The American Promise: A History of the United States Fourth Edition

1. The American Promise:A History of the United States Fourth Edition CHAPTER 23 From New Era to Great Depression 1920�1932

2. The New Era A Business Government 20% unemployment � Harding tried some successful methods at easing economy � Tea Pot Dome scandal � VP Coolidge president on Harding�s death � pro-business Promoting Prosperity and Peace Abroad Rejection of League of Nation and Wilsonian internationalism � but New York replaced London as center of world finance � Washington Disarmament Conference (1921) and global balance of naval power � Kellogg-Briand Pact (1928) � 50 nations pledged to renounce war as a means to settle disputes � Dawes Plan (1924) loans to Germany and France retreated from Ruhr valley Automobiles, Mass Production, and Assembly-Line Progress Automobile industry � largest single industry that brought other industries into being � altered face of America � mass production Assembly line �welfare capitalism�

4. Consumer Culture Mass Production Advertising � change from production to consumption � Henry Ford paid workers more so they could consume more Foreign markets The Roaring Twenties Prohibition 18th Amendment (1920) banned manufacture, sale, and transportation of alcohol � increase in number of �speakeasies� Criminals and bootlegging Gang wars, police corruption, disrespect for loyal citizens � end of Prohibition The New Woman Alternatives to traditional roles of women � suffrage in 1920 Protective laws such as Sheppard-Towner

6. Political influence limited � failed to form voting bloc � in traditional female jobs �economic independence � birth control Flapper life style � new women challenged American ideas of separate spheres The New Negro �New Negro� � W. E. B. Dubois and the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Marcus Garvey and the United Negro Improvement Association (UNIA) Harlem Renaissance � art, music, fiction, poetry, sculpture Mass Culture Consumer goods � Hollywood � radio � sports stars � hero worship The Lost Generation Writers and artists alienated from society Some left to Europe � others stayed but critical of American culture

9. Resistance to Change Rejecting the Undesirables Nativism and anti radical sentiments and immigration restriction � Johnson-Reid Act (1924) Barred immigration of specific groups � Chinese, Japanese, later other Asians Anti foreign hysteria - 1920 trial of Nicola Sacco and Bartolomeo Vanzetti and execution The Rebirth of the Ku Klux Klan Reborn in the anti foreign hysteria � defend traditional American and family values Increased membership but lawlessness made the Klan unpopular The Scopes Trial fundamentalist religion v. evolution � Scopes, Tennessee teacher and fundamentalist Bryan Struggle between intellectuals and unlettered

10. Al Smith and the Election of 1928 Prohibition, immigration, religion, and the clash of rural and urban values Republican Herbert Hoover (morality, efficiency, service, and Prosperity - won by a landslide) - Democrat Alfred E. Smith, from Irish political machine and Catholic lost The Great Crash Herbert Hoover: The Great Engineer Progressive Republican Ideological and political liabilities The Distorted Economy Spring 1929 fragile prosperity Lop sided distribution of wealth Signs of economic decay seen in mid decade The Crash of 1929 Despite economic decay frenzied stock market activity � inflated values for stocks � investors wanted to sell stocks

12. Desperate attempts to sell stocks on Black Thursday and Black Tuesday � other causes for the Great Depression Hoover and the Limits of Individualism Urged business leaders to keep existing levels of production � decline in demand Agricultural Marketing Act (1929) and Farm Board Hawley-Smoot tariff (1930) Reconstruction Finance Corporation (RFC) (1930) � too little help for poor � not a solution to American woes - inadequate Life in the Depression The Human Toll Jobless, homeless victims � urban and rural poverty No federal assistance � private charities � Mexican immigrants blamed Affected American family and institution of marriage Denial and Escape Hoovers optimism no solace Hoover practiced denial � people looked to the movies � grim details of woes � increase in crime Working-Class Militancy Working class bore brunt of the economic collapse � workers and farmers protest movements

15. Left became active � attacks on racism and sharecropping Many questioned American capitalism � unemployment, foreclosures, soup lines, breadlines, and cold despair