THE GOOD OL’ DAYS
TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER
• Many people feared a post war recession
• After 17 years of depression/war shortages people were anxious
to buy “stuff”
• GI Bill boosts the economy further
• Provided generous funds to help veterans start businesses, buy
homes and go to college
• High demand led to some inflation
• As prices rose workers began to strike for higher wages
• Truman nationalized the mines and stopped a railroad strike
• Labor unrest and inflation let to Republican victories in
the mid-term (1946) elections
• Took control of Congress for the first time since 1930
• Taft-Hartley – outlawed closed shops and right to work laws
• Truman vetoed the Act, but was easily overridden
• Labor leaders called the act “slave labor”
THE GOOD OL’ DAYS
TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER
• Truman‟s Legislative Agenda
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Expansion of Social Security benefits
Increase minimum wage
Government programs to ensure full employment
Public housing and slum clearance
Long range environmental and public works planning
National Health Insurance
Civil Rights bill (abolish poll taxes, ensure voting rights)
• Very little got passed (Republicans and Southern Dems)
• Did issue an executive order desegregating the military
• Election of 1948
• Democrats were split
• Southern Dems left the party over Civil Rights – Dixiecrats
• Nominated Strom Thurmond of SC
THE GOOD OL’ DAYS
TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER
• Election of 1948
• Liberal wing also left – Progressive party –nominated Henry
Wallace
• Republicans chose Thomas Dewey
• Dignified and popular, seemed unbeatable
• Polls called for a Dewey landslide
• Truman campaigned hard nationwide
• Attacked the “do nothing” Republican Congress
• Attacks weren‟t totally accurate (Marshall plan, Truman doctrine,
National Security Act), but they stuck
• It was close, but when the dust cleared, Truman and the Democrats
had won the Presidency and the Congress
THE GOOD OL’ DAYS
TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER
• The Fair Deal
• Didn‟t get it all but he did get:
• Increase in the minimum to 75 cents per hour
• Increased social security benefits by 75% and extended them to 10
million additional people
• Passed the National Housing Act providing for low-income housing
• National health insurance, subsidies for farmer, federal aid for schools
and his civil rights legislation were defeated
• The Eisenhower Years
• Eisenhower won in a landslide in 1952
• “Dynamic conservatism”
• Promoted business growth as “vital to the nation”
• Cut the federal budget, vetoed school construction bill, slashed aid to
government housing
• Enacted moderate tax cuts
THE GOOD OL’ DAYS
TRUMAN AND EISENHOWER
• The Eisenhower Years
• Also cut federal aid to businesses
• In some areas Eisenhower was an activist
• Federal Highway Act
• Great Lakes– St. Lawrence Seaway connected the Great Lakes to the
Atlantic Ocean
• Extended Social Security to 10 million people and unemployment to 4
million more
• Also raised the minimum wage
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• The Election of 1960
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Republicans – VP Richard Nixon
Democrats – John Kennedy
First televised presidential debates
Campaign focused on the economy and the Cold War
• Kennedy‟s Catholicism was an issue
• Kennedy won a narrow victory, but became a very popular
president
• The New Frontier
• Increased aid to education, health insurance for the elderly,
create a Department of Urban Affairs
• Tough sledding in Congress
• Short coattails and southern Democrats
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Kennedy – win some and lose some
• Economic growth through government spending
• Pushed businesses to hold down prices and labor to hold the line
on wages
• Pushed for a tax cut, “A rising tide lifts all boats”; but Congress
refused
• Congress also blocked health care for the elderly, and aid to
education
• Passed Equal Pay Act for women
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• The Warren Court
• ONE MAN ONE VOTE – Reynolds v Sims
• Due Process – Mapp v Ohio, Gideon v Wainwright; Miranda v
Arizona
• Prayer and privacy – Engle v Vitale, Abingdon School District v
Schempp, and Griswold v Connecticut
• Kennedy and the Cold War
• Foreign aid to Latin American countries; mostly to support existing
governments and discourage communism
• Alliance for Progress, Peace Corps
• “The Space Race”; to the moon by the end of the decade
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Cold War Crises
• The Bay of Pigs
• Castro had taken over Cuba, and gone communist
• Eisenhower had authorized CIA to secretly train and arm Cuban exiles
to invade the island and set off a popular uprising
• Kennedy‟s advisors recommended the plan
• When the landing boats ran aground, Kennedy withheld US air support
to keep our involvement a secret
• Within a couple of days most of the insurgents were killed or captured
• The Bay of Pigs was a low point for the Kennedy administration
• US looked weak and disorganized
• The Berlin Wall
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Khrushchev wanted to stop the exodus from east to west Berlin
Demanded that US/UK/FR withdraw from W. Berlin
When Kennedy refused, he ordered construction of the Berlin wall
Guards posted on the wall would shoot those trying to cross over
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Cold War Crises
• The Cuban Missile Crisis
• In October of 1962, CIA confirmed that the USSR had placed nuclear
missiles in Cuba
• Missiles posed serious threat to US national security
• Kennedy ordered a naval blockade to stop delivery or more missiles
and demanded USSR remove the missile
• If US were attacked they would respond against the Soviet Union
• Soviets continued work on the sites in Cuba
• After a flurry of secret negotiations, USSR agreed to remove the missiles
from Cuba if US removed missiles from Turkey
• Neither side really wanted nuclear war, but they had come close!
• US/USSR reached a nuclear test ban treaty the next year
• Khrushchev however, was damaged politically by the crisis and would
be driven from power the next year
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Death of a President
• A year after the crisis, November 22,1963 President Kennedy was
shot and killed in Dallas, Texas
• Lee Harvey Oswald appeared to be a confused and embittered
Marxist who had spent time in the Soviet Union
• Accused of the killing, he himself was killed on Sunday,
November 24th
• Lots of conspiracy theories, but the Warren Commission
concluded that Oswald was the lone gunman in the Kennedy
assassination
• In office for just over 1000 days, Kennedy had made a profound
impact on most American
• Lyndon Baines Johnson, took over the reins and set out to
promote many of Kennedy‟s programs
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Johnson takes charge
• Coalition builder, arm twister, wheeler dealer – he got things done
• His ability to reach consensus made him very effective
• The War on Poverty
• Linked his plan to Kennedy‟s legacy
• Economic Opportunity Act
• Attacked inadequate public services, illiteracy, and unemployment
• 10 new programs aimed at young Americans in the inner cities
• Job Corps, VISTA (Volunteers in Service to America), Upward Bound, and
Work Experience Program (day care support for poor working households)
• Election of 1964
• Johnson had little time to accumulate political capital
• Ran against Barry Goldwater, one year after assuming office
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Election of 1964
Goldwater was a strong conservative
“Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice”
But to Americans Goldwater did seem too extreme
Painted by Johnson as reckless and a war monger who would
lead the country into nuclear war
• Johnson won in a landslide
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• The Great Society
• Vowed to work with Congress and create the “Great Society”
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Civil Rights Act of 1964
Voting Rights Act of 1965
Included more than 60 programs initiated between „65 and „68
Medicare (elderly) and Medicaid (poor)
Elementary and Secondary Education Act
Head Start / HUD
THE NEW FRONTIER AND THE GREAT
SOCIETY
• Legacy of The Great Society
• Touched a lot of people, but was it successful?
• Implemented so quickly, often not executed well
• Expectations were very high (immediate gratification); when that
failed people became frustrated
• Lack of money hindered Great Society programs
• Some programs did survive however:
• Medicare, Medicaid, HUD, Dept. of Transportation, Head Start
• It did start a profound debate over the role of government in the
lives of its citizens
• If Johnson came up short, it was perhaps because his goals were
so high!