Acts
Dawes Severalty Act
provided for elimination of tribal ownership (individual); designed to force Indians to become landowners and farers to abandon their collective society; lost lots of land; repealed
Gospel of Wealth
wealthy had responsibility to use riches to advance social progress/better progress; written by Andrew Carnegie - use wealthy for good of community
Prohibition (18th Amendment)
prohibited sale and manufacturing of alcohol; 1920; eventually repealed during Great Depression to create jobs
Women’s Suffrage Movement (19th Amendment)
progressive achievement during WW1 area; sought since 1848 Seneca Falls; helped by contributions made by women at home and abroad in WW1
EPA (Environmental Protection Agency)
This was created by Nixon in 1970. With the Occupational Health and Safety Administration, it climaxed two decades of mounting concern for the environment. It was legislatively armed with the Clean Air Act of 1970 and the Endangered Species Act of 1973.
Sherman Antitrust Act
any contract, combination in the form of trust or otherwise, or conspiracy in restraint of trade or commerce is illegal; trusts illegal; eventually repealed
Social Darwinism
only fittest individuals succeed in marketplace; coined by Herbert Spencer; justify success of Robber Barons; applying Darwin to human society
Stock Market Crash
first visible sign of severe economic crisis; did not cause depression; origins: lenient/easy stock buying rules (credit); insider trading; banks investing.
Montgomery Bus Boycott
Rosa Parks jailed for refusing to give up seat white person; leads to no bus service; rise of MLK and use of nonviolent protest; ended with court ordered bus integration
Federal Securities Act
This law was passed by the Hundred Days Congress and required promoters on Wall Street to transmit to the investor sworn information regarding the soundness of their stocks and bonds. It is also referred to as the "Truth in Securities Act." It showed that reformist New Dealers were determined from the outset to curb the "money changers" who had played fast and loose with gullible investors before the Wall Street crash in 1929.
Social Security Act
immediate relief for poor elderly (pension); unemployment insurance; public assistance programs (AFDC for women)
Populism
reaction to economic difficulties of farmers; want govt, ownership of railroad, govt. control of money supply, expansion of democracy and anti-trusts; grew in 1890s
Tet Offensive
Vietcong uprising in south Vietnam urban centers; leads to credibility gap b/t administration's promises and reality; numerous protests; series of concerted attacks unnerved Americans
14th Amendment
This amendment was proposed and approved by Congress in June 1866. It 1) conferred civil rights, including citizenship but excluding the franchise, on the freedmen, 2) reduced proportionately the representation of a state in Congress and in the Electoral College if it denied blacks the ballot, 3) disqualified from federal and state office former Confederates, 4) guaranteed the federal debt, while repudiating all Confederate debts. It did not grant the right to vote, but all Confederate states, except TN, rejected it anyway. They were forced to ratify it before re-joining the Union.
Social Securities Act
This law was passed in 1935 to provide for federal-state unemployment insurance, old age security, and provisions for the blind, the physically handicapped, delinquent children, and other dependents. To provide security for old age, specified categories of retired workers were to receive regular payments from Washington. These payments ranged from $10 to $85 (later raised) and were financed by a payroll tax on both employers and employees. It was largely inspired by the example of some of the more highly industrialized nations of Europe. Republicans opposed it.
Civil Rights Act of 1964
integration of public accommodations; end Jim Crow Laws; LBJ broke south filibuster
Progressivism
more middle class; emphasis on urban reform; want regulation of trusts as well as expansion of democracy; belief in progress/desire for order/active gvt.; solve problems of urban-industrial revolution of Gilded Age; reduce power of political parties/urban machines
Détente
lessening of tensions with major communist powers: USSR, China; Nixon visits China
Brown Decision
rejected Plessy v. Ferguson; separate but equal in public school in unequal; school segregation is unconstitutional
TVA (Tennessee Valley Authority)
An act creating this enterprise was passed in 1933 by the Hundred Days Congress. It was a result of the vision and zeal of Senator George W. Norris of Nebraska. The new agency was determined to discover precisely how much the production and distribution of electricity cost, so that a "yardstick" could be set up to test the fairness of rates charged by private companies. The project brought employment, cheap electric power, low-cost housing, abundant cheap nitrates, restoration of eroded soil, reforestation, improved navigation, and flood control to the area around the Tennessee River. It combined the immediate advantage of putting thousands of people to work with a long-term project for reforming the power monopoly. Critics complained that it was socialism.
Voting Rights Act
ended literacy tests, established federal supervision of voting registration and federal supervision of all elections of previous discrimination in south (1965); federal supervision of all south elections
Red Scare
hysterical fear of left-wing; persecution of radicals b/c fear/anger at Soviet Union; injures labor movement; series of bombings including Palmer Raids (deportation) and Sacco and Vanzetti
New Deal
foundation of modern welfare system; federal regulation of areas of economy; birth of modern labor movement; govt force in agriculture; create modern Democratic party; use of govt to achieve prosperity and social justice; end depression, prevent future, economic security for all Americans.
Civil Rights Movement
This was a social movement in the U.S. aimed at outlawing racial discrimination against African Americans and restoring voting rights to them. Main events of the movement were Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, KS, the Montgomery bus boycott, the desegregation of Little Rock with the Little Rock Nine, sit-ins, Freedom Rides, the organization of voter registration, the integration of Mississippi universities, the Birmingham Campaign, the March on Washington, the Mississippi Freedom Summer, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party, and the assassination of Martin Luther King. Key leaders of the movement were Malcolm X, Martin Luther King, Rosa Parks, and Marcus Garvey.
Trueman Doctrine
Truman appeared before Congress on March 12, 1947 to request support for this doctrine. The doctrine said that it must be the policy of the U.S. to support free peoples who are resisting attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by outside pressures. Specifically, he asked for $400 million to bolster Greece and Turkey, which Congress granted. Critics complained that it needlessly polarized the world into pro-Soviet and pro-American camps, construed the Soviet threat as primarily military in nature, and that Truman had overreacted by promising unlimited support to any despot who claimed to be resisting "Communist aggression."