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1920 s Culture Clash

1920 s Culture Clash. John Ermer U.S. History Honors Miami Beach Senior High LACC.1112.RH.1.9, SS.912.A.5.1-10, SS.912.A.1-7, SS.912.G.1-3, SS.912.G.4-3. Prohibition. 1920: Eighteenth Amendment prohibits the manufacture, transport, sale, and consumption of “intoxicating liquors”

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1920 s Culture Clash

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  1. 1920s Culture Clash John Ermer U.S. History Honors Miami Beach Senior High LACC.1112.RH.1.9, SS.912.A.5.1-10, SS.912.A.1-7, SS.912.G.1-3, SS.912.G.4-3

  2. Prohibition • 1920: Eighteenth Amendment prohibits the manufacture, transport, sale, and consumption of “intoxicating liquors” • Congress passes the Volstead Act to enforce Prohibition • Only 1,500 federal prohibition agents hired to enforce law, local cops help little • Law not enforced well, illegal alcohol is widely available • Criminals now make fortunes in trade of illegal alcohol, rise in crime • Prohibition loses support of urban middle class due to organized crime • Many rural, Protestant “drys” fight back against “wet” urbanites • Prohibition repealed in 1933 by the Nineteenth Amendment

  3. Immigration • After WWI, immigrants associated with radicalism (Sacco & Vanzetti) • Many nativists use this perception to fight for immigration control • Emergency Immigration Act of 1921 sets quotas on immigration • National Origins Act of 1924 strengthens 1921 quotas • Quotas based on 1890 census population (3% of 1890 numbers) • Angers Japanese who understood selves as targets (Chinese already illegal) • Law favors immigration by northern Europeans

  4. Nativism • 1915: New Ku Klux Klan established at Stone Mountain, Georgia • D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation helps KKK’s cause, recruiting • At first, Klan most concerned with “insubordinate” African-Americans • Primary targets of 1920s Klan = Catholics, Jews, and “foreigners” • New focus makes Klan popular outside the South, moves North & West • Defended what it called “traditional values” • Worked for Bible readings in schools, terrorized divorced women/men • Klan membership in declines after 1925 due to scandals & infighting

  5. Religious Fundamentalism • American Protestantism divided b/w modernists & fundamentalists • Fundamentalists insisted on literal translation of the Bible • Fundamentalists fight against teaching of Evolution in schools • Fundamentalist evangelists spread message to new groups w/ revivals • In some Southern and Western states, Fundamentalists gain political power • Some states (including Tenn.) outlaw the teaching of Evolution in public schools • The Scopes “Monkey” Trial • ACLU and Tenn. biology teacher John Scopes fight against Tenn. Law • Famous attorney Clarence Darrow defends Scopes against W. J. Bryan • Scopes loses the trial, but fundamentalists were made to look foolish • Fundamentalists marginalized from mainstream churches & politics, start own churches

  6. Democratic politics • Democratic Party really a loose coalition of groups with different ideas • Rural prohibitionists, Klansmen, and fundamentalists • Urban immigrants, urban workers, and Catholics • 1924 Democratic convention shows disunity of party, lose election • 1928: Al Smith, northern Irish Catholic, wins Democratic nomination • First democrat since Civil War not to win entire South • Republican Herbert Hoover wins Election of 1928

  7. Republican Government • 1921-1933: Republicans hold both the Presidency and Congress • Warren G. Harding is “man of limited talents from a small town” • Limited intellect, uneventful political career, gambler, drinker, womanizer • William Daugherty and the Ohio Gang—party cronyism • Teapot Dome Scandal • Sec. of Interior Albert Hall extorts money from naval oil reserves—convicted • Harding dies in San Francisco, succeeded by Calvin Coolidge • Coolidge is opposite of Harding, known as “Silent Cal,” but takes same passive approach to the presidency—wins reelection in 1924

  8. Government & Business • Goal of Harding and Coolidge administrations = help business efficiency • Secretary of Treasury Andrew Mellon enacts plan toward this goal • Lower taxes on corporate profits, personal income, and inheritance • Shrinks the federal budget • Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover, views self as a progressive • Believes corporations should cooperate with one another with gov’t help • Concept known as “Associationalism” • Businesses help other businesses to stabilize and promote efficiency • Elected president in 1928 on a progressive platform

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