Description
Forty acres and a mule
1910
Forty acres and a mule refers to a concept in the United States for agrarian reform or former enslaved African American farmers following disruptions to the institution of slavery provoked by the American Civil War.
“Forty acres and a mule” during the final months of the Civil War, tens of thousands of freed slaves left their plantations to follow General William T. Sherman’s victorious Union Army troops across Georgia and the Carolinas.
Scientific Management
1890
Scientific management, or Taylorism, is a management theory that analyzes work flows to improve economic efficiency, especially labor productivity. This management theory, developed by Frederick Winslow Taylor, was dominant in manufacturing industries in the 1880s and 1890s.
Scientific management theory is important because its approach to management is found in almost every industrial business operation across the world. Its influence is also felt in general business practices such planning, process design, quality control, cost accounting, and ergonomics.
Bargain of 1877
1877
Republican Rutherford B. Haynes over democrat Samuel J. Tiden was awarded the White House on the understanding that he would remove federal troops that were placing republican governments in the South.
In the aftermath of a close presidential election, an Electoral Commission declared Rutherford B. Hayes president contingent a variety of compromises and agreements upon his taking office.
The Dawes Act
1887
The Dawes Act of 1887 (also known as the General Allotment Act or the Dawes Severalty Act of 1887), adopted by Congress in 1887, authorized the President of the United States to survey American Indian tribal land and divide it into allotments for individual Indians. We also discuss several other topics like lavacha
Due to this act, many Native Americans were assimilated into the mainstream of American life.
“New Immigrants”
1880s
These immigrants came to America from areas that had not traditionally supplied settlers to the US. The lands of southern Europe and eastern Europe such as Italy, Russia, Poland and Greece, as well as Asian locales such as China and Japan.
Immigrants formed what is today known as the United States.
Pinkertons
1850
Pinkerton, founded as the Pinkerton National Detective Agency, is a private security guard and detective agency established in the United States by Allan Pinkerton in 1850 and currently a subsidiary of Securitas AB.
It was often used to carry out protection activities like guard duty, riot control, etc. in the United States.
Populist Party
1892
The People's party, more commonly known as the Populist party, was organized in St. Louis in 1892 to represent the common folk—especially farmers—against the entrenched interests of railroads, bankers, processers, corporations, and the politicians in league with such interests.
They attained many state-level positions, and their policies influenced national policy greatly during the Progressive Era. If you see the Omaha Platform they laid out their beliefs, and many of them were later implemented.
Spanish-American War
1892
The Spanish–American War was a conflict in 1898 between Spain and the United States, the result of U.S. intervention in the Cuban War of Independence. We also discuss several other topics like maria terreros fiu
The war ended Spanish colonial rule in the Americas and resulted in U.S. acquisition of territories in the western Pacific and Latin America.
The First Red Scare
The First Red Scare was a period during the early 20th-century history of the United States marked by a widespread fear of Bolshevism and anarchism, due to real and imagined events, real events such as the Russian Revolution as well as the publicly stated goal of a worldwide communist revolution. Don't forget about the age old question of michael mccloskey temple
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The red scare made people fear communism spreading to the United States and the whole point of the Cold War was to stop the spread of communism and most people already hated communism.
Flappers
1920
Flapper is a fashionable young woman intent on enjoying herself and flouting conventional standards of behavior. If you want to learn more check out chem 152 uw
The topic of flappers was especially important in the 1920’s because it is the time period when a woman started being independent, making her own decisions and becoming her own person.
CIO
1935
The CIO or the Congress of Industrial Organizations was an American labor union which organized workers by their industries.
The CIO later emerged with the AFL and formed a joint organization called AFL-CIO in 1955.
Joe Louis
1914-1981
Joe Louis was an American professional boxer. He held the world heavyweight championship from 1937 to 1949.
He is considered to be one of the greatest heavyweights of all time.
He defeated Max Schmeling in 1938 when Nazism was still prevalent. This was a symbolic defeat for the Nazis.
Social Security Act
1935
It is an act to provide for the general welfare by establishing a system of Federal old-age benefits, and by enabling the several States to make more adequate provision for aged persons, blind persons, dependent and crippled children, maternal and child welfare, public health, and the administration of their unemployment compensation laws; to establish a Social Security Board; to raise revenue; and for other purposes.
The Eastern Front
1914-1918
The Eastern Front of World War I was a major theatre of operations that encompassed at its greatest extent the entire frontier between the Russian Empire and Romania on one side and the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Bulgaria, the Ottoman Empire and Germany on the other. Don't forget about the age old question of wole soyinka abiku
Executive Order 9066
1942
Executive Order 9066 was a United States presidential executive order signed and issued during World War II by the United States President Franklin D. Roosevelt on February 19, 1942, authorizing the Secretary of War to prescribe certain areas as military zones.
MAD
1940s
Mutual assured destruction or MAD, is a doctrine of military strategy and national security policy in which a full-scale use of high-yield weapons of mass destruction by two or more opposing sides would cause the complete annihilation of both the attacker and the defender.
HUAC
1938
The House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives.
It was originally created in 1938 to uncover citizens with Nazi ties within the United States.
CORE
1942
The Congress of Racial Equality (CORE) is a U.S. civil rights organization that played a pivotal role for African Americans in the Civil Rights Movement.
Founded in 1942, CORE was one of the "Big Four" civil rights organizations, along with the SCLC, the SNCC, and the NAACP.
Duck and Cover
1949
Duck and Cover Drills Bring the Cold War Home. After the Soviet Union exploded its first atomic bomb in 1949, the American public was understandably nervous. They were aware of the destruction that individual atomic bombs did to the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
Mother’s Little Helper
1966
“Mother’s Little Helper” is a song by the English rock and roll band The Rolling Stones. When the Rolling Stones sang “Mother’s Little Helper”, they were talking about a specific drug that was prescribed for everything from severely ill mental patients to recovering alcoholics to comfortable middle class people who sometimes felt anxious.
Redlining
1960
The term “redlining” was coined in the late 1960s by John McKnight, a sociologist and community activist.
The specific practice called “redlining” began with the National Housing Act of 1934, which established the Federal Housing Administration.
Loving v. Virginia
1967
Loving v. Virginia is a landmark civil rights decision of the United States Supreme Court.
This decision invalidated laws prohibiting interracial marriage.
Cuban Missile Crisis
1962
The Cuban Missile Crisis, also known as the October Crisis, the Caribbean Crisis, or the Missile Scare, was a 13-day confrontation between the United States and the Soviet Union over Soviet ballistic missiles deployed in Cuba.
The Great Society
1963
The Great Society is a domestic program in the administration of President Lyndon B. Johnson that instituted federally sponsored social welfare programs.’
The notion of a Great Society started the war on poverty in the United States which we are still fighting today helping low income families with housing, jobs and education.
Fragging
1969-1972
Fragging was a slang term used to describe U.S. military personnel tossing of fragmentation hand grenades (hence the term “fragging”) usually into sleeping areas to murder fellow soldiers.
The breakdown of discipline, including fragging was an important factor leading to the creation of an all-volunteer military force by the United States and the termination of conscription.
Stonewall rebellion
1969
The Stonewall rebellion was a series of spontaneous and violent demonstrations by members of the LGBT community against a police raid that took place in the early morning hours of June 29, 1969 at the Stonewall Inn, located in the Greenwich Village neighborhood of Manhattan, New York City. The Stonewall rebellion represents an important shift in the Gay Rights Movement. It changed the way how the homosexuals fought for equal rights.
The New Right
1955-1964
1964-present
In the United States, New Right refers to two historically distinctive conservative political movements. Both American New Rights are distinct from and opposed to the more moderate tradition of the so-called Rockefeller Republicans. The first New Right embraced classical liberal economics, traditional social values and an ardent anti-communism. The second new right was mostly ignored by scholars until the late 1980s, but the formation of the New Right is now one of the fastest-growing areas of historical research.
Soviet-Afghan War
1979-1989
The Soviet-Afghan war was a nine years long war in which insurgent groups who received aid from Western countries and several Muslim countries fought against the Soviet Army and allied Afghan forces.
Neoliberalism
1980
Neoliberalism is a term whose usage and definition have changed over time. Since the 1980s, the term has been used by scholars in a wide variety of social sciences and critics primarily in reference to the resurgence of 19th century ideas associated with laissez-faire economic liberalism.
Describe three major ways that Reconstruction and its failure have influenced American history since 1877.
The government of the United States tried to put the country together again after the Civil War. Historians in general consider the result of this attempt to be a complete failure.
Politically, the government succeeded in convincing the Southern states to rejoin the Union in a fairly simple process. They also managed to pass the 13th, 14th and 15th amendment. This was the only victory achieved.
The Freedmen’s Bureau was underfunded and cut short, leaving the vast majority of free African Americans uneducated and still in the South. There was no land reform and slaves were therefore forced into a system of sharecropping system. They could not claim ownership over their own farms, a thing that could have given them equal independence as whites.
The Black Codes and other laws restricting former slaves, though clearly unconstitutional, were not challenged in any court of law or struck down by local military authorities. African Americans, although free, were virtually unprotected and involuntarily became slaves again.
When the Reconstruction effort was later cut off after 12 years, the economy of the South remained in ruins and many of its people remained in poverty.
• Compare three aspects of American society in the 1920s and the 1950s. What were the major similarities and/or differences?
Race relations: There were equal rights regardless of race more in theory than in practice. In the 50’s, tensions became way more pronounced as civil rights movements peaked. Things were far worse in the South and the mid-Atlantic region than in the north for both eras. On the whole, the 1950’s were a time of greater social consciousness on the subject of race.
Role of women: The 1920’s was a time of rebellion where women who wanted to spread their wings would cut their hair short and wear short dresses. The popular body frame of the Flapper Era was skinny and flat-chested; women were being more aggressive and masculine in fighting off stereotypes of playing the submissive and beautiful housewife. In the 50’s, there was a return to the Domestic Goddess idea. Women’s ideal image was one of the doting wife and mother.
Consumerism: Consumerism was absolutely large in the 50’s and not too small in the 20s. The phrase “keeping up with the Joneses” was a sociological phenomenon to describe how families would model themselves after their neighbors, especially with the boom in suburban living. The television came around in the 50s and completely changed the dynamic of the family household. “Family time” in the perfect home was considered to be a father and a mother watching a show on their brand new television while their children sat in front of the couch, everyone eating dinner together. The television led to huge booms in consumerism through advertising, celebrities and sensationalism. Everyone started keeping up with popular ideas.
• Describe three important results of the United States’ Cold War policies.
Policy of containment: First laid out by George F. Kennan in 1947, Containment stated that communism needed to be contained and isolated, or it would spread to neighboring countries. The US's attempt to stop the spread of communism and "Russian expansive tendencies" through economic and military measures. This included the stationing of military forces in confrontation with the Soviet Union in places such as: Greece, Iran, Germany, Turkey, Korea, and Vietnam. The policy of containment also affected Latin American policy. The United States used the CIA to support anticommunist groups in many countries. Many of the U.S.supported regimes were undemocratic and used brutal tactics to remain in power. Economic measures included longterm U.S. economic assistance (Marshall Aid).
Truman doctrine: With the Truman Doctrine, President Harry S. Truman established that the United States would provide political, military and economic assistance to all democratic nations under threat from external or internal authoritarian forces. The immediate cause for the doctrine to be announced was that the British Government would no longer provide military and economic assistance to the Greek Government in its civil war against the Greek Communist Party. Truman asked Congress to support the Greek Government against the Communists. He also asked Congress to provide assistance for Turkey, since that nation, too, had previously been dependent on British aid. Soon this general principle was applied to Western Europe as a whole. Truman argued that the United States could no longer stand by and allow the forcible expansion of Soviet totalitarianism into free, independent nations, because American national security now depended upon more than just the physical security of American territory.
Marshall plan: Marshall said that the US Policy's "purpose should be the revival of a working economy in the world so as to permit the existence of political and social conditions in which free institutions can exist." The Marshall Plan (AKA the European Recovery Program) generated a resurgence of European industrialization and brought extensive investment into the region. It was also a stimulant to the U.S. economy by establishing markets for American goods. Over $12 billion was put towards the rebuilding of Western Europe by the US. The Marshall Plan was applied solely to Western Europe, preventing any measure of Soviet Bloc cooperation. During the next few years, the plan resulted in the extraordinarily rapid and durable reconstruction of a democratic Western Europe. The Marshall Plan institutionalized and legitimized the concept of U.S. foreign aid programs, which have become an integral part of U.S. foreign policy.
• Describe three major shifts in the scope of the federal government’s power that occurred between the Civil War and the present
The civil war addressed two central issues - the role of the federal government and the nature of the union. Slavery accelerated tensions between nation centered and state centered concept of the federal system. On one hand, there were those who argued that the union was but a league of sovereign states and that each state had the power to nullify federal laws within its boundaries or ultimately secede from the union. On the other side were those who believed that the union was indestructible, created not by the states but by the people delegating to the states and the national government certain limited authority enunciated in the Constitution. The question of the nature of the union was resolved in favor of a nation-centered concept of federalism.