Transcript 20th 12-13 Unit IX - posted Truman _ Ike

Unit IX: Postwar America and
the 1950’s at Home and
Abroad
Truman Administration: 1945-1953
(Democrat) “The Fair Deal”
• Missouri farmboy, various jobs, WW1 army
officer; 1934 US Senate; 1944 Democratic
Convention  VP
• Viewed the Presidency as an office of
power & leadership
• Above all a “fighter” and champion of the
average citizen
• HARRY TRUMAN
(1884-1972)
Transition to Peacetime
• Strong public pressure  Truman to
demobilize the armed services
• Veterans enjoy benefits of the
Serviceman’s Readjustment Act (GI Bill of
Rights)
• Entitled to unemployment pay, medical
care, loans for homes, farms, or
businesses, payments for education
• Prices & wages soar  inflation
Election of 1948
• Republicans: nominate Thomas E. Dewey
• Very confident of victory – 1946 
Republicans gained control of both Houses
• Colorless campaign to avoid offending
voters
• Democrats: nominate Truman
• Split within the Democratic Party
• “whistle-stop” RR tours; berated a “donothing Republican Congress
Democratic Party is Split
• Dixiecrat Party (State’s Rights) – formed
because southern Democrats opposed to
Truman’s strong stand on civil rights 
Strom Thurmond
• Progressive Party – left-wing Democrats
who opposed Truman’s efforts to halt the
spread of Soviet influence  Henry
Wallace
• Campaign increasingly under Communist
domination
Election of 1948
Strom Thurmond & Henry Wallace
The “Fair Deal”
• Relationship to the New Deal:
• Wilson’s New Freedom had ended with
WW1; Truman determined FDR’s New
Deal would survive WW2
• It would continue to improve & expand as
the “Fair Deal”
Opposition in Congress: The
Conservative Coalition
• Conservative coalition  Republicans &
Southern Democrats defeat Fair Deal
proposals
• 1) civil rights legislation (anti-lynching.
Anti poll tax & the Fair Employment
Practices Comm. (FEPC)
• 2) compulsory health insurance
• 3) federal aid to education
Congress Overrides Truman’s Veto
• 1) Taft- Hartley Act (1947): curbed labor
unions
• 2) McCarran Act (1950): protect internal
security; strict regulation of proCommunist activities within the US
• 3) McCarran-Walter Act (1952): continue
immigration restrictions
Accomplishments
• (a) continuation of existing laws: expand
Soc. Sec.; raise minimum wage; slum
clearance; low income housing; maintain
farm supports
• (b) new laws: est. Atomic Energy
Commission, unifying the armed services;
committing govt. to full employment
• (c) civil rights: –> Committee on Civil
Rights
• executive order: desegregation of
armed forces
Other Developments
• (1) Loyalty Program
• 3 million investigated/ 2,000 resigned/
• 200 dismissed
• (2) Steel Strike 1952
• unions and management disagree
• Truman seizes mills
• Supreme Court: seizure illegal/ executive
power checked
Important Domestic Legislation
• 1. Employment Act (1946)
• “maximum employment”; Council of
Economic Advisors
• 2. Atomic Energy Act (1946)
• govt. control of AEC
• 3. National Security Act (1947)
• Unified armed forces  Department of
Defense
Significant Foreign Affairs
• 1. Japanese Phase of WWII and the Atomic
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Bomb:
to speed up the end of the war; save countless
US casualties; 8 days after drop - Japan
surrenders
2. United Nations
overwhelming Senate ratification of American
membership
3. Cold War - “containment”
Truman Doctrine; Marshall Plan; Point Four
Program
NATO; non-recognition policy of China; US
forces to Korea
Unit VIII: The Eisenhower Era
The Eisenhower Administration
(1953-1961) Republican
Election of 1952:
 The Democratic Party – Problems

1) deadlock in Korea
 2) Truman’s clash with MacArthur
 3) War-bred inflation

Truman refuses to run again
 Nominate the reluctant Adlai Stevenson
(governor from Illinois)

1952 Democratic Platform
(Stevenson)
Platform:
 Nation’s prosperity
 Foreign affairs conduct (ex. contained
Communism in Korea)
 Says there are no easy solutions
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Election of 1952
The Republican Party:
 Nominated Dwight D. Eisenhower (Ike)
 War hero, most popular American of his
time (I Like Ike), nonpartisan
 Represents the liberal and
internationalist wing of the party
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Challenged by Robert Taft – represented
the “Old Guard”
Richard Nixon  VP
Senator Robert Taft, Governor Earl Warren, Ike & Nixon
1952 Republican Platform
(Eisenhower)
Platform:
 Wants lower taxes
 Reduce government regulation
 Criticized Truman as incompetent 
conduct of the Korean War and
overspending
 Charged Democrats had been in power
for over 20 years – “time for a change”

Nixon and the 1952 Campaign

Nixon blasted his opponents:
That they cultivated corruption
 Caved in on Korea
 And coddled communists

Attacked Stevenson as
 “Adlai the appeaser” with a “Ph.D.

from (Sec. of State) Dean Acheson’s
College of Cowardly Communist
Containment.”
The “Checkers Speech”
& Its Significance
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Questions about Nixon’s alleged secret
Senatorial “slush fund”
Invokes reference to his family dog Checkers
 saves his candidacy
Significance: demonstrates the political
potentials of TV
Senator Richard Nixon delivers the Checkers Speech
The Political Impact of Television
TV proved more compelling than radio
 Even Eisenhower later appeared in
short, tightly scripted televised “spots”
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Foreshadows future political advertising
 Oversimplified complex economic and social
issues
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One critic compared the spots to “selling
the President like toothpaste”
1952 Election Results
1952 Election Results
Ike cracks the Solid South
 Helps ensure GOP control of Congress
by a thin margin

The Election of 1956
A replay of 1952
 Eisenhower vs. Stevenson
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Ike: campaigns on “peace and prosperity”
Stevenson (and Democrats) hard-pressed
to find issues to attack
Later charge Ike is a “part-time President”
1956 Election Results
1956 Election Results
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In the South:
Many whites angry over his strong stand
on civil rights
 Also opposition to further strengthening of
federal power
Ike wins many Black votes  Brown
decision in 1954
 Felt the Democratic Party was dominated
by Southerners
Republicans lose control of Congress for 2 of
the 8 years Ike is President
W. F. Turner
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Faithless elector from Alabama
Cast his vote for President in 1956 for Walter
B. Jones (circuit court judge from his
hometown –unknown nationally) & Herman
Talmadge (popular US Senator from
Georgia)
“I have fulfilled my obligations to the people
of Alabama. I'm talking about the white
people.”
View of the Presidency
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Opposed the FDR and Truman ideal of a
strong president
Believed in separation of powers between
the executive branch and the legislative
branch
Believed in leadership by “influencing
people” not “desk-pounding”
Eisenhower Advocates
Modern Republicanism
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Ideal was both liberal and conservative
 Was conservative  money
 Was liberal  people
I. Modern Republicanism accepted many
New Deal and Fair Deal reforms such as:
Social Security
Minimum wage
Slum clearance and government housing
Modern Republicanism (cont’d)
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II. Modern Republicanism wanted to limit
Federal power (feared statism)
Desire to make the federal government smaller
(give more power to the States and private
enterprise)
1) Expand States’ power  offshore lands (oil)
2) Encourage private enterprise
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End wage/price controls (est. during Korea)
Provide flexible support of agriculture
Called the TVA “creeping socialism”; future water
power  private enterprise
Balance the budget
Other Developments
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1) Eisenhower’s Illness (3 major problems)
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Result: By 1967 the 25th Amendment was
passed (Presidential disability)
2) Civil Rights
1954: Brown v. Board of Education
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Issues of disability and replacement become
concerns
Supreme Court outlaws segregation (schools)
1957: Government orders 101st Airborne to
enforce integration  Little Rock (also
prevented mob rule)
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Thurgood Marshall in
1936 at the beginning
of his career with the
NAACP
Brown vs. Board of Education of Topeka (1954)
and Thurgood Marshall
Other Developments (cont’d)
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2) Civil Rights (cont’d)
Declared racial discrimination a national
security issue (used in Communist
propaganda to attack US)
Civil Rights Acts of 1957 and 1960
 Primarily protected voting rights
 Proposed and signed by Eisenhower
Governor Orvel Faubus
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Sept. 4, 1957 – Orders the Arkansas
National Guard to support the
segregationists school councils
Woodrow Mann (Mayor) of Little Rock
requests help from Eisenhower to enforce
integration
Sept. 24, 1957 Ike orders the 101st
Airborne  Little Rock & federalizes the
Arkansas National Guard
Faubus speaks against integration
Little Rock Central High School
The Little Rock Nine (1957)
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Pictured above: seated, left to right:
Thelma Mothershed, Minnijean Brown,
Elizabeth Eckford, Gloria Ray.
Top row, left to right: Jefferson Thomas,
Melba Beals, Terrence Roberts, Carlotta
Walls, Daisy Bates (NAACP President),
Ernest Green.
Other Developments (cont’d)
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3) The Space Program
1957: USSR launches Sputnik I (becomes
the first artificial Earth satellite)
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It was visible all around the Earth and its radio
pulses were detectable
Significance: The surprise success
1) precipitated the American Sputnik crisis
2) began the Space Age
3) and triggered the Space Race (a part of
the larger Cold War)
Other Developments (cont’d)
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3) The Space Program (cont’d)
Eisenhower responds to the Sputnik crisis:
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Increased funding for the space program
Established NASA
Passed the National Defense Education Act
Increased emphasis on math, science, and
foreign language – concern the US was falling
behind the USSR in education
4) Highway Act (1956)  Interstate
Highway System
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Link major cities (42,000 miles)
Dawn of the Space Age (Sputnik)
1955 Map: The planned status of US highways in 1965
Wernher von Braun briefs President Eisenhower in front of a Saturn 1 vehicle
at the Marshall Space Flight Center dedication on September 8, 1960.