Review for Final Examination History 419: American Social and Intellectual History

1. Review for Final Examination History 419: American Social and Intellectual History Examination Date: December 11, 2008

2. The Presidential Election of 1928. New York Governor Alfred E. Smith (1873 - 1944) Herbert Hoover 1929-33

3. Herbert Hoover, Financing Relief Efforts (1931) Main Points: 1. The best way to help people during times of national difficulty is through mutual self-help and voluntary giving. My own conviction is strongly that if we break down this sense of responsibility of individual generosity to individual and mutual self-help in the country in time of national difficulty and if we start appropriations of this character we have not only impaired something infinitely valuable in the life of the American people but have struck at the roots of self-government. (p. 109)

4. Herbert Hoover, Financing Relief Efforts (1931) 2. Federal aid to the hungry and poor encourages expectations of future paternal care and weakens Americans’ self-reliant character. It also weakens Americans’ willingness to help each other and give to each other, and thus enfeebles the bonds of common brotherhood. Quotation of President Grover Cleveland by President Herbert Hoover: The friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune. This has been repeatedly and quite lately demonstrated. Federal aid in such cases encouraged the expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood. (p. 110) President Herbert Hoover: The help being daily extended by neighbors, by local and national agencies, by municipalities, by industry and a great multitude of organizations throughout the country today is many times any appropriation yet proposed. The opening of the doors of the Federal Treasury is likely to stifle this giving and thus destroy far more resources than the proposed charity from the Federal Government. (p. 110)

5. Roosevelt consciously abandoned the term “progressive” and chose instead to employ “liberal” to define himself and his administration. In so doing, he transformed “liberalism” from a shorthand for weak government and laissez-faire economics into belief in an activist, socially conscious state, an alternative both to socialism and to unregulated capitalism. (Foner, The Story of American Freedom, pp. 201-204.) Redefining Liberalism Freedom, Hoover insisted, meant unfettered economic opportunity for the enterprising individual. Far from being an element of liberty, the quest for economic security was turning Americans into “lazy parasites” dependent on the state. For the remainder of his life, Hoover continued to call himself a “liberal,” even though, he charged, the word had been “polluted and raped of all its real meanings.” (Foner, The Story of American Freedom, p. 205.)

6. Socialist Party Platform (1932) Norman Mattoon Thomas

7. Socialist Party Platform (1932) • Norman Mattoon Thomas (1884-1968) • Took over leadership of the Socialist Party after the death of Eugene Debs in 1926. • Was the party’s presidential candidate six times. • Polled his highest vote in 1932 with 880,000 votes. • Some members of the socialist party were: W.E.B. DuBois, Margaret Sanger, and Helen Keller. • “Democratic Socialism," is defined by the Socialist Party as “a political and economic system with freedom and equality for all, so that people may develop to their fullest potential in harmony with others.” The party further states that it is “committed to full freedom of speech, assembly, press, and religion and to a multi-party system” and that the ownership and control of the production and distribution of goods “should be democratically controlled public agencies, cooperatives, or other collective groups.” • (source: http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1669.html)

8. Socialist Party Platform (1932) • Main Points • Socialists feel there are many flaws with the capitalist system, which is now in the process of breaking down, resulting in human suffering. • “We are facing a breakdown of the capitalist system…Unemployment and poverty are inevitable products of the present system.” • The Socialist Party believes that workers are exploited by a capitalist economy. • “Under capitalism the few own our industries. The many do the work. The wage earners and farmers are compelled to give a large part of the product of their labor to the few. The many in the factories, mines, shops, offices and on the farms obtain but a scanty income and are able to buy back only a part of the goods that can be produced in such abundance by our mass industries.” (http://www.u-s-history.com/pages/h1669.html)

9. Socialist Party Platform (1932) • By voting for the Socialist Party you can help remove the struggles that the capitalist system has created. • “The Socialist Party is to-day the one democratic party of the worker whose program would remove the causes of class struggles, class antagonisms, and social evils inherent in the capitalist system.” • “[The Socialist Party] proposes to transfer the principal industries of the country from private ownership and autocratic, cruelly inefficient management to social ownership and democratic control…It proposes the following measures…” • The American people will never knowingly adopt Socialism; but under the name of liberalism, they will adopt every fragment of the Socialist program until America will one day be a Socialist nation without knowing how it happened.

10. Source: http://www.drfurfero.com/books/231book/ch03f1.html

11. Four FreedomsFranklin D. Roosevelt(1941)

12. Franklin D. Roosevelt • Born: Jan 30, 1882 in Hyde Park, New York • Education: Attended Harvard University and Columbia Law School • Married Eleanor Roosevelt in 1905 • Elected into New York Senate in 1910 • Served under President Wilson as Assistant Secretary of the Navy • In the summer of 1921 he was stricken with polio and lost most of the use of his legs • 1928 he became Governor of New York • Took Presidency at the depth of the Great Depression and served as the 32nd President from 1933-1945 • He was elected President in November of 1932 and in March of 1933 there were 13,000,000 unemployed. • New Deal-carious social programs including Social Security, and new control on banks and public utilities • Died: at the age of 63 on April 12, 1945 in Warm Springs, Georgia

13. 1. The American way of life is being threatened! • “Every realist knows that the democratic way of life is at this moment being' directly assailed in every part of the world--assailed either by arms, or by secret spreading of poisonous propaganda by those who seek to destroy unity and promote discord in nations that are still at peace.” • “During sixteen long months this assault has blotted out the whole pattern of democratic life in an appalling number of independent nations, great and small. The assailants are still on the march, threatening other nations, great and small. “ • “No realistic American can expect from a dictator’s peace international generosity, or return of true independence, or world disarmament, or freedom of expression, or freedom of religion-or even good business.”

14. 2. The future and safety of our country lies outside our own borders • “I find it necessary to report that the future and the safety of our country and of our democracy are overwhelmingly involved in events far beyond our borders.” • “Armed defense of democratic existence is now being gallantly waged in four continents. If that defense fails, all the population and all the resources of Europe, Asia, Africa and Australasia will be dominated by the conquerors. Let us remember that the total of those populations and their resources in those four continents greatly exceeds the sum total of the population and the resources of the whole of the Western Hemisphere-many times over.”

15. 3. America is unprepared for war and must increase production of munitions and war supplies. • “When the dictators, if the dictators, are ready to make war upon us, they will not wait for an act of war on our part.” • “In times like these it is immature--and incidentally, untrue--for anybody to brag that an unprepared America, single-handed, and with one hand tied behind its back, can hold off the whole world.” • “The immediate need is a swift and driving increase in our armament production…I also ask this Congress for authority and for funds sufficient to manufacture additional munitions and war supplies of many kinds, to be turned over to those nations which are now in actual war with aggressor nations.” • “I recommend that we make it possible for those nations to continue to obtain war materials in the United States.”

16. 4. We cannot expect freedom from a dictator. "Those, who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." “Their only interest is in a new one-way international law, which lacks mutuality in its observance, and, therefore, becomes an instrument of oppression.”

17. 5. We will not be intimidated by dictators • “We will not be intimidated by the threats of dictators that they will regard as a breach of international law and as an act of war our aid to the democracies which dare to resist their aggression. Such aid is not an act of war, even if a dictator should unilaterally proclaim it so to be.”

18. 6. We seek a world based upon four human freedoms. • “In the future days, which we seek to make secure, we look forward to a world founded upon four essential human freedoms.” • “The first is freedom of speech and expression--everywhere in the world.” • “The second is freedom of every person to worship God in his own way--everywhere in the world.” • “The third is freedom from want--which, translated into world terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants-everywhere in the world.” • “The fourth is freedom from fear--which, translated into world terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor--anywhere in the world.”

19. Questions to consider • Were Roosevelt’s critics fair in charging him with sneaking the United States into WWII? • Why should the United States be “the arsenal of democracy,” as Roosevelt called it in an earlier speech? • Entry into the war helped pull our country out of the depression. Do you think it was worth it? • If Roosevelt were President today, how do you think he would handle our present situation with terrorists?

20. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) Background • Harry S. Truman was born in Lamar, Missouri on May 8, 1884, the son of John Anderson Truman and Martha Ellen (Young) Truman. • From 1905 to 1911, Truman served in the Missouri National Guard. • When the United States entered World War I in 1917, he helped organize the 2nd Regiment of Missouri Field Artillery, which was quickly called into Federal service as the 129th Field Artillery and sent to France. Truman was promoted to Captain and given command of the regiment's Battery D. • On June 28, 1919, Truman married Bess Wallace, whom he had known since childhood. Their only child, Mary Margaret, was born on February 17, 1924. • Truman was elected in 1922, to be one of three judges of the Jackson County Court. • In 1934, Truman was elected to the United States Senate.

21. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) More Background • In July 1944, Truman was nominated to run for Vice President with President Franklin D. Roosevelt. On January 20, 1945, he took the vice-presidential oath, and after President Roosevelt's unexpected death only eighty-two days later on April 12, 1945, he was sworn in as the nations' thirty-third President. • Truman's presidency was marked throughout by important foreign policy initiatives. Central to almost everything Truman undertook in his foreign policy was the desire to prevent the expansion of the influence of the Soviet Union. • He meet with Joseph Stalin in Potsdam Germany, to discuss postwar occupation of Germany, the Japanese forces, and use of the atomic bomb.

22. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) • In 1948, Truman won reelection. His defeat had been widely expected and often predicted, but Truman's energy in undertaking his campaign and his willingness to confront issues won a plurality of the electorate for him. His famous "Whistlestop" campaign tour through the country has passed into political folklore, as has the photograph of the beaming Truman holding up the newspaper whose headline proclaimed, "Dewey Defeats Truman." • Truman left the presidency and retired to Independence in January 1953 • Harry S. Truman died on December 26, 1972. Bess Truman died on October 18, 1982. They are buried side by side in the Library's courtyard.

23. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) Main Point #1 • The situation is dire. “The gravity of the situation which confronts the world today necessitates my appearance before a joint session of the Congress.”

24. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) Main Point #2 • The U.S. must be involve in world affairs. “The foreign policy and the national security of this country are involved.” “We shall not realize our objectives, however, unless we are willing to help free peoples to maintain their free institutions and their national integrity against aggressive movements that seek to impose upon them totalitarian regimes.” “I believe that it must be the policy of the United States to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures.”

25. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) Main Point #3 • There are only two sides “One way of life is based upon the will of the majority, and is distinguished by free institutions, representative government, free elections, guarantees of individual liberty, freedom of speech and religion, and freedom from political oppression.” “The second way of life is based upon the will of a minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies upon terror and oppression, a controlled press and radio, fixed elections, and the suppression of personal freedoms.” Us v. Them (Wagy)

26. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) Main Point #4 • It is up to us. “We must take immediate and resolute action.” “The free peoples of the world look to us for support in maintaining their freedoms.” “The seeds of totalitarian regimes are nurtured by misery and want. They spread and grow in the evil soil of poverty and strife. They reach their full growth when the hope of a people for a better life has died.” “We must keep that hope alive. “

27. Harry S. Truman, The Truman Doctrine (1947) References • "Harry S. Truman- "The Truman Doctrine"" American Rhetoric: Harry S. Truman- "The Truman Doctrine" American Rhetoric. 12 Nov. 2008 <http://www.americanrhetoric.com/speeches/harrystrumantrumandoctrine.html>. • Truman: HST Biography. Harry S. Truman Library and Museum. 12 Nov. 2008 <http://www.trumanlibrary.org/hst-bio.htm>.

28. J. Edgar Hoover1895-1972

29. Background • Born January 1, 1895 in Washington, D. C. • Parents: Dickerson and Anna Hoover • Hoover did not obtain a birth certificate until he was 43, which fueled suspicions, in and out of the bureau, that he was of African-American descent – a family out of Mississippi tried to prove these allegations, but failed. • He kept detailed records on himself, teachers, and family members starting at a young age. • At age 11, started his own newspaper, The Weekly Review, that he sold to family and friends for 1 cent.

30. Background continued… • His school nickname was “Speed” because he thought fast and talked fast. • Hoover’s father, Dickerson, spent the last eight years of his life in an asylum. His cause of death was listed as “melancholia” – clinical depression. • 1916 – graduated with a law degree from George Washington University Law School. • Hoover became a Freemason in 1920.

31. Hoover’s failure to marry and his constant companionship with Clyde Tolson, led to many rumors about his sexuality. Clyde Tolson was the sole heir to Hoover’s estate and was also buried next to Hoover. Hoover was also an avid dog lover. Background continued…

32. Head of the FBI • Hoover joined the Bureau of Investigation, later known as the FBI, in 1921. • In 1924 at the age of 29, Hoover was appointed acting Director of the BOI and by the end of the year he was officially named Director. • Hoover remained the Director of the FBI until his death on May 2, 1972 at the age of 77. • The FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. is named after Hoover. Because of the controversial nature of Hoover's legacy, there have been periodic proposals to rename it.

33. Head of the FBI • During his reign over the FBI, Hoover built an efficient crime-detection agency, established a centralized fingerprint file, a crime laboratory and a training institution for police. • He dictated every aspect of his agents’ lives from who their friends should or should not be, who they should or should not marry, what organizations they could or could not join; decided where they would live; monitored their morals; even told them what to wear and what they could weigh; and bestowed praise and awards, blame and punishments, when he decided they were due.

34. Head of the FBI • The FBI, under Hoover, collected information on all America's leading politicians. Known as Hoover's secret files, this material was used to influence their actions. It was later claimed that Hoover used this incriminating material to make sure that the eight presidents that he served under, would be too frightened to sack him as director of the FBI..“ • Presidents Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon Johnson each considered firing Hoover but concluded that the political cost of doing so would be too great. Richard Nixon twice called in Hoover with the intent of firing him, but both times he changed his mind when meeting with Hoover.

35. Head of the FBI • Hoover ignored the existence of organized crime in the U.S. until famed muckraker Jack Anderson exposed the immense scope of the Mafia's organized crime network. It has been suggested that Hoover did not pursue the Mafia because they had incriminating evidence (photos) against him in respect to his sexual orientation. • Despite all of these allegations, during his long career of public service, Director Hoover received three presidential awards, sundry citations by Congress, and following his death was the first civil servant in U.S. history to lie in state in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol.

36. Political Views • Conservative • Anti-communist • Against suffrage for women • Opposed the Civil Rights movement Intended Audience • Hoover delivered “The Communist Menace” before the House Committee on Un-American Activities on March 26, 1947.

37. Major Issues of the Time • 1st Red Scare (1917-1920) • Espionage Act of 1917 • Sedition Act of 1918 • The Palmer Raids • House Committee on Un-American Activities • WW II • Iron Curtain in Europe

38. The more famous of the Palmer raids was December 21, in which 249 people were dragged from their homes, forcibly put on board a ship and deported. "Uncle Sam bids good riddanceto the deportees"(from J. Edgar Hoover'smemorabilia and scrapbookin the National Archives).

39. The Communist MenaceMain Points 1. The Communist Party of the United States intends to destroy the American businessman, take over our government, and throw the whole world into revolution. • “The Communist movement in the United States…stands for the destruction of free enterprise, and it stands for the creation of a “Soviet of the United States” and ultimate world revolution.”

40. The Communist MenaceMain Points continued… 2. The American programs to help society such as, social security, veterans’ benefits, and welfare are all communist ideas used to lure the support of unsuspecting citizens. • “The American progress which all good citizens seek, such as old-age security, houses for veterans, child assistance and a host of others is being adopted as window dressing by the Communists to conceal their true aims and entrap gullible followers.”

41. The Communist MenaceMain Points continued… 3. The greatest threat of communism is not how many Communists are in this country, but their ability to insert themselves into positions of power and their ability to persuade through lies and deception. Americans should FEAR the communist infiltration of their government and society. • “What is important is the claim of the Communists themselves that for every party member there are 10 others ready, willing, and able to do the party’s work. Herein lies the greatest menace of communism. For these people who infiltrate and corrupt various spheres of American life. So rather than the size of the Communist Party the way to weigh its true importance is by testing its influence, its ability to infiltrate.” • “…When the Communists overthrew the Russian government there was one Communist for every 2,277 persons in Russia. In the United States today there is one Communist for every 1,814 persons in the country…”

42. Historical Significance • 2nd Red Scare (1947-1957) • 1947 - Ronald Reagan and wife Jane Wyman provide to the FBI names of SAG members believed to be communist sympathizers. • 1947 - Top Hollywood executives decide not to employ individuals who refused to answer questions about communist infiltration of the film industry • McCarthyism starts(1950): Sen. Joseph P. McCarthy says he has a list of 205 communists in the State Department. • 1950 - California Legislature passes a bill requiring state employees to sign a loyalty oath. • 1953 - Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, convicted of conspiring to commit espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union, are executed.

43. Dwight D. Eisenhower • Born in Denison, Texas on Oct 14, 1890 • Went through the Military Academy at West Point in 1911 • Served as Supreme Allied Commander in the European Theatre in World War II; promoted to General of the Army • Served as the Chief of Staff of the Army from 1945 to 1948 • In 1948, became president of Columbia University • In 1950, became Supreme Commander of NATO • Elected 34th President in 1953; served until 1961

44. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Main Points • America must act as the peace keepers and safe-guarders of the free world. • “America’s leadership and prestige depend, not merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches and military strength, but on how we use our power in the interests of world peace and human betterment.” • “Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict upon us grievous hurt both at home and abroad.”

45. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Main Points • We must guard against the hostile ideology. • “We face a hostile ideology- global in scope, atheistic in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in method. Unhappily the danger it poses promises to be of indefinite duration.” • “To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so much the emotional and transitory sacrifices of crises, but rather those which enable us to carry forward steadily, surely, and without complaint the burdens of a prolonged struggle- with liberty at stake.”

46. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Main Points • We must guard against imbalance in our economic and military spending. • “But each proposal must be weighed in the light of broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in and among national programs…Good judgment seeks balance and progress, lack of it eventually finds imbalance and frustration.” • “A vital element in keeping our peace is our military establishment.” • “Our military organization today bears little relation to that known of any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.”

47. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Main Points: • We must guard against the military-industrial complex in our democratic government. • “The total influence- economic, political, even spiritual- is felt in every city, every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its grave implications.” • “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence…by the military-industrial complex. • “The potential for disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.” • “We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes.” • “In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly.” • “Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop has been overshadowed by task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields.” • “Partly because of the huge cost involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.” • “We must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”

48. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Main Points • We must safe-guard the resources of democracy for future generations. • “we- you and I, and our government- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow.” • “We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow.”

49. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Main Points • We must guard against only resolving differences with military conflict. • “this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect.” • “Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose.”

50. Farewell Address (Eisenhower) Questions • What factions does Eisenhower fear will attempt to influence and control government? • How did Eisenhower resolve bring the countries of the world together?