U.S. History
Final Exam Review
1920’s to Present
1920’s
1. Population patterns:
A. Great Migration – African Americans move from
South to Northern Industrial centers (cities)
B. More people live in cities and surrounding areas
than rural countryside
C. Suburbanization (#1): middle class America
1) Automobile (#5)
a. Ford’s assembly line production
b. growth in petroleum / oil industry
c. development of service stations / strip malls
d. residential neighborhoods
1920’s
2. Social & Cultural Trends:
A. Immigration: increase due to
growing American Industries
1) National Origins Act of 1924 (#6)– Nativists (#2)
a. Southern / Easter Europeans (Catholic) & Japanese
B. Harlem Renaissance (#4): African American
inner-city cultural movement
1) Langston Hughes – Jazz poetry
2) Louis Armstrong – Jazz music (#8) African American
musical traditions
3) Marcus Garvey (#11) – U.N.I.A. / migration to Africa
C. Scopes Trial (#3): evolutionary Science
1920’s
3. Politics: Republican Presidents
A. President Warren Harding (1921-1923)
1) Republican Party – put their faith in big
business (#10)
2) Teapot Dome Scandal (#9) - gov’t officials
illegally leased land to oil companies for
illegal “kickbacks”
B. President Coolidge (1923-1928)
1920’s
4. Economy:
A. Booming economy (#7)
1) Aggressive advertising
2) Consumerism
3) steady increase in industrial profits
B. Characteristics of Consumerism (#13)
1) living on credit (beyond their means)
2) spending less due to limited income
3) more then 50% of population were working
poor ($1,500 a year)
Great Depression
A. Causes:
1) unequal distribution of wealth and income
2) oligopolies “administered prices”
3) weakness of key industries: agriculture, mining,
textiles
4) lack of government
regulation
Great Depression
B. Black Tuesday: Stock crash of 1929 (#12)
due to over speculation / buying on margin
1) start of the Great Depression
C. Bank Failures (#14)
1) panicked rush on banks – withdrawal $
2) banks lacked revenue – lost $ in market crash
3) no federal insurance to protect accounts
Great Depression
1. President Herbert Hoover (#16) (1929-1932)
A. limited response:
1) volunteerism: private action not federal
2) self-reliance & charity for relief – not gov’t
bailout
3) Gov’t should direct relief measures – but avoid
increasing size of government
a. RFC: Reconstruction Finance Corporation
B. Result – deepening of recession / Hoovervilles /
Bonus Army
Great Depression
2. Social consequences:
A. Minority groups (#15) African & Hispanic
Americans
1) higher unemployment
2) racial violence
3) deportation
4) denied government relief programs
B. Women – reduced employment / abandonment
C. Marriage – rapid decline / reduced divorce rate
Great Depression
3. President FDR (1933-1945)
A. First Hundred Days:
1) New Deal program – FDIC, Emerg. Banking Act,
SEC, FERA: CWA, PWA, CCC, AAA, NRA
2) Budget deficit spending = increased federal
bureaucracy
B. 2nd New Deal: 1935
1) Wagner Act = Union’s collective bargaining
2) Emergency Relief Appropriations Act: WPA, NYA
Path to War
1. Majority of American’s supported isolationism:
A. Neutrality Act of 1939 (#17) – allowed arms sales to
belligerent nations on a “cash & carry” basis.
1) favored British & French who controlled the
Atlantic Ocean
B. Lend-Lease Program of 1941(#18) – allowed Great
Britain to borrow military equipment from the United
States
C. Atlantic Charter of 1941(#19)– provided a political
framework for the possibility of American
involvement in the war
WWII
1. Pearl Harbor – Dec. 7, 1941
A. Two Theatre War:
1) Pacific – “Island Hopping Campaign”
2) European – N. Africa / Italy / D-Day: France
B. Unconditional Surrender / Europe 1st
C. Turning tide of the war:
1) Europe – Battle of Britain, El Alamien, Sicily
Stalingrad, D-Day
2) Pacific – Coral Sea, Mid Way, Leyte Gulf
WWII
2. Home front
A. War Production:
1) U.S. production = 40% of world materials
2) Ended the Great Depression
3) full employment = equalization of population
B. Mobilization of workforce
1) Bracero Program(#20)– recruitment of Mexican
workers for 6 to 12 month contracts
2) Women workers(#22)
a. “Rosie the Riveter” – poster propaganda
b. vital role in shipyards and aircraft industries
c. High employment
WWII
C. Executive Order 9066(#24) – interment of Japanese
Americans
3. Manhattan Project(#23)
1) developed the atomic bomb
4. Using the Bomb
1) President Truman’s decision to use the bomb(#21)
a. projected casualties in a U.S. invasion of Japan
Post WWII
1. G.I. Bill (#51): guaranteed loans for veterans
to buy a house, and tuition for college
A. Levittown (#52): provided affordable housing in
American suburbs
2. Baby Boom (1945-1950) – period of
significant increase in babies being born
3. Fair Deal (#53): Truman’s economic package
A. extension of FDR’s New Deal
Post WWII
4. Social & Economic Trends of the 1950’s and 60’s
A. President Dwight D. Eisenhower (1952-1960)
1) IKE – popularity as WWII General
a. positive image with both liberals and
conservatives
B. Consumerism: growth of domestic economy due to
consumers buying commodities on credit
1) Counterculture(#56) – 1960’s youth expressed
their alienation from American society (drugs)
Cold War
1. Yalta Conference, 1945(#25)
A. “Big Three” – U.S., G.B., Soviet Union
1) met to discuss post war Europe, Germany,
Soviet occupied Eastern Europe
2. Truman Doctrine(#26)
A. U.S. military and economic support of countries
threatened by Communism
1) Greece & Turkey
B. Containment (#27): to block Soviet attempts to spread
communism by creating alliances & support of
weaker nations
Cold War
3. Marshall Plan(#28): U.S. plan for European
economic recovery after WWII
4. NATO(#29): North Atlantic Treaty Organization
A. Military alliance between the U.S., Canada, and
10 Western European nations
B. Warsaw Pact(#29): Soviet response to NATO
1) alliance between USSR and 8 Eastern
European nations
Cold War
5. Escalation of U.S. fear of Communism in the late
1940’s and 50’s
A. China became Communist
B. Soviets get the bomb
6. 1960’s
A. Brinkmanship (#30)– U.S. and Soviet willingness to go
to the edge of war to keep peace
B. Sputnik(#31) – USSR launched 1st satellite
C. Bay of Pigs(#32) – failed U.S. supported invasion of
Cuba in 1961
D. Cuban Missile Crisis(#32) – U.S. & USSR came the close
to full scale nuclear war
Hot War
1. Korea (1950-1952)
A. North Korean invasion of South Korea
1) UN – Gen. MacArthur
2) Chinese involvement
3) 39th Parallel
2. Vietnam
A. Domino Theory(#33) – idea that countries
bordering communist countries were in danger
of becoming communist
Vietnam War
1. Gulf of Tonkin Resolution(#34), 1965
A. Congress granted President Johnson broad
military powers in Vietnam
1) Operation Rolling Thunder (#35)- first U.S.
sustained bombing of North Vietnam
2) by end of 1965 – 180,000 U.S. troops in
Vietnam
3) Vietcong fighting for their survival
4) increasingly negative view of the war (T.V.)
5) strain on U.S. economy
Vietnam War
2. Tet Offensive (#36), 1968
A. Vietnamese New Year
1) Vietcong / N. Vietnamese attacks of U.S.
bases and South Vietnam cities
2) intended to trigger uprising in South –
resulted in defeat for the North
3) Increased American opposition to the war
a. Johnson doesn’t run for reelection in 68’
Vietnam War
3. Vietnamization(#37) – President Nixon’s plan
to withdrawal troops from Vietnam
4. Nixon: secret war in Cambodia
a. anti-war protest: 4 students killed at Kent
State (#49)
Civil Rights
1. Brown v. Board of Education
A. Supreme Court decision of 1954 – segregation in
public schools / facilities was unconstitutional
2. Little Rock Arkansas (#38), 1957
A. Little Rock Nine – 9 African American students
who were enrolled in a white school to integrate
1) federal troops used to ensure their safety
Civil Rights
3. Civil Rights Movement
A. Montgomery Bus Boycott: Martin Luther King, Jr.
1) used carpools
B. Freedom Riders (#45): integrated buses challenged
segregation of interstate bus terminals
C. Greensboro (#48): black college students hold sit-ins
at lunch counters
D. Freedom Summer (#42): registered black voters
E. March on Washington of 1963 (#46):
1) transformed civil rights into a national cause
2) biracial crowd of nearly 250,000 people
3) Martin Luther King, Jr. – I Have a Dream Speech
Civil Rights
4. Kennedy’s assassination – Nov. 23, 1963
A. Warren Commission (#55): official investigation
of the assassination that left many loose ends
5. President Johnson (1963-1968)
A. Civil Rights Act of 1964 (#43):
1) prohibited segregation in public facilities
Civil Rights
6. Watts Riots of 1965 (#47):
A. looting and burning of Los Angeles in response to
the arrest of a black man
1) built up tension due to poor condition of cities
and racism
B. Black Panthers (#39): Bobby Seal & Huey Newton
C. Black Power
1) celebrated African-American heritage
2) Stokely Carmichael & Malcolm X
3) controlling local black communities through
political activism
Civil Rights
7. Spread of Civil Rights:
A. Cesar Chavez (#40)– organized the United Farm
Workers
B. American Indian Movement (#41)
1) established to increase economic opportunity,
stop police mistreatment, insert their
distinctiveness w/in American society
2) organization refused to ally itself with other
Indian groups
Modern Women’s Movement
1. Betty Friedan: Feminine Mystique (#54) –
A. book that provided a voice for women who
felt dissatisfied with limits of their domestic lives
2. Roe v. Wade,1973 (#50) – Supreme Court
ruled that state laws could not forbid
abortions in
the first 3 months of pregnancy
1970’s
1. Summer of 1969 – Neil Armstrong
1st man to walk on the moon
2. Economic problems of the 1970s:
A. OPEC – oil embargo by Arab nations
B. Energy Crisis: increased gas prices, rising energy
costs, high inflation
C. Stagflation (#57): inflation + high unemployment
+ flat economic growth
Nixon
1. President Nixon (1969 – 1973)
A. Watergate Scandal (#58):
1) special prosecutors independent of the White
House
2) Nixon’s urge for power
3) President’s administration had broken the law
4) Separation of Powers reigned in the President
5) President’s tapes revealed cover up