History 240/American Studies 230
Ronald W. Schatz
Fall 2015
Office hours: Tues., 3-4 p.m,, Wed 10-11a.m.
Office: PAC room 306
(860) 685-2384; rschatz@wesleyan.edu
The United States since 1901
“I am certain that history has equipped modern American liberalism with the ideas and the knowledge to construct
a society where men will be both free and happy.” - Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., January 19491
This course will explore the history of the United States from 1901 until recent times. The emphasis
will be on politics and society. However, these are broad topics and so we will also be discussing
economics, foreign policy, war, intellectuals, popular culture, education, and sports. The unifying theme
will be the emergence of modern liberalism during the Progressive Era and its dominance in American
politics and thought by the mid- twentieth century. Throughout this period, however, there was an
active minority hostile to modern forms of liberalism which began to organize in the 1950s and proved
quite successful in the latter twentieth and early twenty-first centuries.
The course is designed to help students acquire greater understanding of the history of the U.S.,
sharpen their ability to interpret documents, and encourage their feeling for history—that is, sensitivity
to how humanity evolves over time.
MAJOR READINGS
Michael McGerr, A Fierce Discontent: The Rise and Fall of the Progressive Movement in America,
1890-1920 (2003)
Melvyn P. Leffler, The Specter of Communism: The United States and the Origins of the Cold War,
1917-1953 (1994)
William E. Leutchenburg, Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, 1933-1940 (1963, 2009)
Julian Zelizer, The Fierce Urgency of Now: Lyndon Johnson, Congress, and the Battle for the Great
Society (2015)
Donald T. Critchlow, The Conservative Ascendancy: How the GOP Right Made Political History
(2011)
These books will be available at Olin Library’s reserve desk, the Broad Street Bookstore, and most online booksellers. Second-hand copies should be available for most of these books. Either edition of
Leutchenburg’s history of the New Deal is fine.
In addition, we will be using documents and chapters of other books. Many of them are accessible on
the Internet, as indicated on the syllabus. Others are available on electronic reserve (password:
HIST240). A few—for instance, James Allen’s Without Sanctuary—are only available at the Olin
Library reserve desk.
RECOMMENDED READING
If you lack background in U.S. history, I recommend Alan Brinkley’s textbook The Unfinished Nation,
copies of which are available on reserve at Olin Library, at the Broad Street Bookstore, and most online booksellers. Any edition would be fine for the course.
1
Arthur M. Schlesinger, Jr., The Vital Center: The Politics of Freedom (1949, 1962), p. xxiv.
1
EXAMINATIONS, ASSIGNMENTS & GRADES
There will be an in-class exam on September 24, a take-home essay due on October 23 at 1p.m., a quiz
in November, and a final exam or essay on the date scheduled by the Registrar. The final grade will be
based on the grades on these exams and the essay (20% for the first exam, 30% for the mid-term essay,
10% for the quiz, and 40% for the final), plus class participation. Contributions in class will raise a
student’s course grade, assuming that s/he has done the reading and respects other students.
A NOTE
Regular attendance is required. Please turn off cell phones before class and don’t bring lunch to class.
TEACHING APPRENTICES
Two excellent students, Marcos Plaud Rivera and Candace Powning, will be working with us in this
course. If you need information about the assignments or anything else and I am not available, you
should ask them for assistance. Their email addresses are mplaud@wesleyan.edu,
cpowning@wesleyan.edu.
OFFICE HOURS, TELEPHONE, E-MAIL
I’ll be happy to meet after class, during office hours, and by appointment. If the regular times are not
feasible, send an e-mail or speak to me after class and we can find another one. My office is room 306
in the Public Affairs Center. My office hours this semester will be on Tuesday, 3-4 p.m. and
Wednesdays, 10-11 a.m. My e-mail address is rschatz@wesleyan.edu. My telephone number is (860)
685-2384.
DISABILITIES RESOURCES
Wesleyan University is committed to ensuring that all qualified students with disabilities are afforded
an equal opportunity to participate in and benefit from its programs and services. To receive
accommodations, a student must have a documented disability as defined by Section 504 of the
Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and the ADA Amendments Act of 2008, and provide documentation of the
disability. Since accommodations may require early planning and generally are not provided
retroactively, please contact Disability Resources as soon as possible.
If you believe that you need accommodations for a disability, please contact Dean Patey in Disability
Resources, located in North College, Room 021, or call 860/685-5581 for an appointment to discuss
your needs and the process for requesting accommodations.
2
TOPICS & READING ASSIGNMENTS
September 8 The 1901 Pan-American Exposition
September 10 The Roots of Liberal Reform
Reading: McGerr, introduction, chs. 1-2
Henry George, “The Paradox of Capitalist Growth,” 1879
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/the-paradox-of-capitalist-growth/
Jane Addams, “The Subjective Necessity of Settlement Houses,” 1892:
http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=1439
September 15 The Progressive Movement
Reading:
McGerr, chs. 3-5
Theodore Roosevelt, “The New Nationalism,” August 31, 1910, Osawatomie, Kansas:
http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=501
Progressive Party Platform, August 7, 1912:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/progressive-platform-of-1912/
September 17 Racial Segregation, Lynching, and the Founding of the NAACP
Reading:
McGerr, chs. 6
Plessy v. Ferguson, U.S. Supreme Court, May 18, 1896:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/plessy-v-ferguson-excerpts/
James Allen, Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America (2000)
– reserve desk only
W.E.B. DuBois, The Souls of Black Folk (1903), ch. 3
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=1111
September 22 The War to End All Wars
Reading:
McGerr, ch. 9
President Woodrow Wilson, “War Address to the Congress,” April 2, 1917:
http://www.teachingamericanhistory.org/library/index.asp?document=177)
Randolph Bourne, “War and the Intellectuals,” Seven Arts, 1917:
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/4941/
President Woodrow Wilson, “Fourteen Points,” delivered to Joint Session of Congress,
January 8, 1918:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/fourteen-points/
Jill Leopard, “The Tug of War,” The New Yorker, September 9, 2013:
http://eres.wesleyan.edu.ezproxy.wesleyan.edu/eres/download.aspx?docID=29468&shortname=lepore.
pdf
September 24 In-class exam
September 29 1919!
Reading:
Leffler, The Specter of Communism, ch. 1
Immigration restriction debate, Congressional Quarterly, 67th Cong., 1st sess., 1921, vol.
61, pt. 1, and A. Mitchell Palmer, “The Case Against the Reds,” Forum, February
1920; reprinted in The Culture of the Twenties, ed. Loren Baritz (1970), pp. 50-85 and
available on E-Reserve and reserve desk.
3
October 1
Reading:
Cultural Clashes during the Roaring Twenties
Hiram Wesley Evans, “The Klan’s Fight for Americanism,” 1926; Beatrice M. Hinkley,
“Women and the New Morality,” 1924; Walter Lippmann, “The Causes of Political Indifference to-Day,” Atlantic Monthly, February 1927; from The Culture of the
Twenties, ed. Loren Baritz (1970), pp. 85-108, 145-58, 280-88, E-Reserve & reserve
desk.
October 6
Reading:
Hoover, Roosevelt and the Great Depression
Leutchenburg, Franklin D. Roosevelt and the New Deal, chs. 1-2
Jack Douglas, Veterans on the March (1934), ch. X (pp. 65-69) – E-Reserve.
Franklin D. Roosevelt, Commonwealth Club Address, September 23, 1932:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/commonwealth-club-address/
Franklin D. Roosevelt, First Inaugural Address, March 4, 1933, excerpts:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/first-inaugural-address-36/
October 8
Reading:
The First Hundred Days
Leutchenburg, chs. 3-4
Franklin D. Roosevelt, Radio Appeal for the NRA, July 24, 1933:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/radio-appeal-for-the-nra
October 13
Reading:
Radical Protests and the Second Hundred Days
Leutchenburg, chs. 5-7
Gerald L. K. Smith, “A Superman,” New Republic, Feb. 13, 1935:
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/5107
Rev. Charles E. Coughlin, “The National Union for Social Justice,” Nov. 1934
radio address from The Strenuous Decade: A Social and Intellectual Record of
the Nineteen-Thirties, ed. Daniel Aaron and Robert Bendiner (1970), pp. 150-161.
October 15
Reading:
Franklin Roosevelt and “the Common Man”
Leuchtenburg, chs. 8-9
Langston Hughes, “Let America Be America Again,” 1936, reprinted in The American
Writer and the Great Depression, ed. Harvey Swados (1966), pp. 498-501.
October 20
Reading:
On the Eve of War
Leuchtenburg, ,chs. 10-14
Franklin D. Roosevelt, Arsenal of Democracy fireside chat, December 29, 1940:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/fireside-chat-on-the-arsenal-of-democracy/
Charles A. Lindbergh, Address in New York, April 24, 1941:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/charles-a-lindberghs-address-in-new-york/
America First Rally, Carnegie Hall, September 17, 1941:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/wake-up-america-the-hour-is-late/
October 22
Reading:
America at War- I
George Herring, From Colony to Superpower: U.S. Foreign Relations since 1776
(2008), ch. 13 (pp. 538-94)
October 29
Readings:
America at War - II
Kevin Starr, Embattled Dreams: California in War and Peace, 1940-1950 (2002),
chs. 3 & 5
Franklin D. Roosevelt, “State of the Union Address,” January 11, 1944:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/state-of-the-union-address-3/
4
November 3 The Breakdown of the Alliance and the Onset of Cold War
Reading: Address to U.S. Congress by Harry S Truman, March 1947:
http://eres.wesleyan.edu/eres/coursepage.aspx?cid=581&page=docs
Leffler, The Specter, chs. 2-4
November 5 Eisenhower, Taft & Joe McCarthy
Reading:
Alonzo L. Hamby, Liberalism and Its Challengers: From F.D.R. to Bush,
2nd ed. (1992), ch. 3
Speech of Joseph McCarthy to Republican Women’s Club, Wheeling, West Virginia,
February 9, 1950:
http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6456
Donald Critchlow, The Conservative Ascendancy, introduction, ch. 1
November 10 Brown v. Board of Education & the Feminine Mystique
Reading: U.S. Supreme Court ruling, Brown vs. Board of Education, 1954: \
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/brown-v-board-of-education-of-topeka-iand-ii-excerpts
Elaine Tyler May, Homeward Bound: American Families in the Cold War Era (1988).
ch. 4.
Betty Friedan, The Feminine Mystique (1963), ch. 1
November 12 John F. Kennedy and His Legacy
Reading:
John F. Kennedy, “Inaugural Address,” January 20, 1961:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/inaugural-address-2/
John F. Kennedy, Commencement Address, American University, June 10, 1963:
http://eres.wesleyan.edu/eres/coursepage.aspx?cid=581&page=docs
Alan Brinkley, Liberalism and Its Discontents (1998), ch. 11 (“The Posthumous Lives of
John F. Kennedy”)
November 17 Lyndon Johnson and the Civil Rights Movement
Reading:
Zelizer, The Fierce Urgency of Now, chs. 1-4
Lyndon Johnson. “Remarks at the University of Michigan,” May 22, 1964:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/great-society-speech/
Lyndon Johnson, Draft of Plan of Action for South Vietnam, September 3, 1964:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/draft-of-plan-of-action-for-south-vietnam/
Lyndon Johnson, “Commencement Address at Howard University,” June 4, 1965:
http://teachingamericanhistory.org/library/document/commencement-address-at-howard-university-tofulfill-these-rights/
November 19 The 1964 Election & the “Great Society”
Reading:
Barry Goldwater, The Conscience of a Conservative (1960), excerpted in
Conservatism in America since 1930: A Reader (2003), pp. 211-25
Zelizer, The Fierce Urgency of Now, chs.5-6
Critchlow, ch. 2
5
November 24 “That Bitch of a War”
Reading:
Zelizer, The Fierce Urgency of Now, chs. 7-9 (to page 319)
Josh Zeitz, “What Trump Doesn’t Get about Vietnam, Politico:
http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/07/donald-trump-vietnam-war120393.html?hp=m1#.VblD2LXjVZF
December 1
Reading:
Richard Nixon & Watergate
Critchlow, ch. 3
Lowell P. Weicker, Jr., Maverick: A Life in Politics (1995), chs. 4-5.
December 3 Right Star Rising
Reading: Critchlow, chs. 4-6
December 8 “The Reagan Revolution”
Reading:
Critchlow, ch. 7
Ronald Ronald’s address to the House of Commons, June 8, 1982:
http://www.historyplace.com/speeches/reagan-parliament.htm
December 10 American Politics and Culture in the Early 21st Century
Reading:
Critchlow, chs. 8-9
Zelizer, The Fierce Urgency of Now, pp. 319-324
6