CHAPTER OUTLINE
I. Foreign Policy, 1953-1960
A. Eisenhower takes command
1. Eisenhower fulfilled campaign pledge to go to Korea
2. Peace talks stalled over repatriation of prisoners of war
3. Peace treaty in 1953 provided for international commission to deal with question
4. Ike eventually wrested control of anticommunist issue from Joseph McCarthy
5. Administration pursued low-key approach to national securitya. Extended Truman’s programs of domestic surveillance, wiretapping, and covert action overseas
b. Also backed secret program to develop new aerial surveillance capabilities6. Eisenhower stayed in background and managed from behind the scenes
7. Described as running a “hidden hand” presidencyB. The New Look and summitry
1. Ike quietly worked to reorient U.S. anticommunist foreign policy
2. Soviets under Nikita Khrushchev were pursuing “peaceful coexistence”
3. Administration backed the “New Look” in Dec 1953a. Deemphasized conventional and costly ground troops
b. Relied instead on airpower, advanced nuclear capabilities, and covert action4. Administration also advanced idea of “massive retaliation”
a. Gambled that the threat of US nuclear weaponry would check Soviet expansion
b. Given weight by expansion of NATO to include West Germany5. Security pacts negotiated to buttress US security position
a. Southeast Asia Treaty Organization (SEATO) in 1954
b. Central Treaty Organization (CENTO) in 19596. Psychological warfare gained prominence during Eisenhower administration
a. Voice of America expanded its activities
b. Radio Free Europe, Radio Liberty, and Radio Asia
c. United States Information Agency created in 19537. Series of summit meetings held with Soviet Union
a. Agreement on Austria reached in 1955
b. Geneva Conference in same year resulted in agreement on cultural exchanges
c. Soviet premier visited the United States in the fall of 1959
d. Paris conference in 1960 collapsed after Soviets shot down a U-2 spy plane8. Ike’s Open Skies proposal for reconnaissance flights to verify disarmament efforts collapsed due to Soviet refusals
9. Events in Eastern Europe demonstrated dangers of confronting Sovietsa. Poland forced Wladyslaw Gomulka on Soviets in June 1956
b. Hungarians sought to place Imre Nagy in power later than yeari. Led to armed rebellion throughout the country
ii. Sought US help, but none was forthcoming
iii. Soviets crushed rebellion, killing thousands of dissidentsC. Covert action and economic leverage
1. US battle against communism shifted from Europe to Third World
2. Covert action and economic leverage replaced overt military confrontation as primary tools of US containment policy
3. CIA intervened repeatedly around world to further US anticommunist goalsa. Ensured election in Philippines of Ramón Magsaysay in 1953
b. Engineered overthrow of Mohammed Mossadegh in Iran in 1953
c. Overthrew Jacobo Arbenz Guzmán in Guatemala in 19544. Administration also employed economic strategies--trade and aid--to fight communism
a. Open opportunities for American business abroad
b. Discourage establishment of state-directed economic systems
c. Encourage trade expansion5. Economic aid to friendly nations, as well as military aid, rose sharply
II. America and the Third World
A. Latin America
1. US talked of freedom but backed dictatorial regimes that welcomed US investment and rejected leftist movements
2. Policies resulted in widespread Yankeephobia throughout the region
3. Events in Cuba demonstrated problems with US policya. Dictatorship of pro-U.S. Fulgencio Batista overthrown by Fidel Castro in 1959
b. After Castro tried to curtail US influence in Cuba, Ike imposed an economic boycott
c. Only forced Castro to turn to Soviet Union for assistance
d. CIA planning ways to overthrow Castro when Ike left office4. Review of US Latin American policy as Ike was leaving office recommended changes
a. Greater emphasis on encouraging democratic political processes
b. More attention to protection of human rights
c. Real efforts to encourage economic growthB. Nasserism and the Suez crisis of 1956
1. Corrupt monarchy of King Farouk in Egypt overthrown in 1954
2. New government under Gamal Abdel Nasser sought to remove foreign influence
3. Sought aid from both the United States and the Soviet Union
4. Alienated US and lost funding for a huge dam on the Aswan River
5. Nationalized British-controlled Suez Canal in July 1956
6. British-French-Israeli operation to retake canal in Oct
7. US refused to back Europeans against Egypt
8. Egypt allowed to retain control of canal
9. Episode cost US prestige and power in Middle East as a result
10. Built support for Nasserism throughout region
11. Eisenhower Doctrine declared in spring of 1957
12. US determined to support Middle East against overt aggression from the forces of international communism
13. Led to US intervention in Lebanon and backing for British intervention in Jordan
14. Furthered US policy of supporting friendly, conservative governments in Middle East but intensified Arab nationalism and fostered anti-Americanism
15. Botched plan to remove Achmed Sukarno from power in Indonesia in 1958 only intensified his power and led to widespread repressionC. Vietnam
1. Part of the Eisenhower administration’s strategy of thwarting communism and neutralism in the Third World
2. Ho Chin Minh sought independence from France
3. Requested US backing but was rebuffed by Truman administration
4. French fought to regain control until defeat at Dien Bien Phu in 1954
5. Geneva Accords in 1954 temporarily divided country at 17th parallel
6. Administration articulated domino theory to justify US backing of noncommunists
7. Created government in South under Ngo Dinh Diem.
8. Diem government unpopular and sparked formation of National Liberation Front in 1960.
9. Administration committed more and more aid and national prestige to South Vietnam and tied US honor to Diem’s political position
III. Affluence--A “People of Plenty”
A. Economic growth
1. 1950s were midpoint of period of generally steady economic growth that began during World War II and lasted until the early 1970s
2. National security policies helped to maintain growth by keeping raw materials and energy flowing from the Third World
3. Chemicals and electronics became especially important industries for US economy
4. New suburbs exemplified the consumer abundance that many Americans thought characterized their age
5. Life in America increasingly revolved around the automobile
6. Two-car family and new suburban shopping mall became tangible symbols of economic growth
7. Availability of consumer goods suggested that Americans truly were people of plenty and that they lived in an affluent society
8. Eisenhower remained fiscally conservative and refused to increase spending, which he feared would fuel an inflationary spiral of rising prices and lead to economic destabilization
9. Federal government ran a balanced budget during the late 1950sB. Highways and waterways
1. Highway Act of 1956 funded construction of a national system of limited-access expressways
a. Largest public works project in the history of the world
b. Helped the oil, concrete, and tire industries and helped interstate trucking business
c. Funded by national tax on gasoline and other highway related products
d. Confirmed victory of automotive travel over other modes2. Administration also funded water diversion projects in the far west
a. Funding for dams, irrigation canals, and reservoirs
b. No society in history had ever devoted a similar portion of its national treasury to water projects
c. Provided basis for economic growth of Texas, California, and Arizona
d. Projects came at high environmental cost3. Labor-management accord
a. Auto industry pioneered good labor-management relations
b. Labor dropped previous demand for greater union involvement in “management prerogatives”
c. Labor disavowed wildcat tactics that had been employed during 1930s and 1940s
d. AFL and CIO merged, further signaling a decline in labor militancy
e. Generous contracts for workers bought peace and stability for corporations4. Real wages steadily rose and jobs were plentiful during 1950s and early 1960s
C. Political pluralism
1. Sociological idea that claims that no single group in society can dominate the political process
2. Policymaking was function of wide participation in public debate by broad range of interest groups
3. Affluence worked to moderate political passions and foster procedures by which different interests eventually could frame a consensus
4. Harmony depended on continued economic growthD. A religious people
1. Celebration of pluralism dovertailed with an exaltation of religion’s role in American life
2. Congress emphasized religious values as part of the crusade against “atheistic communism”a. Added “under God” to Pledge of Allegiance
b. Declared “In God We Trust” as official national motto3. People were urged to practice whatever religion suited them
4. Religious leaders stressed the similarities between faiths rather than the differences
5. Some religious leaders even became pop culture celebrities
6. Surge of religious faith during the 1950s remained closely identified with the culture of affluence
IV. Discontents of affluence
A. Conformity in an affluent age
1. Critics condemned the corporate world for stressing conformity and destroying individuality
2. Peer groups increasingly determined individuals’ sense of identity and self-worth
3. Resulted in a population that emphasized adjustment to the expectations of others rather than the individual autonomy displayed by people who thought for themselves
4. Critique of conformity reached its broadest audience in the best-selling books of journalist Vance Packard
5. Betty Friedan wrote of the push toward conformity among womenB. Restive youth
1. Concerns about young people, especially about their taste in culture, intensified during the 1950s.
2. Comic books and rock ’n’ roll music both assailedC. The mass culture debate
1. Criticism of conformity and of youth culture part of broader phenomenon becoming known as the mass culture debate
2. Fear that advertisers and other influences could use the cultural marketplace to reach millions of people with standardized imagery and messages
3. Critics feared that “bad” culture was driving anything “good” from the marketplace and preventing people from distinguishing between them
4. Television was easy target for cultural criticsa. Critics denounced its mass-produced programming
b. Also noted its pervasive effect in transforming the fabric of everyday life
V. Changing Gender Patterns
A. The new suburbs and gender ideals
1. Time that women spent on domestic duties not reduced as result of new devices but merely reallocated to new activities that involved the household gadgets that accompanied affluence
2. Daily life in suburbs structured by broad pattern of “separate spheres”a. Public sphere of work and politics dominated by men
b. Private sphere of housework and child care reserved for women3. Suburban women turned to outside authorities for childrearing advice
4. Ideal mother did not work outside the home and devoted herself to rearing her children
5. Women who sought careers outside the home and marriage risked being labeled as lost, maladjusted, guilt-ridden, man-hating, or all of the above
6. Simultaneous call for “family togetherness” with fathers taking an active role in parentingB. Women’s changing roles
1. Economic realities were propelling more and more women into the job market during the 1950s
2. And more and more of those working women were married
3. Employment opportunities for women remained largely limited to well-defined, gender-segregated areasa. Nurses, telephone operators, secretaries, and elementary school teachers
b. Historically, pay scales in these fields lagged behind those paid to men in comparable fields4. Increasing numbers of women, many of them women of color, were struggling to support a family on their own paychecks
VI. The Fight against Discrimination
A. The Brown Case, 1954-55
1. Series of Supreme Court cases on the constitutionality of segregated schools
a. Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka found that state-mandated segregated schools violated the constitutional right of African American students to equal protection of the law
b. Bolling v. Sharpe outlawed segregation in the District of Columbia’s school system2. Cases applied only to educational facilities, but implied that all segregated public facilities were open to constitutional challenge
3. Brown II decreed that school desegregation would not go into effect immediately but only needed to move forward “with all deliberate speed”
4. Campaign against segregation focused on the South, but migration of African Americans meant that all regions of the country had growing black populations
5. Southern segregationists pledged “massive resistance” to the Brown decisions
6. Southern Manifesto signed by 100 members of Congress denouncing Court’s anti-segregationist rulings as a “clear abuse of judicial power”
7. Vigilante violence began in effort to prevent desegregation
8. Murder of Emmett Till in 1955 demonstrated depths of segregationist oppositionB. The Montgomery Bus Boycott and Martin Luther King, Jr.
1. Began when Rosa Parks, an active member of the local NAACP chapter, defied a local segregation ordinance
2. Local blacks mobilized and instituted a total boycott of the bus system
3. Financial losses to the company finally forced desegregation
4. Boycott vaulted Martin Luther King, Jr., to prominence
5. Went on to found Southern Christian Leadership Conference
6. Embarked on campaign of civil disobedience to show people the moral evil of racial discriminationC. The domestic and international politics of civil rights
1. Supreme Court was sympathetic to civil rights cause but lacked the power to mandate broad sweeping institutional change
2. Congress, which did have the power to enact legislation, was badly divided on racial issues
3. Civil Rights Act of 1957 was first civil rights measure in more than 80 yearsa. Created new mechanisms to address African Americans’ claims regarding voting rights violations
b. Created permanent Commission on Civil Rights4. Civil Rights Act of 1960 added additional support for blacks who were being barred from voting in the South
5. Ike generally saw civil rights as a local matter and doubted that the power of Washington could do much to change the attitudes of people opposed to integration
6. Administration was forced to intervene, though, in Little Rock, Arkansas, in 1957a. Local authorities refused to protect black students seeking to integrate schools
b. Prompted federalization of Arkansas National Guard and use of US Army troops
c. Federal government backed integration in defiance of local opposition7. Little Rock crisis underscored international dimension of civil rights struggle
a. Violence made America look bad to rest of the world
b. Administration intervened to buttress image of the United States as a powerful nation committed to liberty and equalityD. American Indian policy
1. Administration struggled with policy toward American Indians
2. Sought two policies simultaneouslya. Termination called for Washington to end the status of Indians as wards of the US government and grant them real and complete citizenship
b. Relocation encouraged Indians to leave rural reservations and seek jobs in urban areas3. Both assumed that Indians could easily be assimilated into urban life
4. Both failed miserably
5. Prompted Indian opposition and forced some reformsE. The growth of Spanish-speaking populations
1. Discrimination also experienced by millions of Spanish-speaking people
2. Puerto Rican-Hispanic Leadership Forum organized in 1957
3. Operation Wetback targeted alleged illegal immigrants from Mexico
4. Organizations like the League of United Latin American Citizens and the Unity League combated segregation in Southern California and throughout the SouthwestF. Urban-suburban issues
1. Growth of suburbs created new urban issues, many of them related to race
2. Red-lining denied mortgages and business loans in inner-city areas populated largely by minorities
3. Federal Housing Authority routinely channeled most lending toward the suburbs
4. Urban renewal programs failed completely
5. Federally financed public housing inadequate and substandard and became housing of last resort for those with chronically low incomes and meager prospects for economic advancement
VII. Debating the Role of Government
A. The new conservatives
1. Mounting opposition to Eisenhower from self-styled real conservatives
2. Condemned Ike’s unwillingness to take stronger measures against the Soviet Union
3. Decried domestic programs, especially in civil rights, as threats to individual liberty
4. Sought a long-term strategy for building a right-of-center political and cultural movement
5. Established Young Americans for Freedom in 1960, several years before similar youth organizations emerged on the political leftB. Advocates of a more active government
1. At the same time, some critics wanted the government to become more active
2. Critics were vocal of lack of action on civil rights and the economy
3. Gaither Report of 1957 painted unfavorable picture of the nation’s security and advocated stepped up militarization of the economy
4. New Look also assailed as having undermined national security by relying too heavily on nuclear retaliation and by downplaying nonnuclear options
5. Ike resisted called for real militarization of the nation
6. Also criticism of US educational systema. Too much emphasis on “life adjustment” skills
b. Insufficient attention to traditional academic subjects7. Case for federal aid to higher education also made
8. Sputnik launch in Oct 1957 led to calls for federal aid for all educational levels
9. National Defense Education Act (1958) funneled money into college-level programs in science, engineering, foreign languages, and the social sciences
10. Milestone in reconceptualization of government’s role in society
11. Also push for funding for social welfare programs, especially in area of poverty reduction
VIII. The Kennedy Years: Foreign Policy
A. The election of 1960
1. John F. Kennedy campaigned vigorously to win Democratic nomination
2. Republicans nominated Vice President Richard M. Nixon
3. First of several televised debates turned tide in favor of Kennedy
4. Kennedy’s campaign focused on his vision of a “New Frontier”a. Call for civil rights legislation
b. Endorsement of social programs, including federal spending to rebuild rural communities, increase educational opportunities, and improve urban conditions
c. Also sought to promote greater economic growth and to pursue a more aggressive foreign
policy5. Kennedy won election, but by narrow margin
a. Results in Illinois could have been fraudulent
b. Anti-Catholic sentiment in South cost Kennedy votes
c. JFK’s running mate Lyndon Johnson helped Democrats carry some important southern states, including Texas6. Shaping appearance and management of media part of administration from very beginning
B. Kennedy’s foreign policy goals
1. Strong administration support for military assistance programs, propaganda agencies, and covert action plans
2. Created Peace Corps to send young people to further development plans in Third World countries
3. Developed Alliance for Progress in Latin Americaa. Sought to check spread of communism by funding economic development
b. Seriously underestimated the obstacles to rapid social and economic change
c. Rapidly emerged as a failureC. Cuba and Berlin
1. Worst fiasco of Kennedy presidency was a daring but ill-conceived mission against Cuba
a. Had origins in Eisenhower administration
b. CIA plan to oust Castro built on earlier successes in Iran and Guatemala2. U.S.-backed and -trained forces landed at Bay of Pigs in Apr 1961
3. Cubans did not rise up to greet invaders
4. Kennedy refused to provide promised air cover, and invaders were quickly captured
5. CIA’s role became public and US was embarrassed
6. Prompted new anti-Castro plans within administration (Operation Mongoose)
7. Another dramatic confrontation came in Berlina. Soviets wanted to end division of city and incorporate it into East Germany
b. Kennedy refused8. Wall dividing two sectors of city constructed during Aug 1961
9. East Germans attempting to escape to the West were shot down
10. Crisis in Cuba in Oct 1962 over construction of Soviet missile bases there
11. Kennedy rejected military strike in favor of quarantine of Cuba to prevent actual arrival of missiles
12. Soviets decided to dismantle missile sites in exchange for withdrawal of US missiles from Turkey
13. Recently released documents reveal that missiles were already in Cuba, unknown to American officials
14. Missile crisis underscored risk of being drawn into a nuclear confrontation and made both
superpowers more cautiousD. Southeast Asia and flexible response
1. JFK continued Ike’s policy of creating a viable, noncommunist state in South Vietnam
2. Diem regime unpopular
3. Vietnam was test case for flexible responsea. Utilized variety of methods to combat communist movements around the globe
b. Counterinsurgency tactics to confront pro-communist guerrillas
c. Social scientists to advise on social and economic change4. When reform not forthcoming, US authorized coup against Diem in Nov 1963
5. Diem killed, just weeks before JFK’s assassination
IX. The Kennedy Years: Domestic Policy
A. Policymaking under Kennedy
1. Proposal to lower taxes for all Americans with special deductions for corporations seemed headed for passage in the fall of 1963
2. Administration pursued efforts to increase the minimum wage and fund urban renewal programs
3. Also backed the Area Redevelopment Bill of 1961, which called for federal aid to areas bypassed by the economic growth of the postwar yearsB. The civil rights movement
1. JFK talked about moving in area of civil rights, but tried to placate segregationists in his own party by not pressing for congressional action early in his presidency
2. Events, though, forced the administration to devise legislative strategies
3. Sit in movement energized civil rights struggle
4. Freedom rides in 1961 resulted in dispatch of federal marshals to protect the riders
5. National Guard troops and federal marshals used to enforce desegregation orders in several educational institutions in the Deep South in 1962 and 1963
6. Long-awaited executive order prohibiting racial discrimination in federally financed housing in Nov 1962
7. Feb 1963 proposal to speed up trial prosecutions involving challenges to racial discrimination in voting practices
8. Civil rights demonstrations in Birmingham, Alabama, in 1963 provoked violent local reaction
9. Television carried footage of violence around the nation--and the world
10. Prompted Kennedy to introduce broader civil rights legislationa. Ban on discrimination in all public facilities and housing
b. New measures to protect voting rights of African Americans in the South11. In June, massive civil rights march held in Washington
12. Issue more sweeping reforms than called for in Kennedy legislative proposala. Higher minimum wage
b. Federal program to guarantee new jobsC. Women’s issues
1. Women increasingly speaking out on contemporary issues
2. Kennedy’s rhetoric convinced many young women that there was more to life than marriage and child rearing
3. Women became active in civil rights movement, labor unions, and general feminist movement
4. Kennedy created Presidential Commission on the Status of Womena. Chaired by Eleanor Roosevelt
b. Documented discrimination against women in employment opportunities and wages
c. Prompted executive order to eliminate gender discrimination within federal civil service system5. Administration supported Equal Pay Act of 1963, which made it a crime to pay lower wages to women who were doing the same work as men
D. The assassination of John F. Kennedy
1. JFK killed during trip to Dallas, Texas, on 22 Nov 1963
2. Lee Harvey Oswald promptly arrested and charged
3. Oswald subsequently killed on national television while in police custody
4. Warren Commission report on assassination blamed Oswald as lone gunman
5. Report has come under increasing scrutiny and many doubt its honesty
6. Competing theories about assassination continue to circulate
7. Recent revelations about JFK’s personal life and health only help to spur public interest in him and do not shed much light on his administration or on what he might have done had he not been assassinated
