Kinsey
Thomas
Serviceman’s Readjustment Act

Passed in 1944 by Congress
 Under part of the law, the federal
government paid a significant portion of
tuition and other higher education fees for
veterans.
 The percentage of college-aged Americans
who attended college almost doubled.
 Colleges developed into larger institutions
○ Updated campuses
○ Higher education for everyone, not just
middle and higher classes


Citizens have a “right” to a job.
With the influx of soldiers
returning from WWII, the
government issued the
Employment Act of 1946.
 Enacted because of what happened
after the First World War—The
Great Depression
 Aided the transition from wartime
goods to other products
 There were numerous revisions
○ Originally called the Full
Employment Bill of 1945

Created the Council of
Economic Advisors (CEA)
 Three member board
 Advises the president on
economic policy
 Established the Joint Economic
Committee
○ Composed of Congress members
of both political parties
○ Charged with reviewing the
president’s report and making
recommendations to the Senate
and House on economic policy.

Long-Term Effects:
 Annual inflation rates typically ranged from 1-5%
 Strengthened labor market
 1970’s America: large inflation
○ Resolution 133
○ 1977: Congress amended the Federal Reserve Act
○ 1978: Congress passed the Humphrey-Hawkins Act
which amended the Employment Act of 1946
The Labor-Management
Relations Act
Enacted June 23, 1947
 The law prohibited a variety
of strikes, boycotts, and
picketing.
 Union shops were restricted
and states were allowed to
pass “right-to-work” laws that
outlawed closed union shops.

O
Political cartoon released after 1947 as
backlash to the recently enacted TaftHartley Act
P
The purpose of the political cartoon was
to raise awareness about the “real” effect
of the act
V
This political cartoon shows the power of
the press over the government and how
the public could be manipulated into
believing what they read in the paper.
L
This political cartoon does not show the
actual effect the act had on the public or
any actually data on how the act helped or
hurt the unions in question.
“Now-Now little man, I’m only taking
these for your own good.”


FDR died soon after the start of his
fourth term, and his vice president,
Harry S. Truman was sworn in.
Accomplishments:
 Ended WWII by dropping the atomic
bombs on Japan
 Truman Doctrine
○ Economic aid to Turkey and Greece
 Helping the US transition into a peace-
time economy
 Blocking Stalin’s attempts to occupy
and conquer Europe
○ Berlin airlift
 Creating the state of Israel for
Holocaust survivors



Young and well-liked
Challenged FDR for the party’s
popular vote in 1944
Former governor of New York
 Cut taxes, doubled state aid to
education, increased salaries for
state employees, reduced the sate’s
debt by more than $100 million
 Laid down the first state law in the
country which prohibited racial
discrimination in employment

Previously an isolationist, at the
time of the election he had been
identified as a internationalist.
The Chicago Daily Tribune, like
the rest of the country, believed
that Dewey would be the
overwhelming winner of the
1948 Presidential Election. The
printed a few hundred copies of
their newspaper with the
headline, “Dewey Defeats
Truman” before the release of
the election results. The mistake
was comical to the new
president elect: Harry Truman.
Despite what everyone predicted, Truman won
and was reelected to presidency.
Dewey is sometimes seen as being too
aggressive
Dewey was not as conservative as the
Republican Congress
Truman linked him to the “Do Nothing” Congress
Dewey never ran for presidency again, but he
did help Eisenhower win the Republican Party’s
presidential nomination





Biography of Thomas Dewey. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.deweydefeatstruman.com/Deweybio.htm
Dewey Defeats Truman. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://history1900s.about.com/cs/trumanharry/a/deweytruman_
2.htm
Employment Act of 1946 - A detailed essay on an important
event in the history of the Federal Reserve. (n.d.). Retrieved
from
http://www.federalreservehistory.org/Events/DetailView/15
Projects: Cold War Guide: The GI Bill and the U of I (1947).
(n.d.). Retrieved from
http://archives.library.illinois.edu/slc/researchguides/coldwar/s
tudentlife/gibill.php
Taft–Hartley Act. (n.d.). Retrieved from
http://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Taft
%E2%80%93Hartley_Act.html