Review for Final Examination
History 419: American Social and
Intellectual History
Examination Date: December 11, 2008
Abrams v. United States
Background
 Jacob Abrams and his four colleagues were born
in Russia.
 One believed that a good form of government
was not capitalist, and in his opinion The United
States was capitalists.
 The other three believed in no form of
government.
 These five people were prosecuted for
publishing leaflets in English and Yiddish
criticizing Americas intervention in the Russian
Revolution.
The group
•
• Russian emigrants who dumped anarchist tracts from New York City
buildings, leading to convictions which the Supreme Court considered in
Abrams v U. S. (Jacob Abrams is at far right.)
First Amendment
• Congress shall make no law respecting an
establishment of religion, or prohibiting the
free exercise thereof; or abridging the
freedom of speech, or of the press; or the
right of the people peaceably to assemble,
and to petition the Government for a redress
of grievances.
Main Points
 Jacob Abrams and four colleagues were
prosecuted for violating the Espionage Act.
› “The first three counts charged the defendants with
conspiring… to unlawfully utter, print, write and
publish: … disloyal and abusive language about the
form of Government of the United States.”
› “Language intended to bring the form of Government
of the United States into contempt… and scorn, …
language intended to incite, provoke and encourage
resistance to the United States in said war.”
Main Points (Cont)
The Espionage Act was argued to be
unconstitutional, but was proven otherwise.
› “On the record thus described it is argued,
somewhat faintly, that the acts charged against
the defendants were not unlawful because within
the protection of that freedom of speech and of
the press which is guaranteed by the First
Amendment to the Constitution of the United
States, and that the Entire Espionage Act is
unconstitutional because in conflict with that
Amendment.”
Main Points (Cont)
– “The manifest purpose of such a publication was
to create an attempt to defeat the war plans of
the Government of the United States, by bringing
upon the country the paralysis of a general strike,
thereby arresting the production of all
munications and other things essential to the
conduct of the war.”
Main Points (Cont)
Mr. Homes argues these leaflets in “no way
attack the form of government of the United
States.”
› “A patriot might think that we are wasting money
on aeroplanes…and might advocate curtailment
with success, yet even if it turned out that the
curtailment hindered and was though by other
minds to have been obviously likely to hinder the
United States in the prosecution of war, no one
would hold such conduct a crime.”
Main Points (Cont)
– “Congress shall make no law abridging the
freedom of speech.” “I regret that I cannot put
into more impressive words my belief that in their
conviction upon this indictment the defendants
were deprived of their rights under the
Constitution of the United States.”
Main Points (Cont)
• The United States has a foundation based on
free trade of ideas.
– “They may come to believe even more than they
believe the very foundation of their own conduct
that the ultimate good desire is better reached by
free trade in ideas…”
Extra info
 Majority Reasoning: Based on Schenk, this speech is clearly
prohibitable. Even though their primary purpose was pro-Russian,
it had an anti-American effect by urging strikes.
 Dissent Reasoning: [Holmes] The Cons did not intend to interfere
with the war against Germany. There was not clear and present
danger present because the leaflet was silly and posed no
immediate danger to the U.S. government. Free speech is
necessary because it is the "marketplace of ideas" that generates
what the truth really is. The suppression of free speech should
only be permitted when necessary to immediately save the
country.
 http://www.lectlaw.com/files/case19.htm
Questions
• Do the leaflets pose any real threat the
United States government?
• Should these men have been charged with
conspiracy?
• By charging these men, is it a violation of
there First Amendment Rights?
• What in your opinion constitutes as treason?
Herbert Hoover, Financing Relief Efforts (1931)
Main Points:
1. The best way to help people during times of national difficulty is
through mutual self-help and voluntary giving.
My own conviction is strongly that if we break down this sense of
responsibility of individual generosity to individual and mutual selfhelp in the country in time of national difficulty and if we start
appropriations of this character we have not only impaired
something infinitely valuable in the life of the American people but
have struck at the roots of self-government. (p. 109)
Herbert Hoover, Financing Relief Efforts (1931)
2. Federal aid to the hungry and poor encourages expectations of future
paternal care and weakens Americans’ self-reliant character. It also
weakens Americans’ willingness to help each other and give to each
other, and thus enfeebles the bonds of common brotherhood.
Quotation of President Grover Cleveland by President Herbert Hoover: The
friendliness and charity of our countrymen can always be relied upon to
relieve their fellow citizens in misfortune. This has been repeatedly and
quite lately demonstrated. Federal aid in such cases encouraged the
expectation of paternal care on the part of the Government and weakens
the sturdiness of our national character, while it prevents the indulgence
among our people of that kindly sentiment and conduct which
strengthens the bonds of a common brotherhood. (p. 110)
President Herbert Hoover: The help being daily extended by neighbors, by
local and national agencies, by municipalities, by industry and a great
multitude of organizations throughout the country today is many times
any appropriation yet proposed. The opening of the doors of the Federal
Treasury is likely to stifle this giving and thus destroy far more resources
than the proposed charity from the Federal Government. (p. 110)
Roosevelt consciously abandoned the term
“progressive” and chose instead to employ
“liberal” to define himself and his
administration. In so doing, he transformed
“liberalism” from a shorthand for weak
government and laissez-faire economics into
belief in an activist, socially conscious
state, an alternative both to socialism and to
unregulated capitalism. (Foner, The Story of
American Freedom, pp. 201-204.)
Redefining Liberalism
Freedom, Hoover insisted, meant unfettered
economic opportunity for the enterprising
individual. Far from being an element of liberty,
the quest for economic security was turning
Americans into “lazy parasites” dependent on the
state. For the remainder of his life, Hoover
continued to call himself a “liberal,” even though,
he charged, the word had been “polluted and
raped of all its real meanings.” (Foner, The Story
of American Freedom, p. 205.)
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM (1932)
Background
 The Socialist Party was
founded in 1901 by Eugene
Debs.
 Its roots can be traced to
German immigrants and to
the Workingmen's Party of
America organized in 1876.
Norman Thomas
 Wanted to bring Democracy and Socialism together -- Socialists and
other Progressives campaigned for municipal ownership of waterworks,
gas and electric plants.
 During the 1920’s, the Party’s appeal shifted to the well-educated
rather than the “workingman”.
 Norman Thomas became leader of the Party in 1928. The son of a
Presbyterian minister, a graduate of Princeton and Union Theological
Seminary, he was committed to social reform.
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM
(1932)
Additional Background

Thomas was in favor of oldage pensions, public works, a
five-day work week and
unemployment insurance.

Thomas' policy researcher and fellow socialist, Henry J. Rosner, helped
write the 1932 Socialist Party Platform.

By 1932, the woes of the Great Depression had increased support for
the Socialist Party (and its platform), as Americans became increasingly
disillusioned with Republican policies.

223 delegates were elected to the 17th National Convention of the
Socialist Party of America held in Milwaukee in May 1932.

As the Presidential nominee of the Socialist Party, Thomas received
885,000 votes in the 1932 election.
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM (1932)
First Main Point
 A capitalist society creates unemployment and poverty.
• In a capitalist society, only a few own the
industries, but many do the work.
•
Workers in factories, mines, shops and offices
and on farms earn a “scanty income and are able
to buy back only a part of the goods” produced in
abundance by mass industry.
• Workers and wage earners must give a large
portion of their work-product to the few.
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM
(1932)
Second Main Point
The Socialist Party advocates better treatment for workers.
• A “6-hour day and the 5-day work week without a reduction of
wages.”
•
“Health and maternity insurance.”
• “Workmen’s compensation and accident insurance.”
• “Abolition of child labor.”
• “Adequate minimum wage laws.”
• Laws to enforce “the rights of workers to organize into unions.”
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM (1932)
Third Main Point
 The Socialist Party offers assistance to the unemployed, the
farmer and the rural community.
• It plans to develop “a compulsory system of
unemployment compensation with adequate benefits…”
• It promotes the development of “old-age pensions for
men and women 60 years of age and over.”
• It proposes “government aid to farmers and small-home
owners to protect … against foreclosures and … sales for
nonpayment of taxes by destitute farmers.”
• It advocates increased subsidies for “road building and
educational and social services for rural communities.”
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM (1932)
Fourth Main Point
 The Socialist Party seeks to protect the alien and the
African-American.
The Socialist Party will:
• Enact “legislation protecting aliens from being
excluded from this country or from citizenship or
from being deported…”
• Enforce the “constitutional guarantees of
economic, political and legal equality for the
Negro.”
• Enact “drastic anti-lynching laws.”
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM (1932)
Fifth Main Point
 The Socialist Party champions the individual and seeks to
eradicate the “evils inherent in the capitalist system.”
• The Socialist Party program seeks to“remove
the causes of class struggles, class antagonisms
and social evils…”
• The Socialist Party also seeks “to transfer the
principal industries of the country from private
ownership … to social ownership and democratic
control.”
SOCIALIST PARTY PLATFORM (1932)
Historical Significance
 The Socialist Party Platform (1932) had a significant impact on American politics
and American life. Franklin Roosevelt incorporated many (though not all) of the
Socialist Party’s ideas into his New Deal, making them law. Thereafter, the
Socialist Party’s appeal to the American worker faded.
 The ideas advanced in the Socialist Party Platform and adopted by the New Deal
resulted in the formation of the Federal Emergency Relief Act, the Public Works
Administration, the Civilian Conversation Corps, the Social Security Act, the
Wagner Act (labor management), Federal Housing Administration, Farm Credit
Administration, and others and laid the foundation for establishing the
minimum wage.
 The ideologies of the Socialist Party Platform provided hope for many
Americans in the face of the Great Depression and beyond. Norman Thomas,
shortly before his death, is quoted as saying “…It is an achievement to … feel
that one has kept the faith, to have had a part in some of the things that have
been accomplished in the field of civil liberties, in the field of better race
relations.” Today, his ideology continues to impact American politics, policy and
life.
The Socialist Party Platform of 1932
Programs Adopted by the Roosevelt Administration
A federal appropriation of $5,000,000,000 for immediate relief for those in
need to supplement state and local appropriations.
Federal Emergency Relief Act (FERA), May 12, 1933
A federal appropriation of $5,000,000,000 for public works and roads,
reforestation, slum clearance, and decent homes for the workers by the
federal government, states, and cities.
Public Works Administration (PWA), established by the National Industrial
Recovery Act (NIRA), May 17, 1933
Civilian Conservation Corps (Reforestation) Act (CCC), March 31, 1933
Home Owners Loan Corp. (HOLC), established by the Home Owners
Refinancing Act, April 13, 1933
Other agencies
Legislation providing for the acquisition of land, buildings, and equipment
necessary to put the unemployed to work producing food, fuel, and
clothing, and for the erection of housing for their own use.
Various experimental communities were established toward these ends.
The six-hour day and the five-day work-week without a reduction in
wages.
The Black bill for the establishment of a thirty-hour week was not passed by
Congress.
A comprehensive and efficient system of free public employment
agencies.
Each state now maintains such offices throughout its jurisdiction.
A compulsory system of unemployment compensation with adequate
benefits, based upon contributions by the government and by employers.
Provided by the Social Security Act, 1936, with additional contributions by
employees.
Old age pensions for men and women sixty years of age and over.
Provided by the Social Security Act, 1936, for those sixty-five years of age and
over.
Health and maternity insurance.
Provided by the Social Security Act, 1936.
Improved systems of workmen's compensation and accident insurance.
Senate bill 2793, introduced May 9, 1935, by Senator Wagner, culminated in
passage by Congress of the Wagner Act, a comprehensive labor-management
act.
The abolition of child labor.
Statutory education requirements and minimum work age laws.
Government aid to farmers and small homeowners to protect them against
mortgage foreclosure and a moratorium on sales for nonpayment of taxes
by destitute farmers and unemployed workers.
Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA), March 16, 1933
Farm Credit Administration (FCA), March 27, 1933
Federal National Mortgage Association (FNMA), 1938
Federal Housing Administration (FHA)
HOLC
Adequate minimum wage laws
Established by the National Recovery Administration (NRA), created by NIRA,
May 17, 1933. In 1935, the NRA was found to be unconstitutional by the untied
States Supreme Court. Nonetheless, minimum wage limits still exist.
Source: http://www.drfurfero.com/books/231book/ch03f1.html
Inaugural
Address
(1933)
Franklin D.
Roosevelt
Background Information
• Born in 1882 at Hyde Park, New York.
• 5th cousin of President Theodore
Roosevelt.
• Attended Harvard University and
Columbia Law School.
• Elected to the New York Senate in 1910.
• Democratic nominee for Vice President
in 1920.
Background Information
Stricken with polio in 1921, at age of 39.
Elected President in November 1932.
It was the first of four terms.
The U.S. enters WWII, in 1941, after
the attacks on Pearl Harbor.
• On April 12, 1945, Franklin suffers a
fatal stroke.
•
•
•
•
Main Point #1
• Now is the time to speak the truth.
– “This is preeminently the time to speak the
truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly.”
– “This great Nation will endure as it has
endured, will revive and will prosper.”
– “…the only thing we have to fear is fear
itself…”
Main Point #2
• We face common difficulties.
– “They concern, thank God, only material things.
Values have shrunken to fantastic levels; taxes
have risen; our ability to pay has fallen;
government of all kinds is faced by serious
curtailment of income; the means of exchange
are frozen in the currents of trade; the
withered leaves of industrial enterprise lie on
every side; farmers find no markets for their
produce; the savings of many years in
thousands of families are gone.”
Main Point #3
• We have what it takes to fix our current economic
problems.
– “Yet our distress comes from no failure of
substance. We are stricken by no plague of
locusts…Nature still offers her bounty and
human efforts have multiplied it.
– “…the rulers of the exchange of mankind’s
goods have failed, through their own
stubbornness and their own incompetence,
have admitted their failure, and abdicated.”
Main Point #4
• Happiness lies in achievement.
– “Happiness lies not in the mere possession of
money; it lies in the joy of achievement, in the
thrill of creative effort. The joy and moral
stimulation of work no longer must be
forgotten in the mad chase of evanescent
profits. These dark days will be worth all they
cost us if they teach us that our true destiny
is not to be ministered unto but to minister to
ourselves and to our fellow man.”
Main Point #5
• Action, and action now.
– “Our greatest primary task is to put people
to work. This is no unsolvable problem if we
face it wisely and courageously.”
– “It can be accomplished…treating the task
as we would treat the emergency of a
war…”
Main Point #6
• Progress requires 2 safeguards.
– “…there must be a strict supervision of all
banking and credits and investments; there
must be an end to speculation with other
people’s money, and there must be
provision for an adequate but sound
currency.”
Main Point #7
• Good-neighbor Policy.
– “In the field of world policy I would
dedicate this Nation to the policy of the
good neighbor—the neighbor who resolutely
respects himself and, because he does so,
respects the rights of others—the
neighbor who respects his obligations and
respects the sanctity of his agreements in
and with a world of neighbors.”
Main Point #8
• FDR accepts role of leader.
– “…I assume unhesitatingly the leadership of
this great army of our people dedicated to
a disciplined attack upon our common
problems.”
– “For the trust reposed in me I will return
the courage and the devotion that befit
the time. I can do no less.”
Main Point #8
(cont.)
– “The people of the United States have not
failed. In their need they have registered a
mandate that they want direct, vigorous
action. They have asked for discipline and
direction under leadership. They have made
me the present instrument of their wishes.
In the spirit of the gift I take it.”
Questions to Consider
• Does FDR suggest any radical alterations in
American politics or society?
• How does this Inaugural Address resonate
today?
Franklin Delano Roosevelt: The Four Freedoms
Delivered 6 January, 1941
WHAT THEY ARE
• The FIRST is freedom of speech and expression -- everywhere in the
world.
• The SECOND is freedom of every person to worship God in his own
way -- everywhere in the world.
• The THIRD is freedom from want -- which, translated into world
terms, means economic understandings which will secure to every
nation a healthy peacetime life for its inhabitants -- everywhere in the
world.
• The FORTH is freedom from fear -- which, translated into world
terms, means a world-wide reduction of armaments to such a point
and in such a thorough fashion that no nation will be in a position to
commit an act of physical aggression against any neighbor-- anywhere
in the world
Norman Rockwell, Our Four Freedoms, (1943)
The Truman Doctrine
Harry S. Truman
Background
• Truman was born May 8, 1884, in Lamar Missouri
,
• Starting from the rank of Private in the National
Guard of Missouri, Truman left military service 37
years later as a Colonel in the U.S. Army Officers'
Reserve Corps.
• United States Senator from 1935-1944
• He entered the Senate in January 1935, and loved
the work he later said his years as a Senator were
the happiest of his life.
• Served as VP under FDR,
Background (Cont.)
• On April 12, 1945, Eleanor Roosevelt informed him that
the President was dead.
• Truman was then sworn in as 33rd President of the
United States in 1945, served until 1953
• Known for ordering the dropping of the atomic bombs
Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
• In 1947, he proclaimed the Truman Doctrine,
prescribing a policy of containment for the Soviet
Union.
• In 1948 he approved the Marshall Plan, developed by
Secretary of State George Marshall for the economic
recovery of Europe.
Background (Cont.)
• In 1948 he approved the Marshall Plan,
developed by Secretary of State George Marshall
for the economic recovery of Europe.
• The same year he authorized the Berlin airlift,
using planes to ship in supplies after the Soviets
closed the road routes to Berlin.
• Died December 26, 1972, in Independence
Missouri from cardiovascular failure.
Main points
• It is the responsibility of the United States to
defend democracy anywhere it is under
assault by minorities and external sedition.
– “The free peoples of the world look to us for
support in maintaining their freedom.”
– “I believe that it must be the policy of the United
States to support free peoples who are resisting
attempted subjugation by armed minorities or by
outside pressures.”
Main point (cont)
• The sanctuary of the United States depends on
protecting democracy abroad.
– “We shall not realize our objectives [creating a world
free of oppression], however, unless we are willing to
help free peoples to maintain their free institutions
and their national integrity against aggressive
movements that seek to impose upon them
totalitarian regimes… Totalitarian regimes imposed
upon free peoples, by direct or indirect aggression,
undermine the foundations of international peace and
hence the security of the United States.
Main points (Cont.)
• Every nation must choose between two
alternative ways of life. “The choice is too often
not a free one.”
– “One way of life is based upon the will of the majority,
and is distinguished by free institutions,
representative government, free elections, guarantees
of individual liberty, freedom of speech and religion,
and freedom from political oppression.”
– The second way of life is based upon the will of a
minority forcibly imposed upon the majority. It relies
upon terror and oppression, a controlled press and
radio, fixed elections, and the suppression of personal
freedoms.”
Main points (Cont.)
• Harry S. Truman believes the United States should
protect those who are resisting suppression by outside
peoples or armed minorities.
– “Should we fail to aid Greece and Turkey in this fateful
hour, the effect will be far reaching to the West as well as
to the East.”
– “The seeds of totalitarian regimes are nurtured by misery
and want. They spread and grow in the evil soil of povery
and strife. They reach their full growth when the hope of a
people for a better life has died. We must keep that hope
alive. The free peoples of the world look to us for support
in maintaining their freedom.”
Questions to consider?
• Is it the United States’ job to protect others from
oppression?
• Is Truman right by saying, “If we falter in our
leadership, we may endanger the peace of the
world-and we shall surely endanger the welfare
of this nation?”
• Is the best way to help other nations to become
economically stable and have orderly political
processes through economic and financial aid?
J. Edgar Hoover
1895-1972
Background
• Born January 1, 1895 in Washington, D. C.
• Parents: Dickerson and Anna Hoover
• Hoover did not obtain a birth certificate until he was
43, which fueled suspicions, in and out of the
bureau, that he was of African-American descent – a
family out of Mississippi tried to prove these
allegations, but failed.
• He kept detailed records on himself, teachers, and
family members starting at a young age.
• At age 11, started his own newspaper, The Weekly
Review, that he sold to family and friends for 1 cent.
Background continued…
• His school nickname was “Speed” because he
thought fast and talked fast.
• Hoover’s father, Dickerson, spent the last eight
years of his life in an asylum. His cause of
death was listed as “melancholia” – clinical
depression.
• 1916 – graduated with a law degree from
George Washington University Law School.
• Hoover became a Freemason in 1920.
Background continued…
• Hoover’s failure to marry
and his constant
companionship with Clyde
Tolson, led to many rumors
about his sexuality.
• Clyde Tolson was the sole
heir to Hoover’s estate and
was also buried next to
Hoover.
• Hoover was also an avid dog
lover.
Head of the FBI
• Hoover joined the Bureau of Investigation, later known
as the FBI, in 1921.
• In 1924 at the age of 29, Hoover was appointed acting
Director of the BOI and by the end of the year he was
officially named Director.
• Hoover remained the Director of the FBI until his
death on May 2, 1972 at the age of 77.
• The FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. is named
after Hoover. Because of the controversial nature of
Hoover's legacy, there have been periodic proposals to
rename it.
Head of the FBI
• During his reign over the FBI, Hoover built an
efficient crime-detection agency, established a
centralized fingerprint file, a crime laboratory and a
training institution for police.
• He dictated every aspect of his agents’ lives from
who their friends should or should not be, who they
should or should not marry, what organizations they
could or could not join; decided where they would
live; monitored their morals; even told them what to
wear and what they could weigh; and bestowed
praise and awards, blame and punishments, when he
decided they were due.
Head of the FBI
• The FBI, under Hoover, collected information on all
America's leading politicians. Known as Hoover's secret files,
this material was used to influence their actions. It was later
claimed that Hoover used this incriminating material to
make sure that the eight presidents that he served under,
would be too frightened to sack him as director of the FBI..“
• Presidents Harry Truman, John F. Kennedy and Lyndon
Johnson each considered firing Hoover but concluded that
the political cost of doing so would be too great. Richard
Nixon twice called in Hoover with the intent of firing him,
but both times he changed his mind when meeting with
Hoover.
Head of the FBI
• Hoover ignored the existence of organized crime in the U.S.
until famed muckraker Jack Anderson exposed the
immense scope of the Mafia's organized crime network. It
has been suggested that Hoover did not pursue the Mafia
because they had incriminating evidence (photos) against
him in respect to his sexual orientation.
• Despite all of these allegations, during his long career of
public service, Director Hoover received three presidential
awards, sundry citations by Congress, and following his
death was the first civil servant in U.S. history to lie in state
in the Rotunda of the U.S. Capitol.
Political Views
•
•
•
•
Conservative
Anti-communist
Against suffrage for women
Opposed the Civil Rights movement
Major Issues of the Time
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
1st Red Scare (1917-1920)
Espionage Act of 1917
Sedition Act of 1918
The Palmer Raids
House Committee on Un-American Activities
WW II
Iron Curtain in Europe
"Uncle Sam bids good riddance
to the deportees"
(from J. Edgar Hoover's
memorabilia and scrapbook
in the National Archives).
• The more famous of the
Palmer raids was
December 21, in which
249 people were
dragged from their
homes, forcibly put on
board a ship and
deported.
Intended Audience
• Hoover delivered “The Communist Menace”
before the House Committee on Un-American
Activities on March 26, 1947.
The Communist Menace
Main Points
1. The Communist Party of the United States
intends to destroy the American
businessman, take over our government,
and throw the whole world into revolution.
 “The Communist movement in the United
States…stands for the destruction of free
enterprise, and it stands for the creation of a
“Soviet of the United States” and ultimate world
revolution.”
The Communist Menace
Main Points continued…
2. The American programs to help society such as,
social security, veterans’ benefits, and welfare
are all communist ideas used to lure the support
of unsuspecting citizens.
“The American progress which all good citizens seek,
such as old-age security, houses for veterans, child
assistance and a host of others is being adopted as
window dressing by the Communists to conceal their
true aims and entrap gullible followers.”
The Communist Menace
Main Points continued…
3. The greatest threat of communism is not how many Communists are in this
country, but their ability to insert themselves into positions of power
and their ability to persuade through lies and deception. Americans
should FEAR the communist infiltration of their government and
society.

“What is important is the claim of the Communists themselves that
for every party member there are 10 others ready, willing, and able
to do the party’s work. Herein lies the greatest menace of
communism. For these people who infiltrate and corrupt various
spheres of American life. So rather than the size of the Communist
Party the way to weigh its true importance is by testing its
influence, its ability to infiltrate.”

“…When the Communists overthrew the Russian government there
was one Communist for every 2,277 persons in Russia. In the
United States today there is one Communist for every 1,814 persons
in the country…”
Historical Significance
• 2nd Red Scare (1947-1957)
• 1947 - Ronald Reagan and wife Jane Wyman provide to the FBI
names of SAG members believed to be communist sympathizers.
• 1947 - Top Hollywood executives decide not to employ individuals
who refused to answer questions about communist infiltration of
the film industry
• McCarthyism starts(1950): Sen. Joseph P. McCarthy says he has a
list of 205 communists in the State Department.
• 1950 - California Legislature passes a bill requiring state employees
to sign a loyalty oath.
• 1953 - Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, convicted of conspiring to
commit espionage on behalf of the Soviet Union, are executed.
Dwight D. Eisenhower
• Born in Denison, Texas on Oct 14, 1890
• Went through the Military Academy at West Point in
1911
• Served as Supreme Allied Commander in the European
Theatre in World War II; promoted to General of the
Army
• Served as the Chief of Staff of the Army from 1945 to
1948
• In 1948, became president of Columbia University
• In 1950, became Supreme Commander of NATO
• Elected 34th President in 1953; served until 1961
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Main Points
• America must act as the peace keepers and safeguarders of the free world.
– “America’s leadership and prestige depend, not
merely upon our unmatched material progress, riches
and military strength, but on how we use our power in
the interests of world peace and human betterment.”
– “Any failure traceable to arrogance, or our lack of
comprehension or readiness to sacrifice would inflict
upon us grievous hurt both at home and abroad.”
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Main Points
• We must guard against the hostile ideology.
– “We face a hostile ideology- global in scope, atheistic
in character, ruthless in purpose, and insidious in
method. Unhappily the danger it poses promises to be
of indefinite duration.”
– “To meet it successfully, there is called for, not so
much the emotional and transitory sacrifices of crises,
but rather those which enable us to carry forward
steadily, surely, and without complaint the burdens of
a prolonged struggle- with liberty at stake.”
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Main Points
• We must guard against imbalance in our economic and
military spending.
– “But each proposal must be weighed in the light of
broader consideration: the need to maintain balance in
and among national programs…Good judgment seeks
balance and progress, lack of it eventually finds imbalance
and frustration.”
– “A vital element in keeping our peace is our military
establishment.”
– “Our military organization today bears little relation to that
known of any of my predecessors in peacetime, or indeed
by the fighting men of World War II or Korea.”
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Main Points:
We must guard against the military-industrial complex in our democratic
government.
• “The total influence- economic, political, even spiritual- is felt in every city,
every State house, every office of the Federal government. We recognize the
imperative need for this development. Yet we must not fail to comprehend its
grave implications.”
• “In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of
unwarranted influence…by the military-industrial complex.
• “The potential for disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist.”
• “We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or
democratic processes.”
• “In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more
formalized, complex, and costly.”
• “Today, the solitary inventor, tinkering in his shop has been overshadowed by
task forces of scientists in laboratories and testing fields.”
• “Partly because of the huge cost involved, a government contract becomes
virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity.”
• “We must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy
could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite.”
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Main Points
• We must safe-guard the resources of
democracy for future generations.
– “we- you and I, and our government- must avoid
the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for
our own ease and convenience, the precious
resources of tomorrow.”
– “We want democracy to survive for all generations
to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of
tomorrow.”
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Main Points
• We must guard against only resolving
differences with military conflict.
– “this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must
avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and
hate, and be, instead, a proud confederation of
mutual trust and respect.”
– “Together we must learn how to compose
differences, not with arms, but with intellect and
decent purpose.”
Farewell Address (Eisenhower)
Questions
• What factions does Eisenhower fear will
attempt to influence and control government?
• How did Eisenhower resolve bring the
countries of the world together?
Brown v. Board of Education
1954
Thurgood Marshall
• Born on July 2, 1908 in Baltimore, Maryland
• He attended Frederick Douglass High School. Later he
graduated from Lincoln University and Howard University Law
School in Washington, D. C..
• In 1934, Marshall was appointed an assistant to special
counsel Charles Hamilton Houston, who worked for the
Baltimore branch of the NAACP.
• He won thirty-two out of thirty-five cases taken to the
Supreme Court
• In June of 1967, President Lyndon B. Johnson nominated
Judge Marshall to become an Associate Justice of the
Supreme Court. With this nomination, Marshall became the
first African-American to serve as a Justice of the Supreme
Court.
Main Point #1
• Segregated public schools do not uphold the
fourteenth amendment.
-”segregated public schools are not equal and
cannot be made equal.”
-”Their opponents, just as certainly, were
antagonistic to both the letter and the spirit of
the amendments and wished them to have
the most limited effect.”
Main point #2
• Segregated schools hinder African Americans from
proper education.
-”To separate them from others of similar age and
qualifications solely because of their race generates a
feeling of inferiority as to their status in the
community that may affect their hearts and minds in
a way unlikely ever to be undone.
-” it is doubtful that any child may reasonably be
expected to succeed in life is he is denied the
opportunity of an education”
Main Point #3
• Separate but equal has no place in public
schools.
-”Separate educational facilities are inherently
unequal.”
-”Education of white children was largely in the
hands of private groups, whereas education of
negros was almost non-existent, and
practically all of the race was illiterate.”
Questions to Consider….
• Why could separate not be equal?
• How does the court propose to desegregate
the nation’s schools?
Brown vs. Board of Education
Presented by: Kathy Kerley
Historical Background
• After the end of the American Civil War in 1865, (Reconstruction
period) the federal government was able to provide some protection
for the civil rights of the newly-freed slaves.
• When Reconstruction ended in 1877 and federal troops were
withdrawn, southern state governments started passing Jim Crow laws
that prohibited blacks from using the same public facilities as whites.
• Fourteenth Amendment did not help because the Supreme Court
ruled, in the Civil Rights Cases (1883), that the amendment applied
only to the actions of governments, not private individuals.
• In 1896, Plessy vs. Ferguson was passed. This was a landmark decision
that upheld segregation and the “separate but equal” doctrine.
Historical Background
• The “separate but equal” doctrine was challenged by Charles Houston, the
head of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People’s
Legal Defense Fund.
• He traveled through the South with his student, Thurgood Marshall (later
appointed to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1967), filming rundown black
schools and gathering any information to help with his appeal.
• In 1950, Thurgood Marshall took over for Houston.
• The case was first argued against the Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas
in 1952. The court was divided about overturning Plessy vs. Ferguson and
asked to have the case reargued in the new term in 1953, paying special
attention to the intention of the Fourteenth Amendment.
• Chief Justice Fred Vinson, who strongly opposed overturning Plessy vs.
Ferguson, died and his successor, Chief Justice Earl Warren, favored ending
segregated education by focusing on the harm done to black children who
were segregated and relying on sociological evidence supporting this idea.
Brown vs. Board of Education Facts
• Brown vs. Board of Education was not the first challenge to school
segregation. In 1849, African Americans filed a suit against an educational
system that mandated racial segregation in the case Roberts vs. City of
Boston.
• This class action suit was filed on behalf of thirteen Topeka, Kansas
parents and their twenty children.
• Oliver Brown, the case namesake was just one of the nearly 200 plaintiffs
from five states who were part of the NAACP cases brought before the
Supreme Court in 1951. The Kansas case was named after Oliver Brown as
a legal strategy. He was the head of the roster because he had an intact,
complete family, and it would be received better by the Supreme Court
than a single parent.
Main Points
Chief Justice Warren delivered the opinion of the Court.
 Although the buildings, curricula, qualifications and salaries of teachers
and other “tangible” factors are equal to the white schools, the issue is
the effect that segregation has on public education and black students.
“Our decision, therefore cannot turn on merely a comparison of
these
tangible factors in the Negro and white schools involved in
each of the
cases. We must look instead to the effect of segregation itself on public
education.”
 Education is an important factor in the development of professional
training and social skills, and those students that are segregated are
deprived of equal educational opportunities, even when the facilities are
equal.
“…To separate [children] from others of similar age and qualifications
solely because of their race generates a
feeling of inferiority as to their
status in the community that may affect their hearts and minds in a way unlikely
to ever be
undone.”
Main Points
 Segregation is detrimental to the psychological and educational
development of the negro group, which in turn will deprive them of
benefits that they would receive if they were not segregated.
“Segregation of white and colored children in public schools has a
detrimental effect upon the colored children. The impact is greater
when it has the sanction of law, for the policy of separating the
races is usually interpreted as denoting the inferiority of the negro
group. A sense of inferiority affects the motivation of a child to
learn. Segregation with the sanction of law, therefore, has a
tendency to [retard] the educational and mental development of
negro children and to deprive them of some of the benefits they
would receive in a racially integrated school system.”
 The Court ruled that in the public education the “separate but equal”
doctrine had no place, and the students were deprived of equal
protection of the laws guaranteed by the Fourteenth Amendment.
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
Historical Background
• Written as a response to the Supreme Court’s
decision in the Brown V. Board of Education.
• Signed by 101 politicians in Alabama,
Arkansas, Georgia, Louisiana, Mississippi,
South Carolina and Virginia.
• Initial version written by Strom Thurmond
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• “I wanna tell you, ladies and gentlemen, that
there’s not enough troops in the army to force
the Southern people to break down
segregation and admit the nigra race into our
theaters, into our swimming pools, into our
homes, and into our churches.”
- Strom Thurmond
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
Main Points
• The Founding Fathers formed a constitution with
checks and balances because they knew not one
man or group of men could be trusted with limitless
power.
• “The unwarranted decision of the Supreme Court in
the public school cases is now bearing the fruit
always produced when men substitute naked power
for established law.”
• “They framed this constitution with its provisions for
change by amendment against the dangers of
temporary popular passion or the personal
predilections of public office holders.”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• The Supreme Court’s decision is an abuse of
power.
“It climaxes a trend in the Federal judiciary
undertaking to legislate, in derogation of the
authority of Congress, and to encroach upon
the reserved rights of the States and the
people.”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• Neither the original constitution, nor the 14th
or any other amendment, mentions
education.
“The debates preceding the submission of the
14th amendment clearly show that there was
no intent that it should affect the systems of
education maintained by the states.”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• Separate but equal doctrine began in the
North, not the South.
“…the doctrine of separate but equal schools,
apparently originated in Roberts v. City of
Boston…(1849), upholding school segregation
against attack as being violative of a State
constitutional guarantee of equality”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• This act has destroyed relations between races that
have taken years to build.
“It is destroying the amicable relations between the
white and Negro races that have been created
through 90 years of patient effort by the good people
of both races. It has planted hatred and suspicion
where there has been heretofore friendship and
understanding.”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• We reaffirm our reliance on the Constitution
as the fundamental law of the land.
“We decry the Supreme Court’s
encroachments on rights reserved to the
States and to the people, contrary to
established law and to the Constitution.”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
• We will fight this decision using all lawful
means.
“We pledge ourselves to use all lawful means
to bring about a reversal of this decision which
is contrary to the Constitution and to prevent
the use of force in its implementation.”
Sam J. Ervin and Others, The Southern Manifesto (1956)
??QUESTIONS??
• What is the fundamental basis of this
manifesto?
• Why would integration offend Southerners?
Martin Luther King, Jr.
Letter from a Birmingham Jail
Background
•
•
•
Martin Luther King, Jr., was born on January 15, 1929 in Atlanta, Georgia. He was the son of Reverend
Martin Luther King Sr. and Alberta Williams King.
Dr. King married Coretta Scott on June 18, 1953. Together they had four children.
In 1957 he was elected president of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, an organization formed
to provide new leadership for the now burgeoning civil rights movement. The ideals for this organization he
took from Christianity; its operational techniques from Gandhi. In the eleven-year period between 1957
and 1968, King traveled over six million miles and spoke over twenty-five hundred times, appearing
wherever there was injustice, protest, and action; and meanwhile he wrote five books as well as numerous
articles. In these years, he led a massive protest in Birmingham, Alabama, that caught the attention of
the entire world, providing what he called a coalition of conscience. and inspiring his "Letter from a
Birmingham Jail", a manifesto of the Negro revolution; he planned the drives in Alabama for the
registration of Negroes as voters; he directed the peaceful march on Washington, D.C., of 250,000 people
to whom he delivered his address, "l Have a Dream", he conferred with President John F. Kennedy and
campaigned for President Lyndon B. Johnson; he was arrested upwards of twenty times and assaulted at
least four times; he was awarded five honorary degrees; was named Man of the Year by Time magazine in
1963; and became not only the symbolic leader of American blacks but also a world figure.
At the age of thirty-five, Martin Luther King, Jr., was the youngest man to have received the Nobel Peace
Prize. When notified of his selection, he announced that he would turn over the prize money of $54,123 to
the furtherance of the civil rights movement.
-nobleprize.org
"Martin Luther King Jr. was photographed by Alabama cops following his February
1956 arrest during the Montgomery bus boycott. The historic mug shot, taken when
King was 27, was discovered in July 2004 by a deputy cleaning out a Montgomery
County Sheriff's Department storage room. It is unclear when the notations 'DEAD'
and '4-4-68' were written on the picture."
In late March 1968, King went to Memphis, Tennessee in support of the black
sanitary public works employees, who had been on strike since March 12 for
higher wages and better treatment. On April 3, King returned to Memphis and
addressed a rally, delivering his “I’ve been to the Mountaintop” address at Mason
Temple (Church of God in Christ, Inc. - World Headquarters). King’s flight to
Memphis had been delayed by a bomb threat against his plane. In the close his
last speech, in reference to the bomb threat, King said the following:
“And then I got to Memphis. And some began to say the threats, or talk about the
threats that were out. What would happen to me from some of our sick white
brothers? Well, I don’t know what will happen now. We’ve got some difficult days
ahead. But it doesn’t matter with me now. Because I’ve been to the mountaintop.
And I don’t mind. Like anybody, I would like to live a long life. Longevity has its
place. But I’m not concerned about that now. I just want to do God’s will. And He’s
allowed me to go up to the mountain. And I’ve looked over. And I’ve seen the
promised land. I may not get there with you. But I want you to know tonight, that
we, as a people, will get to the promised land. And I’m happy, tonight. I’m not
worried about anything. I’m not fearing any man. Mine eyes have seen the glory of
the coming of the Lord.”
Memphis Hotel 1968
On April 4, 1968, while standing on the 2nd floor balcony of the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Dr.
King was assassinated. The assassination led to a nationwide wave of riots in more than 60
cities. Escaped convict James Earl Ray was captured two months later and charged with King’s
death.
The White Minister’s Good Friday
Statement, April 12, 1963
• However, we are now confronted by a series of demonstrations by
some of our Negro citizens, directed and led in part by outsiders.
We recognize the natural impatience of people who feel that their
hopes are slow in being realized. But we are convinced that these
demonstrations are unwise and untimely.
• Just as we formerly pointed out that "hatred and violence have no
sanction in our religious and political traditions," we also point out
that such actions as incite to hatred and violence, however
technically peaceful those actions may be, have not contributed to
the resolution of our local problems. We do not believe that these
days of new hope are days when extreme measures are justified in
Birmingham.
• When rights are consistently denied, a cause should be pressed in
the courts and in negotiations among local leaders, and not in the
streets. We appeal to both our white and Negro citizenry to observe
the principles of law and order and common sense.
1. Why am I here? I am here because
injustice is here.
• I think I should indicate why I am here In Birmingham, since you have been
influenced by the view which argues against "outsiders coming in." I have
the honor of serving as president of the Southern Christian Leadership
Conference, an organization operating in every southern state, with
headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia…So I, along with several members of my
staff, am here because I was invited here I am here because I have
organizational ties here.
• But more basically, I am in Birmingham because injustice is here.
• Moreover, I am cognizant of the interrelatedness of all communities and
states. I cannot sit idly by in Atlanta and not be concerned about what
happens in Birmingham. Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice
everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in
a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all
indirectly. Never again can we afford to live with the narrow, provincial
"outside agitator" idea. Anyone who lives inside the United States can
never be considered an outsider anywhere within its bounds.
2. You condemn demonstrations, yet refuse to see the failure in
your own proposed solutions. These demonstrations are
justified.
•
You deplore the demonstrations taking place In Birmingham. But your statement, I am sorry to say,
fails to express a similar concern for the conditions that brought about the demonstrations.
•
It is unfortunate that demonstrations are taking place in Birmingham, but it is even more
unfortunate that the city’s white power structure left the Negro community with no alternative.
•
In any nonviolent campaign there are four basic steps: collection of the facts to determine whether
injustices exist; negotiation; self-purification; and direct action. We have gone through an these
steps in Birmingham. There can be no gainsaying the fact that racial injustice engulfs this
community. Birmingham is probably the most thoroughly segregated city in the United States. Its
ugly record of brutality is widely known. Negroes have experienced grossly unjust treatment in the
courts. There have been more unsolved bombings of Negro homes and churches in Birmingham
than in any other city in the nation. These are the hard, brutal facts of the case. On the basis of
these conditions, Negro leaders sought to negotiate with the city fathers. But the latter consistently
refused to engage in good-faith negotiation.
•
Then, last September, came the opportunity to talk with leaders of Birmingham’s economic
community. In the course of the negotiations, certain promises were made by the merchants - for
example, to remove the stores humiliating racial signs. On the basis of these promises, the
Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth and the leaders of the Alabama Christian Movement for Human
Rights agreed to a moratorium on all demonstrations. As the weeks and months went by, we
realized that we were the victims of a broken promise. A few signs, briefly removed, returned; the
others remained.
3. We are left with no other alternative. Direct non violent
protests are the only way to seek immediate action.
•
•
•
•
You may well ask: "Why direct action? Why sit-ins, marches and so forth? Isn’t negotiation a better path?"
You are quite right in calling, for negotiation. Indeed, this is the very purpose of direct action. Nonviolent
direct action seeks to create such a crisis and foster such a tension that a community which has constantly
refused to negotiate is forced to confront the issue. It seeks so to dramatize the issue that it can no longer
be ignored. My citing the creation of tension as part of the work of the nonviolent-resister may sound
rather shocking. But I must confess that I am not afraid of the word "tension." I have earnestly opposed
violent tension, but there is a type of constructive, nonviolent tension which is necessary for growth. Just
as Socrates felt that it was necessary to create a tension in the mind so that individuals could rise from the
bondage of myths and half-truths to the unfettered realm of creative analysis and objective appraisal, we
must we see the need for nonviolent gadflies to create the kind of tension in society that will help men
rise from the dark depths of prejudice and racism to the majestic heights of understanding and
brotherhood.
The purpose of our direct-action program is to create a situation so crisis-packed that it will inevitably
open the door to negotiation. I therefore concur with you in your call for negotiation. Too long has our
beloved Southland been bogged down in a tragic effort to live in monologue rather than dialogue.
In your statement you assert that our actions, even though peaceful, must be condemned because they
precipitate violence. But is this a logical assertion? Isn’t this like condemning a robbed man because his
possession of money precipitated the evil act of robbery? Isn’t this like condemning Socrates because his
unswerving commitment to truth and his philosophical inquiries precipitated the act by the misguided
populace in which they made him drink hemlock? Isn’t this like condemning Jesus because his unique Godconsciousness and never-ceasing devotion to God’s will precipitated the evil act of crucifixion? We must
come to see that, as the federal courts have consistently affirmed, it is wrong to urge an individual to
cease his efforts to gain his basic constitutional rights because the quest may precipitate violence. Society
must protect the robbed and punish the robber.
If this philosophy had not emerged, by now many streets of the South would, I am convinced, be flowing
with blood. And I am further convinced that if our white brothers dismiss as "rabble-rousers" and "outside
agitators" those of us who employ nonviolent direct action, and if they refuse to support our nonviolent
efforts, millions of Negroes will, out of frustration and despair, seek solace and security in black-nationalist
ideologies a development that would inevitably lead to a frightening racial nightmare.
4. Freedom is fought for, it is not easily
given.
• One of the basic points in your statement is that the action that I and my
associates have taken in Birmingham is untimely.
• My friends, I must say to you that we have not made a single gain civil
rights without determined legal and nonviolent pressure. Lamentably, it is
an historical fact that privileged groups seldom give up their privileges
voluntarily.
• We know through painful experience that freedom is never voluntarily
given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. Frankly, I
have yet to engage in a direct-action campaign that was "well timed" in
the view of those who have not suffered unduly from the disease of
segregation. For years now I have heard the word "Wait!" It rings in the
ear of every Negro with piercing familiarity. This "Wait" has almost always
meant “Never." We must come to see, with one of our distinguished
jurists, that "justice too long delayed is justice denied."
• Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for
freedom eventually manifests itself, and that is what has happened to the
American Negro.
5. The prevalent social injustices so readily imposed on the black
community must come to an end without further delay. The long
endured “Wait” is over.
•
We have waited for more than 340 years for our constitutional and God-given rights. The nations of Asia and
Africa are moving with jetlike speed toward gaining political independence, but we stiff creep at horse-and-buggy
pace toward gaining a cup of coffee at a lunch counter. Perhaps it is easy for those who have never felt the stinging
dark of segregation to say, "Wait." But when you have seen vicious mobs lynch your mothers and fathers at will
and drown your sisters and brothers at whim; when you have seen hate-filled policemen curse, kick and even kill
your black brothers and sisters; when you see the vast majority of your twenty million Negro brothers smothering
in an airtight cage of poverty in the midst of an affluent society; when you suddenly find your tongue twisted and
your speech stammering as you seek to explain to your six-year-old daughter why she can’t go to the public
amusement park that has just been advertised on television, and see tears welling up in her eyes when she is told
that Funtown is closed to colored children, and see ominous clouds of inferiority beginning to form in her little
mental sky, and see her beginning to distort her personality by developing an unconscious bitterness toward white
people; when you have to concoct an answer for a five-year-old son who is asking: "Daddy, why do white people
treat colored people so mean?"; when you take a cross-county drive and find it necessary to sleep night after night
in the uncomfortable corners of your automobile because no motel will accept you; when you are humiliated day
in and day out by nagging signs reading "white" and "colored"; when your first name becomes "nigger," your
middle name becomes "boy" (however old you are) and your last name becomes "John," and your wife and
mother are never given the respected title "Mrs."; when you are harried by day and haunted by night by the fact
that you are a Negro, living constantly at tiptoe stance, never quite knowing what to expect next, and are plagued
with inner fears and outer resentments; when you no forever fighting a degenerating sense of "nobodiness" then
you will understand why we find it difficult to wait. There comes a time when the cup of endurance runs over, and
men are no longer willing to be plunged into the abyss of despair. I hope, sirs, you can understand our legitimate
and unavoidable impatience.
•
More and more I feel that the people of ill will have used time much more effectively than have the people of
good will. Human progress never rolls in on wheels of inevitability; it comes through the tireless efforts of men
willing to be co-workers with God, and without this hard work, time itself becomes an ally of the forces of social
stagnation. We must use time creatively, in the knowledge that the time is always ripe to do right. Now is the time
to make real the promise of democracy…
6. There are 2 types of laws, just and
unjust
•
•
•
You express a great deal of anxiety over our willingness to break laws. This is certainly a legitimate
concern. Since we so diligently urge people to obey the Supreme Court’s decision of 1954
outlawing segregation in the public schools, at first glance it may seem rather paradoxical for us
consciously to break laws. One may won ask: "How can you advocate breaking some laws and
obeying others?" The answer lies in the fact that there fire two types of laws: just and unjust. I
would be the Brat to advocate obeying just laws. One has not only a legal but a moral responsibility
to obey just laws. Conversely, one has a moral responsibility to disobey unjust laws. I would agree
with St. Augustine that "an unjust law is no law at all“
Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or
unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust
law is a code that is out of harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas
Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law
that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All
segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distort the soul and damages the personality. It
gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority.
Let us consider a more concrete example of just and unjust laws. An unjust law is a code that a
numerical or power majority group compels a minority group to obey but does not make binding
on itself. This is difference made legal. By the same token, a just law is a code that a majority
compels a minority to follow and that it is willing to follow itself. This is sameness made legal.
6. Continued… Examples of just and
unjust laws.
•
•
•
Sometimes a law is just on its face and unjust in its application. For instance, I have been arrested
on a charge of parading without a permit. Now, there is nothing wrong in having an ordinance
which requires a permit for a parade. But such an ordinance becomes unjust when it is used to
maintain segregation and to deny citizens the First Amendment privilege of peaceful assembly and
protest.
A law is unjust if it is inflicted on a minority that, as a result of being denied the right to vote, had
no part in enacting or devising the law. Who can say that the legislature of Alabama which set up
that state’s segregation laws was democratically elected? Throughout Alabama all sorts of devious
methods are used to prevent Negroes from becoming registered voters, and there are some
counties in which, even though Negroes constitute a majority of the population, not a single Negro
is registered. Can any law enacted under such circumstances be considered democratically
structured?
We should never forget that everything Adolf Hitler did in Germany was "legal" and everything the
Hungarian freedom fighters did in Hungary was "illegal." It was "illegal" to aid and comfort a Jew in
Hitler’s Germany. Even so, I am sure that, had I lived in Germany at the time, I would have aided
and comforted my Jewish brothers. If today I lived in a Communist country where certain principles
dear to the Christian faith are suppressed, I would openly advocate disobeying that country’s
antireligious laws.
7. We learn of civil disobedience throughout
history. It is not a new “extreme.”
•
Of course, there is nothing new about this kind of civil disobedience. It was evidenced
sublimely in the refusal of Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego to obey the laws of
Nebuchadnezzar, on the ground that a higher moral law was at stake. It was practiced
superbly by the early Christians, who were willing to face hungry lions and the excruciating
pain of chopping blocks rather than submit to certain unjust laws of the Roman Empire. To a
degree, academic freedom is a reality today because Socrates practiced civil disobedience. In
our own nation, the Boston Tea Party represented a massive act of civil disobedience.
•
But though I was initially disappointed at being categorized as an extremist, as I continued to
think about the matter I gradually gained a measure of satisfaction from the label. Was not
Jesus an extremist for love: "Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them
that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you." Was not
Amos an extremist for justice: "Let justice roll down like waters and righteousness like an
ever-flowing stream." Was not Paul an extremist for the Christian gospel: "I bear in my body
the marks of the Lord Jesus." Was not Martin Luther an extremist: "Here I stand; I cannot do
otherwise, so help me God." And John Bunyan: "I will stay in jail to the end of my days before
I make a butchery of my conscience." And Abraham Lincoln: "This nation cannot survive half
slave and half free." And Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that an
men are created equal ..." So the question is not whether we will be extremists, but what
kind of extremists we will be. Will we be extremists for hate or for love? Will we be extremist
for the preservation of injustice or for the extension of justice?
8. It is just to openly break unjust laws, especially if
one is willing to accept the consequences.
• I hope you are able to see the distinction I am trying to point out. In no
sense do I advocate evading or defying the law, as would the rabid
segregationist. That would lead to anarchy. One who breaks an unjust law
must do so openly, lovingly, and with a willingness to accept the penalty. I
submit that an individual who breaks a law that conscience tells him is
unjust and who willingly accepts the penalty of imprisonment in order to
arouse the conscience of the community over its injustice, is in reality
expressing the highest respect for law.
• As in so many past experiences, our hopes bad been blasted, and the
shadow of deep disappointment settled upon us. We had no alternative
except to prepare for direct action, whereby we would present our very
bodies as a means of laying our case before the conscience of the local
and the national community. Mindful of the difficulties involved, we
decided to undertake a process of self-purification. We began a series of
workshops on nonviolence, and we repeatedly asked ourselves : "Are you
able to accept blows without retaliating?" "Are you able to endure the
ordeal of jail?"
9. “I have been greatly disappointed
with the white moderate.”
• I have almost reached the regrettable conclusion that the Negro’s
great stumbling block in his stride toward freedom is not the White
Citizen’s Counciler or the Ku Klux Klanner, but the white moderate,
who is more devoted to "order" than to justice; who prefers a
negative peace which is the absence of tension to a positive peace
which is the presence of justice; who constantly says: "I agree with
you in the goal you seek, but I cannot agree with your methods of
direct action"; who paternalistically believes he can set the
timetable for another man’s freedom; who lives by a mythical
concept of time and who constantly advises the Negro to wait for a
"more convenient season." Shallow understanding from people of
good will is more frustrating than absolute misunderstanding from
people of ill will. Lukewarm acceptance is much more bewildering
than outright rejection.
10. We should protest, but we should
do so non-violently.
•
•
•
I began thinking about the fact that stand in the middle of two opposing forces in
the Negro community. One is a force of complacency, made up in part of Negroes
who, as a result of long years of oppression, are so drained of self-respect and a
sense of "somebodiness" that they have adjusted to segregation; and in part of a
few middle class Negroes who, because of a degree of academic and economic
security and because in some ways they profit by segregation, have become
insensitive to the problems of the masses.
The other force is one of bitterness and hatred, and it comes perilously close to
advocating violence. It is expressed in the various black nationalist groups that are
springing up across the nation, the largest and best-known being Elijah
Muhammad’s Muslim movement. Nourished by the Negro’s frustration over the
continued existence of racial discrimination, this movement is made up of people
who have lost faith in America, who have absolutely repudiated Christianity, and
who have concluded that the white man is an incorrigible "devil.“
I have tried to stand between these two forces, saying that we need emulate
neither the "do-nothingism" of the complacent nor the hatred and despair of the
black nationalist. For there is the more excellent way of love and nonviolent
protest. I am grateful to God that, through the influence of the Negro church, the
way of nonviolence became an integral part of our struggle.
Questions
• Why are non-violent demonstrations the best
choice?
• Who would you have sided with and why?
Patrick Moynihan, The Negro Family (1965)
Photograph of a Black Family During the
Great Depression
Moynihan, D. P. (1965). The negro family: The case for national action. U.S. Department
of Labor. Retrieved October 17, 2002 from
http://www.dol.gov/asp/programs/history/webid-meynihan.htm.
Moynihan, D. P. (1965). The negro family: The case for national action. U.S. Department
of Labor. Retrieved October 17, 2002 from
http://www.dol.gov/asp/programs/history/webid-meynihan.htm.
Source: Moynihan, D. P. (1965). The negro family: The case for national action. U.S.
Department of Labor. Retrieved October 17, 2002 from
http://www.dol.gov/asp/programs/history/webid-meynihan.htm.
Photograph of a Black Family
During the Great Depression
Source: Moynihan, D. P. (1965). The negro family: The case for national action. U.S.
Department of Labor. Retrieved October 17, 2002 from
http://www.dol.gov/asp/programs/history/webid-meynihan.htm.
Patrick Moynihan, The Negro Family (1965)
Main Points:
1. The role of the family is central to shaping the character of
people, and “[a]t the heart of the deterioration of the fabric of Negro
Society is the deterioration of the Negro family.”
•
The role of the family in shaping character and ability is so
pervasive as to be easily overlooked. The family is the basic
social unit of American life; it is the basic socializing unit….
But there is one truly great discontinuity in family structure in
the United States at the present time: that between the white
world in general and that of the Negro American.
•
…the family structure of lower class Negroes is highly
unstable, and in many urban centers is approaching complete
breakdown….
•
…There is considerable evidence that the Negro community is
in fact dividing between a stable middle-class group that is
steadily growing stronger and more successful, and an
increasingly disorganized and disadvantaged lower-class
group….
2. A long history of discrimination and segregation has worked
against the emergence of a strong father figure in the African
American family.
The Negro was given liberty, but not equality. Life remained
hazardous and marginal. Of the greatest importance, the Negro male,
particularly in the South, became an object of intense hostility, an
attitude unquestionably based in some measure on fear.
When Jim Crow made its appearance toward the end of the
19th century, it may be speculated that it was the Negro male who
was most humiliated thereby.…
Unquestionably, [Jim Crow humiliation of the Negro male]
worked against the emergence of a strong father figure. The very
essence of the male animal, from the bantam rooster to the four-star
general, is to strut. Indeed, in 19th century America, a particular type
of exaggerated male boastfulness became almost a national style.
Not for the Negro male. The “sassy nigger” was lynched.
The White Man’s Double Standard
“We do not admire the man of timid peace. We admire the
man who embodies victorious effort; the man who never
wrongs his neighbor, who is prompt to help a friend, but
who has those virile qualities necessary to win in the
stern strife of actual life.”
--Theodore Roosevelt, The Strenuous Life
White mobs murdered some 500 blacks between 1870 and
1900, and more than 100 black people between 1900 and
1910.
White prejudice included animosity toward black troops in
the U.S. Army. Brownsville whites, for example, objected
to the stationing of the all-black Twenty-fifth Infantry at
Fort Brown. In anger, they charged that the troops had
raided the city in 1906 in protest of discriminatory
practices. Later evidence demonstrated the unfairness of
the charges, but at that time President Theodore
Roosevelt had dishonorably discharged 160 of the troops.
(The History of Texas, 189, 261-262)
3. Unemployment of the African-American male has largely contributed to the present
crisis of the African-American family, which has been forced into a matriarchal
structure.
•
The impact of unemployment on the Negro family, and particularly on the Negro male,
is the least understood of all the developments that have contributed to the present
crisis…. The fundamental, overwhelming fact is that Negro unemployment, with the
exception of a few years during World War II and the Korean War, has continued at
disaster levels for 35 years…. As jobs became more and more difficult to find, the
stability of the family became more and more difficult to maintain….
•
[The African-American community has
paid a fearful price] for the incredible
mistreatment to which it has been
subjected over the past three centuries.
•
In essence, the Negro community
has been forced into a matriarchal
structure which, because it is so out of
line with the rest of the American society,
seriously retards the progress of the
group as a whole, and imposes a crushing
burden on the Negro male and, in
consequence, on a great many Negro
women as well.
Picture by King, Edward, 1848-1896
Source of picture:
http://docsouth.unc.edu/nc/king/king.html
4. A national effort should be made to help the problems faced by the
African-American family.
• It was by destroying the Negro family under slavery that white
America broke the will of the Negro people. Although that will has
reasserted itself in our time, it is a resurgence doomed to
frustration unless the viability of the Negro family is restored….
•
…[A] national effort towards the problems of Negro Americans
must be directed towards the question of family structure. The
object should be to strengthen the Negro family so as to enable it
to raise and support its members as do other families. After that,
how this group of Americans chooses to run its affairs… is none of
the nation’s business….
Questions:
• What is wrong with having female heads of households?
• What are the origins of “the tangle of pathology” in the black community?
• How can the government alter familial relations?
Single Parents
Single parents account for 27 percent of family households with children under 18.
More than two million fathers are the primary caregivers of children under 18,
a 62 percent increase since 1990.
One in two children will live in a single-parent family at some point in childhood.
One in three children is born to unmarried parents.
Between 1978 and 1996, the number of babies born to unmarried women per year
quadrupled from 500,000 to more than two million.
The number of single mothers increased from three million to 10 million between
1970 and 2000.
Divorced Parents
Nearly half of all marriages end in divorce.
More than one million children have parents who separate or divorce each year.
More than half of Americans today have been, are or will be in one or more stepfamily
situations.
Poverty Rates of Single Mother Families by Race (based on cash income)
Children represent a disproportionate share of the poor in the United States; they are 25
percent of the total population, but 35 percent of the poor population. In 2004, 13 million
children, or 17.8 percent, were poor. The poverty rate for children also varies
substantially by race and Hispanic origin, as shown in the table below.
Children Under 18 Living in Poverty, 2004
Category
All children under
18
Number (in
thousands)
Percent
13,027
17.8
White only, nonHispanic
4,507
10.5
Black
4,049
33.2
Hispanic
4,102
28.9
334
9.8
Asian
http://www.epinet.org/images/figure11.gif
Darryll Vann is in a shrinking minority group--African-American men who teach
youngsters. Only 11 percent of elementary school teachers are male and a
much smaller percentage of them are African-American.
Photo by David Snider
http://www.aliciapatterson.org/APF1901/McCarthy/McCarthy.html
Support for the Contras
By Ronald Reagan
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Born February 6, 1911, to Nelle and John
Reagan in Tampico, Illinois.
He attended high school in nearby Dixon and
then worked his way through Eureka College
There, he studied economics and sociology,
played on the football team, and acted in
school plays.
A screen test in 1937 won him a contract in
Hollywood. During the next two decades he
appeared in 53 films.
Reagan became governor of California, the
most populous state, in 1967
Ronald Reagan won the Republican
Presidential nomination in 1980 and chose
as his running mate former Texas
Congressman and United Nations
Ambassador George Bush.
He became the 40th president.
Anastasio Somoza Debayle
& Sandinista Soldiers
Main Points:
• The United States does not start wars.
– “We will never be the aggressor. We maintain our
strength in order to deter and defend aggression, to
preserve freedom and peace. We help our friends
defend themselves.”
• “Central America is region of great
importance to the United States.”
– …San Salvador is closer to Houston, Texas, than
Houston is to Washington, D.C.
– “…[I]t’s become the stage for a bold attempt by the
Soviet Union, Cuba, and Nicaragua to install
communism by force throughout the hemisphere….”
Main Points
• The war in El Salvador is resulting in
massive waves of refugees.
– “Concerns about the prospect of hundreds of
thousands of refugees fleeing Communist
oppression to seek entry into our country are
well-founded.
• The Communist threat is moving
closer to the USA.
– “What we see in El Salvador is an attempt to
destabilize the entire region and eventually
move chaos and anarchy toward the American
border….”
Main Points
• The Communist Sandinistas rule Nicaragua
under the veil of Democracy.
– “…Castro cynically instructed them in the ways of
successful Communist insurrection. He told them
to tell the world they were fighting for political
democracy, not communism.”
• The Contras have taken up arms against the
government.
– “Many of those who fought alongside the
Sandinistas saw their revolution betrayed.
– “Thousands who fought with the Sandinistas…are
now called the contras.”
– “They are freedom fighters….”
Main Points
• With the help of the Soviet Union and Cuba, the
Sandinistas are funding terrorism.
– “Shortly after taking power…began supporting
aggression and terrorism against El Salvador,
Honduras, Costa Rica, and Guatemala.”
– “…Nicaragua is still the headquarters for
Communist guerrilla movements….”
• The Communist presence in Nicaragua is growing.
– “There were 165 Cuban personnel in Nicaragua in
1979. Today that force has grown to 10,000.”
– “Communist countries are providing new military
assistance, including tanks, artillery, rocketlaunchers, and help in the construction of military
bases and support facilities….”
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the
Beginning
Background Information:
Andrew Sullivan was born in England on August 10, 1963 and
is a renowned journalist in both the United Kingdom and the
U.S. He is the former editor of The New Republic for his
battling lifestyle between conservative Catholicism and active
gay lifestyle with HIV. He is also a pioneer in the genre of
Blog Journalism. Sullivan also briefly wrote for The New York
Times Journal. He is often compared to Camille Paglia,
another homosexual who argues from a non-leftist
perspective.
Historical Context:
This article was written after the attacks on September 11,
2001 on the Twin Towers in New York City. It was written in
response that people were not calling this a “religious war”
when he clearly saw that it was.
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
1. This is a religious war between Islamic Fundamentalism and faiths of all kinds that are at peace
with freedom and modernity.
“[T]his surely is a religious war, but not of Islam versus Christianity and Judaism. Rather, it is a war of
fundamentalism against faiths of all kinds that are at peace with freedom and modernity.”
Osama bin Laden: “The call to wage war against America was made because America has
spearheaded the crusade against the Islamic nation, sending tens of thousands of its troops to the
land of the two holy mosques over and above its meddling in its affairs and its politics and its support
of the oppressive, corrupt and tyrannical regime that is in control.” Our terrorism is “of the
commendable kind, for it is directed t the tyrants and the aggressors and the enemies of Allah.” “[O]ur
call is the call of Islam that was revealed to Muhammad. It is a call to all humankind. We have been
entrusted with good cause to follow in the footsteps of the messenger and to communicate his
message to all nations.”
2. Historically, Christianity has a worse record in the “use of religion for extreme repression, and
even terror…”
“From the Crusades to the Inquisition to the bloody religious wars of the 16th and 17th centuries,
Europe saw far more blood spilled for religion's sake than the Muslim world did. And given how
expressly nonviolent the teachings of the Gospels are, the perversion of Christianity in this respect
was arguably greater than bin Laden's selective use of Islam. But it is there nonetheless. It seems
almost as if there is something inherent in religious monotheism that lends itself to this kind of
terrorist temptation.”
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
3. We should not condescend to fundamentalism, no matter how much we may
disagree with it. Fundamentalism elevates and comforts, and it has attracted
millions of adherents for centuries. In the Fundamentalists’ world of “sin begets
sin,” they must attempt to coerce others to conform to God’s laws.
“The first mistake is surely to condescend to fundamentalism. We may disagree with it, but it has
attracted millions of adherents for centuries, and for a good reason. It elevates and comforts. It
provides a sense of meaning and direction to those lost in a disorienting world. The blind
recourse to texts embraced as literal truth, the injunction to follow the commandments of God
before anything else, the subjugation of reason and judgment and even conscience to the
dictates of dogma: these can be exhilarating and transformative. They have led human beings to
perform extraordinary acts of both good and evil. And they have an internal logic to them. If you
believe that there is an eternal afterlife and that endless indescribable torture awaits those who
disobey God's law, then it requires no huge stretch of imagination to make sure that you not only
conform to each diktat but that you also encourage and, if necessary, coerce others to do the
same. The logic behind this is impeccable. Sin begets sin. The sin of others can corrupt you as
well. The only solution is to construct a world in which such sin is outlawed and punished and
constantly purged -- by force if necessary. It is not crazy to act this way if you believe these things
strongly enough. In some ways, it is crazier to believe these things and not act this way.”
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
4. Fundamentalist religions cannot exist alone in a single Person
Dostoyevsky’s Grand Inquisitor explains to Jesus: “these pitiful creatures are
concerned not only to find what one or the other can worship, but to find
something that all would believe in and worship; what is essential is that all
may be together in it. This craving for community of worship is the chief misery
of every man individually and of all humanity since the beginning of time.
This is the voice of fundamentalism. Faith cannot exist alone in a single
person. Indeed, faith needs others for it to survive -- and the more complete
the culture of faith, the wider it is, and the more total its infiltration of the world,
the better.”
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
5. America has its struggle with fundamentalism
“America is not a neophyte in this struggle. The United States has seen
several waves of religious fervor since its founding. But American
evangelicalism has always kept its distance from governmental power. The
Christian separation between what is God's and what is Caesar's – drawn
from the Gospels – helped restrain the fundamentalist temptation. The last few
decades have proved an exception, however. As modernity advanced, and the
certitudes of fundamentalist faith seemed mocked by an increasingly liberal
society, evangelicals mobilized and entered politics. Their faith sharpened,
their zeal intensified, the temptation to fuse political and religious authority
beckoned more insistently.”
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
6. Fundamentalists are reacting to the threat of the ever-changing modern world. Because
change sometimes contradicts the reality found in their ancient religious texts, they often
lash out against proponents or symbols of social change. Much of American and Western
culture represent social change to traditional societies, yet these cultures are in some ways
tempting. Thus, attacks against American and Western culture often are an acting out of an
internal conflict.
“The temptation of American and Western culture -- indeed, the very allure of such culture -- may well require a
repression all the more brutal if it is to be overcome. The transmission of American culture into the heart of what bin
Laden calls the Islamic nation requires only two responses -- capitulation to unbelief or a radical strike against it. There is
little room in the fundamentalist psyche for a moderate accommodation. The very psychological dynamics that lead
repressed homosexuals to be viciously homophobic or that entice sexually tempted preachers to inveigh against
immorality are the very dynamics that lead vodka-drinking fundamentalists to steer planes into buildings. It is not
designed to achieve anything, construct anything, argue anything. It is a violent acting out of internal conflict.”
“The critical link between Western and Middle Easter fundamentalism is surely the pace of social change. If you take your
beliefs from books written more than a thousand years ago, and you believe in these texts literal, then the appearance of
the modern world must terrify you.”
“If you believe that women should be consigned to polygamous, concealed servitude, then Manhattan must appear like
Gomorrah…It is not a big step to argue that such centers of evil should be destroyed or undermined as bin Laden does, or
to believe that destruction is somehow a consequence of their sin.”
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
7. Locke and our Founding Fathers advocated religious toleration
One central influence on the founders' political thought was John Locke, the English
liberal who wrote the now famous ''Letter on Toleration.'' In it, Locke argued that
true salvation could not be a result of coercion, that faith had to be freely chosen to
be genuine and that any other interpretation was counter to the Gospels. Following
Locke, the founders established as a central element of the new American order a
stark separation of church and state, ensuring that no single religion could use
political means to enforce its own orthodoxies.
We cite this as a platitude today without absorbing or even realizing its radical
nature in human history -- and the deep human predicament it was designed to
solve. It was an attempt to answer the eternal human question of how to pursue the
goal of religious salvation for ourselves and others and yet also maintain civil peace.
What the founders and Locke were saying was that the ultimate claims of religion
should simply not be allowed to interfere with political and religious freedom. They
did this to preserve peace above all -- but also to preserve true religion itself.
Andrew Sullivan
This Is a Religious War: September 11 was Only the Beginning
Main Points:
8. In this religious war, we are fighting for our Constitution and the principle of the
separation of politics and religion.
“What is really at issue here is the simple but immensely difficult principle of the
separation of politics and religion. We are fighting not for our country as such or for
our flag. We are fighting for the universal principles of our Constitution -- and the
possibility of free religious faith it guarantees. We are fighting for religion against
one of the deepest strains in religion there is. And not only our lives but our souls
are at stake.”
President Says Saddam Hussein
Must Leave Iraq Within 48 Hours
Remarks by the President in Address to the Nation (March 17,
2003).
George W. Bush
Bush: President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48
Hours
Background:
After Iraq invaded and annexed Kuwait, the U.S. in
August 1990 President Bush appeared before a joint
session of Congress on September 11, 1990 and
announced that Saddam Hussein aggression would not
stand. After a brief war, Iraq was defeated and Kuwait
liberated. However, Saddam Hussein remained in power.
A condition of the peace treaty signed with Hussein was
that Iraq must disarm. Hussein violated the treaty and
UN Resolutions on multiple occasions, choosing instead
to conceal its weapon programs and defense
capabilities from United Nations weapons inspections.
On September 11, 2001, Al Qaeda attacked destroyed
New York’s World Trade Center, killing some three
thousand innocent victims.
Bush: President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48
Hours
Main Points:
1. Iraq still has weapons of mass destruction, even though
they pledge to reveal and destroy them as a condition for
ending the Persian Gulf War of 1991. Iraq also harbors
terrorists, including al Qaeda.
2. FEAR: The United Nation’s Security Council has failed to live
up to its responsibilities to Saddam Hussein, but we must
confront him to avoid the danger of Iraq giving terrorists
chemical, biological or nuclear weapons to kill hundreds of
thousands of people in our country.
3. ULTIMATUM: If Saddam Hussein and his sons do not leave
Iraq within 48 hours, the United States will attack Iraq.
Bush: President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48
Hours
Main Points:
4. “I urge every member of the Iraqi military and
intelligence services, if war comes, do not fight for a
dying regime that is not worth your own life.”
5. The American people should feel assured. Our
government is taking action to protect our homeland.
6. After the United States removes Saddam Hussein, the
Iraqi people “can set an example to all the Middle East
of a vital and peaceful and self-governing nation.
“[T]he greatest power of freedom is to overcome
hatred and violence, and turn the creative gifts of men
and women to the pursuits of peace.”
Bush: President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48
Hours
Questions:
In the speech, President Bush stated, “The security of the world
requires disarming Saddam Hussein now.” Were sanctions
insufficient? The dangerous regimes of Iran and North Korea were
arguably further along in developing weapons of mass destruction.
What made Iraq different so as to require immediate disarmament?
Bush stated, “…the greatest power of freedom is to overcome hatred
and violence, and turn the creative gifts of men and women to the
pursuits of peace.” Has this happened? If not, why has this not
happened?
Bush: President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48
Hours
Historical Significance:
Bush launched the long-anticipated invasion of Iraq on March 19, 2003. Saddam
Hussein’s vaunted military machine collapsed almost immediately. In less than
a month, Baghdad had fallen. Some nine months later, Hussein was captured.
Contrary to rosy predictions that the democracy would blossom in Iraq after the
removal of Hussein, Iraq became a seething cauldron of apparently endless
violence. Iraqi factions jockeyed murderously for political position in the postSaddam era. Iraqi insurgents, aided by militants drawn from other Islamic
nations, repeatedly attacked American troops, killing more soldiers during the
occupation than during the invasion itself. Meanwhile, the invasion and
subsequent unrest claimed the lives of as many as 17,000 Iraqi civilians. By
many accounts, Iraq today is near the brink of civil war. Arguably, U.S. military
in Iraq is now in the difficult position of being both a catalyst for the insurgency
and the only force keeping the country from outright civil war.
The United States’ image in many quarters around the world has been further
tarnished by the preemptive strike against Iraq. Revelations in April 2004 about
American abuse of Iraqi prisoners in Baghdad’s notorious Abu Ghraib prison
have further inflamed anti-American sentiment in Iraq and beyond.
Nevertheless, most Iraqis are not actively fighting the U.S., and instead desire
peace and security. The number of newspapers in Iraq has increased, and so
too has the number of Iraqi policemen and government soldiers. Meanwhile,
many Iraqi politicians are struggling to resolve deep-seated enmities and create
a viable democratic government.
Source: The American Pageant, 13th edition, pp. 1005-1006.
Documented civilian deaths from violence
77,847 – 84,812
Deaths in each week from 2003–2007
Deaths per day from gunfire / executions
Deaths per day from vehicle bombs
Refugees from Iraq have increased in
number since the US-led invasion into Iraq
in March 2003. An estimated 1.6-2.0
million people have fled the country. The
United Nations High Commissioner for
Refugees estimated in a report released in
November 2006 that more than 1.6 million
Iraqis had left Iraq since March 2003,
nearly 7 percent of the total population.
The BBC on 22 January 2007 placed the
refugee figure at 2 million.
http://costofwar.com/index-world-hunger.html
Many Iraqis are leaving their country.
Bush: President Says Saddam Hussein Must Leave Iraq Within 48
Hours
Historical Significance:
In Iran, a backlash response to the
United States’ invasion of Iraq has
resulted in the defeat of a more liberalleaning government and the rise to
power of a radical conservative
government that has aggressively
decided to develop nuclear weapons.
Mohammad Khatami
President of Iran from 1997-2005
BACKLASH IN IRAN: On 24 June 2005 Mahmoud Ahmadi Nejad
[mah-MOOD ah-mah-dih-nee-ZHAHD ] was elected as Iran's
president. Ahmadinejad swept to the presidential post with a
stunning 17,046,441 votes out of a total of 27,536,069 votes
cast in the runoff election. His rival and Expediency Council
Chairman Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani gained only 9,841,346.
Mahmoud
Ahmadi
Nejad
Ali Akbar Hashemi Rafsanjani
Iran's nuclear chief said that Iran has enriched
uranium up to 4.8 percent — the upper end of
the range needed to make fuel for reactors —
as it continues to defy U.S. and European
demands to stop enrichment.