in Nicaragua.

These dealings went on in violation of the Boland amendment, and in conflict with statements made by Reagan that he would not negotiate with terrorists. When a Lebanese magazine revealed the weapons-for-hostages dealings in 1986, scandal ensued. Reagan, with pressure from congressional Democrats and the media, created the Tower commission, led by former senator John Tower. The commission in the end laid most of the blame for the dealings on Reagan himself for not paying more attention and not having more direct control over many governmental agencies. The scandal itself raised many separation of power and presidential ethics questions, but Reagan emerged from its aftermath relatively unscathed. By the end of his second term, Reagan once again was registering positive approval ratings.

A few months ago I told the American people I did not trade arms for hostages. My heart and my best intentions still tell me that's true, but the facts and the evidence tell me it is not.

—President Ronald Regan, Television address in 1987

Changing Modern Society

A broad shift in values and attitudes took place in the U.S. between 1970 and 1990 as financial prosperity spread through American society. Across almost all social and economic groups, the trend was away from community and toward individualism. Aspects of the change included resistance to taxation and support for tax cuts; distrust of government and belief in privatization of public functions on the argument that the private sector could carry them out more effectively; decreased support for public assistance to low-income groups and demands that these groups improve their own economic standing; and a general decrease in the type of public citizen involvement that earlier generations had practiced during the middle decades of the 20th century. Politicians of both major parties hastened to follow these trends, with the Republicans in the lead under Reagan and the elder Bush, while the Democrats, seeing their broad base of voters increasingly drawn toward Republican positions, hastening to follow.

Pop Culture of the 70's and 80's

A Disco ball, a symbol of the 1970's.

Disco music became an icon of the late 1970's, with disco dancers wearing flamboyant and eye catching clothing. While disco had declined in popularity in America by the early 1980's, it had a large influence on emerging genres, such as electronic music and early hip hop.

Hip Hop emerged as a popular genre during the 1980s, with artists like Run-DMC, NWA, and the Beastie Boys enjoying popularity.

Pop artists such as Michael Jackson, Madonna, Bruce Springsteen, Prince, and others became immensely popular in America during the 80's.

Rock music, especially hard rock and related genres, also enjoyed a resurgence in the 1980's, with Metallica, Mötley Crüe, Queen, AC/DC, Kiss, Bon Jovi and other bands enjoying massive success in the United States.

MTV, a music television channel was launched in 1981. During the 1980's it broadcast music videos as well as related content and helped popularize music that was not being played on the radio.

Everyday life

By the late 1970's microwave ovens had become small enough and affordable enough to gain popularity in the household.

During the 1980's, big box stores that combined both a grocery store and a department store under one roof became very popular.

Urban Problems

New York City during the 1980's.

Many people believed that despite large change in the 60’s and 70’s, race relations were taking a major step back during the Reagan administration. Reagan’s “New Right” caused a more apparent dividing of lines between religions and races. In 1988 national report claimed that blacks and whites were once again segregating. It pointed out the fact that more whites were living in nice suburban homes, while blacks and latinos lived in largely impoverished communities. Although there were more white people living in poverty, the percentage of people of color living in poverty was nearly three times that of whites. The living conditions of people of color living in poor urban communities continued to diminish and the neighborhoods became increasingly diminished as more struggled.

The war on drugs disproportionately affected minority communities, with unequal enforcement of the law leading to large numbers of African Americans behind bars for relatively trivial crimes. As an example, Crack first made an impact in New York in 1985, striking poor urban neighborhoods. As more and more people became addicted to crack the business of drug dealing became more profitable and, therefore, more competitive. America saw a steep incline of drug crimes and gang related violence. In 1987 the death toll of gang related violence was at 387 in Los Angeles alone. Many of the victims were innocent bystanders. This increase in violence caused swift action. Many states enacted laws that gave mandatory prison sentences for crack possession. These laws made the punishment of holding 1 gram of crack the equivalent to having 100 grams of cocaine, the drug of choice for higher income whites. These laws are still considered some of the most blatantly racist in recent history. These laws, along with other crackdowns on people of color, caused a disproportion of black and latino convictions compared to people who were white. By 2000, young black men were more likely to have been arrested than to have graduated from college. Many see this as an obvious way to hold young black people down and keep them in impoverished, and even homeless, states.

As the Sun Belt as a whole grew, it accompanied a nationwide trend of migration out of cities and into suburbs. This migration was easier to accomplish with more accessible transportation brought by cars. The service sector of the economy grew along with this shift, at the expense of the shrinking manufacturing industry. Cities in the northern and midwestern "Rust Belt" were left with smaller populations and thus smaller tax bases, and large, poverty-stricken minorities; bankruptcy loomed for many northern cities. Additionally, old downtown areas of cities exhibited gentrification, a phenomenon in which affluent, young middle class citizens move into restored urban areas. This displaced the lower class and poor and contributed to one of the biggest problems of the mid-80s-- homelessness.

Conservative Movements

Neoconservatism The neoconservative movement grew in the 1960s & 1970s as a reaction to the growing antiwar counter-culture & liberal social programs like the Great Society. Neoconservatism advocated a very hawkish, interventionist foreign policy, and was less committed to cutting governmental spending than mainstream conservatism was. While the Reagan administration was the first to show hints of neoconservatism, the movement would not be in the political mainstream until the rise of think tanks like the American Enterprise Institute and the Project for the New American Century in the mid and late 90s. The culmination of this movement was the election of George W. Bush in 2000.

The Religious Right Evangelical Christians constitute the main constituency of what is often referred to as the “religious right.” Like neo-conservatism, evangelical Christianity (often referring to themselves as “born-again”) grew in the 1960s & 1970s. Organization such as the Moral Majority, founded in 1979 by televangelist Rev. Jerry Falwell, stressed “family values.”

Conservative Coalition Sharing membership and views on a variety of issues, neoconservatives and the religious right began to join forces in the late 1970s to form a conservative political coalition. The political platform of this coalition included moral opposition to drug use, pornography, and abortion, as well as opposition to the expensive liberal social programs of the 1960s and 1970s. The coalition also favored free-enterprise and foreign policy backed by a strong military.

The new coalition proved to be politically powerful, fueling a conservative victory in the national elections of 1980 when Republicans, supported by neoconservatives and the religious right, earned a majority in the U.S. Senate, while Ronald Reagan won in a landslide over Jimmy Carter in the presidential race. Specifically, California’s “Christian Voice” was influential in the 1980 election, swaying the vote in the South & the Midwest. The Rev. Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority registered approximately 3 million voters from 1979 to 1980.

African Americans in Politics

By the 80s, African Americans saw a level of political empowerment and representation unseen during the course of the country's history. Mostly running as Democrats, the 80s saw the rise of many major black political players. Shirley Chisholm, a Brooklyn native, was elected to Congress in 1968, representing New York's 12th district. She was one of the founding members of the powerful Congressional Black Caucus, which would eventually constitute a large chunk of the Democratic caucus itself. Today, the powerful group boasts 43 members, all Democrats. Eventually Chisholm would be the first African American and first woman to make a serious (though unsuccessful) bid for the Presidency, but it would not be until Obama that one would get on the ticket in the general election.

In 1984, civil rights leader Jesse Jackson decided to make a bid for the Democratic nomination for the presidency and exceeded expectations, winning five southern primaries. Although he lost the nomination to Vice President Walter Mondale, Jackson was seen as a more credible candidate for the 1988 election. This proved to be an accurate prediction, with he and eventual nominee Michael Dukakis running neck and neck for the nomination. Briefly, Jackson was considered the frontrunner. Despite his loss, Jackson would remain politically active and would continue to push for progressive reform and civil rights for many minority groups, notably including homosexuals.

Other black politicians were appointed to positions of power as well. In 1967 President Lyndon B. Johnson appointed Thurgood Marshall to the supreme court. Marshall became the first African American to serve on the bench, and he did not retire until 1991. Clarence Thomas became the second black justice when he replaced Marshall that same year. As a general in the army, Colin Powell was appointed to the position of National Security Advisor, and was eventually elevated to the powerful position of Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. As a civilian, Colin Powell was appointed to the position of Secretary of State by George W. Bush in 2001. This was the first time a black person had been appointed Secretary of State and was the highest ranking position that any African American had held before.

Technology

In 1984 Motorola introduced the first mobile phone, the DynaTac to limited markets.

NASA launched their first space shuttle in 1981, their first reusable spacecraft.

"A computer on every desk"

This era saw the rise of the personal computer in common business use.

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  An experimental Wind Turbine being tested at NASA's Plum Brook station in 1982.
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  A virtual reality headset from 1985.
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  The introduction of computers in common offices revolutionized how people access information.

Bush and Clinton presidencies,1st Gulf War (1989 - 2001)

1988 Election

Electoral College 1988

Having been badly defeated in the 1984 presidential election, the Democrats were eager to find a new approach to win the presidency. They felt more optimistic this time due to the large gains in the 1986 mid-term election which resulted in the Democrats taking back control of the Senate after six years of Republican rule. Among the field of candidates were the following:

• Bruce E. Babbitt, former governor of Arizona
• Joseph R. Biden Jr., U.S. senator from Delaware
• Michael S. Dukakis, governor of Massachusetts
• Richard A. "Dick" Gephardt, U.S. representative from Missouri
• Albert A. Gore Jr., U.S. senator from Tennessee
• Gary W. Hart, former U.S. senator from Colorado
• Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, civil rights activist
• Paul M. Simon, U.S. senator from Illinois
• Patricia Schroeder, Senator from Colorado

George H. W. Bush

Reagan's Vice President, George Herbert Walker Bush, easily defeated Senator Bob Dole of Kansas and televangelist Pat Robertson for the Republican presidential nomination. Dole, at first, had a significant lead in polls. Bush selected Senator James Danforth (Dan) Quayle of Indiana to be his running mate. The Democrats, after an exhausting primary season, selected Governor Michael Dukakis of Massachusetts as their nominee. The 1988 election was the first time television was used as the primary method of voter mobilization.

During his acceptance speech for the Republican party nomination, Bush said, famously, "Read my lips: no new taxes." Bush assailed his opponent for being soft on crime and insinuated that he lacked patriotism. Specifically, he criticized his unconditional opposition to the death penalty, and his opposition to the proposed law that would require students to recite the Pledge of Allegiance. He also blamed Dukakis for the pollution in Boston harbor. Dukakis lacked experience in national politics and failed to effectively counter Bush's assaults.

Bush won the election with 48.9 million votes (53.4%) against Dukakis's 41.8 million. Carrying 40 states, Bush won in the Electoral College 426 votes to 112.

The campaign's harsh tone repelled voters. It was described as the nastiest election in modern times. Voter turnout was the lowest since 1924.

Exxon Valdez oil spill

On March 24 1988 the Exxon Valdez oil spill occurred in Prince William Sound Alaska. It is considered one of the worst oil spills in American history, behind only the Deepwater Horizon oil spill of 2010 in terms of volume. The economic and environmental damage it caused to Alaska was staggering.

Social Changes of the 1990s

The population continued to grow to over 250 million by 1990. The total had nearly quadrupled in a century and was more than double the population during the first election of Franklin Roosevelt. Medical advances brought the life expectancy to a record high. The Hispanic population grew five times as fast as the rest of the population and began to emerge as a political force.

Left-over changes from the countercultural revolution of the 1960s and 1970s were apparent. "Laid-back" attitudes toward dress, language, and sexual freedom were among these left-over changes. A new tolerance was especially prevalent in what had been historically the most sensitive of all problems for Americans - sex. Ninety-five percent of males and over 80 percent of females between 18 and 24 acknowledged premarital intercourse.

Drugs remained popular as well. While LSD fell out of fashion, marijuana remained popular. "Crack," a cheap and powerful derivative of cocaine, displaced heroin.

The rise of the Moral Majority continued - dismay over crimes, drugs, and drinking was widespread. States raised the drinking age and cracked down on drunk driving. The people revolted against cigarette smoking, and many states and communities began to ban smoking in public places.

The campaign against sexual promiscuity received unexpected support due to the discovery of AIDS.Most politicians were slow to devote resources to combating AIDS, in part because it was initially perceived as a "gay mans disease" which did not threaten other Americans.

The looming threat of nuclear war impacted how many people grew up.

Generation X is the name given to people born between the 1960s up to 1982. The term was penned by author Douglas Coupland in 1991 when he released his era defining Generation X. Coupland wrote of mid-twenty characters who were going through “quarter-life crisis.” In the book Coupland discussed how his generation faced looming threats of nuclear war which made forming meaningful relationships meaningless. He also discussed how major corporations such as McDonald's provided a shared state of consumerism which formed a new zone of comfort. By pointing out major social problems such as AIDS, depression, and sexuality Coupland helped define an entire generation.

The World Changes

The universal oppression in Communist nations and the failure of Communist economies led to growing disenchantment with Communism. Communist regimes began collapsing across the world. Under Mikhail Gorbachev, head of the Communist Party and later President of the USSR, the Soviet Union began to crumble. He was unable to prevent the secession of the Baltic states, and communist hard-liners led an unsuccessful coup that nonetheless demonstrated the loss of most of Gorbachev's stature. Boris Yeltsin, a leader in the resistance against the coup, later became president of the Russian Federation. The Soviet parliament soon adjourned forever, and Gorbachev resigned. The world was at last free of the Cold War.

With the Soviet Union out of Central America and the neutralization of Castro due to the Union's demise, Bush was slowly able to advance American objectives in that region.

The decline of the Soviet Union also left the United States with increased influence in the Middle East. Bush was eager to serve peace by persuading Israel to return the Arab lands it seized in 1967. The Administration was also committed to sustaining the flow of inexpensive oil from the Persian Gulf.

Desert Shield

A stinger crew during Operation Desert Shield

Under Saddam Hussein, Iraqi forces invaded and quickly gained control of Kuwait on August 2, 1990. Bush immediately denounced the invasion as "naked aggression" and banned trade with Iraq, froze all Iraqi assets within the United States, and dispatched an aircraft-carrier group to the Persian Gulf. The UN Security Council unanimously condemned the invasion and demanded the withdrawal of Iraqi forces from Kuwait. On August 15, with the first American soldiers on their way to the Persian Gulf, Bush told Americans that Operation Desert Shield was under way to protect "access to energy resources" and thus "our jobs, our way of life." Most Americans supported the war. American troops began to build up in Saudi Arabia. On November 29 the Security Council authorized the use of "all necessary means" to expel Iraqi troops if they had not left Kuwait by January 15, 1991. Bush was assailed by the media and Democrats for sending 400,000 troops to the Persian Gulf without consulting Congress, for making war seem unavoidable, and for creating crisis in order to draw attention from the faltering economy.

On January 12, 1991, in a largely partisan vote, both chambers - the House 250 to 183, the Senate 53 to 46 - authorized Bush "to use United States armed forces" pursuant to the UN Security Council resolution.

Operation Desert Storm

Bombers fly over burning oil wells during Desert Storm

The U.S. and its coalition overwhelmed its enemy. From the start, the coalition had total command of the air. Within days, Iraqi communication systems, air bases, and antiaircraft defenses were obliterated by aircraft. Americans were quickly attacking strategic targets - power plants, bridges, and chemical, nuclear, and biological weapons facilities. From day eight, coalitions planes devastated the Iraqi army. On the second day, Hussein fired Scud missiles at Israel and Saudi Arabia, but none caused major damage. In late January the Iraqi release of thousands of gallons of Kuwaiti oil into the Persian Gulf polluted the waters of that area.

Bush warned Hussein that the coalition would force him out if he had not begun withdrawal by February 24. Coalition forces placed Iraqi forces in a squeeze they could not escape. Notably, fleeing Iraqi forces were attacked from the air, in an event that would later be known as the Highway of Death. The After 100 hours of ground warfare, Kuwait had been liberated, and the Baghdad area was besieged. The coalition had destroyed some 4,000 Iraqi tanks, more than 1,000 armored vehicles, and about 3,000 artillery pieces. In comparison, the coalition had lost only 4 tanks, 9 other vehicles, and 1 cannon. About 100,000 Iraqi troops were killed, and the coalition had suffered less than 200 deaths.

However, Saddam was still in control. Soon after the cease-fire, the Iraqi army put down a Shiite rebellion and forced Kurds in Iraq to flee to Iran and Turkey. United Nations inspections began. The media did little to inform Americans about the destruction of the Iraqi infrastructure, the foundation of a modernizing society, or about the millions of people left without electricity, running water, or sewage. Another concern was Hussein might also have wanted to invade Saudi Arabia. This was a huge concern because of the rich oil in Saudi Arabia. This would have given Hussein a huge and valuable resource for his army. The collaboration with Saudi Arabia and the United States made Hussein very angry. He thought it as cowardly.

Back to Usual Politics

Bush was closely aligned to Ronald Reagan in regard to social issues after his two terms as vice-president. As a Republican congressman from Texas, he was pro-choice, but when he ran for president, he opposed abortion, and he endorsed Supreme Court decisions weakening affirmative action in hiring and promotion. He consistently tried to make appointments to federal courts of judges that shared his own views about the First Amendment, abortion, and affirmative action. Bush named David Souter to replace Justice William Brennan on the Supreme Court, and he named Clarence Thomas to replace Justice Thurgood Marshall.

Bush called himself "the education president" and "the environment president." Bush called for a controversial program that would allow public money to follow children to public schools but it was not acted upon. Bush appointed performed and committed conservationists to the Environmental Protection Agency. At times he would take the side of business, and at other times he would take the side of ecologists. In 1989 he signed a law to ease the effects of acid rain, mandating a gradual 50 percent reduction in sulfur emissions from power plants burning coal, and it also required the automobile industry to increase gradually the production of cars using fuels other than gasoline or diesel oil. In 1991, Bush put forward an energy plan to open for exploration the Arctic Wildlife Refuge, some other Alaskan areas, and the continental shelf off the coasts of California and the Gulf of Mexico.

During 1989, economic growth in the United States slowed, and by the second half of 1990, most economists considered the economy in recession. Bush again proposed, as he had in 1989, lowering the capital gains tax, but Congressional Democrats balked. During talks, the White House backed down on capital gains and the two sides agreed on a budget package that included a steep increase in excise taxes, a small increase in Medicare charges, and a cut in Medicare spending. However, members of both parties in Congress rejected the solution. Finally, on October 29, 1991, the Congress at last approved an acceptable compromise. It lifted the top surtax rate from 28 to 31 percent, gradually phased out income-tax exemptions for upper-income taxpayers, and raised the tax on gasoline, cigarettes, and beer. It also imposed a luxury tax on expensive automobiles, boats, furs, and jewelry, and raised Medicare premiums. The Democrats committed Congress for five years to reduce expenditures both for the military and domestically. After the quick victory in the Persian Gulf, the administration anticipated a quick return of national growth, but the GNP did not pick up. Unemployment reached a four year high.

Rodney King

As police cracked down on gangs and Crack Cocaine users, tensions began to mount between police and urban communities. On April 29, 1992, the tensions reached their tipping point. A year earlier, Los Angeles resident Rodney King was pulled over and beaten by Los Angeles police. King, who had a history of drug and alcohol problems, initially led the police on a high speed chase going over 110 mph. When the chase finally came to an end, King attempted to flee from officers. Four white male officers pursued and brought down King. But instead of simply apprehending and cuffing King the four officers proceeded to kick and use batons to beat King within an edge of his life.

To many urban Americans the police brutality did not seem unfamiliar, with countless others facing similar treatment. The reason Rodney King's story was different was because a bystander, George Holliday, captured the assault on video. After news networks got hold of the video millions of Americans demanded for the officers to be jailed. When the officers finally were charged and faced trial the entire nation watched on. Then, on April 29, 1992, all four officers were acquitted of all charges. Urban Americans and the African Americans of Los Angeles were enraged.

Within hours of the verdict fires were started, homes and stores were looted, and people began being attacked all across Los Angeles. The riots were filmed by news networks and broadcast nationwide. No matter how many police squads were released the rioting raged on. The riots lasted for nearly a week as blacks expressed their angst over a continued oppression in America, an inequality between race, and an unwillingness by society to recognize and act on urban problems. The riots also caused strife between the local African American and Korean American communities. Over the week long riots 53 people were killed and over a billion dollars in damages was caused.

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  Destroyed building on Hollywood Boulevard.
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  Looting during the riots
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  Armed national guardsmen patrol the streets of LA.
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  The LA riots left parts of LA in ruins.

The Election of 1992

As the election campaign of 1992 began, the incumbent President, George Bush, held a commanding lead in the polls, over any and all potential rivals. Bush had been the Commander- In -Chief presiding over the most decisive American military victory since World War II, the Gulf War. Most of the leading democratic candidates declined to run. After a long primary process Bill Clinton, the then governor of Arkansas, was selected as the Democratic candidate.

Governor Bill Clinton of Arkansas became the apparent leader among the Democratic candidates for the 1992 election. By late April, Clinton had a commanding lead and delegates and was running evenly with Bush in public opinion polls. Rioting in central Los Angeles arose following the verdict of a suburban jury that found Los Angeles policemen not guilty of using undue force in beating a black motorist they had arrested.

From the time of the Democratic convention, Governor Clinton obtained a commanding lead in the polls over Bush. Bush's campaign was hobbled by troubled economy. The campaign revolved primarily around economic issues. The end of the cold war, which the Republicans took credit for, perversely worked against them. No longer could they use the issue of "Do you trust the Democrats to stand up to the Russians" against them. The third party candidacy of Ross Perot was a true wild card in the campaign.

The 1992 Electoral College results

The polls showed extreme disenchantment with both candidates, and H. Ross Perot, a Texas billionaire, organized a run as a Reform Party nominee. Perot appealed to conservatives by speaking out against taxes, deficits, and adultery, but he was pro-choice and had a tolerant attitude toward homosexuality. He also appealed to traditionally Democratic voters by being an outspoken opponent of NAFTA (a free-trade agreement). He remained evasive about his economic and social agenda, and becoming uncomfortable with the probings of the media, he withdrew from the election, only to return in October. Perot's entrance into the race reflected the impatience of the electorate with politics and their dissatisfaction with the major parties. Perot was also able to gain such a level of support because he was allowed to participate in all three Presidential debates. Incumbents at every level were worried, and an unprecedented number of members of Congress chose not to seek reelection. Bush and Quayle stressed "family values." Bush called for across-the-board tax cuts, and public opinion polls revealed the closeness of the race.

The Clinton camp began to use the famous slogan "It's the economy, stupid!" and he was successful in presenting his theme of change. Clinton won an overwhelming majority in the Electoral College (370 to 168) but received only 43 percent of the popular vote.

William Jefferson Clinton

William Jefferson Clinton

President of the United States of America. William Jefferson Clinton was born on August 19, 1946, in Hope, Arkansas, a small town with a population of about 8,000. His father, William Jefferson Blythe, died in a car crash several months before Clinton was born, leaving him in the care of his mother, Virginia Cassidy Blythe. In order to provide for her son, Virginia moved to New Orleans, Louisiana, to complete two years of nursing school, while Clinton stayed with his grandparents, Eldridge and Edith Cassidy. Clinton's grandparents were strict disciplinarians who instilled in him the importance of a good education. "My grandparents had a lot to do with my early commitment to learning," he later recalled. "They taught me to count and read. I was reading little books when I was three."

William Jefferson Clinton became the 42nd President of the United States in 1992, signaling a generational change. He was the first Democrat in over 50 years to win a second term and presided over the longest peace time economic expansion in history. He was an activist, progressive president (of a breed of politicians which he called the "New Democrats") who stayed constantly surrounded by controversy.

Bill Clinton was born William Jefferson Blythe in Hope, Arkansas and was raised in Hot Springs, Arkansas. In 1950, Clinton's mother remarried to Roger Clinton, Clinton's natural father having been killed in an automobile accident, three months before his son's birth. Roger Clinton was an alcoholic gambler who would beat his wife and Clinton's half-brother also named Roger.

Clinton's Domestic Agenda

Clinton had a very progressive agenda, which included ending the recession of the early 90s, health care reforms, and domestic reforms. Clinton, working with the Republican Congress, helped narrow the deficit by cutting spending and increasing taxes on the wealthiest Americans. On the issue of health care, Clinton wanted to stop the rising costs of health care and provide the estimated 39 million uninsured Americans with health insurance. He created a task force, headed by his wife, Hillary Clinton, to deal with the problem, but critics attacked the plan. They worried that the plan was too expensive and too complicated. Congress would never vote on Clinton's plan, and his health care effort would die.

Clinton was able to succeed in other efforts, though. Despite opposition, Clinton was able to pass the Brady Bill (named after James Brady, who was crippled after being shot in the Ronald Reagan assassination attempt), which created a mandatory waiting period in which gun vendors could check a buyer's criminal background before a buyer could receive his gun. A 1994 crime bill complemented the bill by banning 19 kinds of assault weapons and creating 100,000 new police jobs.

Clinton was also able to push Congress to pass the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), despite strong opposition from labor unions (which, ironically, are the strongest source of Democrat support). The agreement would provide lower costs for consumers in many markets, due to increased trading with Mexico and Canada.

The Third Way

Clinton is a supporter of the Third Way, or Radical center, a centrist political philosophy of governance that embraces a mix of market and interventionist philosophies. The Third Way rejects both socialism and laissez-faire approaches to economic governance, but chiefly stresses technological development, education, and competitive mechanisms to pursue economic progress and governmental objectives. Third way philosophies have been described as a synthesis of capitalism and socialism by its proponents.

In the United States, Third Way adherents emphasize fiscal conservatism, some replacement of welfare with workfare, and a stronger preference for market solutions to traditional problems (as in pollution markets), while rejecting pure laissez-faire economics and other libertarian positions. The Third Way style of governing was firmly adopted and partly redefined during the Administration of President Bill Clinton.

After Tony Blair came to power in the UK, Clinton, Blair and other leading Third Way adherents organized conferences to promote the Third Way in 1997 at Chequers in England. The Democratic Leadership Council are adherents of Third Way politics.

In 2004, several veteran U.S. Democrats founded a new Washington, DC organization entitled Third Way, which bills itself as a "strategy center for progressives." John Kerry of 2004 U.S. Democrats Presidential candidate is also considered to be third way politician, as are 2008 U.S. Democratic candidates Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama.

Keeping Peace

During the Clinton administration, keeping peace in other parts of the world was a priority. When the President of Haiti, Jean-Bertrand Aristide, was overthrown by violent dictators, Clinton sent troops to Haiti to pressure the new dictators to step down and to help slow the tidal wave of Hatian refugees fleeing to Florida. They did step down, and Aristide's power was restored.

Another challenge to peace was a bloody civil war that had erupted in Yugoslavia, part of the Balkan peninsula in Europe. Bosnia-Herzegovina, Slovenia, and Croatia all declared independence from Yugoslavia, but many Serbs (from Serbia, a part of Yugoslavia) still lived in those areas, and Yugoslavia fought to hold onto parts of Bosnia and Croatia. As America became aware of the atrocities of the war, Clinton arranged peace talks in Dayton, Ohio, and the Serbs, the Croats, and the Bosnians signed a peace agreement in December 1995. Eventually, another conflict would arise in the region during Clinton's second term.

1994 Midterm Elections

During the 1994 midterm Congressional elections, Republicans presented a plan called the "Contract with America." The contract detailed the actions Republicans would take upon becoming the majority party in Congress. This charge was led by Newt Gingrich. The GOP plan was a success, winning the Republicans a majority in the House for the first time in 40 years, and a Republican majority in the Senate. The massive success became known as the Republican Revolution.

In retrospect, the Republicans' dramatically large gains can be attributed to many things. A larger than average number of incumbents retired, and thus there was a larger number of open seat races, which are far easier to switch parties. Additionally, the previously Democratic-controlled House had been plagued by a scandal since before the 1992 election. The scandal implicated far more Democrats than Republicans and can in part be blamed for the large number of open seats. Historians and political scientists also point to President Clinton's resounding failure to pass his universal healthcare plan in a Democratic-controlled congress. The plan had been a large part of his 1992 campaign and was to be the cornerstone of his first-term agenda. The defeat likely demoralized Democratic voters, who ended up turning out in low numbers.

1996 Election

The 1996 electoral college results.

Clinton easily won Democratic renomination in 1996. His opponent was Kansas senator Bob Dole, who had served in Congress since 1961. Dole claimed that he could lower taxes by 15 percent and that Clinton was an unethical president. Clinton said that Dole would ruin the environment and reverse the progress that Clinton had made with Medicare. Ross Perot ran again; he did not qualify for the debates, but put on infomercials.

Clinton won the election in a near-landslide, while Perot received far fewer votes than he did in 1992. Despite Clinton's victory, Democrats did not fare well in the congressional elections. Republicans gained two seats in the Senate, giving them a 55-45 majority. Even though Democrats gained 11 seats in the House, Republicans still held a 226-207 majority. Independents held two seats. Republicans had total control of Congress.

Conflict in Kosovo

Members of the KLA handing over their weapons to American troops.

After 1995, it seemed that things would stay relatively quiet in the Balkans. But a series of events would lead to rampant political instability within Yugoslavia and eventually a civil war. Kosovo, a province of Serbia (which was a part of Yugoslavia) was home to a large number of Albanians (from the neighboring Albania), who were actually the ethnic majority in the area. In the late eighties and early nineties, the Serbian leader Slobodan Milosevic passed laws that eliminated Kosovo's constitutional rights and oppressed Albanians. In 1991, Kosovo voted to break away from Yugoslavia. Although Yugoslavia claimed that the vote was illegal, things in the area stayed relatively quiet until April 1996, when a mysterious organization known as the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) began attacking Serbian civilians.

Eventually, the attacks on civilians caused hundreds of thousands of people to flee Kosovo. Serbians viewed the KLA as a group of terrorists, and retaliated. As the violence became bloodier and bloodier, more and more refugees began to flee into Macedonia, and tensions between the refugee Albanians and the native Macedonian Slavs grew, and a possible civil war loomed. A civil war in Macedonia would have been catastrophic to the already damaged stability and security of the area, and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization concluded that intervention was needed.

A coalition of NATO members, headed by the United States, began a bombing campaign on March 24, 1999. The goal of the campaign was to force the Serbs to leave Kosovo so that the Albanian refugees could return to their homes. Initially, the bombing caused a mass Albanian exodus from Kosovo, with the U.N. reporting that over 850,000 Albanians had fled from Kosovo to Albania or Macedonia. Milosevic would not step down until June, when Finnish and Russian negotiators convinced him that NATO was serious in its goal and that Russia (a long time protector of Slavic people) would not step in to protect Yugoslavia. On June 10, the bombings ended, and an occupation of the area by U.N. and NATO peacekeeping troops began. Kosovo lay in ruins and hundreds of thousands of people were displaced.

The Monica Lewinsky Scandal

President Clinton and Monica Lewinsky in 1997.

The Monica Lewinsky Scandal was a scandal involving President Bill Clinton and a young White House intern named Monica Lewinsky. Bill Clinton had a relationship that was sexual in nature with the intern and lied about it in court. The catalyst of the scandal were the tape recordings of Linda Tripp and Lewinsky discussing Lewinsky's relationship with Clinton, conversations recorded by Tripp. Monica Lewinsky was a young twenty two year old who interned at the White House only about two years later her and President Clinton were accused of having an affair. After the news got out President Clinton had a televised speech and stated "I did not have sexual relations with that woman." This caused a huge controversy and many people began to make political jokes using Clinton's bold statement.

Initially, the Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr was investigating President and Mrs. Clinton's role in the Whitewater scandal, which led to the investigation of the Lewinsky affair after Attorney-General Janet Reno granted Starr authority to probe the affair. The incident that led to the advancement of the scandal was the procurement of the tapes of Linda Tripp and Lewinsky discussing her relationship with Clinton, by Starr from Tripp. There does not appear to be any evidence that Starr sought the tapes out or knew of their existence, rather it was perhaps Linda Tripp who handed them over freely to Starr.

US Senate in session during the impeachment trial.

On February 12, 1999, the US Senate voted on the Articles of Impeachment requiring a two-thirds majority, or 67 votes, to convict. On Article 1, which charged that the President willfully provided perjurious, false and misleading testimony to the grand jury" in relation to the Paula Jones lawsuit, 45 Senators voted for guilty and removal from Office, and 55 for not-guilty and no removal from Office. On Article II, which charged that the President "prevented, obstructed, and impeded the administration of justice", 50 Senators voted for guilty and 50 for not-guilty. In his testimony, Clinton denied having had an affair with Monica S. Lewinsky, an unpaid intern and later a paid staffer at the White House, in 1995–96. Lewinsky had earlier, in a deposition in the same case, also denied having such a relationship. Kenneth Starr, the independent counsel in the Whitewater case, had previously received tape recordings made by Linda R. Tripp (a former coworker of Lewinsky's) of telephone conversations in which Lewinsky described her involvement with the president. Asserting that there was a “pattern of deception,” Starr obtained from Attorney General Janet Reno permission to investigate the matter.

The president publicly denied having had a relationship with Lewinsky and charges of covering it up. His adviser Vernon Jordan denied having counseled Lewinsky to lie in the Jones case, or having arranged a job for her outside Washington, to help cover up the affair. Hillary Clinton claimed that a “vast right-wing conspiracy” was trying to destroy her husband, while Republicans and conservatives portrayed him as immoral and a liar.

Despite the scandal many still hold firm that Clinton's presidency was a success. He was the first president since the depression to have consecutive quarters without a deficit. His two terms were a success for the economy after George H.W. Bush's tenure. Clinton also avoided any major wars. Kosovo was the largest military action, but did not involve ground troops.

Disasters

Oklahoma City Bombing

Aftermath of the tragic event.

At 9:02 a.m. on April 19, 1995, a truck bomb exploded near the Alfred P. Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City, pulverizing nearly the entire north face of the 9-story building into dust and rubble. It took weeks of sorting through debris to find the victims. 168 people were killed, including 19 children, as the building housed a day-care center. This was the deadliest act of terrorism on US soil until September 11, 2001.

Although militant groups based in the Middle East were initially seen as the likely perpetrators, a native-born white American named Timothy McVeigh was soon arrested and charged with the crime. McVeigh, a veteran of the Persian Gulf War, would subsequently be put on trial and sentenced to death. Also implicated in the crime was McVeigh's army friend Terry Nichols, who was convicted in a separate trial and sentenced to life in prison. The attack was said to be motivated in part by the siege in Waco, Texas, which culminated in a fire which killed 80 Branch Davidians on April 19, 1993. This was said to be McVeigh's reason for attacking on April 19.

In September 1994, McVeigh purchased large amounts of fertilizer (ammonium nitrate) and then stored it in a rented shed in Herington, Kansas. The ammonium nitrate was the main ingredient for the bomb. McVeigh and Nichols reportedly stole other supplies needed to complete the bomb from a quarry in Marion, Kansas.

On April 17, 1995, McVeigh reportedly rented a Ryder truck, and on the following day he and Nichols reportedly loaded the Ryder truck with approximately 5,000 pounds of ammonium nitrate fertilizer. McVeigh related to biographers that on the morning of April 19, he drove the Ryder truck to the Murrah Federal Building, lit the bomb's fuse, parked in front of the building, left the keys inside the truck and locked the door, then walked across the parking lot to an alley, and started to jog.

McVeigh was executed by lethal injection on June 11, 2001. In a direct quote McVeigh stated that he was "sorry" people died - but added, "That's the nature of the beast."

Questions persist regarding the full extent of the conspiracy to bomb the Murrah building. Although McVeigh and Nichols were the only ones ever charged with the attack, and Nichols was by all accounts at home in Kansas at the time of the actual blast, several witnesses reported seeing McVeigh in the company of at least one other person on the morning of the bombing. A "John Doe" was reportedly seen exiting the Ryder truck after it was parked next to the building. As well, Nichols was known to have traveled to the Philippines on at least five occasions, and was reported by one witness to have met there with international terrorist Ramzi Yousef, who was himself later arrested and convicted of masterminding the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center in New York City. More generally, those who argue for a wider conspiracy question whether McVeigh and Nichols working by themselves had the ability to produce such a large and powerful explosive device.

Columbine High School Massacre

Video of President Clinton remarking on the Columbine High School Massacre.

On April 20, 1999, Colorado's Columbine High School was the site of a deadly rampage by two students, who killed twelve classmates, a teacher, and themselves; approximately twenty-three others were injured. While school shootings were not unknown in the U.S., this level of carnage stood out at the time. The assailants were eighteen-year-old Eric Harris and seventeen-year-old Dylan Klebold, who had reportedly planned the attack for a year with hopes of killing hundreds. In addition to firearms, Klebold and Harris brought many explosive devices to the scene, including two propane bombs meant to detonate in the cafeteria during the lunch period. Though there were minor explosions, all fifteen deaths resulted from gunshots. The killers left behind videos in which they discussed their deadly plans and target practiced with old bowling pins. This massacre raised a lot of concern over youth violence and access to guns.

Technology

Personal computers continued to gain popularity during the 1990's, especially with the rise of the world wide web and internet access. Email and instant messaging became popular.

The 1990's saw the first digital cell phones, which were much more affordable and smaller than their analog predecessors. Digital Cameras also emerged on the mass consumer market, allowing people to ditch film for more convenient digital files, though it would be some time before they were considered a quality replacement for film.

Legislation and government efforts affecting digital civil rights started to become notable during the 1990's, with the Clipper chip and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act being notable examples of government action taken during this time.

GPS became fully operational in 1995, allowing for anyone to know precisely where they were anywhere on the planet with a good view of the sky.

In 1997 IBM's Deep Blue computer beat world chess champion Garry Kasparov after loosing its first game in 1996 during widely publicized games.

The end of the 1990's saw the launch of the international space station, a multinational collaboration between the American, Russian, European, and Japanese space agencies.

The Year 2000 problem was expected to cause massive computer failures, causing many organizations to overhaul their computer systems. Little happened once the year 2000 came along, possibly as a result of the massive effort to patch systems.

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  A General Motors EV1, the first mass produced electric automobile with a modern design.
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  An Apple Powerbook from 1991.
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  An IBM desktop computer from 1995, typical of the era.
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  An iMac desktop computer from the late 1990's
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  A Motorola StarTAC cell phone.

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  Many government institutions set up websites during this time. Pictured in the White House website in 1995.
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  Unlaunched GPS Block II Satellite
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  Deep Blue computer modules
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  The International Space Station in September of 2000.

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George W. Bush, September 11, 2nd Gulf War, and Terrorism (2001-2006)

President George W. Bush

2000 Election

The 2000 Presidential Election electoral college results.

As Clinton's presidency came to a close, Democratic voters chose Al Gore, Clinton's vice president, as their nominee. Republicans chose George W. Bush, the governor of Texas and son of former President George H.W. Bush.

With 25 electoral votes, Florida emerged as an important battleground state. Florida had traditionally been a Democratic-leaning state, but explosive population growth in the late nineties had brought many social and economic conservative Cubans to southern Florida. The growth had left Florida very evenly split among the parties.

On election night, the news media outlets first called Florida for Gore; this appeared to substantially diminish Bush's prospects for victory. This call was retracted, however, when the actual returns did not line up with the exit polls. Florida was eventually called for Bush, but this too was retracted when the vote tightened. Florida law provided for an automatic recount when votes differ by such a small margin, and when Florida decided that Bush had won, Gore sued to force further recounts in several Florida counties. Bush counter-sued, and the case went to the Supreme Court of the United States. In a 5-4 decision, the Court decided that the state of Florida must recount all the ballots in all the Florida counties and not just those for which Gore had sued, in accordance with the Equal Protection Clause of the U.S. Constitution. As Florida was required by the Florida Constitution to certify its election within days of the Court's decision, there was not enough time to recount the entire state. Thus, the final state count stood, with Bush winning Florida by 537 votes. The electoral vote was thus 271-267 in favor of Bush, who thus won the presidency despite losing the national popular vote.

Bush's First Four Years

9/11 and its Aftermath

President George W. Bush addresses the nation following the attacks.

Less than a year later, on September 11, 2001, terrorists hijacked four airline jets. At 8:46 a.m., the first plane crashed into the 110-story North Tower of the World Trade Center, and seventeen minutes later the South Tower was hit by a second plane, resulting in a huge explosion and a fire. In just two hours, both of the buildings collapsed, killing thousands, including hundreds of firefighters and police officers responding to the catastrophe. At 9:37, a third plane was flown into the Pentagon, the U.S. military headquarters in Arlington, Virginia, which sustained a huge hole in its west side. A fourth hijacked airliner crashed in Pennsylvania, perhaps as a result of resistance by the passengers. It appeared to have been heading in the direction of Washington, D.C., and its intended target is believed to have been either the U.S. Capitol building or the White House. Approximately 3000 people died in what came to be known as "9/11", making it the deadliest ever attack on the country by a foreign enemy.

Responsibility for the attacks was soon attached to Osama Bin Laden, the leader of al-Qaeda, an Islamic terrorist network with training camps in Afghanistan. Bin Laden's exact grievances have been debated, but include US military presence in major Islamic nations and US support of Israel. There had been many smaller terrorist attacks aimed towards Americans by al-Qaeda before 2001, including the bombing of US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998.

The attacks, while devastating and deadly, abruptly ended the period of sharp division after the 2000 election. Many world leaders and countries expressed solidarity with the American people following the attacks. Soon after the attacks, U.S. President George W. Bush declared a “war on terrorism,” warning countries that harbored terrorists would face the full power of the U.S. military. The United States charged Al Qaeda with responsibility and demanded that the Taliban turn over bin Laden and the Al Qaeda leadership, and dismantle terrorist training camps in Afghanistan. In October, the United States and Great Britain launched an attack on the Taliban and terrorists within Afghanistan. The Taliban government quickly collapsed and many Al Qaeda leaders were captured or killed, though Bin Laden would remain at large for nearly ten years. Bin Laden’s role in enabling the attacks appeared to be confirmed by videotapes in which he said that the September 11th attacks had been even more destructive than he had hoped they would be. In the weeks following September 11, a series of letter containing anthrax spores went through the mail in the United States, ultimately killing five people. No evidence was found to link the anthrax to Al Qaeda, but the anthrax scares contributed to an atmosphere of uncertainty and even panic. In response to the September 11th attacks, security has been considerably tightened on airplanes, in buildings, and in public areas. U.S. authorities detained hundreds of people whose actions or immigration status made them appear questionable, and Bush created special military tribunals that could try foreign nationals accused of terrorism.

The attacks also shook the worldwide economy. Stocks tumbled when the New York Stock Exchange reopened the week following the attacks. The travel industry also declined because fewer Americans wanted to fly (due to the nature of the 9/11 attacks). In the immediate aftermath of the September 11 attacks, the United States and other countries around the world were placed on a high state of alert against potential follow-up attacks. Civilian air travel across the U.S. and Canada was — for the first time ever — almost completely suspended for three days with numerous locations and events affected by closures, postponements, cancellations, and evacuations. Other countries imposed similar security restrictions. In the United Kingdom, for instance, civilian aircraft were forbidden to fly over London for several days after the attack. Many airlines went bankrupt. A recession, following the economic boom during Bill Clinton's second term, was exacerbated by the attacks.

The World Trade Centers were occupied by a lot of firms conducting key economic activities (e.g., stock trading). As a result of the attacks the stock market began to decline. This had an impact on employment and decreased the amount of available jobs for Americans.

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  The 9/11 attacks caused a terrible loss of innocent lives.
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  Smoke pouring out of the World Trade Center, stunning New Yorkers, the Nation, and the World.
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  The collapse of the towers released a large cloud of debris on New York City.
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  Debris from the collapse caused extensive damage to surrounding areas.
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  A fireman yelling for rescue workers.
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  Debris from Flight 77 at the Pentagon.
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  The Flight 93 crash site in Pennsylvania.
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  Missing persons flyers in the aftermath of the attacks.
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  Sympathy display in November of 2001 in remembrance of the victims and those affected by their loss.

The War on Terror

An American soldier in Afghanistan providing security for a medical project.

Directly following the September 11th attacks, Congress drafted and overwhelmingly passed the USA PATRIOT Act, which was signed into law on October 26, 2001. The law, while forcing citizens to forfeit some rights, strengthened the government's ability to gather information and convict suspected terrorists. Hundreds of accused terrorists have been charged and approximately half have been convicted. There have, however, been reports of abuse of the law, which went under reexamination by Congress in 2005.

In response to the attacks, the United States declared a symbolic war on terrorism. The first target in the war was Afghanistan, where the Taliban government was believed to be hiding Bin Laden and al-Qaeda. After the Taliban refused to turn Bin Laden over, American and British forces began bombing strategic Taliban centers on October 7. The invasion was swift, and major fighting had ended by the middle of 2002. The Taliban government was eliminated, and the Afghanis soon participated in their first democratic processes in many years.

In his 2002 State of the Union address, Bush named Iraq, Iran, and North Korea as a part of the "Axis of Evil," a phrase he partially coined from the World War II Axis Powers. President Bush specifically named these three countries because they were all described as rogue states, either fostering terrorists or trying to obtain nuclear weapons.

The successful invasion of Afghanistan was the first time that the newly adopted Bush Doctrine had been carried out. The Bush Doctrine stated that there was no difference between a terrorist and one who fosters a terrorist, and that the U.S. would practice pre-emptive strikes against perceived threats to American security (acting alone if needed), as it was the United States' duty to spread freedom and democracy to the rest of the world.

War in Iraq

A UN weapons inspector working in Iraq in 2002

In the middle of 2002, the United Nations began focusing its attention on Iraq, as American and international intelligence agencies had intelligence indicating that Iraq possessed a number of Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD), as well as the ongoing capacity to produce them. The United Nations Security Council passed Resolution 1441, requiring Iraq to open up to U.N. weapons inspectors or else face "serious consequences." Two of the veto-wielding members (France and Russia) of the Security Council did not wish to use military force against Iraq, and promised to veto any resolution ordering such force.

As a result to a perceived security threat verified by intelligence (which has now been found to have been unreliable), President Bush and a number of allies, deemed by the President as the "coalition of the willing," began the invasion without U.N. sanction. On the night of March 17, 2003, President Bush gave Hussein and his two sons, Uday and Qusay, an ultimatum to leave Iraq in 48 hours or face an invasion. They refused. After the expiration of the deadline given by the President, the invasion of Iraq began. The invasion lasted only a short time, and the Iraqi government and military collapsed within three weeks.

Uday and Qusay Hussein were killed in a firefight with U.S. forces in July. Saddam Hussein was found in a spider-hole and captured on December 13. Weapons of Mass Destruction were never located in Iraq. Continued suicide bombings and the ongoing American casualties led to a steady decline in American popular support for the war.

The invasion of Iraq is considered by many to mark the end of the political unity following the September 11th attacks. Although both the public and Congress favored going to war by overwhelming majorities, a substantial minority expressed reservations about invading. Many feared that the administration lacked a plan for rebuilding once the war was over. Still others worried that an invasion would alienate U.S. allies. On February 15, just one month before the invasion commenced, millions protested worldwide, including hundreds of thousands in 150 U.S. cities.

Gay Marriage

Another key issue of the 2004 election was same-sex marriage. On November 18, 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that the banning of gay marriage is unconstitutional, thereby allowing gay marriage in that state. Following the Massachusetts ruling, California, Vermont, Maine, Hawaii, New Jersey, the District of Columbia, and Connecticut allowed for same-sex civil unions, reciprocal benefits, or domestic partnerships. In February 2004, President Bush called for a constitutional amendment defining marriage as between a man and a woman. The Senate looked into the issue, but only a minority supported the provision, while a two thirds majority is needed to pass an amendment in Congress. "The union of a man and a woman is the most enduring human institution, honored and encouraged in all cultures and by every religious faith," President Bush said. "Marriage cannot be severed from its cultural, religious and natural roots without weakening the good influence of society."

The gay rights movement took a major hit on Election Day, when seven states (Georgia, Arkansas, Michigan, North Dakota, Kentucky, Oklahoma, and Utah) made it unconstitutional for marriage, civil unions, or domestic partnerships between same-sex couples. Three more (Oregon, Mississippi, and Montana) made it illegal only for homosexuals to marry, and one more (Ohio) passed an amendment illegalizing any benefits whatsoever for homosexual couples.

2004 Election

John Kerry

As the incumbent, Bush was unopposed for the 2004 Republican nomination. On the Democratic side, presumed favorites Hillary Clinton and Al Gore both declined to run. With the field wide open, ten Democrats sought their party's nomination. Former Vermont governor Howard Dean emerged as the front-runner, and received Gore's endorsement. However, Massachusetts senator John F. Kerry managed to win the Iowa Caucus, and rode the momentum from there.

Kerry chose North Carolina Senator John Edwards, ostensibly the Democratic candidate who received second place in terms of delegates, as his running mate. Kerry was recognized as a liberal Senator - he openly supported gay rights and same sex civil unions, was pro-choice and supported embryonic stem cell research, and opposed drilling in Alaska for oil. The Bush campaign targeted Kerry as a "flip-flopper," a term coined by the campaign to indicate that the Senator from Massachusetts changed his position constantly. The flip-flopping label was directed particularly toward Kerry's positions on the war in Iraq. In regard to a bill that passed the United States Senate providing $87 billion in funding to the war, Senator Kerry made the remark that "I actually voted for the eighty-seven billion - before I voted against it." The Bush campaign took advantage of this remark and used it as the epicenter of their flip-flopping campaign against the Senator.

The 2004 Presidential election electoral college results. Red indicates electoral votes for Bush, and Blue indicates electoral votes for Kerry.

With Bush and Kerry running close in the polls, it appeared that the election might come down to Florida or Ohio. Bush won both, widening his margin of victory in Florida this time around. As there appeared to be no doubt about the outcome, Kerry conceded on the following day. The final electoral vote total was 286 for Bush and 251 for Kerry (with one Minnesota elector casting a ballot for John Edwards for both President and Vice President). Additionally, Republicans strengthened their hold in both houses of Congress, particularly increasing their majority in the Senate to 55-44. The strengthening of the control of the Senate would be important to the Republicans in the following year.

The Start of a New Term

Social Security

Created in 1935, Social Security OASDI is a government program that provides most seniors with a steady income based on the real value of their prior earnings, funded by a 6.2% tax on each workers' pay and and on each employers' payrolls. Surpluses are held in Treasury securities in special Trust Funds which are credited with interest. The surplus is projected by government actuaries to peak around 2018 or 2019 and then to decline until the Trust Funds are exhausted in sometime between 2042 and 2052.

In the latter part of his first term and in his 2004 campaign, Bush focused on the issue of Social Security, and how to prevent its bankruptcy. He proposed a plan to have young workers set up stock funds which might turn out to produce better retirement benefits than OASDI but would not solve the system deficits. Many experts expect that the only long-term solution is a tax increase of about 2 percent of payroll, or a government subsidy of the same size.

Cabinet Replacements

At the start of his second term, Bush's cabinet saw significant changes. Colin Powell departed as Secretary of State, replaced by National Security Advisor Condoleeza Rice, the first African American female to hold the position. Alberto Gonzales replaced John Ashcroft as attorney general the first Mexican American to hold this post. Tom Ridge, former Governor and Vietnam War hero, also resigned from the post of Secretary of Homeland Security. Michael Chertoff, a Justice Department official, took his place.

The Double Vacancy on the Supreme Court

Rehnquist portrait as an Associate Justice in 1972.

In October, 2004, William H. Rehnquist was diagnosed with thyroid cancer. In July, 2005, he informed the press that he would remain on the Court as long as his health permitted.

Despite all expectations, Sandra Day O'Connor ended up being the first member of the Court to retire. Prior to O'Connor's retirement, the Court had consisted of three conservatives, five liberals, while O'Connor was the Court's swing vote. In many cases relating to restrictions on abortion, affirmative action, and detention of unlawful combatants, O'Connor had been the deciding vote. Liberals feared the replacement of O'Connor with a conservative, while conservatives realized that the replacement of O'Connor would leave them only one vote away from a majority on the Court.

John Roberts

Chief Justice John G. Roberts

On July 19, President Bush nominated John Roberts, a judge serving on the US Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia, to fill the vacancy created by O'Connor. Liberals were for the most part against the Roberts nomination, claiming that he would be far to the right of O'Connor. Conservatives had mixed reactions, based on quotes he had made concerning Roe v. Wade.

On September 3, 2005, Chief Justice William H. Rehnquist died of complications from thyroid cancer, creating a double vacancy. On September 6, President Bush withdrew the nomination of Roberts to the office of Associate Justice and instead nominated him to be Chief Justice. The Senate Judiciary Committee began holding hearings for John Roberts on September 12. On September 22, the Committee voted 13-5 to approve the Roberts nomination. On September 29, the Senate confirmed the nomination of John Roberts to the Supreme Court by a vote of 78-22. Hours later, Associate Justice John Paul Stevens swore him in as the seventeenth Chief Justice of the United States.

Samuel Alito

Having successfully nominated John Roberts to the Supreme Court, Bush now turned his attention back to filling O'Connor's vacancy. On October 3, 2005, he chose the White House Counsel, Harriet Miers. Miers withdrew her nomination on October 27, 2005, after weeks of criticism. On the morning of October 31, 2005, President Bush announced the nomination of a Circuit Court judge named Samuel Alito.

Samuel Alito acknowledges his nomination, with President George W. Bush looking on.

Conservatives were quick to applaud President Bush for nominating Alito to the Court, and liberals were quick to oppose the new nomination. Conservatives saw in him a competent judge who would develop a truly conservative reputation on the Court and oppose Roe v. Wade. Unlike with the Miers nomination, Bush's conservative base was mostly in support of the Alito nomination.

On January 24, 2006, the nomination of Samuel Alito was approved by the Committee, and the Senate debates began the next day. On January 31, 2006, Samuel Alito was confirmed by the Senate by a vote of 58-42. Thereafter, Sandra Day O'Connor officially retired. Samuel Alito was sworn in as the 110th Associate Justice hours later. The next day, he was ceremonially sworn in.

Souring Public Mood

A confluence of events, beginning at the end of 2005, began to turn public opinion against the Bush Administration and the Republican-controlled congress, and, as many argue, toward the opposition Democrats in the 2006 election year.

Hurricane Katrina

The summer of 2005 saw a very active hurricane season, with a total of five hurricanes striking the Gulf Coast. Of these, on August 29, Hurricane Katrina, struck New Orleans as a strong, 'category three' hurricane, breached the levees on Lake Pontchartrain, flooding the city, devastated the surrounding coasts of Alabama, Mississippi, and to a lesser extent, the already struck Florida panhandle (it also struck South Florida, but the effects were far less than those seen in the Gulf). The catastrophic flooding and subsequent responses from all levels of the government highlighted many far reaching deficiencies in the government's ability to protect the country in times of disaster.

An aerial view of the flooding in part of the Central Business District of New Orleans. The Louisiana Superdome is at center.

Mistakes at the state and local levels were made primarily before the storm. The most glaring mistake made by the state of Louisiana was its issuance of evacuation orders, but no provision of transportation for the estimated 120,000 poor, elderly, and sick unable to leave the inner city. After the storm struck, governor Kathleen Blanco's (of Louisiana) alleged refusal to give control of the state's National guard troops to the President caused the rampant looting crisis in the city to be firmly her responsibility. She did not commit herself to fighting the looting in the city until September 2, nearly five days after landfall.

But by far, most criticism was directed towards the federal response and the Bush Administration. The American people, aided by angry criticism from the news media, perceived the response as proof that America was woefully unprepared for another disaster, even after the governmental reforms following 9/11. President Bush did not survey the disaster area until August 31, and was criticized by the media for treating the disaster too casually. President Bush is famously quoted as saying "Brownie, you're doing one heck of a job." This was the same day that Michael Brown, head of the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) and the man he was referring to, told reporters that he and the federal government were unaware of the horrific conditions in the Louisiana Superdome (the primary shelter for those unable to evacuate), even though the news media had been reporting on them for days.

The result of the storm was a realization by the American people that disaster relief agencies were unprepared for what they were created to do. President Bush's approval dropped to its lowest point during his entire presidency, and he was accused of cronyism for hiring unqualified officials to the Department of Homeland Security. Congressional hearings to investigate the matter were to commence in the coming months.

Growing Scandal

In addition to complaints of cronyism, a multitude of scandals were brewing in Washington. The CIA Leak scandal ("Plamegate") involved pre-Iraq War intelligence. Joseph C. Wilson, a former diplomat to African countries in previous decades, was recommended by his wife, CIA agent Valerie Plame, to investigate claims that Iraq was buying uranium from Niger. He alleges that he found no connection between the two countries, but President Bush said in his January 2003 State of the Union Address that "The British government has learned that Saddam Hussein recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa." That summer, Wilson wrote a column in the New York Times that was highly critical of this remark, and told reporters in several anonymous interviews that the Bush administration was misrepresenting intelligence. A few days after Wilson's column was published, the Washington Post published a column in its paper revealing the identity of the undercover Valerie Plame, thus ruining her career as an agent. Wilson claimed that high officials, namely Karl Rove, the President's chief of staff and a top Republican strategist, leaked her identity to the paper for "retribution" for Wilson's dissent.

I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby

Eventually, an investigation into the matter was opened up. It is illegal for high officials, elected or not, to leak classified information without going through a declassification process. A special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald of Illinois, was appointed to head the investigation. In 2005, he indicted Lewis "Scooter" Libby, Vice President Cheney's chief of staff, for perjury and obstruction of justice in the investigation. Later, Libby testified that he was authorized by White House "superiors" to leak classified info regarding prewar intelligence. The investigation remained ongoing, and many speculated that Fitzgerald was aiming to indict a higher official for the actual investigated offense, leaking Plame's identity, rather than lying to investigators.

Meanwhile, investigations regarding lobbying and political corruption in Congress were ongoing. Jack Abramoff, a top Republican lobbyist, pleaded guilty in early 2006 to three felony charges related to his defrauding of his Native American tribe lobbying clients and tax evasion. He consented to enter a plea bargain in which he agreed to testify in related Congressional corruption investigations in return for a lesser sentence.

Late in 2005, the House Republican leader, Tom Delay, was indicted for conspiracy to violate election law, money laundering, and conspiracy to engage in money laundering. Because of the indictments, Republican house rules forced Delay to temporarily step down as majority leader. A judge threw out the election law violations, but upheld the other charges, causing the rest of Delay's caucus to successfully pressure him to permanently step down as majority leader. Eventually, Delay's heavy association with a litany of scandals forced him to resign from the House in order for his party to retain his congressional seat.

2006 Midterm Elections

The Democrats won back the House and the Senate. This mid-term election is notable for the fact that no incumbent Democrat vying for a national congressional position was voted from office. The Democratic party gained control of six Senate seats by defeating Republican senators in the states of Montana, Pennsylvania, Missouri, Rhode Island, Ohio, and Virginia. The Democrats gained a 51–49 majority in the Senate House by caucusing with independent senators. The Democratic party gained thirty House seats from the Republican party. This was the first time since the midterm elections of 1994, the Democratic Party gained control of both houses of the United States Congress.

Falling Dollar

The U.S. economy and its currency as an instrument of world trade has suffered a series of major setbacks in recent months. Some analysts say that the Federal Reserve's September 18th dramatic rate cut to 4.75% from 5.25% may be a case of "too little, too late", or that it was excessive and dooms the dollar.

On September 20, 2007, Saudi officials declined to cut interest rates in lockstep with the US Federal Reserve for the first time in decades. According to Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor for The Daily Telegraph, "it's a signal that the oil-rich Gulf kingdom is preparing to break the dollar currency peg in a move that risks setting off a stampede out of the dollar across the Middle East."

Hans Redeker, the Currency Chief at BNP Paribas, stated that Saudi Arabia's move to not adjust their own interest rates in sync with the Fed's cuts is a very dangerous situation for the US dollar. Redeker points out that "Saudi Arabia has $800bn (£400bn) in their future generation fund, and the entire region has $3,500bn under management. They face an inflationary threat and do not want to import an interest rate policy set for the recessionary conditions in the United States.

American consumers, meanwhile, stood to be hurt. A drooping dollar means that foreign imports should cost more, from Murano glassware to French candles, to the Middle Eastern oil that powers the boats that bring all this stuff to America.

Advancing Technology

Technology in this era saw large refinements, following trends from previous years.

The 2001 antitrust case United States v. Microsoft Corp. was a significant antitrust action, before it was settled.

By the mid 2000's flat screen televisions and monitors became readily available, as had digital video recorders and other advancements in entertainment. Cell phones continued to advance, with many phones adding cameras and additional features during this time. 2007 saw the launch of the iPhone, one of the first smartphones with a minimalist slate deign that found wide market success.

In April of 2003 the Human Genome Project was declared complete, creating a map of the human genome.

NASA's Mars Exploration rovers landed in January 2004, with Spirit working till 2010, and Opportunity continuing to work diligently till 2018, both well past their expected service lives.

The 2004 DARPA Grand Challenge was one of the first major competitions meant to spur the development of autonomous vehicles. Though no vehicles successfully completed the 2004 course, the 2005 course did have winners.

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  Wikipedia in 2001, created by Americans Jimmy Wales and Larry Sanger.
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  An early self driving vehicle from the 2004 DARPA grand challenge.
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  An artist depiction of one of the martian rovers, which landed on Mars in 2004.
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  Mark Zuckerberg in 2005, who had launched Facebook the previous year while studying at Harvard.
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  The first iPhone on display in 2007.
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  Various iPods, popular media players during the 2000's.

Growing Crisis with Iran (2006-)

Operation Merlin

Operation Merlin is an alleged United States covert operation under the Clinton Administration to provide Iran with a flawed design for building a nuclear weapon in order to delay the Iranian nuclear weapons program.

In his book State of War, author and New York Times intelligence correspondent James Risen claims that the CIA chose a defected Russian nuclear scientist to provide deliberately flawed nuclear warhead blueprints to Iranian officials in February 2000. Operation Merlin backfired when the Russian scientist noticed the flaws and pointed them out to the Iranians. Instead, the book alleges, it may have accelerated Iran's nuclear program by providing useful information, once the flaws were identified. Critics' contention Risen's citation of Seymour Hersh as well as anonymous sources make the book's claims somewhat suspicious.

Modern Crisis

On August 14th 2002, Alireza Jafarzadeh revealed the existence of two nuclear sites (Natanz, Arak) previously unknown to the International Atomic Energy Agency. This had many people worried that Iran might, now or later, get the capability to make a nuclear bomb. Since the revelation, the so-called EU-3 (Germany, France and Britain) have tried to pressure Iran to abandoning uranium enrichment. However, Iran has shown no sign of backing down, and after a few "voluntary suspensions", it began enriching uranium yet again.

Ultimately, the IAEA referred Iran to the UN Security Council, the body that can impose sanctions on Iran, or even authorize military action against the country, if Iran does not comply with its demands. Thus far, the Security Council has only agreed on a presidential statement, the weakest action that the body can take, demanding that Iran halt uranium enrichment. After the 30-days deadline passed without compliance by Iran, talks between Europe, Russia, China and the United States have begun yet again about how to handle the Iranian issue. The chance of getting China and Russia, supporters of Iran, to agree with sanctions was slim, but the Bush administration decided to take a gamble. Breaking with nearly 30 years of policy (not recognizing the Iranian regime), the administration offered bilateral talks with Iran on the nuclear issue, if Iran would halt uranium enrichment. It also offered some Euro-American economic and technological incentives for Iran, and the implicit threat of sanctions, if Iran does not accept the deal. Currently, the Iranians are deciding whether or not to accept the offer. President George W. Bush has said that Iran has weeks, not months to accept or reject the deal.

Involvement in 9/11

In July of 2004, the 9/11 Commission unearthed evidence that Iran might have offered safe passage to Al-Qaeda members, who were later involved in the September 11th attacks. However, the CIA had found "no direct connection between Iran and the attacks of Sept. 11." Ultimately, the 9/11 Commission found that Iran did allow safe passage for Al-Qaeda members, but that it had no part in, and was probably not aware of the plot to strike New York and Washington.

Announcement of Enriched Uranium

Then on April 12, 2006, came the news that Iran had completed the enrichment of uranium and sought to increase the enrichment to create industrial grade uranium. What was next? Weapons grade uranium? Many people in the West feared that the United States was planning military action against Iran, in part because of the resemblance between Bush's diplomatic campaign against Iraq and Iran. Also, the American president's harsh rhetoric against Iran has contributed to that perception. Bush, in a State of the Union message, said that Iraq, Iran and North Korea were part of an "Axis of Evil." In the 2006 State of the Union speech, he had mentioned that he wanted Iran to become democratic and free, because the current theocratic dictatorship does not reflect the wishes of the people of Iran, according to Bush. However whether or not there was to be a war was yet to be seen. Bush has not ruled out an attack against Iran, but he is apparently trying to downplay it.

Enriched Uranium Matter

The matter about possible uranium enrichment in Iran was mentioned after the War in Iraq. Enrichment refers to the percentage of ²³⁸Uranium to ²³⁵Uranium.

Definition

Enriched uranium is a kind of uranium in which the percent composition of uranium-235 has been increased through the process of isotope separation. Natural uranium is 99.284% ²³⁸U isotope, with ²³⁵U only constituting about 0.711% of its weight. However, ²³⁵U is the only isotope existing in nature (in any appreciable amount) that is fissionable by thermal neutrons.

Enriched uranium is a critical component for both civil nuclear power generation and military nuclear weapons. The International Atomic Energy Agency attempts to monitor and control enriched uranium supplies and processes in its efforts to ensure nuclear power generation safety and curb nuclear weapons proliferation.

During the Manhattan Project enriched uranium was given the codename oralloy, a shortened version of Oak Ridge alloy, after the location of the plants where the uranium was enriched. The term oralloy is still occasionally used to refer to enriched uranium. There are about 2,000 metric tons of highly enriched uranium in the world, produced mostly for nuclear weapons, naval propulsion, and smaller quantities for research reactors.

The 238U remaining after enrichment is known as depleted uranium (DU), and is considerably less radioactive than even natural uranium, though still extremely dense. It is useful for armor- penetrating weapons, and other applications requiring very dense metals, though at the present time, only 5% of it is put to any use; the rest remains in storage at the enrichment facilities.

International View on Crisis

Russia and China so far are against any use of sanctions to make Iran abandon its enrichment program. Iran has always condemned U.S hegemony over it. Pakistan is afraid of U.S threats; otherwise it is also very close to Iran.

Arrest of Ramin Jahanbegloo

In May 2006, after he came back from India to Iran, he was arrested by the Iranian government, speculated to have a relation to his recent interview with a Spanish newspaper about Ahmadinejad's comments concerning the Holocaust.

On May 3, Iran judiciary branch officials confirmed that he has been arrested and now he is imprisoned in the Evin Prison. Additionally, an unconfirmed source told the Fars News Agency that he was charged with spying.

On May 4, a friend of his told CBC News that he has been transfered to a hospital.

On May 5, Human Rights Watch expressed concern about Ramin Jahanbegloo being detained without charge and stated that he must immediately be released.

On May 6, The Ottawa Citizen published an article containing concerns voiced by friends of Mr. Jahanbegloo that he was being tortured. These concerns become more urgent Friday, when it became known that Jahanbegloo had been examined twice in the medical clinic at Tehran's notorious Evin prison for political prisoners. Boston University Professor Houchang Chehabi, an Iranian friend of Mr. Jahanbegloo, indicated this was a "bad sign" because it "may mean he's been tortured..."

Kavoshgar-1

Omid in 2009

Kavoshgar-1 (Explorer-1) is the name of the first Iranian rocket type that is able to reach space. The first launch was conducted on February 4, 2008, as announced by state-run television (or maybe on February 25, 2007, as it is unknown if the two rockets launched are of the same type). Kavoshgar-1 is not, or not yet, able to carry a satellite, but only instruments to measure the higher atmosphere. The rocket launched on February 4, 2008, was a liquid propellant driven rocket, probably a derivate of the Shahab 3, that reached an orbit in space at an altitude of 200-250 km and successful returned science data according to the Iranian News Agency.

On February 19, 2008, Iran offered new information about the rocket and announced that Kavoshgar-1 is a two staged rocket. The first stage separated after 100 seconds and returned to earth with the help of a parachute. The second stage continued its ascend to the altitude of 200 kilometers. However it was not intended to reach orbital velocity.

UN Resolution

The U.N. Security Council imposed another round of sanctions on Iran for refusing to suspend uranium enrichment, but Iran defiantly vowed Monday to continue its nuclear program despite the nearly unanimous censuring vote.

The resolution authorized a third set of sanctions targeting individuals, companies and equipment that could be used in Iran's nuclear program. It was adopted on a vote of 14-0, with Indonesia abstaining.

Two previous sanctions resolution were adopted unanimously, but diplomats said this vote still sent a strong message to the Tehran government that there is global concern that Iran is trying to produce nuclear weapons. Iran insists the program is aimed only at generating power.

The council imposed limited sanctions in December 2006 and has been ratcheting them up in hopes of pressuring Iran to suspend enrichment and start negotiations on its nuclear program. Iran has repeatedly defied the demand and has stepped up enrichment activities.

Iranian Ambassador Mohammad Khazee said just before Monday's vote that his government would not comply with what he called "unlawful action" against Iran's "peaceful nuclear program." He said the Security Council was being "downgraded to a mere tool of the national foreign policy of just a few countries."

"Iran cannot and will not accept a requirement which is legally defective and politically coercive," Khazee said. "History tells us that no amount of pressure, intimidation and threat will be able to coerce our nation to give up its basic and legal rights."

Iran Expelled

Iran has been kicked out of an international defense show in Malaysia for exhibiting missile equipment in violation of U.N. rules, an official said Thursday.

Malaysian Deputy Prime Minister Najib Razak said Iranian companies were ordered out of the Defense Services Asia show Tuesday because their exhibition was deemed "offensive."

"Unfortunately, when we came around to inspecting their stand, they displayed equipment that clearly contravened the U.N. resolution — equipment such as missiles and missile systems and others," Najib told reporters.

"The moment they crossed the line, we had no option but to terminate them," Najib added.

Najib said the exhibit was in defiance of U.N. resolutions that ban Iranian arms exports and forbid countries from providing Iran with technical and financial assistance that could contribute to its alleged nuclear weapons program.

Iran is under three sets of U.N. Security Council sanctions for its refusal to suspend uranium enrichment and meet other council demands designed to ease fears that its civilian nuclear program is a cover for attempts to make atomic weapons.

Tehran has denied ever trying to make nuclear arms.

Complaint

Iran has lodged a formal protest at the United Nations about comments by Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton that the United States would “totally obliterate” Iran if it attacked Israel with nuclear weapons, the state-run IRNA news agency reported Thursday.

Iran’s deputy ambassador to the United Nations, Mehdi Danesh-Yazdi, sent a letter of protest on Wednesday to the United Nations secretary general and the United Nations Security Council denouncing the remarks, according to IRNA.

Mrs. Clinton made the comments in an interview on ABC last week. “I want the Iranians to know that if I’m the president, we will attack Iran,” she said when she was asked what she would do if Iran attacked Israel with nuclear weapons. “In the next 10 years, during which they might foolishly consider launching an attack on Israel, we would be able to totally obliterate them,” she added.

Mr. Danesh-Yazdi wrote in the letter that Mrs. Clinton’s comments were “provocative, unwarranted and irresponsible” and “a flagrant violation” of the United Nations charter, IRNA reported.

“I wish to reiterate my government's position that the Islamic Republic of Iran has no intention to attack any other nation,” the letter said.

Nonetheless “Iran would not hesitate to act in self-defense to respond to any attack against the Iranian nation and to take appropriate defensive measures to protect itself,” the letter added.

Secretary Rice

Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice raised fresh doubts Thursday about the nature of Iran's nuclear program, saying if the clerical state really wanted only an avenue to peaceful atomic energy it could quickly have it.

Instead, Iran is stonewalling on an attractive deal to trade away only the part of the program that could result in a nuclear weapon, Rice said ahead of a gathering of the U.N. nations that have presented a carrot-or-stick package to Iran.

"I continue to suspect this is not at all about a civil nuclear program," Rice told reporters traveling with her. Iran's insistence that it be able to enrich uranium on its terms seems at cross-purposes with that goal, Rice said.

"One has to wonder what is going on here."

U.S. intelligence agencies concluded in a report last year that Iran shelved an active weapons-development program years ago, a finding that undercut the Bush administration's claim that Iran was using a public energy development program to hide a secret drive for a bomb. An unclassified summary of the report, known as a National Intelligence Estimate, said Iran could resume a weapons program and might evade detection if it did. Rice did not say whether she thought that had happened and did not directly accuse Iran of lying.

Problem left to Successor

The United States and the European Union told Iran on Tuesday they were ready to impose more sanctions over its nuclear enrichment program.

But President George W. Bush acknowledged the limits of U.S. influence over Tehran and, in the twilight of his presidency, appeared resigned to leaving the standoff to his successor.

"I leave behind a multilateral framework to work on this issue," Bush said after a U.S.-EU summit at a Slovenian castle.

"A group of countries can send a clear message to the Iranians, and that is: We're going to continue to isolate you ... we'll find new sanctions if need be, if you continue to deny the just demands of the free world, which is to give up your enrichment program," he said.

He stopped short of repeating the U.S. position that all options, including military action, remain open. "Now is the time for there to be strong diplomacy," Bush said.

Iranian Responce to Election 2008

President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad of Iran told reporters during a trip to New Delhi, the Indian capital, that he believed neither Mrs. Clinton nor Barack Obama , the other Democratic presidential candidate, had a chance of winning the presidential election.

“Do you think a black candidate would be allowed to be president in the U.S.?” he asked, the semiofficial Mehr News Agency reported. “We don’t think Mr. Obama will be allowed to become the U.S. president,” he said.

Referring to Mrs. Clinton, he said: “Presidency of a woman in a country that boasts its gunmanship is unlikely.”

According to the Iranian

Also in the Iranian, an Iranian newsletter, it was said, "Her ideology has contributed to the nation's moral bankruptcy, the loss of over one million lives, and the depletion of America’s treasury. These neoliberals who have driven us into a quagmire, elaborated it would serve America’s interest to promote the Democratic peace theory. Scholars, university professors, and neoliberal jurists presented the concept that sovereignty, as it stood in international law did not provide immunity from attack to states engaging in systematic human rights abuses or amassing weapons of mass destruction. These would be considered ‘pariah’ states to be attacked by democratic coalitions with a warrant to liberalize them.3 Candidate Hillary comes from this stock. It seems that the only thing which differentiates her from McCain is the conduct of the war in Iraq, not the immoral and illegal war itself."

Gordon Brown on Iran and Israel

Gordon Brown threatened Iran with tougher sanctions as he became the first British prime minister to address the Israeli parliament.

At the conclusion of his first trip to Jerusalem as Premier, Mr Brown vowed that Britain would stand by Israel's side as it faced threats to its existence.

Condemning as "abhorrent" Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad's call for Israel to be wiped from the map, he said he would not stand by as Tehran sought to acquire nuclear weapons.

The Prime Minister also urged Israel to seize the opportunity of lasting peace with the Palestinians. He was heckled at one point as he raised again the need for Israelis to withdraw from settlements on Palestinian land - an issue over which he clashed with his opposite number, Ehud Olmert, on Sunday.

Mr Brown, who was greeted at the Knesset with a red carpet and guard of honor, pleased his audience of MPs and visitors with a Hebrew phrase soon into his speech, "Shalom aleichem", meaning peace be unto you.

He went on to describe his long-standing admiration for Israel, stemming from his churchman father's fascination with, and frequent visits, to the country. He said his premiership would ensure that Britain remained Israel's "true friend".

Syria and Iran Blame U.S. in Blast on Iraq Border

Iran joined Syria on Monday in condemning what they described as an attack by four United States helicopters on the Syrian side of the border with Iraq that they said killed eight people.

Reach of War

The United States confirmed that a special operations mission took place in the area on Sunday but a senior military official gave no more details for now.

The incident comes at a time when the United States is trying to negotiate a strategic agreement with Iraq that would allow American troops to remain in the country and carry out military operations. The pact faces strenuous opposition from neighboring countries, especially Syria and Iran, because of concerns that the United States might use Iraqi territory to carry out attacks on them.

Syria’s state-run news channel reported that United States helicopters on Sunday attacked an area within Syria near the town of Abu Kamal. The official news agency, SANA, cited an anonymous official as saying four American helicopters had “launched aggression on a civilian building under construction,” killing eight people, giving the details of those it said were killed, and that the Syrian deputy foreign minister had summoned the chargé d’affaires from the American and Iraqi Embassies in protest.

Syria also said that United States soldiers on the ground had stormed a building in the area, Reuters reported.

In Tehran, an Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman, Hassan Qashqavi, condemned the attack, saying a violation of the territorial integrity of any sovereign state was unacceptable.

“Iran condemns in strongest terms any form of aggression or violation of the states’ territorial integrity which leads to the death of innocent civilians,” he told reporters, according to the official news agency IRNA.

Syria’s state-run media also intensified its criticism of the United States on Monday, with the government newspaper Tishrin accusing American forces of committing “a war crime,” Agence France-Presse said.

Iran asks India to be more active in gas pipeline plan

Iran's oil minister called on India to play a more active role in development of a multi-billion dollar gas pipeline from Iran to Pakistan and India, semi-official Mehr news agency reported. "In the light of the many wasted opportunities in the pipeline project because of stalling by India, we asked this country to be more active," Gholam Hossein Nozari said after meeting Indian Foreign Minister Pranab Mukherjee. The 7.5 billion dollar project for the 2,600 kilometer (1,600 miles) Iran-Pakistan-India (IPI) pipeline was launched in 1994 but has been held up by disagreements between India and Pakistan. Iran and Pakistan agreed last month to go ahead with the pipeline on a bilateral basis. Mukherjee, who was in Tehran for an official visit, said India "has no intention of quitting the project," Mehr reported. He also raised the possibility of a three-way meeting between Iran, Pakistan and India, though no date has yet been set.

New Delhi has been under pressure from the United States not to do business with Iran, viewed in Washington as a state sponsor of terrorism that is bent on acquiring nuclear weapons.

Iran holds the world's second largest gas reserves after Russia but remains a small-scale exporter because of heavy domestic consumption and the lack of exploitation of some of its gas fields.

The 2008 Election

No Incumbent

The 22nd Amendment prevented George W. Bush from running for a third term as President, and Vice-President Dick Cheney declined to seek the presidency. Thus, for the first time since 1928, there was no sitting president or vice-president running. The public campaign began quite early, with a wide field of candidates jockeying for position for the primaries during 2007. The Iowa caucuses were on January 3, 2008, an early date which prompted other states to move up their primaries.

Primary Season

Republican Primary

2008 Republican Primary results. Orange represents McCain wins, Red represents Mike Huckabee wins, and green represents states won by Mitt Romney.

Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, Arizona Senator John McCain, and former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney led the early Republican field. Rudy Giuliani was mayor of NYC during 9/11, was seen as a strong choice in urban areas, and at one point had a 20 point lead. Former Tennessee Senator Fred Thompson joined the race later. Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee appeared to be in the lower tier, but eventually surged in polls.

Huckabee won the Iowa caucuses. Romney placed a disappointing second, while Thompson and McCain placed a distant third and fourth. Giuliani had not campaigned in Iowa, concentrating on other early states instead. Likely Giuliani supporters, however, increasingly looked elsewhere, especially to McCain. McCain won the New Hampshire primary; Romney placed second, but was steadily losing momentum. In a serious setback for Huckabee, McCain then won South Carolina. Giuliani still hoped to win the Florida primary, but quickly lost momentum and placed well behind McCain and Romney in Florida. Giuliani then dropped out and endorsed McCain.

McCain had strong momentum after winning Florida, and secured enough delegates for the nomination on March 4.

John McCain

Arizona Senator John McCain, the Republican nominee.

Both McCain's grandfather and his father were Admirals in the United States Navy. McCain graduated from the United States Naval Academy in 1958, becoming a naval aviator, flying attack aircraft from carriers during the Vietnam War. On his twenty-third bombing mission over North Vietnam later in 1967, he was shot down and badly injured. He then endured five and a half years as a prisoner of war, including periods of torture, before he was released following the Paris Peace Accords in 1973.

Retiring from the Navy in 1981 and moving to Arizona, McCain entered politics. In 1982 he was elected to the U.S. House of Representatives from Arizona's 1st congressional district. After serving two terms, he was elected to the U.S. Senate in 1986. He was re-elected in 1992, 1998, and 2004. While generally adhering to American conservatism, McCain established a reputation as a political maverick for his willingness to defy Republican orthodoxy on several issues. Surviving the Keating Five scandal of the 1980s, he made campaign finance reform one of his signature concerns, which eventually led to the passing of the McCain-Feingold Act in 2002.

Sarah Palin

Sarah Palin and John McCain campaigning in Fairfax, Virginia.

Alaska governor Sarah Louise Heath Palin was chosen as McCain's running mate. She became the first female Vice Presidential candidate representing the Republican Party and the second female Vice Presidential candidate representing a major political party.

Palin was born in Idaho and raised in Alaska. In 1984, she was the runner-up in the Miss Alaska pageant, receiving a scholarship that allowed her to attend the University of Idaho, where she received a degree in journalism. After working as a sports reporter at an Anchorage television station, Palin served two terms on the Wasilla, Alaska, City Council from 1992 to 1996, was elected mayor of Wasilla (population 5,470 in 2000) in 1996, and ran unsuccessfully for Lieutenant Governor in 2002.

Palin was elected Governor of Alaska in 2006 on the theme of governmental reform, defeating incumbent governor Frank Murkowski in the Republican primary and former Democratic Alaskan governor Tony Knowles in the general election. She gained attention for publicizing ethical violations by state Republican Party leaders.

Democratic Primary

Obama walks on stage in Minnesota the night he won the Democratic nomination.

For the Democrats, New York Senator and former first lady Hillary Clinton was the decisive front-runner, but former North Carolina Senator John Edwards and Illinois Senator Barack Obama also generated enthusiasm, which they hoped would result in momentum as the primaries approached. Delaware Senator Joe Biden, Connecticut Senator Chris Dodd, U.S. Representative Dennis Kucinich of Ohio, former Alaska Senator Mike Gravel, and New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson also pursued the nomination, but got little attention.

The Democratic Primary featured much more controversy and complexity than that of the Republicans. The Democratic Convention features unelected "superdelegates," who are party officials who may cast their vote for the candidate of their choice. In the early stages of the race, Senator Clinton held an overwhelming lead among superdelegates, while Senator Obama led the popular vote. This disparity, and the possibility that unelected officials could decide the outcome of the nomination was a point of contention among Democrats.

Additionally, the Democratic National Committee penalized the states of Michigan and Florida for changing their primary dates to be ahead of schedule. The DNC decided that the delegates from these states would not be seated at the Convention, effectively nullifying the votes of these states. Senator Clinton (who coincidentally won both states' vote) was a constant proponent of reversing this decision and allowing the delegates to be seated. Eventually a compromise was reached, and all of each states' delegates were allowed to vote, but they were only allowed half a vote each.

As the primary season wore on, the difference between the delegate count of Senators Obama and Clinton changed little. As other candidates dropped out and endorsed one of the two, it became clear that this primary would be a historic one- whether it be the first nomination of an African-American or a woman by a major party for the office of President of the United States. In the end, Senator Obama garnered enough delegates to secure the historic nomination, and he chose Senator Biden to be his running mate.

Joe Biden

Joe Biden had represented the state of Delaware in the United States Senate since 1972, when he was elected at the age of twenty-nine.

Illinois Senator Barack Obama

Election Controversy

The issues of caging lists and other techniques of voter suppression which gave rise to many 2004 United States election voting controversies have not been addressed by further legislation or a regulatory crackdown, and are predicted by Greg Palast (a reporter who has investigated these controversies) to recur to the extent that they could swing the result.

Voter list purges using unlawful criteria threaten election integrity in at least six swing states: Colorado, Indiana, Ohio, Michigan, Nevada and North Carolina.

On October 5, 2008 the Republican Lt. Governor of Montana, John Bohlinger, accused the Montana Republican Party of vote caging to purge 6,000 voters from three counties which trend Democratic. These purges included decorated war veterans and active duty soldiers.

An allegation that the Republican Party in Michigan plans to challenge the eligibility of voters based on lists of foreclosed homes has led to a lawsuit from the Obama campaign and a letter from the House Judiciary Committee to the Department of Justice calling for an investigation.

Libertarian candidate Bob Barr filed a lawsuit in Texas petitioning to have Obama and McCain removed from the ballot in that state. The suit alleged that both the Republicans and Democrats missed the deadline to file, and were present on the ballot contrary to Texas election law. The Texas Supreme Court dismissed the lawsuit without giving an explanation.

Voter Fraud

The liberal activist group ACORN came under fire for allegedly filing a few thousand fake voter registration forms in several states. John McCain declared ACORN to be possibly trying to conduct a massive voter fraud campaign, and following the election a poll showed that over half of Republicans polled believed that ACORN stole the election. A 2009 inquiry by the nonpartisan Congressional Research Service found that ACORN had not filed any fraudulent ballots or committed financial fraud in the five year period leading up to the investigation, though some Republicans found the report unconvincing. Shortly following the election controversy, edited videos were released showing ACORN members engaging in illegal activity. Though the videos were shown to be intentionally edited to be misleading, the soured public opinion of ACORN ultimately caused the organization to fold.

Obama wins

The 2008 Electoral College results.

On November 4, with 364 Electoral votes, Obama won the White House.

Barack Obama did more than thump John McCain in the Electoral College tally; he also handily won the popular vote and redrew the great divide between red states and blue states.

Riding a Democratic tide that bolstered the party's presence in both houses of Congress, Obama snared about 63 million votes to McCain's 55.8 million, according to early totals.

According to exit polls, Obama did well compared to McCain among women voters (56 percent to 43 percent); voters under 30 (66 percent to 32 percent); African-American voters (95 percent to 4 percent); Latino voters (66 percent to 32 percent); first-time voters (68 percent to 31 percent); and voters making less than $100,000 a year (55 percent to 43 percent).

"I think this is the passing of an old order," CNN senior political analyst David Gergen said as the results rolled in Tuesday night and the outcome became increasingly evident.

"I think what we see ... is a new coalition, a new order emerging. It isn't quite there, but with Barack Obama, for the first time, it's won. It is the Latino vote we just heard about. It is the bigger black vote that came out. Very importantly, it's the youth vote, the 18-to-29-year-old," said the Harvard University professor and former presidential adviser.

Obama

President Barack Obama

President Barack Obama

Barack Hussein Obama II (b.August 4, 1961) was the President of the United States from 2009 to 2017. He is the first African-American to serve as president. He was the junior senator of Illinois in 2005. He was elected after serving part of his first term as a United States Senator, resigning from his senator position on November 16, 2008, following his election to the presidency.

Early career

Obama was a graduate of the University of Columbia and Harvard, where he was president of the Harvard Law Review. Obama taught constitutional law at the University of Chicago from 1992 to 2004.

He announced his candidacy for the senate of the United States in January 2003, gained a primary victory in March 2004, and was elected in November 2004. Obama provided orientation with national convention Democratic in July 2004. As a member of the Democratic minority in the 109th congress, he helped to create the legislation to order the conventional armaments and to support a greater public responsibility in use of the Funds Federal. He also made official trips in Europe, the Middle East, and in Africa. During the 110th congress, he helped to create the legislation relating to incentive and electoral fraud, climate change, nuclear terrorism, and the care for turned over military service members of the United States.

Hobbies

Obama playing basketball with members of Congress and his Cabinet.

Barack Obama is a very passionate sports fan and roots for the Chicago Bears, Bulls, Blackhawks, and White Sox. Obama is also a very avid basketball player and frequently plays competitive pickup games with his closest friends and advisors. Obama has a tradition on election day that he plays pickup games in whatever city he happens to be in.

First 100 Days

Seeking to replicate the first 100 days of FDR in office during the depression, Obama set out to spend his first 100 days addressing the recession. His principal policy for this was the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, commonly referred to as the "stimulus package". The act funded infrastructure improvements, cut some taxes, gave money to struggling schools, and expanded Medicaid. By mid-2009, the private sector started to experience job gains rather than losses, and the stock market began to surge. However, some sectors experienced little to no growth.

Another key action of Obama's first 100 days was ceasing the use of torture.

Domestic Policies

In 2014 The Obama Administration oversaw the creation of the United States Digital Service and 18F agencies to help assist the American government with digital initiatives.

Obamacare

President Obama signing the Affordable Care Act into law in 2010.

Background

Obama and the Democratic majority in Congress spent much of 2009 debating a number of plans that would grant health insurance to all Americans while attempting to halt the steep rise in healthcare costs. The result was Obamacare, signed into law in early 2010 and rolled out in stages during the Obama administration.

Individual Mandate

The linchpin of Obamacare was the individual mandate, requiring nearly all American citizens to buy health insurance if they did not receive it from their employer or qualified for Medicaid. It limited the ways insurers could deny coverage, in particular requiring that coverage not be discriminated due to patients having pre-existing conditions. It also enacted mechanisms to subsidize health care and established a network of exchanges to buy health insurance on.

Facing Crisis

Environmental Disasters

On April 20th, 2010 the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded, spilling 4 million barrels of oil into the Golf of Mexico, resulting in the largest marine oil spill in US history.

Hurricane Sandy made landfall on the east coast in 2012, causing massive damage to urban areas.

Many Americans during this time were affected by issues relating to water availability or quality. From 2012 to 2016 California experienced a continual drought. In 2014 Lake Erie experienced a tremendous Algae Bloom, rendering drinking water undrinkable for 400,000 Americans near Toledo, Ohio. In early 2016, it became clear that much of the water of Flint, Michigan was tainted with lead, attracting nationwide attention. The lack of clean drinking water for Flint became a symbol of Environmental Injustice.

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  Deepwater Horizon in Flames, 2010
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  Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill from Space - May 24, 2010
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  Power outage in Manhattan as Hurricane Sandy makes landfall.
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  A 2011 Algae Bloom in Lake Erie, similar to the 2014 Bloom.
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  National Guardsmen deliver water to Toledo Residents.
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  Obama speaks with California Farmers about the Drought, 2014.
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  A wildfire rages in California, 2014
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  Obama drinking filtered water from Flint, Michigan, 2016.
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  A Flint protestor in 2019. Issues with the Flint water supply persist.

Diseases & Drugs

The 2009 swine flu pandemic killed about 203,000 people worldwide, 12,469 of whom were in America. This was the disease that had the largest impact on the United States during the Obama Administration, though several diseases would threaten America and would be contained following this. The Western African Ebola virus epidemic nearly spread to the United States in 2014, though it was contained. Later on, the 2015–2016 Zika virus epidemic hit some areas of the southern US and Puerto Rico, though it was under control by early 2017.

Other medical issues continued to worsen in America. The Opioid epidemic continued to grow in severity during the Obama administration. A continuing Anti-Vaccine movement lead to the reintroduction of diseases previously eliminated from the United States.

Notable Domestic Incidents

Notable shootings and domestic incidents during this time include the 2009 Fort Hood shooting, the 2012 Aurora, Colorado shooting, the 2012 Sandy Hook Elementary School shooting, the 2013 Boston Marathon bombing, the 2014 Fort Hood shooting, the 2014 Bundy standoff,the 2015 San Bernardino attack, and the 2016 Orlando Night Club Shooting.

Other controversial incidents to occur during this time include the 2011 Zanesville, Ohio animal escape, the 2011 end times prediction, the 2011 Federal government credit-rating downgrades, and the 2012 Petraeus scandal

Tea Party movement

A tea party protest in September of 2009.

The Tea Party movement generally wanted smaller government, lower taxes, and less government controls, particularly on firearms and healthcare. It received funding from conservative businesspeople, particularly the Koch Brothers. The Tea Party movement believed many conventional Republicans were not conservative enough, and took down a number of Republican leaders in primary elections. The enthusiasm of the Tea Party, coupled with malaise toward Obamacare, led to Republicans recapturing the House of Representatives in 2010.

Birtherism

During Obama's campaign and administration, there were unsubstantiated allegations that Barack Obama was not born in the United States. His certificate of live birth lists his birthplace as Hawaii, but a large cadre of Americans, including his successor Donald Trump, did not believe this. Other Americans believed an unsubstantiated claim that Obama was a Muslim. These "birthers" and "truthers" were often part of the Tea Party movement.

Obama Military Policy

Wars in Iraq and Afghanistan

Obama took office with the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan still raging. Though he significantly reduced troop levels, he did not completely withdraw from either country due to instability in those countries. Under Obama, the United States continued drone strikes in the Middle East.

Ten years after the terrorist attack that took place on September 11th, Pakistan officials gave President Obama a lead that Osama Bin Laden was hiding in a densely populated city in their country. On May 1^st President Obama authorized a covert operation to terminate Osama Bin Laden and was successful.

US Cyber Command

In mid-2009 United States Cyber Command was established to unify cyber defense efforts.

LGBT rights

During the Obama Administration, several states legalized gay marriage at the state level, either at the ballot box on in the state government. Notably just prior to the Obama Administration, the California Supreme Court overturned the state's ban on Gay Marriage in 2008, before it was again banned by Proposition 8 during their fall election that same year. In 2009 Congress passed the Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. Hate Crimes Prevention Act which expanded the definition of hate crimes to include protection for sexual orientation, as well as gender identity. Obama repealed the Don't Ask, Don't Tell rule in the military in 2011. Prior to the 2012 election, Obama became the first president to come out in favor of nationwide gay marriage.

During this time the general public slowly grew to accept LGBT rights, with polling showing approval for gay marriage surpassing disapproval of gay marriage after 2012. Several religious organizations began allowing the ordinations of gay ministers, such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church in 2009 and the Presbyterian Church in 2011.

In 2015, the Supreme Court legalized gay marriage nationwide.

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  A protest in favor of equality in 2011.
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  A crowd gathers in the Minnesota capitol during the same sex marriage vote in 2013.
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  A crowd outside the Supreme Court on 26 June 2015 celebrates the Obergefell v. Hodges decision.
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  The White House was lit in rainbow colors on 26 June 2015 following the nationwide legalization of gay marriage

Education

Under the Obama Administration Charter School attendance grew, and attempted to make test results comparable across states with the introduction of Common Core standards, though neither were without controversy.

Economic Reform

The Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act in 2010 overhauled financial regulations following the Great Recession. The Administration also oversaw the establishment of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.

2012 election

Obama defeated Mitt Romney to win re-election

Primaries

Barack Obama was renominated by the Democrats. Seven people ran in the Republican primaries: Michele Bachmann, Newt Gingrich, Jon Huntsman, Ron Paul, Rick Perry, Mitt Romney and Rick Santorum. Other prominent Republicans, such as Sarah Palin and Chris Christie, did not run, while Herman Cain and Gary Johnson aborted their campaigns prior to the first primary votes.

Mitt Romney

Romney was the frontrunner through most of the primary cycle, though he split the first three states with Santorum and Gingrich. Bachmann, Huntsman and Perry dropped out of the race following poor showings in the early primaries. Romney had broad support from most of the Republican establishment, while Santorum started by running an Iowa-only campaign, later branching out to Christian conservatives in all states. Paul's support was primarily among libertarian and young Republicans, while Gingrich's support was concentrated in the Deep South. By the end of March, Romney had a large lead in delegates, with Santorum winning several states before dropping out. Gingrich did not actively campaign anywhere but Delaware after March, and dropped out after losing to Romney in Delaware. By late April, Romney had clinched the nomination.

Results

The general election between Obama and Romney was expected to be very close. Ultimately, Obama won every state he won in 2008 except North Carolina and Indiana, and defeated Romney.

Debt ceiling debates and government shutdown

The influence of the Tea Party and the debt ceiling crisis ultimately brought down the Speakership of John Boehner, and he was replaced by Paul Ryan, another Republican.

A Changing Country

The War on Drugs changes

The Justice Department during the Obama Administration had a relatively relaxed posture on marijuana, allowing states to determine their policy on it's local legalization, while keeping it illegal at a federal level. Colorado became the first state to legalize marijuana for recreational use in 2014.

Demographics

As the United States entered the 21st century, it continued to experience demographic and economic changes. Two of these were the "browning" and "graying" of America: the average age of Americans continued to rise as the "Baby Boom" generation aged, while half of people born in the 1980s or later were non-white, many the children of immigrants from Mexico and other Latin American countries. The aging of the American populace is one major contributing factor to the rise of the healthcare sector as a portion of the American economy. Fewer people were working in the manufacturing and mining sectors, with more working in the service sector or the temporary "gig economy".

Technology

Technology continued its advances during this time. Smartphones and tablet computers became widespread by the mid-2010s, as did membership on social networks, and consumption of media on the Internet. Sleek new takes on Smart Glasses like Google Glass or Microsoft HoloLens did not perform well commercially, but captured the imagination of the public.

Space exploration shifted in this era towards more robotic exploration, with the retirement of the space shuttle program in 2011. NASA's Mars reconnaissance orbiter found evidence of water on Mars in 2011, with the Curiosity rover confirming it in 2015. The New Horizons probe, launched during the Bush administration in 2006, did a flyby of Pluto in 2015 gaining mankind their first high quality photos of Pluto.

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  Steve Jobs introducing the iPad in 2010, one of the first popular tablet computers.
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  Facebook joins the NASDAQ in 2012. Social media gained widespread popularity during this time.
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  Consumer Augmented Reality platforms, such as this headset, began to become available during the Obama administration, but did not achieve popularity.
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  New Horizons captured a high detail photo of Pluto for the first time in 2015.

Post-racial society...or not?

Many had hoped that the election of Obama would contribute to a society devoid of the racism that had always been part of the country's history. However, racial tensions between Americans continued during the Obama administration.

2016 Election

The 2016 election was an election to decide who would replace Barack Obama as president.

Candidates

Primaries

GOP

Results from the 2016 GOP Primaries. Blue is Trump, Yellow is Cruz, Red is Rubio, and Green is Kasich

The GOP Primaries lasted from February 1st to June 7th, 2016.

Following an early polling lead in the run up to the primaries by Jeb Bush, he withdrew on February 20th, 2016. Following Jeb Bush's withdrawal, four major Republican candidates remained in the race: Businessman Donald Trump, Texas Senator Ted Cruz, Ohio Governor John Kasich, and Florida Senator Marco Rubio.

Donald Trump's key platform promise in the race was construction of a "giant wall" on the United States-Mexico border. During the 2016 primary, much of Donald Trump's early support came from voters who believed the untrue claims that President Obama was a Muslim or born outside the United States. Trump also did well with blue-collar voters in the Rustbelt and Frostbelt, while Cruz did fairly well in the Rocky Mountain and Southern states. Many Christian evangelicals supported Cruz in the primary, but enough supported Trump to give him the nomination.

Winning only Ohio, Kasich suspended his campaign on May 4th, 2016 when he was the only remaining major Republican challenger to Donald Trump.

Democratic

The 2016 Democratic Primary results. Yellow for Clinton, Green for Sanders.

The Democratic Primaries lasted from February 1st to June 24, 2016.

The main candidates in the Democratic Primaries were Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders. Hillary Clinton was the spouse of former President Bill Clinton and had also served as a Senator from New York and Secretary of State. Bernie Sanders was a Senator from Vermont, and had been a socialist or independent for most of his political career. Clinton ran as a moderate, while Sanders ran as a leftist, promising expanded healthcare, student loan relief, and regulation of institutions of the Top 1% such as large banks. Clinton won more votes in the primary, but a significant number of voters backed Sanders. In particular, Sanders received the overwhelming support of younger voters.

Major Candidates

Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton were the nominees of the two major political parties

The candidates after the primaries were:

1. Hillary Clinton , Democrat
2. Donald Trump, Republican

Third Party Candidates

The two most notable third party candidates were

1. Gary Johnson, of the Libertarian Party
2. Jill Stein, of the Green Party

Controversies

The 2016 election was noted for a large amount of misinformation being spread during the election, labeled as Fake News.

Hillary Clinton made a statement in September of 2016, in which she called many of Trump's supporters as being deplorable, attracting criticism. Especially controversial was her use of a private email server for work purposes while serving as Secretary of State. Months after clearing Clinton of criminal conduct in the case, and less than two weeks before the election in late October Republican FBI director James B. Comey sent a letter to Congress which brought the issue back into the public view. Analysts would later debate if this action cost Hillary Clinton the Election.

Donald Trump made several controversial statements. His comment "I like people who weren't captured", regarding John McCain, who was captured while fighting in the Vietnam War was controversial. On October 7th, 2016 the Access Hollywood tapes were leaked, a 2005 recording of Trump where inappropriate comments were made.

Results

The 2016 electoral map

Voting took place on November 8, 2016.

Hillary Clinton got 65,853,516 votes, or 48.5% of the people who voted. She scored 232 electoral votes.
Donald Trump got 62,984,825 votes, or 46.4% of the people who voted. He scored 306 electoral votes, giving him the amount of electoral votes needed to become president-elect. Trump narrowly won several states in the Rustbelt that had previously voted for Obama: Wisconsin, Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania

This election was somewhat unusual in that Hillary Clinton received the most popular votes but Trump received the most electoral votes. This was the fifth time in United States history that happened, but the second time in the previous 16 years, having also occurred in 2000.

Reaction

President Obama and then President-elect Trump in the Oval Office.

The election results were widely seen as surprising, with many predictions made prior to the election giving a Clinton victory a 70%-99% chance of occurring. There was open speculation about if the Electoral College would elect a different person to the position of president. While a historic number of Electoral College votes did defect, most were from Clinton to a minor candidate. People began to question if the protections the Electoral College is supposed to offer was worth the disenfranchising trade offs caused by the system.

Trump

President Donald Trump in the White House

Donald John Trump was elected the 45th US President on November 8, 2016. As President he led the Republican Party in a different direction.

Supreme Court

An important point in Donald Trump's 2016 campaign for president was the promise of nominating conservative judges to the Supreme Court.

Neil Gorsuch

President Donald Trump with Neil Gorsuch

In early 2016, Supreme court justice Antonin Scalia died. Following the controversial decision of the Senate not to consider Obama's nomination of Merrick Garland, the seat was left vacant until 2017 until President Trump appointed Neil Gorsuch.

Brett Kavanaugh

Following the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy, President Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh, which was controversial due to sexual assault allegations made against him during the confirmation process. The vote to confirm Kavanaugh was among the closest in American history, with only 51.02% of senators voting to approve his nomination.

Amy Coney Barrett

Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg died in September 2020, saying on her deathbed "My most fervent wish is that I will not be replaced until a new president is installed.".

President Donald Trump nominated Amy Coney Barrett to the Supreme Court in late September 2020. Amy Coney Barrett was confirmed by the Senate just over a week before the 2020 election.

North Korean Talks

During the talks, President Trump became the first president to enter North Korea.

From 2017 to 2018 the North Korean Government sped up its nuclear program, causing a crisis.

On a January morning in 2018 an accident triggered the emergency warning system in Hawaii, with messages blaring from cell phones radios, and televisions of impending nuclear attack, leading to real panic as people rushed for cover, and attempted to make peace with a harrowing future.

Economy

Corporate Growth

During this time, the US saw its first publicly traded company, Apple , reach a value of 1 trillion dollars in 2018. Apple then became the first American publicly traded company to reach a value of two trillion in 2020, again Apple.

Trade Wars

In 2018 the administration began a trade war with China, where both nations placed tariffs on the goods of the other nation. The trade war was caused in part by a growing trade deficit with China, as well as controversy surrounding protection of technology and intellectual property. The trade war resulted in economic damage to both economies, as well as the shifting of some supply chains away from China to other areas of the world.

National Debt

The national debt grew significantly under the Trump administration, even before the COVID-19 pandemic required additional spending.

Technological Innovation

Progress

A self driving car navigates Mountain View, California in 2017.

Many of the technology trends that started in the George W. Bush or Obama Presidencies continued to mature during the Trump administration. More importantly, many technologies had left the realm of enthusiasts and labs, and began really impacting society by 2016 once their adoption had become significant enough. Voice and Facial Recognition technology began seeing widespread use in the field. Electric Cars became a status icon widely available in the mass market, with a number of competing manufacturers vying to release electric vehicles. VR headsets became more affordable and higher quality than ever before, though struggled in the market. Renewable energy costs continued to decline. More automation found its way into society with smarter cars and more customer facing automation finding its way into metro areas.

Controversy

Many controversies surrounded the use of technology during this time. Concerns were raised about algorithmic bias, as well as the potential to misuse large datasets such as in the Facebook–Cambridge Analytica data scandal. Other concerns were raised about counterfeit products being more commonly sold online, as well as technology companies conflicting with local and state level regulators. Near the end of 2020 a few major technology companies see significant antitrust action from various parts of the American Government, threatening to break up companies that used their monopolies improperly.

Space heats back up

Billionaire Space Race

The 2010's in space were hallmarked by a number of private space companies backed by billionaires like Jeff Bezos or Elon Musk competing for achievements in privately run space ventures. This came to be known as the Billionaire space race.

Space Force

In December of 2019, the Space Force was established as a separate service branch, instead of operating under the Air Force, as its preceding organization had since 1982. In December of 2020 members of the space force are named Guardians.

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  In 2018 SpaceX sent an automobile from its sister company Tesla into space. This served as both a dummy payload, and a successful advertisement.
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  Space Force members attending an officer graduation ceremony in April, 2020.

Civil Rights

The last state to fly a flag with blatant confederate imagery, Mississippi, redesigns their flag in 2020 without such imagery following calls from citizens.

Immigration

Immigration issues were a key point of President Trump's 2016 campaign, including a promise to replace preexisting fencing and barriers on the US Mexico border with a wall.

In 2017 Trump signed an executive order which restricted travel from certain countries. Similar bans would be implemented throughout the Trump administration, with many protesting the decisions.

The family separation policy pursued by the administration proved to be very controversial, as the policy resulted in families split, often with no way put in place to reunite them. Harsh immigration policies continued to result in American Veterans waiting for expedited citizenship promised to them being deported.

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  President Trump signs Executive Order 13780, one of several of his travel bans.
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  President Trump in San Diego examining border wall prototypes in 2018.
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  Caged sleeping area at the Usula detention center in 2018.
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  Caged holding cell at McAllen Station in 2019.
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  Overcrowded facilities in 2019.

Facing Crisis

In late 2017 Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico, with much of the island damaged two years after the hurricane.

Notable shootings from this time include the 2017 Las Vegas shooting, Stoneman Douglas High School shooting / Parkland Shootings, and the 2019 El Paso shooting.

Environment

The Trump Administration, reaffirmed existing bipartisan legislation supporting the removal of debris from marine environments.

Notable Protests, Demonstrations, and Riots

Aided by social and mass media, protesting was widespread and visible during this time, with many protests ranking among the largest in American history.

2017 Women's March

The 2017 Women's March

The day following the inauguration of President Trump, the 2017 Women's March occurred, which was the largest single day protest in American history to that point.

Dakota Pipeline Protests

Fearing that a pipeline could endanger their water source, a number of indigenous people protested the construction of a pipeline in North Dakota.

Unite the Right

The Unite the Right Rally.

The Unite the Right rally held in Charlottesville attracted nationwide attention and controversy following an attack on counter protesters that killed one and injured at least 19 more.

Major marches and Rallies

The March for Our Lives, March for Science, 2018 Women's March,Telegramgate, Juggalo March and the September 2019 climate strikes were other major protests against the administration during this time. The Mother of All Rallies, the Trump Free Speech Rally, and the March 4 Trump were notable rallies in favor of President Trump during this time.

George Floyd Protests

On May 25, 2020 George Floyd was killed in Minneapolis. Video of the event sparked nationwide protests, that dwarfed the size of the previous largest protest, the 2017 Women's March.

By May 31st, 2020 credentialed journalists across the United States attempting to cover the events were being targeted by members of a number of police departments,, with many calling these targeted attacks violations of the First Amendment. By the 14th of July federal police began forcing protestors into unmarked vehicles with no warning or explanation. Critics called the detainments by officers who did not identify themselves unlawful, while proponents of the action said it was needed to protect a courthouse. The arrival of paramilitary forces fueled even larger protests, leading to their withdrawal.

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  Memorial for George Floyd outside the store where he was killed.
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  Protestors in Philadelphia
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  Graffiti on a Robert E. Lee Monument.
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  Minneapolis State Patrol in riot gear.
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  President Trump at St. John's Episcopal Church. The removal of the peaceful protestors for the purpose of a photo op upset protestors and church officials.
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  A policeman in Philadelphia takes the knee.

2019 College Admission Scandal

In 2019 a college admissions bribery scandal broke, when it became publicly known that many wealthy Americans had paid for their children to gain unfair advantages when applying to well ranked schools. The scandal fueled feelings of racial injustice in education, as well as economic inequality between the wealthy elite and the average low income or middle class American.

Impeachment Trial

Following a number of controversies and impeachment by the House of Representatives, President Trump was put on trial for impeachment by the Senate in early 2020. He was acquitted by the Senate, and remained president.

Withdrawal from Afghanistan

In February of 2020 President Trump struck a deal with the Taliban to end the war in Afghanistan by withdrawing US troops.

COVID-19 Pandemic

Origin

At the beginning of 2020 the World Health Organization began monitoring a disease emerging near Wuhan, China. By early 2020 the pandemic had spread across the globe, including to the United States of America.

Early response

On March 13, 2020 President Trump declared a national emergency, allowing the Federal government to more effectively respond to the pandemic. By late March a bipartisan two trillion dollar stimulus bill was passed, the largest in American history at the time. The CARES Act included one time direct payments of $1,200 to many, but not all, individuals who made less then $75,000, and added an extra $600 a week to anyone on unemployment for a period of four months.

Despite the S&P500 and NASDAQ reaching all time highs in February 2020, the pandemic caused a significant economic downturn. A number of anti-lockdown protests occurred as a result of the economic damage from lockdown measures, with President Trump supporting a number of the protests.

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  A US Navy Comfort Ship docked in New York City during the pandemic.
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  President Trump visiting the National Institute of Health during the Pandemic.
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  A Colorado National Guardsman offering food aid in Denver.
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  An anti-lockdown protestor in Columbus, Ohio.
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  Deceased in New Jersey being loaded into a makeshift morgue.
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  Empty shelves in a Texas store.

Late 2020

On October 2nd, 2020 President Trump announced that he had tested positive for COVID-19. President Trump would recover from COVID-19 later that October.

On December 13th, 2020 the first COVID-19 vaccines approved for widespread use began being distributed across the United States.

The 2020 census encountered a number of difficulties owing to the unique circumstances surrounding the year 2020.

The 2020 Election

The 2020 Electoral College results. Trump won states shaded in red, while Biden won states shaded in blue.

Campaigning

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, the Biden Campaign focused on virtual events, as opposed to the Trump Campaign use of in person events.

Early on in 2020 the recently appointed Postmaster Dejoy ordered a number of existing postal sorting machines to be removed without a reason given. Many industry professionals questioned this, as it would have been easier to just turn the machines off.

During the election a number of issues with Election mail occurred as a result of cuts to the United States Postal Service early in 2020.

Aftermath

Joe Biden won the election receiving 74 million votes and winning the Electoral College.

President Trump made a number of attempts to challenge the election results. Notably, in December of 2020 President Trump requested that the Supreme Court overturn 2020 election results in several key states where he lost, a request which the Supreme Court rejected.

A Georgia Runoff election for control of the Senate gained national attention. The results of this runoff election ended a Republican senate majority.

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  Joe Biden and Kamala Harris during the campaign.
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  A poll worker sanitizes an election booth in California.
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  Early voting in Cleveland, Ohio.
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  People celebrating the election results in Washington DC.

Transition Period

Donald Trump falsely tweeted that he won the election on November 7th, 2020.

Following the Election, President Trump refused to concede and contested many of the results in court.

On November 17th, 2020 following a statement that the election was secure by federal cybersecurity official Christopher Kerbs, President Trump announced he had fired him on Twitter.

During the transition period, a call between President Trump and the Georgia Secretary of State was leaked in which President Trump urged the secretary to overturn the election results in that state in his favor.

Following a inciting speech by President Trump, on January 6th, 2021 the US Capitol building was stormed by a pro-trump mob as Congress tallied electoral college votes. As a result of this event President Trump was impeached by the House for a second time on January 13th, 2021, notably with greater support from House Republicans then during the previous impeachment.

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  Supporters of President Trump storm the Capitol building.
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  A gallows set up outside the capitol during the storming.
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  The second Impeachment of President Trump.
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  National Guardsmen secure the Capitol building in preparation for President elect Joe Biden.

Biden

President Joseph "Joe" Biden in the White House.

Early Presidency

On January 20th, 2021 Joseph Biden was sworn in as President of the United States of America. President Biden inherited a nation in crisis. The COVID-19 pandemic still raged on, where over 400,000 American lives had already been lost before he took office. President Biden also inherited an economy that had lost over 3 million jobs since President Trump had taken office in 2017.

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  National Guard soldiers protecting Washington DC on January 20th, 2021.
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  Biden taking the oath of office.

COVID-19 Response

As the COVID-19 pandemic continued, so did hate speech and attacks on Asian Americans, and leading the White House to issue a memorandum condemning such acts on January 26th, 2021. The vaccine rollout that began under the Trump administration continued into 2021. The Delta strain created a surge of infections in Summer of 2021. By May 17, 2022 the American death toll of the COVID-19 pandemic had reached one million lives.

Domestic

Protests over the issue of Abortion in New York City - May 2022.

The Biden Administration saw the first African American to serve as Defense Secretary.

On February 12th, 2021, Biden halted further construction of the southern border wall.

Following the second impeachment of President Trump by the House on January 13th, 2021, the Senate continued the trial on February 9th, 2021. Despite a bipartisan 57-43 vote in favor of convicting former President Trump, as a 2/3 majority was not reached Trump was acquitted for a second time by the Senate on February 13th, 2021.

A winter storm created an emergency in Texas in February 2021, as infrastructure buckled under the storm.

On June 17th, 2021 legislation was signed which made Juneteenth a federal holiday.

On June 24th, 2022 the Supreme Court overturned their prior decision on Roe v. Wade when deciding Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization. President Biden condemned the decision, and two weeks after the ruling issued an executive order to partially restore limited abortion access.

Economy

From 2021 through 2024 (Ongoing), Inflation was a major concern.

In early 2022 gas prices reached very high levels due to global supply issues with crude oil. A number of measures were employed to control the price of gas, leading to a slow decline in gas prices. Even so, the high oil prices increased the costs of many items. This was made worse, as a combination of general reduced supply and increased demand for consumer goods over the pandemic caused inflation to rise sharply. In 2022 the Inflation Reduction Act was passed in order to not only to save money, but also to fight climate change. However there was criticism that the bill did not do enough.

In August of 2022, it was announced that holders of federal student loans would have $10,000 to $20,000 dollars of their debt forgiven, and that the student loan pause would end at the conclusion of the year.

International relations

Withdraw from Afghanistan

Honoring a previous commitment made by the Trump administration to withdraw troops from Afghanistan, America began to withdraw Troops from the country, leading the Taliban to quickly overrun much of Afghanistan outside of Kabul in Summer of 2021. This resulted in an evacuation of Kabul., which ended on August 30th, 2021 with over 122,000 evacuees, many dead, and many Afgan allies left behind.

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  A June meeting between President Biden and then Afghanistan President Ashraf Ghani.
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  Evacuation checkpoint in August 2021.
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  Interception of a rocket attack at Kabul Airport during the evacuation.
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  The last American soldier leaves Afghanistan.
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  Evacuees aboard a C-17 plane.

Ukraine

Joe Biden visiting Kyiv on February 20, 2023.

On February 24th, 2022 a war began between Ukraine and Russia.

In February 2023 President Biden visited Kyiv.

Balloon Incident

A U-2 Pilot next to the balloon over the United States

In February 2023 an unusual balloon was sighted traveling over the continental United States, and was later shot down off the coast of South Carolina. Some of the debris of the Balloon were recovered for inspection.

Technology and Science

Perseverance rover.

2021 saw the first Science advisor to be appointed to the cabinet level, which was in addition to a number of appointments of notable scientists to leadership positions.

On February 18th, 2021 the Perseverance rover successfully landed on Mars.

Hope

The problems faced by America today often have their roots in earlier struggles in American history. American history is not yet over, and you can be a part of it. Use your talents and constitutional liberties like freedom of speech to help enrich the lives of others as well as yourself, and American will be a better place for all.

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Appendix Alpha: Presidents and Vice Presidents of the United States

Presidents of the United States

Although Washington was a member of the Whig Party before the Revolution, after the war he was not a member of any party, though he tended to lean toward Federalist positions. Since the formation of the Democratic-Republican party and the Federalist Party, there has always been at least one viable political party. Today the United States has a two party system. There have been many third party movements, such as Ralph Nader, and Theodore Roosevelt, but these attempts to create a three-party system have, thus far, failed.

#	President	Years in Office	Political Party	Notes
1	George Washington	1789-1797	Unaffiliated	British officer in the French and Indian War, American general, war hero in Revolution against the British. Robert E. Lee is a distant relative. The only President to have been elected without a political party. Reluctant to become president. Set many precedents in office.
2	John Adams	1797-1801	Federalist	The only Federalist Party president. First president to live in the White House. President during the Quasi-War with France.
3	Thomas Jefferson	1801-1809	Democratic-Republican	Author of the Declaration of Independence. The Louisiana Purchase occurred under his presidency.
4	James Madison	1809-1817	Democratic-Republican	President during the War of 1812. His support for the colonists which would eventually found the African nation of Liberia lead those colonists to name their capital city, Monrovia, after him.
5	James Monroe	1817-1825	Democratic-Republican	Opposed European involvement in the Americas with the Monroe Doctrine. Oversaw the Acquisition of Florida from Spain.
6	John Quincy Adams	1825-1829	Democratic-Republican	Son of former President John Adams. A skilled diplomat who played a key role as secretary of state in the previous Monroe Administration. Lost the popular vote, but won the electoral college. As president he made trade deals which greatly helped grow the US economy. Advocated the abolition of slavery after his presidency.
7	Andrew Jackson	1829-1837	Democrat	Promoted policies which lead to Indian Removal and the Trail of Tears.
8	Martin Van Buren	1837-1841	Democrat	After his presidency he became a notable abolitionist.
9	William Henry Harrison	1841	Whig	Died in office from disease on April 4th, 1841, making his presidency the shortest.
10	John Tyler	1841-1845	Democrat	Succeeded President Harrison. Following his presidency he played an important early role in the government of the Confederate States of America.
11	James Knox Polk	1845-1849	Democrat	Oversaw significant territorial expansion through the Mexican-American War and negotiations with Great Britain over the disputed Oregon territory.
12	Zachary Taylor	1849-1850	Whig	Died in Office from disease. Attempted to compromise on Slavery.
13	Millard Fillmore	1850-1853	Whig	Succeeded President Taylor. Last Whig president. Oversaw the Compromise of 1850 to attempt to ease tensions between free states and slave states. Following his presidency, he opposed secessionism.
14	Franklin Pierce	1853-1857	Democrat	Oversaw the Gadsden Purchase of territory from Mexico and the Perry Expedition that opened up Japan to trade with the outside world. Oversaw the Kansas - Nebraska Act and the resulting Bleeding Kansas event which started under his administration.
15	James Buchanan	1857-1861	Democrat	Dodged the issue of slavery and opposed a strong federal government in favor of strong state governments. Influenced the Dred Scott decision. President during the economic crisis caused by the Panic of 1857. Southern states began succeeding during his presidency, which he took little action against. The only president to have been a bachelor.
16	Abraham Lincoln	1861-1865	Republican	Attempted to preserve the Union. Lead the Union during the American Civil War. Issued the Emancipation Proclamation. Delivered the Gettysburg Address. Assassinated days after the wars end.
17	Andrew Johnson	1865-1869	Democrat	Southern Unionist who succeeded President Lincoln. Finished adopting the Thirteenth Amendment abolishing slavery except as punishment for a crime started under Lincoln's term. Attempted to end reconstruction quickly. Impeached by House, acquitted by one vote in the Senate.
18	Hiram Ulysses Grant	1869-1877	Republican	Important Civil War general. Grant took important steps to safeguard the civil rights of African Americans during the reconstruction period, and fought against the rise of groups such as the Ku Klux Klan. Though he made strides to attempt to value merit rather over nepotism, Grant's presidency was marred by corrupt officials and an economic depression caused by the Panic of 1873. Grant also established Yellowstone as the first national park.
19	Rutherford Birchard Hayes	1877-1881	Republican	Lost the popular vote but won the electoral college. He ended reconstruction and sought to make merit a key component of appointments. He tried to improve civil rights for African Americans. He attempted to assimilate Indians, which greatly damaged their culture and traditions. Did not run for re-election.
20	James Abram Garfield	1881	Republican	Garfield attempted to improve the status of African Americans, education, and meritocracy in government. However shortly into his presidency he was assassinated by Charles J. Guiteau for not being awarded a consulship as a political favor.
21	Chester Alan Arthur	1881-1885	Republican	Succeeded President Garfield. Compromised with hardliner anti-immigration members of congress to reduce the length of a ban on Chinese immigration. Attempted to improve civil rights and modernize the navy, but faced significant obstacles in doing so.
22	(Stephen) Grover Cleveland	1885-1889	Democrat	The first Democrat to be elected since the civil war. Strove for merit, and notably kept Republican appointees from the previous administration who he thought were good at their job. His first term saw little concern for civil rights. Also served as the 24th President.
23	Benjamin Harrison	1889-1893	Republican	Grandson of former President William Henry Harrison. Lost the popular vote but won the electoral college. He signed the Sherman Antitrust Act of 1890 into law. He also tried to strive for merit in governance, and attempted to safeguard the right of African Americans to vote.
24	(Stephen) Grover Cleveland	1893-1897	Democrat	Also served as the 22nd President. The depression caused by the Panic of 1893 marred his second term. He took strong action against unions by sending the Army to end the Pullman Strike with violence.
25	William McKinley	1897-1901	Republican	Last president to have served during the American Civil War. President during the Spanish - American War. Annexed Hawaii, as well as Puerto Rico, Guam, and the Philippines, as well as defacto control of Cuba. Oversaw economic growth. Assassinated by an anarchist.
26	Theodore Roosevelt	1901-1909	Republican	Succeeded President McKinley. Roosevelt had previously fought in the battle of San Juan hill. He promised Americans a "Square Deal", promoted Trust Busting, conservation of natural resources, landscapes, and historic areas, and safety in food and medical products. He successfully used gunboat diplomacy with his great white fleet to promote American Interests, and paved the way for the Panama Canal. He was Esperanto speaker, winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, and on the staff of National Geographic while President.
27	William Howard Taft	1909-1913	Republican	Unlike previous Republican presidents, he explicitly tried to keep African Americans out of politics. Tried to pursue "Dollar diplomacy" over military intervention. Continued Antitrust actions from Rosevelt. Many of his decisions incensed his predecessor Theodore Rosevelt, leading to the Progressives of the Republican party leaving to form the Bull Moose Party.
28	(Thomas) Woodrow Wilson	1913-1921	Democrat	After committing to avoiding involvement in the Great War, diplomatic incidents lead to him serving as President during the First World War. As president he helped establish the League of Nations after the war to prevent another such conflict, for which he received the Nobel Peace Price. However he was not able to get the United States itself to join the League, weakening it substantially. He segregated previously integrated federal offices, and the second Ku Klux Klan gained significant power during his presidency.
29	Warren Gamaliel Harding	1921-1923	Republican	Died in office
30	(John) Calvin Coolidge, Jr.	1923-1929	Republican	Succeeded President Harding
31	Herbert Clark Hoover	1929-1933	Republican	His term saw the end of the roaring twenties, and the start of the Great Depression.
32	Franklin Delano Roosevelt	1933-1945	Democrat	Lead America to recovery from the great depression, and helped repeal Prohibition. Lead America through most of World War II. Only president to serve more than two terms (he served four); Died in office
33	Harry S Truman	1945-1953	Democrat	Succeeded President Roosevelt during the final months of World War II. Lead America during the postwar era and the beginning of the Cold War. Signed the Marshall Plan into law. President during most of the fighting of the Korean War.
34	Dwight David Eisenhower	1953-1961	Republican	An important general during World War II. Eisenhower helped promote the creation of the interstate system.
35	John Fitzgerald Kennedy	1961-1963	Democrat	First Catholic President. Escalated the Vietnam War. Attempted to overthrow the communist Cuban government. President during the Cuban Missile Crisis. Established the Peace Corps. Supported domestic civil rights. Assassinated.
36	Lyndon Baines Johnson	1963-1969	Democrat	Succeeded President Kennedy. Escalated the Vietnam War. Promoted the "Great Society" and stronger civil rights protections.
37	Richard Milhous Nixon	1969-1974	Republican	Eased relations between America and China. Established the Environmental Protection Agency. Resigned over the Watergate scandal. Author of No More Vietnams and The Real War
38	Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr.	1974-1977	Republican	Succeeded President Nixon, whom he controversially pardoned. The only man to become Vice President and President without involvement of the Electoral College. The Vietnam War fully ended under his presidency and he partially pardoned draft dodgers. Promoted detent with the Soviet Union and China. Though he attempted to reduce Inflation with his WIN program, the end of his presidency faced a very bad recession. Signed the Education for All Handicapped Children Act, which helped guarantee equal access to education for students with disabilities. He supported the ultimately unsuccessful Equal Rights Amendment, which would have constitutionally guaranteed equal rights between women and men.
39	James Earl Carter, Jr.	1977-1981	Democrat	The owner of a Peanut farm, he set aside his business in a blind trust to avoid conflicts of interest as president. Established the Department of Education, the Department of Energy, attempted to fight stagflation, and Fully pardoned Vietnam war draft dodgers. He promoted peace with the SALT II talks and the Camp David accords. The end of his presidential term was marked by multiple events, including The Energy Crisis, the Three Mile Island nuclear accident, and the Iranian hostage crisis. After his presidency he became a proponent of humanitarian work, which earned him the Nobel Peace Prize in 2002.
40	Ronald Wilson Reagan	1981-1989	Republican	A former Hollywood actor, nicknamed "The Gipper". His leadership lead to a fundamental shift in American conservatism. He was tough on the Soviet Union, participating in an arms race and famously demanded the Berlin wall be torn down. His economic policies reduced taxes and inflation, but significantly increased national debt. As president he took action against unions and escalated the war on drugs. HIV/AIDS became an important issue during his presidency.
41	George Herbert Walker Bush	1989-1993	Republican	President during the reunification of Germany and the collapse of the Soviet Union. He signed the Americans with Disabilities Act of 1990 into law which helped those with disabilities greatly. He laid the groundwork for NAFTA. He was president during the Gulf War.
42	William Jefferson "Bill" Clinton	1993-2001	Democrat	Oversaw NAFTA and reform on how the criminal justice system handled violent crimes. Oversaw US military intervention in Bosnia and Kosovo. Impeached by House, acquitted by Senate.
43	George Walker Bush	2001-2009	Republican	Son of former President George Herbert Walker Bush. Lost the popular vote in the 2000 election, but won the electoral college. Led America during the horrific attacks on September 11th, 2001 and was president during the War on Terror. Spearheaded the establishment of the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief, a major program which helped fight the HIV/AIDS epidemic. Near the end of his second presidential term the Great Recession began.
44	Barack Hussein Obama, Jr.	2009-2017	Democrat	First African-American president. Won the Nobel Peace prize in 2009. He used economic stimulus to fight the Great Recession, and signed the Affordable Care Act into law. He attempted to take action against Global Warming. Under his administration LGBTQ rights improved.
45	Donald John Trump	2017-2021	Republican	Lost the popular vote in the 2016 election, but won the electoral college. The only president to be impeached by House twice, and acquitted by the Senate twice. Replaced NAFTA with USMCA. Established the US Space Force. Was president during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic.
46	Joseph Robinette Biden Jr.	2021-Present	Democrat	Assumed Presidency during the COVID-19 pandemic. Second Catholic President.

Vice Presidents of the United States of America

#	Vice President	Years in Office	Political Party	Notes
1	John Adams	1789-1797	Federalist	Second President
2	Thomas Jefferson	1797-1801	Democratic-Republican	Founder of the Democratic-Republican Party
3	Aaron Burr	1801-1805	Democratic-Republican	Shot Alexander Hamiltion in a duel. Bribed electors to vote for him, and ended up tied with Jefferson. Scandal resulted in the 12th Amendment.
4	George Clinton	1805-1812	Democratic-Republican	Died in office.
5	Elbridge Gerry	1813-1814	Democratic-Republican	Died in office.
6	Daniel D. Tompkins	1817-1825	Democratic-Republican	An entrepreneur, jurist, Congressman and Governor of New York
7	John Caldwell Calhoun	1825-1832	Democratic-Republican	A major figure in the Nullification crisis and the Petticoat Affair. Resigned near the end of his term.
8	Martin Van Buren	1833-1837	Democrat	Later became president.
9	Richard Mentor Johnson	1837-1841	Democrat	Elected by the United States Senate to the position of Vice President due to the Twelfth Amendment to the United States Constitution. Opposed abolition. Took a nine month leave while vice president to operate a Tavern in Kentucky due to financial difficulties caused by the panic of 1837.
10	John Tyler	1841	Whig	Succeeded President Harrison
11	George Mifflin Dallas	1845-1849	Democrat	Supported expansionist policies.
12	Millard Fillmore	1849-1850	Whig	Succeeded President Taylor
13	William Rufus DeVane King	1853	Democrat	Died in Office, strong believer in "Manifest Destiny."
14	John Cabell Breckinridge	1857-1861	Democrat	A major candidate in the 1860 United States presidential election, and won most southern electoral college votes. Joined the Confederate army almost immediately following his vice presidency, and later served as the Confederate States Secretary of War at the end of the War.
15	Hannibal Hamlin	1861-1865	Republican	First Republican vice president. Believed his position as vice president should not exempt him from his duty in the Maine State Guard, and served during the Civil War while vice president.
16	Andrew Johnson	1865	Democrat	Succeeded President Lincoln
17	Schuyler Colfax	1869-1873	Republican	President Ulysses S. Grant and Vice President Colfax, both 46 at time of entering offices, were the youngest presidential team until election of Bill Clinton and Al Gore in 1992.
18	Henry Wilson	1873-1875	Republican	Died in Office
19	William Almon Wheeler	1877-1881	Republican	Better known for his friendship with President Hayes then his actions as vice president.
20	Chester Alan Arthur	1881	Republican	Succeeded President Garfield
21	Thomas Andrews Hendricks	1885	Democrat	Died in office
22	Levi Parsons Morton	1889-1893	Republican	Attempted to pass the Lodge Bill, which would have greatly improved access to voting for African Americans in the south. The bill was filibustered and failed to pass as a result.
23	Adlai Ewing Stevenson	1893-1897	Democrat	Nearly became president when Grover Cleveland underwent a dangerous surgery.
24	Garret Augustus Hobart	1897-1899	Republican	Died in office
25	Theodore Roosevelt	1901	Republican	Succeeded President McKinley
26	Charles Warren Fairbanks	1905-1909	Republican
27	James Schoolcraft Sherman	1909-1912	Republican	Died in office
28	Thomas Riley Marshall	1913-1921	Democrat
29	John Calvin Coolidge, Jr.	1921-1923	Republican	Succeeded President Harding
30	Charles Gates Dawes	1925-1929	Republican
31	Charles Curtis	1929-1933	Republican	First vice president with American Indian ancestry through the Kaw people.
32	John Nance Garner	1933-1941	Democrat
33	Henry Agard Wallace	1941-1945	Democrat	Worked closely with President Roosevelt on Economic and Military issues. Denounced racism and advocated good relations with the Soviet Union.
34	Harry S Truman	1945	Democrat	Succeeded President Roosevelt
35	Alben William Barkley	1949-1953	Democrat	The oldest vice president, elected at age 71. Popularized the term Veep.
36	Richard Milhous Nixon	1953-1961	Republican	Would later run for president after his term as Vice President.
37	Lyndon Baines Johnson	1961-1963	Democrat	Succeeded President Kennedy
38	Hubert Horatio Humphrey	1965-1969	Democrat	Initially opposed expanding the Vietnam war before later supporting it.
39	Spiro Theodore Agnew	1969-1973	Republican	Resigned following a scandal unrelated to Watergate.
40	Gerald Rudolph Ford, Jr.	1973-1974	Republican	Succeeded President Nixon
41	Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller	1974-1977	Republican	A grandson of John D. Rockefeller. The origin of the "Rockefeller Republican".
42	Walter Frederick Mondale	1977-1981	Democrat	Pursued an active role as vice president.
43	George Herbert Walker Bush	1981-1989	Republican	Would run and win election for President following his term as Vice President.
44	James Danforth "Dan" Quayle III	1989-1993	Republican	Despite making a number of notable public speaking gaffes, his Murphy Brown speech was influential. A proponent of space exploration.
45	Albert Arnold Gore, Jr.	1993-2001	Democrat	Labeled an "Atari Democrat" for his work promoting investment in emerging technologies, especially those related to computers. He ran unsuccessfully against Bush in 2000, and later won the Nobel Prize for the film "An Inconvenient Truth".
46	Richard Bruce Cheney	2001-2009	Republican	Was very active and influential in the Bush administration. Advocated "Enhanced Interrogation" techniques during the war on terror, which critics called torture. Notably broke ranks with President Bush to oppose his push to ban same sex marriage nationwide.
47	Joseph Biden	2009-2017	Democrat	Senator for the state of Delaware for 36 years. The first Roman Catholic vice president. Would later be elected as 46th President.
48	Michael Pence	2017-2021	Republican	A major figure in the Trump Administration's handling of the COVID-19 pandemic. Publicly got a vaccine to encourage other Americans to also vaccinate. Narrowly escaped during the Capitol Riot of January 6th, 2021, safeguarding his aide carrying the backup nuclear football.
49	Kamala Devi Harris	2021-Present	Democrat	First female vice president, first Asian American vice president and first African American vice president.

Appendix Beta: Chief Justices of the United States Supreme Court

• 
  1: John Jay, served October 19, 1789–June 29, 1795
  Appointed by: George Washington
• 
  3: Oliver Ellsworth, served March 8, 1796–December 15, 1800
  Appointed by: George Washington
• 
  4: John Marshall, served February 4, 1801–July 6, 1835†
  Appointed by: John Adams
• 
  5: Roger B. Taney, served March 28, 1836–October 12, 1864†
  Appointed by: Andrew Jackson
• 
  6: Salmon P. Chase, served December 15, 1864–May 7, 1873†
  Appointed by: Abraham Lincoln
• 
  7: Morrison Waite, served March 4, 1874–March 23, 1888†
  Appointed by: Ulysses S. Grant
• 
  8: Melville Fuller, served October 8, 1888–July 4, 1910†
  Appointed by: Grover Cleveland
• 
  9: Edward Douglass White, served December 19, 1910–May 19, 1921†
  Appointed by: William Howard Taft
• 
  10: William Howard Taft, served July 11, 1921–February 3, 1930
  Appointed by: Warren G. Harding
• 
  11: Charles Evans Hughes, served February 24, 1930–June 30, 1941
  Appointed by: Herbert Hoover
• 
  12: Harlan Fiske Stone, served July 3, 1941–April 22, 1946†
  Appointed by: Franklin D. Roosevelt
• 
  13: Frederick Moore Vinson, served June 24, 1946–September 8, 1953†
  Appointed by: Harry S. Truman
• 
  14: Earl Warren, served October 5, 1953–June 23, 1969
  Appointed by: Dwight D. Eisenhower
• 
  15: Warren Earl Burger, served June 23, 1969–September 26, 1986
  Appointed by: Richard Nixon
• 
  16: William Rehnquist, served September 26, 1986–September 3, 2005†
  Appointed by: Ronald Reagan
• 
  17: John Roberts, served September 29, 2005–present
  Appointed by: George W. Bush

† Died in office.

Appendix Gamma: Supreme Court Decisions

The reader may find this section a bit different than the other sections of this book.

Introducing the Constitutional Structure of the United States

The United States is a country ruled by an association representative of, elected by, and accountable to, the people of the United States (as opposed to being ruled by a king or a dictator--in essence, a country ruled by those possessing superior capability for violence compared to anyone else); this makes the United States a "democracy", a country ruled by the people.

The association of the people of the United States - the government of the United States - is ruled by a set of previously declared principles applied in a uniform, consistent, and fair fashion to every situation the government of the United States finds itself in; these principles, and their application, are called "law"; this makes the United States a country that is ruled by law, or has the "rule of law".

But who rules the law? The law rules the law; the system of laws of the United States has certain laws that are more important than others. The highest law of the United States, the "supreme law of the land", is called the "Constitution of the United States of America"; it is a set of laws that govern laws and govern the government. It specifies what kind of laws can be made, and what the government can do. It prohibits certain types of laws from being made, and specifically forbids the government from doing certain things. And it places fundamental limits on the power of government, by specifying that every power that is not specifically granted (or specifically implied) to the government in the Constitution, the government does not possess, may not exercise, and cannot claim to have. This makes the United States a country that has a "limited government"--there are things that the government of the United States cannot do, like throw people in jail for no reason, name one religion as the only religion allowed, send the police to search homes without evidence of crimes being committed, or punish people because they say things that other people disagree with. The reader should understand that the government of the United States does not do these things not because it chooses not to do them--but because it has no power to do them.

But who rules the Constitution? The individual people of the United States do. They can change it, if it becomes necessary. It has been changed 27 times in the past two-hundred-and-twenty or so years. But the process to do so is slow, and arduous, and most people hesitate to change what has worked so well for so long, especially for light causes.

The Constitution In Practice

A word about the Constitution: it was written before the Internet, the computer, the television, nuclear power, radio, the airplane, the automobile, electricity and electric lighting, the train, or in-home running water--before 37 of the 50 current states were part of the United States--before there were any other democracies on the face of the Earth--before there were large cities in our country--and before there were industries, or corporations, or any of the other modern conveniences of life. It was written by candlelight, not by electric light, it was delivered to the 13 states by riders on horseback, not by posting it on the Web. But it was not written before there was what many Americans believe to be God, or before there was a notion that all people are equal, and have the right to be free. Many view the Constitution as a set of truths that apply themselves in similar ways in changing times.

Therefore, the Constitution can sometimes be unclear, and be subject to changing situations. In those situations, there are people who interpret the Constitution and the law of the United States; they are called judges; and the supreme interpreters of the Constitution are called Justices; there are nine of them, and together they form the Supreme Court of the United States. They decide what the Constitution means to us when a situation presents itself where the Constitution is unclear. These decisions are made when one person argues that what another person is doing (or not doing) is forbidden by the Constitution. That is why they have names like "Marbury v. Madison"; Marbury, a person, complained against Madison, a person.

When the Justices of the Supreme Court make decisions in the present, they look to their past decisions (what they call "precedents") for guidance. This is an important part of the law, because the law must be consistent. Sometimes, however, they find their past decisions to be wrong--or inapplicable--and revise them. Sometimes they are upheld, or expanded upon. In any event, there are times when Supreme Court decisions play a very, very major role in the history of the United States.

In the following sections, we name the most major decisions of the Supreme Court and discuss why they occurred, what was decided, and why the decision was important. These decisions--these interpretations of the Constitution by the Supreme Court of the United States--form an important part of the history of the United States, as the United States is a nation ruled by law.

First Constitutional Era (1787-1850)

The Union, its nature, judicial supremacy, rule of law, states' rights, federal powers and the limits thereof, allotment and allocation of powers between the several branches, the several states, and the people thereof, the question of slavery.

Marbury v. Madison 5 U.S. 137 (1803)

The day before his last in office, President John Adams appointed 42 judges to fill seats in many newly-created courts. One of these was William Marbury. The Senate confirmed the judges, and Secretary of State John Marshall signed their commissions, the paper each requires to assume his appointment. But the day Thomas Jefferson was inaugurated, he ordered his appointed Secretary of State, James Madison, not to deliver the commissions to many of the confirmed judges, Marbury included. Marbury sued to force Madison to give up the commissions. The suit was filed directly in the Supreme Court, since Marbury argued that the Judiciary Act 1789 gave the Supreme Court jurisdiction over writs of mandamus, court orders that force public officials to do things.

John Marshall, who incidentally was appointed to the position of Chief Justice on Adams' last day, wrote in the court's unanimous decision that the Court could not rule in Marbury's case because it did not have the jurisdiction to do so. Marbury had argued that Article III of the Constitution only set basic rules concerning the Supreme Court's powers, and that they could be expanded by Congress any time it wanted. Marshall disagreed, pointing to the simple logic: what was the point of having a Constitution if Congress could write laws that changed courts' jurisdictions, thus ignoring the rules explicitly stated in Article III? If laws could be written that circumvented Article III in the way that Marbury argued that the Judiciary Act should, could laws be written that allowed the courts to ignore the Constitution altogether?

In determining that the Judiciary Act was in violation of the Constitution by adding on to Article III, Marshall affirmed the all-important principle of judicial review. Judicial review is the judicial branch's, and specifically the Supreme Court's, power to declare laws in conflict with the Constitution and overturn them.

Fletcher v. Peck, 10 U.S. 87 (1810)

Fletcher v. Peck was the first case in which the Supreme Court ruled a state law unconstitutional. In the course of the westward push for the control of Indian lands, the state of Georgia took from the Indians a 35,000,000-acre (140,000 sq. km) region in the Yazoo River area known as the Yazoo Lands. This land later became the states of Alabama and Mississippi. In 1795, the Georgia legislature divided the area into four tracts. The state then sold the tracts to four separate land development companies for a modest total price of $500,000, i.e. about 1.4 cents per acre, a good deal even at 1790s prices. The Georgia legislature overwhelmingly approved this land grant, known as the Yazoo Land Act of 1795.

It was revealed that the Yazoo Land Act sale to private speculators had been approved in return for bribes. Voters rejected most of the incumbents in the next election, and the next legislature, reacting to the public outcry, repealed the law and voided transactions made under it.

John Peck had purchased land that had previously been sold under the 1795 act. Peck sold this land to Robert Fletcher and in 1803, Fletcher brought suit against Peck, claiming that he did not have clear title to the land when he sold it. The case reached the Supreme Court, which in a unanimous decision ruled that the state legislature's repeal of the law was unconstitutional. The opinion, written by John Marshall, argued that the sale was a binding contract, which according to Article I, Section 10, Clause I (the Contract Clause) of the Constitution cannot be invalidated, even if illegally secured. Today the ruling further protects property rights against popular pressures, and is the earliest case of the Court asserting its right to invalidate state laws conflicting with the Constitution.

Martin v. Hunter's Lessee, 14 U.S 304 (1816)

During the Revolutionary War, Virginia passed legislation allowing it to take Loyalists' property. The United States signed the Treaty of Paris in 1783 with Britain; it included a clause that stated that the federal government would tell the states to give back the Loyalists' property. A Loyalist named Denny Martin sued in Virginia's state court system on the grounds that Loyalists were to get their properties back in accordance with the treaty.

The case eventually reached the Virginia Supreme Court, which upheld the confiscation on the grounds that the court's interpretation of the treaty was that it did not cover the case. The case was appealed to the Supreme Court, which decided that the treaty did apply to the case and remanded it back to the Virginia Supreme Court. The court decided that the Supreme Court did not have jurisdiction over cases originating in state courts, and the decision was appealed back to the Supreme Court. Once again, the Supreme Court overturned the Virginia Supreme Court's ruling, arguing that the case involved federal law. The Court's decision was very important because it affirmed that it had supreme power over all courts in regards to federal law and the Constitution.

McCulloch v. Maryland, 17 U.S. 316 (1819)

This case was a very important test of States' Rights against the power of the federal government. Many states continued to oppose the Bank of the United States after it was reinstated in 1816, mostly because it called for its loans to be owed by the states. In retaliation to this policy, Maryland passed a tax on the bank, which the bank refused to pay. Maryland soon filed suit against James McCulloch, the head of the Baltimore branch of the bank.

The Court's unanimous opinion established two extremely important principles. The first was that, yes, Congress could create the Bank under the doctrine of implied powers. The Constitution specifically lists that Congress has the power to borrow money and regulate commerce (among others), and it can be implied that Congress had the power to create the Bank. The second point that the Court made was that Maryland's tax was unconstitutional because it was in conflict with the Supremacy Clause, which says that states can never willingly impede the federal government. The court reasoned that taxing, if other states decided to adopt Maryland's policy, had the potential to destroy the bank, and thus impede the federal government's efforts to regulate the economy.

Dartmouth College v. Woodward, 17 U.S. 518 (1819)

The Dartmouth College Case was a reiteration of the judicial principle of pacta sunt servanda ("contracts are to be held"). Dartmouth College was established per a colonial charter in 1769, by King George III. In 1815, the legislature of New Hampshire attempted to change the charter of the College in such a way that the governor would be able to appoint a new president of the College, as well as appoint new members of the Board of Trustees and to create a state board to supervise the school, effectively trying to change the college from private to public institution. The court ruled that the old charter was still valid per the Contract Clause of the Constitution (also cited in Fletcher v. Peck). Essentially, the ruling was that a charter was also a contract, and the state legislature had no right to convert the private institution to a public institution as long as the old charter was in power.

Gibbons v. Ogden, 22 U.S. 1 (1824)

In Gibbons v. Ogden, the Supreme Court held that the power to regulate interstate commerce was granted to Congress by the Commerce Clause of the Constitution. The case was argued by some of America's most admired and capable attorneys at the time. Exiled Irish patriot Thomas Addis Emmet and Thomas J. Oakley argued for Ogden, while William Wirt and Daniel Webster argued for Gibbons.

The Constitution In Crisis and Decision (1850-1871)

The Union; its fundamental nature and character; the nature and character of states, and sovereignty; the meaning of citizenship; the extraordinary powers of the President; the war powers; the customs, usages, rules, and articles of war; the Great Writ, and its application in times of crisis; the formal ratification of the principles of the Declaration of Independence, and the formal repudiation of the Calhounian counterrevolutionary ideology of oligarchic slave power despotic tyranny.

This section will depart from the normal style, as there are important changes that were made in the Constitution and Constitutional interpretation through means other than judicial interpretation, such as by means of amendment, or by right of the victor.

Dred Scott v. Sandford, 60 U.S. 393 (1857)

Dred Scott was perhaps the most controversial Supreme Court decision in all of U.S. history, quite possibly was a major cause of the U.S. Civil War, and is generally regarded by most U.S. historians, scholars, and lawyers as a moment of supreme infamy, when the U.S. unquestionably knew sin.

Dred Scott was an African-American slave who originally lived in Missouri, and was taken to Illinois, a free state, by his master. Scott sued for freedom, as he was in a free state. The case worked its way through the courts, until it reached the Supreme Court. Although the case could have been dismissed for technical reasons, Chief Justice Roger Taney decided to attempt to resolve the slavery issue in the United States once and for all, by imposing his personal opinion (his personal opinion as a slaver) upon his fellow citizens. Taney declared, simply, that African-Americans were not citizens within the meaning of the Constitution, and had no rights except for what "those who held the power...might choose to grant them", and thus, not being citizens, in Taney's opinion, had no standing to sue. He dismissed the case.

The most infamous passage of Scott is as follows:

"The words 'people of the United States' and 'citizens' are synonymous terms, and mean the same thing. They both describe the political body who, according to our republican institutions, form the sovereignty, and who hold the power and conduct the Government through their representatives. They are what we familiarly call the 'sovereign people,' and every citizen is one of this people, and a constituent member of this sovereignty. The question before us is, whether the class of persons described in the plea in abatement compose a portion of this people, and are constituent members of this sovereignty? We think they are not, and that they are not included, and were not intended to be included, under the word 'citizens' in the Constitution, and can therefore claim none of the rights and privileges which that instrument provides for and secures to citizens of the United States. On the contrary, they were at that time considered as a subordinate and inferior class of beings, who had been subjugated by the dominant race, and, whether emancipated or not, yet remained subject to their authority, and had no rights or privileges but such as those who held the power and the Government might choose to grant them."

It took a civil war and 700,000 dead U.S. citizens, both black and white, to obliterate the stain of Scott from the Constitution with the blood of patriots and tyrants, to end slavery once and for all, but it was done.

Ex parte Merryman, (1861)

TBD

Merryman was not decided by the Supreme Court, but is included for purposes of clarity, as it involves the extraordinary powers of the Presidency.

The United States, as it was in 1860, was a vast, sparsely populated, primarily agricultural nation. She was not a Great Power, for the Great Powers of the day were European principalities, kingdoms, and empires who did the world's business at the Docklands of London, the harbors of Amsterdam, and the Palaces of Versailles, The Hague, and Vienna. She was a minor power who kept to herself and was looked upon by the philosophers and thinkers of the time as a minor experiment in popular rule which was not bearing major fruit; to the princes of Europe, the United States was a convenient place to exile their radicals to who were calling for elected governments or civil liberty. In the words of certain Europeans, the United States had "gone from barbarism to decadence without passing through civilization". Washington, D.C. was viewed as a semi-tropical backwater of minor import; for many European diplomats used to soirees in the imperial courts of France and Prussia, or grand balls in the Hall of Mirrors in Versailles, it was a post worthy of substantial hardship pay.

Many of the Far Western states (the Great Plains States and the Rocky Mountain States) were not States at that time, and those regions were mostly unsettled, with the land owned by the Government, but the Government unable to disburse of it at the time in a manner perceived as fair. The Pacific Coast States were settled, but only moderately, and had low levels of industry and moderate levels of agriculture prior to the construction of the Transcontinental Railroads (the completion dates of those being the Union Pacific in 1873; the Southern Pacific in 1882; and the Great Northern in 1891). In the Eastern States, the United States had a moderate population level in the Old Northwest, along with mining, industry, and agriculture; a comparatively high population level in the Mid-Atlantic and the Northeast, where the industry and trade of the nation was concentrated; and a moderate to high population level and large scale agriculture in the Old South. Transportation links in the North, which consisted of the Northeast, the Mid-Atlantic and the Old Northwest (what we now call the Upper Midwest - beyond the Appalachians to the Mississippi River) were rather developed, to meet the needs of commerce and industry, and the railroads provided transportation from one city to another in the North within the travel of 2-3 days. The South's rail systems were underdeveloped, and transit there was often an extended affair. To the Far Western states, transit would have to be either by steamer or overland; either mode of transit was not particularly fast. It could take a month - or more - for a person to get from one side of the United States to the other. Information did travel much faster than that - the Transcontinental Telegraph permitted the news of the East to reach the West within minutes, while the Pony Express served such purposes prior to that point, with round-trip mail times of days.

The reason for this being important to this case is that the Congress of the United States did not, like it does today, meet during all the year. The Congress was but a part-time legislature; the laws were few and simple, the business of the time was of import but not of great urgency, and following their session, the Congress dissolved and returned to the states and districts, the log cabins, the small farms, the cities, and the plantations from whence they came.

Following the election of the Northerner Abraham Lincoln as President, an insurrection had broke out in certain areas of the United States, as the slave-power of the South was desirous of subduing the anti-slavery North once and for all by fire and the sword, or at the very least, breaking free of the "oppressive" Federal rule so she could once again traffic in the human flesh of the African coast and build a slave empire extending even to Cuba and Mexico, as contemplated by the then dead John Calhoun, chief of the slave-power faction in the Congress at one time. This insurrection had turned into a rebellion, forming an alleged government; South Carolina, a hot-bed of slaving conspiracy where there were more African-Americans in bondage than there were people of any race, had seceded from the Union first, and was followed by the states of the Deep South where the Slave Power was the strongest. The less degenerate slave states of Virginia and Tennessee only saw treason openly fomented in their legislatures at first, and they did not break from the Union yet... Prior to attempts to peacefully settle the crisis, the South Carolinian fire-eaters fired the first shot of the coming war at Fort Sumter in Charleston Harbor, the property of the Federal Union, and with those shots, the war came, the War Between the States, The War of Southern Aggression, The War of Northern Aggression, or as it is known by later times, the U.S. Civil War.

Following the assault on Fort Sumter, the Upper South joined itself to the rebellion, and even Maryland, Kentucky, and Missouri, only lightly scarred by the lash of the slaver, were rumored to be beset by internal commotion by slavers and slave-power sympathizers who sought to secede from the Federal Union and deliver those states into the hands of the so-called Confederacy.

During the first six or seven months of 1861, the Congress was not assembled in Washington D.C., and it could not be returned into session, because its members were scattered around the nation, word of the emergency traveled slowly, and people traveled like molasses, if they traveled at all.

During the first year of the Civil War, President Abraham Lincoln

Compare and contrast with the more moderate opinion of the Court in Youngstown.

Ex parte Milligan, 71 U.S. 2 (1866)

Case involving Confederate sympathizers subjected to (sham) trial by "military commission" based on order of the so-called unitary executive. Supreme Court ruled that use military commissions or any form of attenuated due process had to be based on military necessity, and proximate in time and space to the actual zone of military operations.

Second Constitutional Era (1871-1938)

Substantive due process, "corporate personhood", "separate but equal", "freedom of contract", monopolies, corporations, the national and state level economies, private greed v. public need.

Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company, 118 U.S. 394 (1886)

Decision where the scope of the term "person" under the 14th Amendment and the Constitution of the United States was expanded to include legal fictions, such as corporations. This granted to corporations the same rights (such as freedom of speech, freedom of contract) that previously were retained only by human persons, under the Constitution, the Bill of Rights, and the 14th Amendment. Enormously controversial, as decision allowed corporations to claim the Constitution protected them from popular legislation such as minimum wage laws, health and safety standards, taxation, labor laws, etc. Set the defining theme of the Court's jurisprudence for the next 50 years, until Carolene Products in 1938.

Plessy v. Ferguson, 163 U.S. 537 (1896)

The Plessy v. Ferguson decision upheld the constitutionality of racial segregation even in public accommodations (particularly railroads), under the doctrine of "separate but equal". This case remained the legal basis for Jim Crow segregation laws in the Southern states.

The decision was handed down by a vote of 7 to 1, with the majority opinion written by Justice Henry Billings Brown and the dissent written by Justice John Marshall Harlan. Justice David Josiah Brewer did not participate in the decision. "Separate but equal" remained standard doctrine in U.S. law until its repudiation in the 1954 Supreme Court decision Brown v. Board of Education.

After the high court ruled, the New Orleans Comité des Citoyens (Committee of Citizens) that had brought the suit and that had arranged for Homer Plessy's arrest in order to challenge Louisiana's segregation law, replied, "We, as freemen, still believe that we were right and our cause is sacred."

Insular Cases, (1901-1905)

The Insular Cases were a series of Supreme Court decisions concerning territories annexed by the United States during the 1898 Spanish-American War and further annexations. The most significant precedent established by these cases was that "the Constitution does not follow the flag." This means that the rights of American citizens as granted by the Constitution do not necessarily apply to "American" inhabitants of U.S. territories. These cases were known as Insular Cases because the territories annexed by the U.S. were islands, among them the Philippines, Hawaii, Puerto Rico, and Guam. These cases also established that the Constitution only applied to "fully incorporated territories," meaning that the territories had to be fully incorporated into the United States under the doctrine of territorial incorporation, also established during this time.

Schenck v. United States, 249 U.S. 47 (1919)

Schenck v. United States was a United States Supreme Court decision concerning the question of whether the defendant possessed a First Amendment right to free speech against the draft during World War I. Charles Schenck was the Secretary of the Socialist party and was responsible for printing, distributing, and mailing 15,000 leaflets to men eligible for the draft that advocated opposition to the draft. These leaflets contained statements such as; "Do not submit to intimidation", "Assert your rights", "If you do not assert and support your rights, you are helping to deny or disparage rights which it is the solemn duty of all citizens and residents of the United States to retain." Ultimately, the case served as the founding of the "clear and present danger" rule, first written in the majority opinion written by Chief Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes.

Third Constitutional Era (1938-?)

Civil rights, equality under the law, the right to privacy, "penumbras formed by emanations", the meaning of justice, the limits of the executive, the manifold possibilities of liberty.

Hague v. CIO, 307 U.S. 496 (1939)

First civil liberties case of the Third Era, involving freedom of assembly, association, and speech; specifically, related to the repression of labor unions by infamous Boss Hague in New Jersey.

Korematsu v. United States, 323 U.S. 214 (1944)

Fred Korematsu, an American born in California who was subjected to Japanese Internment.

Korematsu v. United States was a decision related to internment of Japanese-Americans (including citizens of the United States) in prison camps during World War II. By Executive Order 9066, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt ordered all Japanese and Japanese American residents of certain parts close to the coast removed in 1942, following the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. This eventually led to the establishment of internment camps for around 120,000 ethnic Japanese, most of them citizens of the United States, in the military zones established by the executive order. In this decision, the Supreme Court upheld the constitutionality of the internment, voting by 6-5 that the requirement to protect the United States against espionage was more important than the rights of Japanese immigrants and citizens in the United States.

In 2018 the Supreme Court found that Korematsu v. United States was wrongly decided in the case Trump v. Hawaii.

Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer, 343 U.S. 579 (1952)

During the Korean War, a labor dispute arose between the Steelworkers (an association of workers, called a labor union) and the various steel mills who employed them. The steel mills claimed that the workers in question were being paid too much, and, after difficult negotiations, decided to lockout these workers, so that they could avoid paying them. The workers were outraged that they were being locked out, due to the enormous unfulfilled needs of soldiers on the battlefield for tanks and weapons that couldn't be produced and were being ignored due to the position of the mill owners, and perhaps also due to the fact that they weren't able to work or get paid.

President Harry Truman decided to intervene, claiming that due to the fact that a war was going on, he, as "Commander in Chief", could temporarily seize and run the steel mills under the Federal Government so as to continue production during the war. This outraged both the steel mills and the workers; both sides didn't believe the government could do such a thing, as no law had been passed to allow those sorts of actions to take place; indeed, most people believed that unilateral actions like Truman's, in this case, were exactly the type of thing the Constitution was there to prevent.

The owners of the steel mills sued the government for seizing the steel mills. Within several weeks, due to the emergency nature of the situation, the case came before the Supreme Court.

The Court ruled against the Government, finding that there were no provisions in the law or the Constitution that allowed the government to seize private industry (or to force workers to work) during a labor dispute. Though the decision was mixed--almost every Justice wrote an opinion--it was definitively against the Government. Justice Harlan? wrote the most famous opinion in this case--delineating three spheres of Presidential power--that is considered to be the single most authoritative pronouncement of the Supreme Court on the scope of Presidential powers since the immediate aftermath of the Civil War; Harlan's? opinion still is considered authoritative to this day.

This case, although it might seem minor to the reader, has great meta-Constitutional importance--Presidential powers have greatly expanded since the Framing of the Constitution--and their exact scope is extremely controversial, especially in the past 30-40 years.

The mills were returned to their owners, who (very quickly) reached agreement with the workers, and the dispute was resolved.

Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954)

VERY IMPORTANT Supreme Court case which decided that racial segregation in public schools was contrary to the letter and the spirit of the Constitution; one factor that set in motion the civil rights movement amongst African-Americans. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, 347 U.S. 483 (1954),[1] was a landmark decision of the United States Supreme Court, which overturned earlier rulings going back to Plessy v. Ferguson in 1896, by declaring that state laws that established separate public schools for black and white students denied black children equal educational opportunities. Handed down on May 17, 1954, the Warren Court's unanimous (9-0) decision stated that "separate educational facilities are inherently unequal." As a result, de jure racial segregation was ruled a violation of the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution. This victory paved the way for integration and the civil rights movement.[2] Contents [hide]

Mapp v. Ohio, 367 U.S. 643 (1961)

The Exclusionary Rule protects defendants in criminal cases from having unlawfully obtained evidence used against them in court, such as stolen items found during a search of a residence by police without a warrant. For many years, the Exclusionary Rule only was applied at the federal level. Federal criminal prosecutions are an extremely tiny minority of all criminal prosecutions in the United States; most prosecutions occur at the state level, including nearly all of those for extraordinarily serious crimes, such as murder and rape. (Federal crimes include offenses against federal property and agents; certain crimes taking place in multiple states, such as a spree of bank robberies; interstate conspiracies, such as a drug-smuggling ring; crimes taking place under color of law, such as police brutality or judicial corruption; and also include acts of terrorism, military crimes, espionage, and treason. The states are responsible for the prosecution of all other criminal acts, from drunken disorderliness all the way to premeditated murder.)

In Mapp, the Supreme Court found that the Exclusionary Rule applied to the states, and that evidence unlawfully obtained could not be used for state prosecutions, in addition to federal ones. The grounds for this were found in the Fourteenth Amendment, which required that states not deprive any person of life, liberty, or property without due process of law; liberty was held to include those rights protected by the Bill of Rights, which had previously only applied to acts of the Federal Government.

Mapp forced wholesale changes in police procedure throughout the United States, as police were now required to obtain warrants to gather evidence that could be used in court. (Previously, police were supposed to obtain warrants to search homes, but as the evidence gained by warrantless (i.e. unlawful) searches was admitted regardless of whether it was obtained by warrant or not, this rule was widely ignored.) In addition, Mapp signaled an increased level of scrutiny by the Supreme Court over police practices, which has continued to the present day.

Gideon v. Wainwright, 372 U.S. 335 (1963)

Case that decided that accused persons had right to a lawyer even if they could not afford one.

Griswold v. Connecticut, 381 U.S. 479 (1965)

This Supreme Court case was brought by a married couple who claimed that their fundamental liberties were infringed by a Connecticut statute that outlawed the sale of birth control devices and medicines within the state. The Supreme Court agreed, finding that their Constitutional right to privacy was infringed by the Connecticut birth control ban, and invalidated it for married couples.

Justice Douglass famously wrote that the right to privacy, a right not explicitly written into the text of the Constitution, was instead implied by "penumbras formed by emanations" by the other enumerated rights reserved to the people and listed in the Constitution, such as the right to be free from unreasonable searches without a warrant. Especially after Roe v. Wade, some conservatives have used the "penumbra" passage to decry what they believe to be the alleged judicial "creation" of rights not found in the Constitution.

Though this case was relatively uncontroversial when it was decided, as it only impacted married couples, it laid the foundation for the Court's decision 8 years later in Roe v. Wade, where the Court overturned all laws banning abortion in the US as violations of the right to privacy, which is perhaps one of the most controversial Supreme Court decisions ever.

Miranda v. Arizona, 384 U.S. 436 (1966)

Case requiring that the famous Miranda warnings, advising arrested persons of their right to remain silent, to have a lawyer present, and to have a lawyer appointed for free, in the event of lack of money, be given to persons arrested by police prior to interrogation.

Brandenburg v. Ohio, 395 U.S. 444 (1969)

Free speech case. Changed what remained of old "clear and present danger" test to "incitement to imminent lawless action test". Important in understanding U.S. free speech jurisprudence.

Roe v. Wade, 410 U.S. 113 (1973)

Roe v. Wade, decided in 1973, is a famous and extraordinarily controversial Supreme Court case that found the Constitution of the United States prohibits outlawing of abortion, or the imposition of undue restrictions upon it, at least during the initial stages of a pregnancy. Roe is likely the most controversial Supreme Court case in 20th century U.S. history, and ranks among Bush v. Gore (2000), Santa Clara County v. Southern Pacific Railroad Company (1886), and Dred Scott v. Sanford (1857), as one of the most controversial Supreme Court cases of all time. On June 24th, 2022 the decision was overturned by the Supreme Court in the decision of Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Organization.

Roe, a woman from the state of Texas, had an unwanted pregnancy. Texas law, at that time, forbade the termination of pregnancy except under certain medical circumstances, such as the endangerment of the pregnant woman's life. Roe sued the state of Texas, alleging that her 14th Amendment right to privacy was being violated by the law forbidding termination of pregnancy. The case worked its way up through the several Federal courts, and reached the Supreme Court. The Supreme Court agreed with Roe, and found the Texas law to be an unconstitutional invasion of Roe's right to privacy between doctor and patient. The decision in Roe was unique, though, as the Court did not just strike down the Texas law; it issued guidelines as to what regulation of abortion it would consider permissible. (It is normally very unusual for the Court to say what is allowed to government, versus determining what is forbidden for government to do.) The Court decided that during the first 3 months of a pregnancy, abortion was acceptable for any reason; during the second 3 months, regulation to protect health could be imposed, such as requiring that abortions take place in hospitals; and during the last 3 months, abortion could be generally forbidden, due to the late stage and development of the pregnancy.

This decision caused immediate and immense controversy throughout the United States. Persons of numerous faiths objected to it (especially Catholics and conservative Protestants); feminist & civil rights groups applauded it; liberal groups (the left of the American political spectrum) were generally viewed as supportive of Roe, while conservative groups (the right of the American political spectrum) were generally viewed as being opposed to the decision.

Support & Opposition to Roe

Political and religious stereotypes scarcely capture the immense political and legal debate about the implications of Roe. This section reviews a few of these arguments.

Supporters of Roe view Roe as an important decision that affirmed what they consider the basic rights of women, especially the right for women to control their own body and reproductive systems. Other supporters view Roe as an important triumph in the area of reproductive public policy, establishing the right to control over active pregnancy into the law of the land. Still others focus on sociological arguments, sometimes claiming that Roe led to decreases in crime in the years since the decision, as unwanted pregnancies, and therefore the number of unsupportable children was reduced by the availability of abortion. (Others claim that the decrease in unwanted children is due to effective contraception widely available upon request, and the rise of comprehensive sex education.) Still others claim that it is hypocrisy for people to object to Roe, especially men, who will never have the "opportunity" to walk a mile in the shoes of a teenage woman with an unwanted pregnancy, which will severely impact her future choices as well as cause her and her family shame. This view can be expressed by the slogan: "Don't like abortion? Get a vasectomy!"

Objections to Roe are numerous. Legal objections can be broken down into several arguments. One is that the Supreme Court, rather than interpreting the Constitution, legislated from the bench, in either upholding or greatly expanding the scope of the unwritten privacy right into an area which is generally not considered a subject of privacy, namely the permissibility of medical procedures performed by state-licensed health-care professionals. Individuals subscribing to this argument may take the view that irregardless of whether abortion is good public policy or not, it is not a legal matter implicating fundamental liberties, due to the uncertain origin and tortured nature of the privacy argument, but a political matter, for the people's representatives to consider and decide upon. Another is that the Supreme Court failed to consider the possibility that fetuses (or, as some term them, babies), may have rights as well as the pregnant woman, and those potential rights have to be analyzed as part of any decisions surrounding abortion. Others focus on the implications of decisions of this nature, viewing them as overreaching, and setting dangerous precedents that allow the Court to deeply intrude into political questions that go further than fundamental liberties (like freedom of speech, or the right to a fair trial), such as the Court was viewed by many as doing in Bush v. Gore.

Other objections include those of morality and religion. These objections are often raised by conservative Protestants, as well as Catholics, in general. However, a number of liberal Protestant and Catholics, as well as non-religious people also object to abortion, as what they view as a violation of human rights.

Impact and Implications of Roe

It can be scarcely disputed that Roe has caused immeasurable political conflict between supporters and opponents of abortion that goes on to this day; some even believe that Roe and the conflicts surrounding it have caused the basic consensus underlying the foundations of United States democracy to be injured. It is arguable that Roe was the last blow that shattered the New Deal Coalition of liberals and moderates that had governed the U.S. for perhaps 40 years at the time. Objectors to Roe no longer saw the general political community of the United States as sharing their values, and opted out of that community, seeking and creating new political communities within and based upon their faith. These faith-based political communities would later do battle with the ideology-based political communities created during and in the wake of the Vietnam War, and forged in place by the great unrest of 1968.

This clash of beliefs came to be characterised by conservatives as a 'Culture War' which became an evocative touchstone of their political activism from the 1980s onwards.

United States v. Nixon, 418 U.S. 683 (1974)

This case originated out of a dispute over a subpoena for evidence pertinent to special prosecutor Archibald Cox's Watergate investigation. Because of Cox's insistence that President Nixon hand over his infamous audiotaped conversations, he was fired as a part of Nixon's Saturday Night Massacre. Cox's successor, Leon Jaworski, continued to pursue the subpoena. Nixon continued to refuse to hand the tapes over, and cited his executive privilege in asserting their confidentiality. Jaworski filed a lawsuit in the Supreme Court in hopes of obtaining a court order forcing Nixon to obey the subpoena.

Although in private deliberations, the justices did not come to a unanimous opinion, they decided to rule unanimously with the majority's opinion in order to make the ruling more definitive to Nixon and pressure him not to ignore it. The opinion held that, not only as established in Marbury v. Madison that the Court was the final say concerning whether or not laws were constitutional, the Court could also decide how the President's powers are limited by the Constitution. The court also held that executive privilege did not apply to evidence pertinent to criminal cases. Most importantly, the Court ruled that, using the power it had affirmed, that nobody, including the President of the United States, was above the law.

Regents of the University of California v. Bakke, 438 U.S. 265 (1978)

Supreme Court case that ruled that quotas as a form of affirmative action (i.e. a guaranteed minimum percentage reservation of seats in a public institution for minority groups who were subject to past discrimination) were violative of the Constitution, and were thus illegal.

Bowers v. Hardwick, 478 U.S. 186 (1986)

Supreme Court case that found that laws forbidding and criminalizing private, consensual, non-commercial sexual conduct between unrelated adults that a legislative body found to be immoral were compatible with the Constitutional guarantees of liberty and privacy. Overruled and reversed as being wrongly decided in the first instance by Lawrence v. Texas (2003).

Bush v. Gore, 531 U.S. 98 (2000)

This case is notable, not because it set any new precedent, but because of the magnitude of the decision: the Supreme Court effectively decided the 2000 Presidential election, due to voting irregularities in Florida.

Lawrence v. Texas, 539 U.S. 558 (2003)

Lawrence, a gay man, was in his apartment, having consensual intimate transactions with his unrelated sexual partner, when local police, responding to a weapons complaint of shots fired, suddenly entered his apartment to search for weapons. No weapons were found, but Lawrence and his partner were discovered by the police in flagrante delicto. They were cited by the police for "unnatural sexual intercourse", a crime under the law of the State of Texas.

Lawrence and his partner, Gardner, decided to fight the charges, on the grounds that:

1. The law only applied to "unnatural sexual intercourse" between persons of the same sex, but not against persons of the opposite sex engaging in the same sort of "unnatural sexual intercourse". This, claimed Lawrence, deprived him of the equal protection of the law.
2. The law was an unconstitutional invasion of Lawrence's and Gardner's privacy and liberty, as the "crime" Lawrence and Gardner were accused of were transactions of the most intimate character, were consensual, were non-commercial and took place in private, behind closed doors, in a private space where the authority of the state had no power to enter, nor to regulate such transactions, absent some compelling showing of harm.

The State of Texas argued that the charges should be upheld on the grounds that the state has the right to determine and regulate morality, including morality in private spaces, and that laws forbidding homosexuality were found to be constitutional in the case of Bowers v. Hardwick, creating a precedent that had to be upheld by the Court.

The Court agreed with Lawrence and Gardner. Justice Kennedy, writing for the Court, concluded:

“These matters, involving the most intimate and personal choices a person may make in a lifetime, choices central to personal dignity and autonomy, are central to the liberty protected by the Fourteenth Amendment. At the heart of liberty is the right to define one’s own concept of existence, of meaning, of the universe, and of the mystery of human life. Beliefs about these matters could not define the attributes of personhood were they formed under compulsion of the State.

Persons in a homosexual relationship may seek autonomy for these purposes, just as heterosexual persons do. The decision in Bowers would deny them this right. Bowers was not correct when it was decided, and it is not correct today. It ought not to remain binding precedent. Bowers v. Hardwick should be and now is overruled.

The present case does not involve minors. It does not involve persons who might be injured or coerced or who are situated in relationships where consent might not easily be refused. It does not involve public conduct or prostitution. It does not involve whether the government must give formal recognition to any relationship that homosexual persons seek to enter. The case does involve two adults who, with full and mutual consent from each other, engaged in sexual practices common to a homosexual lifestyle. The petitioners are entitled to respect for their private lives. The State cannot demean their existence or control their destiny by making their private sexual conduct a crime. Their right to liberty under the Due Process Clause gives them the full right to engage in their conduct without intervention of the government. “It is a promise of the Constitution that there is a realm of personal liberty which the government may not enter.” Casey, supra, at 847. The Texas statute furthers no legitimate state interest which can justify its intrusion into the personal and private life of the individual.

Had those who drew and ratified the Due Process Clauses of the Fifth Amendment or the Fourteenth Amendment known the components of liberty in its manifold possibilities, they might have been more specific. They did not presume to have this insight. They knew times can blind us to certain truths and later generations can see that laws once thought necessary and proper in fact serve only to oppress. As the Constitution endures, persons in every generation can invoke its principles in their own search for greater freedom."

District of Columbia v. Heller, 554 U.S. 570 (2008)

This case involved the interpretation of the Second Amendment, appertaining to militias as well as the right to keep and bear arms, as well as the Fourteenth Amendment, which secures and specifies that the people retain certain rights, including those to life, to liberty, and to property, that no state government may deny them.

Heller, the petitioner, lived in the District of Columbia, whose law forbade the possession of handguns within said District, except under certain very narrow circumstances, which Heller was not eligible for. Believing the Second Amendment to apply to individuals, Heller sued, claiming that his right to keep and bear arms was being infringed by the District.

The Supreme Court agreed with Heller, finding that the Second Amendment does indeed secure to individuals the right to keep and bear arms, and that the Fourteenth Amendment applies this right to the several States; the District's handgun ban was thus overturned.

Appendex Delta: Famous Third Parties

Third Parties of the United States

Though the United States government is overwhelmingly based on a two-party system, there have been times in history when minor third parties have rose to prominence and affected the government.

	Party	Presidential Candidates, if any	Number of Votes for candidate	Notes
1	Nullifier	1832 - John Floyd	1832 -               0	Although John Floyd did not run for president, the Nullifier Party supported him, and South Carolina gave its eleven electoral votes to him.
2	Anti-Masonic	1832 - William Wirt & Amos Ellmaker	1832 -    100,715	Ironically, Wirt was a former Mason Wirt received seven electoral votes from Vermont
3	Liberty	1840 - James G. Birney & Thomas Earle 1844 - James G. Birney & Thomas Morris 1848 - Gerrit Smith & Charles C. Foote 1852 - William Goodell & Samuel M. Bell 1856 - Gerrit Smith & 1860 - Gerrit Smith & Samuel McFarland	1840 -        6,797 1844 -      62,103 1848 -        2,545 1852 -         1856 -         1860 -
4	Free Soil	1848 - Martin Van Buren & Charles F. Adams 1852 - John P. Hale & George W. Julian	1848 -    291,501 1852 -    155,210	Martin Van Buren had previously been president, having formerly been elected as a Democrat. The derogatory term "spoiler" emerged after the 1848 election.  Democrats called the Free Soilers "Free Spoilers" because the Free Soil Party, which gained more than 10 percent of the vote, appealed so greatly to antislavery Democrats.
5	Prohibition	1872 - James Black & John Russell 1876 - Green Clay Smith & Gideon T. Stewart 1880 - Neal Dow & Henry A. Thompson 1884 - John Saint John & William Daniel 1888 - Clinton B. Fisk & John A. Brooks 1892 - John Bidwell & James B. Cranfill 1896 - Joshua Levering & Hale Johnson 1900 - John G. Woolley & Henry B. Metcalf 1904 - Silas C. Swallow & George W. Carroll 1908 - Eugene W. Chafin & Aaron S. Watkins 1912 - Eugene W. Chafin & Aaron S. Watkins 1916 - Frank Hanly & Ira Landrith 1920 - Aaron Watkins & D. Leigh Colvin 1924 - Herman P. Faris & Marie C. Brehm 1928 - William F. Varney & James A. Edgerton 1932 - William D. Upshaw & Frank S. Regan 1936 - D. Leigh Colvin & Claude A. Watson 1940 - Roger Babson & Edgar V. Moorman 1944 - Claude A. Watson & Andrew Johnson 1948 - Claude A. Watson & Dale H. Learn 1952 - Stuart Hamblen & Enoch A. Holtwick 1956 - Enoch A. Holtwick & Edwin M. Cooper 1960 - Rutherford Decker & E. Harold Munn 1964 - E. Harold Munn & Mark R. Shaw 1968 - E. Harold Munn & Rolland E. Fisher 1972 - E. Harold Munn & Marshall E. Uncapher 1976 - Benjamin C. Bubar & Earl F. Dodge 1980 - Benjamin C. Bubar & Earl F. Dodge 1984 - Earl Dodge & Warren C. Martin 1988 - Earl Dodge & George Ormsby 1992 - Earl Dodge & George Ormsby 1996 - Earl Dodge & Rachel Bubar Kelly 2000 - Earl Dodge & W. Dean Watkins 2004 - Earl Dodge & Howard Lydick, Gene Amondson & Leroy Pletten 2008 - Gene Amondson & Leroy Pletten 2012 - Jack Fellure & Toby Davis	1872 -        5,607 1876 -        6,945 1880 -      10,269 1884 -    147,482 1888 -    249,819 1892 -    270,879 1896 -    124,896 1900 -    210,864 1904 -    259,102 1908 -    254,087 1912 -    208,156 1916 -    221,302 1920 -    188,787 1924 -      55,951 1928 -      20,095 1932 -      81,905 1936 -      37,646 1940 -      57,903 1944 -      74,758 1948 -    103,708 1952 -      73,412 1956 -      41,937 1960 -      46,203 1964 -      23,267 1968 -      15,123 1972 -      13,497 1976 -      15,961 1980 -        7,212 1984 -        4,242 1988 -        8,002 1992 -           935 1996 -        1,298 2000 -           208 2004 - Amondson: 1,944, Dodge: 140 2008 -           643 2012 -           519	Although the Prohibition Party never obtained the presidency, its primary issue of prohibiting alcohol became the law of the land with the ratification of the Eighteenth Amendment to the United States Constitution.  The amendment went into effect on 17 January 1920. The nationwide prohibition of alcohol ended with the passage of the Twenty-first Amendment to the United States Constitution, ratified on 5 December 1933, which repealed the Eighteenth Amendment.
6	Libertarian	1972 - John Hospers & Tonie Nathan 1976 - Roger MacBride & David P. Bergland 1980 - Ed Clark & David H. Koch 1984 - David P. Bergland & James A. Lewis 1988 - Ron Paul & Andre Marrou 1992 - Andre Marrou & Nancy Lord 1996 - Harry Browne & Jo Jorgensen 2000 - Harry Browne & Art Olivier 2004 - Michael Badnarik & Richard V. Campagna 2008 - Bob Barr & Wayne Allyn Root 2012 - Gary Johnson & Jim Gray	1972 -        3,674 1976 -    172,553 1980 -    921,128 1984 -    228,111 1988 -    431,750 1992 -    290,087 1996 -    485,759 2000 -    384,431 2004 -    397,265 2008 -    523,715 2012 - 1,275,971	Hospers and Nathan each received one electoral vote, making Nathan the first female in American history to receive an electoral vote
7	Green	1996 - Ralph Nader & Winona LaDuke 2000 - Ralph Nader & Winona LaDuke 2004 - David Cobb & Pat LaMarche 2008 - Cynthia McKinney & Rosa Clemente 2012 - Jill Stein & Cheri Honkala	2004 -    119,859 2008 -    161,680 2012 -    468,907
8	Workers World	Gloria La Riva Monica Moorehead
9	Socialist Workers	Farrell Dobbs Fred Halstead Linda Jenness Róger Calero

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Keywords (People, Events, etc)

• == Pre Colonial America ==

Aztecs
Incas
Mayas
human sacrifice
tribe

Nomads and Barbarians

Viking
Goth
Visagoth
Vandal
Conan
Huns
Kutriguri
Joseph of Aramathea
Britania
Nordic Theory
Iceland

Colonial America (1600-1763)

Jamestown
John Rolfe
Captain John Smith
Powhattan
House of Burgesses
Mayflower Compact
Pilgrims
Plymouth (Massachusetts Bay Colony)
William Bradford
Separatists
Puritans
John Winthrop
Halfway Covenant
Roger Williams & Anne Hutchinson
Deism
Great Awakening
George Whitefield
Jonathan Edwards
Old Lights v. New Lights
Indentured servitude
Salutary neglect
Enlightenment
Glorious Revolution
Leisler's Rebellion
Sir Edmond Andros
Bacon's Rebellion
French and Indian War
Proclamation of 1763
William Penn
mercantilism
Toleration Act of 1649
Navigation Acts
Molasses Act
Hat Act
Iron Act
Stamp Act

American Revolution (1750-1800)

Proclamation of 1763
Paxton Boys
Regulators
Stamp Act
Stact Congress
Virtual v Actual Representation
Samuel Adams
Tea Act
Boston Tea Party
Intolerable of Coercive Acts
Thomas Paine's Common Sense
Sons of Liberty
Patrick Henry
Franco-American Alliance (1778)
Treaty of Paris (1783)
Shay's Rebellion

Birth of a Nation (1780s)

Articles of Confederation
Northwest Ordinance of 1785
Shay's Rebellion
Great Compromise
Three-Fifths Compromise
Federalists
Anti-Federalists
Federalist Papers
Bill of Rights
First Bank of the United States
Alexander Hamiltion
Federalist Party
Judiciary Act of 1789
Pinckney Treaty
Jay's Treaty
Alien and Sedition Acts
Virginia and Kentucky Resolutions
Washington's Neutrality Proclamation
Washington's Farewell Address
XYZ Affair

• ==Jeffersonian and Jacksonian Democracy (1800-1840)==

strict v. broad interpretation (of Constitution)
Revolution of 1800
Alexis de Tocqueville
Monroe Doctrine
Marbury v Madison
Clay's American System
Whig Party
Louisiana Purchase
Lewis and Clark
Haitian Rebellion
Embargo Act
impressments
War of 1812
War Hawks
Hartford Convention
Era of Good Feelings
cotton gin (Eli Whitney)
Erie Canal
Lowell factory system
Transcendentalists
Emerson
Thoreau
Hawthorne
Seneca Falls
Republican motherhood
Horace Mann
Dorothea Dix
William Lloyd Garrison
Monroe Doctrine

Jackson

Jackson's Indian policy
Indian Removal Act
Supreme Court and the Cherokees
Chief Justice John Marshall
Trail of Tears
Tariff of Abominations
Nullification crisis in South Carolina (1832)
Webster-Hayne Debates
Force Bill (1833)
Second Bank of the US

Manifest Destiny and Sectionalism (1820-1860)

Republican Party
Free-Soil Party
"Bleeding Kansas"

Treks

Gold Rush
49er
Donner Party
Joseph Smith
Book of Mormon

• ==Civil War and Reconstruction (1860-1877)==

Jefferson Davis
Abraham Lincoln
First Battle of Manasses (Bull Run)
Second Battle of Manasses (Bull Run)

New South, Old West, Gilded Age, Populism, Imperialism (1870-1900)

Jim Crow
Ku Klux Clan
Sinmiyangyo
Charles H. Winfield

1900-WWI

aeroplane
Silent Film
RMS Titanic
RMS Brittanic

World War I

War to End All Wars
World War
Kaiser
Hoch, hoch der Kaiser!
von Hindenburg ist mein Vater!
Tsar
Austria-Hungary
Flying Circus
Trotsky
Мы - We (Novel)
Mustafa Kemal Atatürk
The Lost Battalion

• ==Roaring 20s (Lost Generation)==

Gay 80s
Gay 90s
Women's Suffrage
Prohibition
Red Scare
Second International
income tax
"New Negro"
Jazz
Esperanto
League of Nations (United Nations)
Cheaper by the Dozen
The Sun Also Rises
Al "Scarface" Capone
"Bugs" Muran
Valentine's Day Massacre
Bonnie and Clyde
anti-Modernism

Depression

Hoover
Third Riff War
Lina Medina
Franklin Roosevelt (FDR)

Spanish Civil War (Guerra Civil Española)

Popular Front
Francisco Franco
Calros Garcias
Pope Pius XII
Ernest Hemingway
For Whom the Bell Tolls
Tierra Española

World War II

Free World
Slave World
mind control
Josef Stalin
Adolf Hitler
Emperor Hirohito
Swastika
Nazi
fascist
yellow star
total war (totalier Kreig)
SNAFU
Winston Churchill
D-Day
Pearl Harbor
Allies

• ==World War II Related==

Rommel
"do a Rommel"
First, Second Battle of the Bulge
Battle of Leningrad
Battle of Stalingrad
Webrovka
Franz Jägerstätter
ninja
White Card
Sonman Mine explosion
Zog of Albania
Under the Blood Banner
schlechtes Hasserscheinen

WWII Ideas

Degenerate Art
twelf
rubber elf
age of degeneracy
Heil Hits
grey blobs
Zionistic masons
Glacial Cosmology
"All the little children love Stalin."
teeth of the Dragon
life in a cloud

Stalin

Cash and Carry
capitalism
Red Communist
Trotsky
Revolution Betrayed
Why Stalin Won
Spanish Civil War
Battle of Stalingrad
Iron Curtain
Yalta Agreement
United Nations
NKVD
KGB
English Racial Theory
Joseph Stalin
First Secretary
freedom from religeon
Doctor's Plot
"English Racial Theory"
"unperson"
Kremlin
GUM Department
Thermonuclear
H-bomb
Taiwan
1984
Big Brother
telescreen
containment
Stalin.ru
Nabokov

Atomic Age

e=mc²
critical mass
uranium
plutonium
neptunium
neucleus
Albert Einstein
Niels Bohr
Carl Sandburg
atomic bomb
quark
lepton
muon
antimatter
thermonuclear transcorder device

"Believe in hope"

- The philosophy during this time was to "believe in hope", because it "saved one from doubt, despair, and the Slave World." This was shown in a radio adaptation of A Miracle on 34th Street, where Kris Kringle emphatically says so. In later times, this attitude came to be associated by some with romanticism. Hope was defined as "A desire of some good, accompanied with an expectation of obtaining it, or a belief that it is obtainable; an expectation of something which is thought to be desirable; confidence; pleasing expectancy."

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Authors

• Original Author: Etothex
• Principal Author: Lord Emsworth
• Chief Contributor of Images: Karl Wick
• Organizer, Edit Crawler: Hyperlink
• Cleanup, Revamp Pages: Red4tribe

GNU Free Documentation License

GNU Free Documentation License